Do we truly know and understand the LGBT community?

I would never call you that bud, but if it applies to you it applies to me. And I don't have the excuse of being from an earlier time either.

Speaking from personal experience, for the longest time (preschool to high school) I didn't know about queers outside of what I learned about them in church and at my daddy's knee - where they didn't have any name but faggot - and I didn't care to know them. I was taught to stay away from them so I did.

So when I fell in love with another guy in college, it really, really, really messed with my head. I had absolutely no frame of reference, because I had never even been in contact with an openly gay person at that point in my life (and still wasn't since me and Nick were both closeted). I never expected to be put in that position, I always assumed I would just date a girl at school, get married and have kids like everybody else. For years I went around thinking it was MASSIVELY unfair that I wasn't straight, that I couldn't feel for a girl the same way I felt for him. I even told him lying in bed at one point (only semi-jokingly), "Why can't you be a woman?" Now that was a massively unfair thing to say.

I don't know, but it's kind of depressing sometimes to see lil kids here talking about being openly gay in their early teens and dating in high school, where at my high school they wouldn't have dared and the only two openly gay guys (femme and couldn't hide it) were open season.

I'd like to say I stepped up and played the white knight whenever I saw those two getting theirs, but that would make me out to be a better and braver person than I actually am.

I didn't really participate, but I didn't stop it either.

 

I agree. We have all been brought up to thing of lgbt as minority groups, with parents hoping we would be straight and 'normal', even if they want that for our own sakes.

The most liberal of teachers feel awkward discussing such matters. I think the change can only really happen when we stop referring to a gay 'community', it makes us sound separated. We are a big part of most communities

 

The thing with stereotypes though is that you can't break the stereotypes you hold unless you want to break them, and even then it's not easy. So if we're talking about hardcore bigoted people who will hate us for being stereotypical, it doesn't matter how nonstereotypical we are, they'll still hate us for it.

At the very least, a super gay pride parade that's raging with stereotypical gays will get the attention of a lot of people since most people associate that flamboyant behaviour with "gay people".

 

The tricky part about being LGBT is that our "culture" and history isn't passed along by family members or friends. For an LGBT person to get that knowledge about the culture and the history they must consciously strive to obtain the information themselves and finding people they can rely on, which is hard if you don't want to be LGBT in the first place. That is where the internet has been an amazing tool for LGBT people.

With every single minority, there will always be two main sides to the mainstream. One side will always want to assimilate and the other side has a more pluralistic view. Of course there are people in between since nothing is black and white, and some people have completely different views, but those are the two "mainstream" views.

You can never run from having a stereotype. Every group will always have a stereotype and someone will always hate something about that stereotype. Can you think of one single group that doesn't have a negative stereotype? Or maybe one single group that isn't hated by another group?

The problem with homophobia isn't the stereotype. Gay people have been hated for centuries, yet the pride parades have only been around for less than 50 years. What gives?

As for how to educate people? That's a hard question to answer for many reasons.

The first one is who and how are we going to choose our educators? Who would be in charge of educating the new gay generation? What will we teach them? Will you teach them to assimilate or will you teach them a more pluralistic view?

Its definitely a hard question to answer, but for now everyone is both responsible for their own education about the topic and to try and help with what they can.

 

I am Jewish and Gay - a nazi nightmare.

By now I am used to stereotypes about being a Jew and have definitely experienced the many ways that it affects my relationship with non-jews. Actually the more overt incidents are easier to deal with than the more covert ones, I'm thinking of a particular boss of mine for example.

It's true, we can't avoid stereotypes even if we are the most unassuming "normal" person out there, it doesn't matter, the label gets stuck on with industrial-grade glue.

So how to deal with it? I always thought that seizing a pejorative and transforming it (i.e the word "Queer") was an excellent strategy. Other than that, the more we are open, the more mainstream it becomes, gay pride parades don't have to be only about flamboyance if there are also a good number of less-flamboyant types there too! I think it's a matter of time, there is no quick-fix.

And yes, like what is happening in Russia with the imminent passing of legislation prohibiting "gay propaganda" there will be no end to the hatred. The trick is to know deeply who you are, what community you belong to (yes, there is a community and there always will be, and God knows we need each other!) and we need to get very clear in our own heads why it is important to let others know who we are and that we will not disappear.

 

Nope, but flamboyant people didn't choose to represent a whole group of people. They were just being themselves, doing what they know how to do and being awesome, and the media chose to use certain people to represent a whole community. That's what sells and its a way simpler way to tackle the whole gay thing for many people.

The same applies to every group, but the LGBT group get hit with it harder since you can only be LGBT if you identify yourself as LGBT. That means that if you are a "discrete" LGBT person, then you are going to be read as straight and not as "oh, that's a discrete LGBT person". The only way you can do that is by self-identifying as LGBT first, which many already feel its "flaunting it" and then being yourself.

This is the main reason why most people only know about gay parades, because its easy to say "oh, there is the gay people", but even then if you go to most parades you will see people that really aren't being all that flamboyant themselves.

Why do you want to change the stereotype so much?

 

Ah, I get that

Food for thought just because I find this topic interesting.

People don't go into the closet because they don't fit a certain stereotype, they go into the closet because they fear the hate that comes with the stereotype. Which means it would be better to focus on taking the hate from the stereotype, and not the stereotype itself.

For example, if you take the "flamboyant" stereotype away, but the same hate towards gay people remain, then it will just get replaced by another excuse that people will use to discriminate. If its not a mental disorder, then its because they are pedophiles. If its not because they are pedophiles, then its because they were abused when they were children. If it isn't abuse, then its the media. If it isn't the media, then its their morals and lack of religion. And the excuses just pile on.

But, once you get the hate out of people, then any negative stereotype that people may have won't really matter. If a gay kid in the closet knows that even flamboyant gay people don't get discriminated against, then they will have an even easier time coming out.

 

Maybe more kids will come out when they don't have to worry about their heads getting kicked in when they do. :dry:

Vicious cycle and all that.

 

Hate and fear are not logical emotions. You don't just hate someone for logical reason and you certainly don't discriminate and kill them for logical reasons either.

If you are saying that certain stereotypes are keeping us from getting our rights and being accepted, then what was stopping us before the stereotype was form?

Being flamboyant is only a negative stereotype because it is connected with being gay, and not the other way around. Many people have been flamboyant before gay people, and that was never seen as a bad thing until it was connected with gays.

But, back on topic, this is why its so complicated to say that someone must be in charge or educating people. There are so many view points you can get out of this, that there is just no way to teach people everything and from only one point of view.

 

Are we living in the same species? :lol:

 

But wouldn't the logical thing be to stop discriminating people even when they are flamboyant? If you concentrate on taking the stereotype away then you aren't fighting fear and hate with logic, you are just avoiding the hate and fear.

And like I said before, even if you take that one stereotype away, people aren't going to stop hating on gay people because people don't hate gay people because they are flamboyant, they hate us because we are gay. As simple as that.

Either way, it seems like we would just have to agree to disagree

 

Personally, I always felt that the discrimination of "Flamboyance" of some gay men stems solely from deep-rooted Sexism. I remember doing a light reading on homosexuality in the past and I read at sometime in Italy(I think), if two men were caught or known to have sexual intercourse, The Aggressor(Top) was lightly punished while The Receptor(Bottom) was burned or tortured to death. After reading that, it seemed very obvious that the only reason someone would clearly overeact in giving a punishment to that degree would be insecurity. By that I mean those pricks felt that if a man, blessed with a penis(Their perspective, not mine), was to lay down and allow himself to be penetrated like a woman, he has completely disrespected himself, his family and all fore-fathers that bore his name. My point is also proven when you think back to times when people would ask "So whose the guy and whose the girl?" which basically has evolved into "Whose the pitcher and whose the catcher?" Once said question is answered or if the fact is presumed to be already known, respect is usually given to The Aggressor aka The Alpha. Most of that stems from the backwards idea that Men have "divine" dominion over Women. to sum it up, it's Heteronormativity's way of forcing it's oppressive attitude and beliefs upon anything that isn't it's shadow. Like being open yet close-minded at the same time if you will. Sidenote: I always felt that saying "My relationship is just like your's" shouldn't have been done since im sure we all know that equality doesn't stem from similarity. Equality is only true when Person A can look at Person B and say "You are not like me at all and i'm ok with that."


I think you(Stuck) and TheEdend both are making valuable points. The silent majority does need to speak up for themselves and let it be known that Gay is just as varied as Straight is especially for the sakes of the kids who don't fit the stereotypes and end up neglecting and denouncing the LGBTQ community because of it. And I think Ed's point was that if the silent majority do make themselves heard, lets not make it at the expense of the guys who happen to fit or is very close to the stereotype(s). (&&&)