Greetings folks, Been thinking about what it means to come out, and then about how being in a same-sex relationship is also surrounded by coming out issues. In a certain sense, I think it is easier for those to whom you are coming out to accept you then and there. After all, you've done nothing more than say some words that seem to indicate your orientation, usually in a vulnerable way that (usually) elicits a sympathetic and genuinely caring response...so far, so good. But it seems to me that there is a second phase to coming out: that's when the full-fleshed, three-dimensional carbon-based sentient being who happens to be your new "significant other" walks through the door... Coming out then becomes something else entirely! You have to start making decisions with your new partner about how demonstratively affectionate you will be with each other in public or at family gatherings. You will need to set boundaries on what you will be willing to accept about discretion when it comes to demonstrating your love for each other in various settings - all of these need a coming-out decision. For us older people with kids, I intend to make it very clear to them and to my ex that I will not hide the physical aspects (except for the sex, of course) of my love for my partner in front of them...God knows, after so many years of the spectacle of a bad marriage, they could use some positive examples of what a loving relationship looks like!
Great topic as usual from GW. I was not a PDofA guy when I was faking my hetero life, I guess having never considered your question, I sort of assumed that I just don't do PDA, I can see that this is a definite negotiate in advance topic. Almost the same as birthdays , I never cared about mine, no fan fare or acknowledgement is fine, so it was surprising to me when others were so crushed that I "forgot" theirs. Sorta a thing you need to know about your partner. Good thoughts GW, and yet another layer in the coming out ! Thanks for the thought provocation
Good post...and it's something I've considered. To some degree, the issues of PDA are something any couple might have to deal with. Personally, I don't feel comfortable with PDA past a certain point. Prudish background? Naturally reticent? I have no idea. I also cheerfully admit that my attitudes might change if I ever get into a relationship. One thing that I will be insistent on, though: any future boyfriend (past casual dating/early days) will be a part of my social life. One reason for coming out is simply so that I can live openly. If my boyfriend is not welcome at family events, then I won't be attending. And, as Mrs. Slocombe used to say, "I am unanimous in that!"
That was really nice. And I agree with you. Coming out is not only about "hey, mom, or whoever you are, I'm gay". It's also about not being ashamed of demonstrating your love to your partner. It's really important in a relationship.
As I was walking home this evening, I spotted a couple of guys walking together (as is my wont) and I wondered if they were gay. It didn't take long to find out, they were holding hands. It is really cold outside, they held hands in full daylight and, as usual when I see that, I can't help staring; not because I feel it is odd or wrong, but because I wish it were me holding hands with my partner just walking down an ordinary street! It has been discussed elsewhere here at EC that perhaps it is time for the "institutions" of the gay world (the clubs, the Village, the bars, the saunas, etc...) should fade away so that these places of apparent self-exclusion are gone. As I watched these two young men unashamedly holding hands and walking down a street in my own neighbourhood (something I would never have seen just a few years ago), I couldn't help thinking that perhaps these discussions have a point. Although I have asked whether these places, where the LGBT could still feel comfortable and free to be themselves, were worth keeping alive anyway. I think that it is couples, like these young men, that will change the way the world treats us. The decisions that they make as a couple to demonstrate and normalize these beautiful, legitimate, necessary and loving relationships will make this a better world for everyone, not just for our brothers and sisters in the LGBT world.
This post makes me happy. Happiest I've felt in weeks. I think visibility is important. The more non-LGBT people who know, care about, and love open, confident LGBT people, the better.
Now that I'm fully out I've been dating guys in restaurants, bars, etc that I would go to with my kids, family, friends. Mostly I don't know if it's obvious the man I'm With is a date. We're probably pretty engaged in conversation, laughing, maybe some touching. Last week was at a restaurant/bar I'm at often enough. And my date and I started kissing. Not over the top making out, but clearly kissing. It was liberating, natural, ok. We were sitting in a corner so not overly conspicuous, but you know what, I didn't care. It was ok.
As long as the venue is safe, then why not? I'm sure it must have been both exhilirating and liberating for the both of you!
Not sure where I am going with this, but I wanted to add another facet of visibility. I am a gay trans man married to a cisgender bisexual man. Depending on the day, I am can be read as a masculine woman, but being a gay man is a very important part of my identity. I am not super touchy feely, but don't feel self-conscious showing affection to my husband in a public place. I just feel like being a trans person is an element of visibility that is often hard to hide. Regardless of what you do, you will be viewed a certain way, even if you aren't interacting with anyone else.
I'm looking forward to the day when this (or any non-hetero-PDA) is no big deal. It will be nice when PDA is ok for any couple and we don't have to feel scared about offending anyone. The super conservative area I live in, there is no way I'd feel safe holding hands, let alone kissing. Some of my associates say they are ok with "the gays" here, as long as it is kept behind closed doors. I gestured toward a hetero-couple who were cuddling & asked if they were offended by that. They laughed & said, "no because that's normal". They didn't even realize how offensive their reply was. :icon_sad:
Clarification about my above comment: when I talk about not being comfortable about PDA beyond a certain point, I mean this period. It's uncomfortable for me to witness some of the things you see straight couples doing. Holding hands, lovely. A fast hug? Fine. But when I see something that makes me think they are filming a sex scene in public... Yes, I probably am a prude. Probably out of touch with the times. Perhaps instead of coming out, I should contemplate moving to a small cabin 200 miles from civilization.
:roflmao: I completely agree about doing this tastefully, but the cabin idea sounds a bit drastic...unless you're living with a beautiful 6 foot tall French Canadian woodsman called André and you`re licking hot maple syrup off of each other....yeah...but I digress...
:roflmao: I completely agree about doing this tastefully, but the cabin idea sounds a bit drastic...unless you're living with a beautiful 6 foot tall French Canadian woodsman called André and you`re licking hot maple syrup off of each other....yeah...but I digress...[/QUOTE] :roflmao: This is a nice thread and it makes me hopeful for the future.
"Woody Woodpecker" (wonderful name for that ancient cartoon character) wouldn't have it better! :icon_bigg
This thread contains much food for thought; enough to fill a small grocery store. I'm just now in the process of coming out to myself. Also, as a bisexual man, I have that added layer of deciding, "Okay, now what, if anything, do I want to DO about it." Plus there's always the distinct possibility that I'm not Bisexual, that I'm just plain Gay. But I figure I'll skip across that bridge when I'm ready.:eusa_danc
I found an article today that really hit home. It is a direct response to the desire, mentioned in my quote above to have queer culture disappear in the interest of "normalizing" LGBT relationships. The title is "California Love Story" by Alexander Borinsky: n+1: California Love Story It's about how California's Prop 8 was overturned by Judge Vaughn Walker of the Northern District Court of California (gay marriage is, however, still in legal limbo pending the Supreme Court decision) by the argument that gay couples were "normal" folk who aspired to nothing more than the right to marry as straight couples do. But what was fascinating about this article is Borinsky's argument that much of gay culture, a culture without the kind of institutional memory that straight culture takes for granted, was set aside to win that argument. One of the more fascinating points he made was that he felt the need to affirm that being gay is, actually, "a lifestyle choice"...here's how he put it: "The urge [after a difficult breakup] to prove that I could stand on my own two manly legs came, in part, from the language of helplessness that pervades most messages of gay acceptance: “It’s okay that you’re gay, because you were just born that way. It’s no one’s fault.” Binging and fucking made my gayness into, yes, a “lifestyle” choice—not just a hormonal tic I couldn’t help. I was a person making choices, not a sexuality unfolding itself." Borinsky argues for the retention of that missing memory and goes on to describe a necessary richness and diversity of gay culture: "The fact is that gays haven’t always paired off into happy couples. There have long been places where it was messier than that. Even in the 1980s—an era of homosexual mortality that gay-marriage supporters pay homage to but don’t want to talk about—a surprisingly interconnected group of men were fucking and falling in love and arguing and sleeping in each others’ arms and making art and going to work in suits and cooking meals together and reading Proust, or Baldwin, and doing drugs and going to church and dying. They improvised a network of connections erotic, emotional, familial, or what have you. A web of friends, old friends, once-friends, mentors, surrogates, lovers, almost lovers, ex-lovers, lost souls, loose cannons, patrons, pickups, dropouts, healers, strippers, gods; all contributing to a social fabric—call it tulle, or cashmere—in which a clear distinction between love and friendship, eroticism and warmth, loving and fucking, couldn’t quite exist. Versions of that fabric existed long before AIDS, before Stonewall, and versions exist today." One last quote that, to my mind strikes me as important, arguing for the need to understand gay culture as distinct from the straight norms that are aspired to: "In Perry, the plaintiffs argued that gayness is a biological kink that simply substitutes one gender for another within an otherwise universal mechanism of desire. The lawyers insisted with dogged humorlessness that it is possible to separate the homosexual dancer from what has been—if only historically, as Peplau maintained—the homosexual dance. Fine. But the resulting portrait, so stripped, is not a particularly useful one. Take away everything that’s not foretold in my genes and you’ll find me a meager specimen—all hunger, sleep, and hormone. Our histories, our habits, and our choices are as “fundamental,” as “relevant to the ability to form successful marital unions,” as anything else about us. I’m made by that late night on the deserted streets of South London, and I’m made by promises exchanged with people I’ve loved. It’s no less true to say that gay individuals and communities are made by decades spent negotiating nonstandard models of love and family. In his ruling, Walker may be talking about legal status, but he’s also trying to talk about history, and about love." Turns out Judge Vaughn Walker is gay and has lived in a same-sex partnership for a decade. Opponents argued that he was not an unbiased judge in this case, but that argument was struck down by Judge James Ware; judge Walker's replacement after he retired. It's Borinsky's argument that "gay individuals and communities are made by decades spent negotiating nonstandard models of love and family" that is striking to me. Whereas before I would have drifted to the idea that gay relationships should be "normal", and to a certain extent that is a good thing, he argues that there is a necessity to understand how these "non-standard models of love and family" also deserve to be taken seriously. I welcome your comments, but please read the article first, it is very much worth understanding!
