Conference quark::mennotes-v1

87.0. "Article: Male Sexuality" by DSSDEV::FISHER () Tue Mar 31 1987 17:29

From "Cosmopolitan" April 1987:-

Homosexuality has been treated as a plague boys will catch.  Read about the
real reasons for straight men's paranoia.  By Jonathan Rutherford. 


			Tyranny and terror flown
			Left a pair of friends alone
			And beneath the nether sky
			All that stirred was he and I ...

			Midmost of the homeward track
			Once we listened and looked back
			But the city, dusk and mute,
			Slept, and there was no pursuit.

These lines were written in 1922 by A E Housman, a poet and a gay man.  Sixty
five years later another two men were outside a pub in the less romantic
setting of Lewisham in south London.  In their case "the city" was in pursuit. 

The paper "Capital Gay" reported: "These four lads came towards us and shouted,
"Queers".  Then all hell broke loose, I was punched and kicked to the ground
... Suddenly there was a shout and they all ran off.  I got up and saw Richard
lying in a pool of blood.  His left eye had been split open.  Somebody lifted
his shirt and there was blood pumping out of the side of his body."  Time might
separate these two moments, but the fear, hostility and violence remain. 

Since Victorian times, homosexuality has been categorised as a disruptive
threat to family order and social stability.  Since then it's been tarred with
the brush of child abuser and sexual pervert, viewed as a sign of the softness
and degeneracy of post-Imperial Britain, and now as the cause of AIDS. 

Pronouncement from politicians and moral majorities have all lined up to keep
the threat of homosexuality at bay.  It's been treated like a contagion that
boys will catch, a plague that threatens us all. 

Traitors, liars, cowards have invariably all been associated with
homosexuality. Foreigners, flabbiness, weakness, femininity, Communists,
unmanliness - these associations pile up to produce an hysterical terror of
anything that does not correspond to the myth of the blue-blooded, white,
Anglo-Saxon male.  As one gay man told me, "This paranoia conjures up images of
St George [patron saint of England] fighting the dragon, all these noble, clean
living men doing battle with filth and perversity.  But really their enemy is
within.  It's their own feelings they're frightened of, that's what causes the
hysteria. 

This fear of homosexuality, or homophobia, is particularly strong among
heterosexual men.  Part of an anonymous letter sent to Peter Tatchell, a
prospective Parliamentary Labour Candidate in the 1983 Bermondsey by-election,
reads: "When I lived in Bermondsey we had a saying, Bermondsey was a place when
men were men and women were 'manholes' and members of the Middlesex Regiment
would not be tolerated." 

It was a sentiment I've heard from many men.  An ex-miner from South Wales
assured me that homosexuality was not a problem in the village he came from.
But he contradicted himself by admitting that homosexuals down the pits he'd
worked had been shunned and ostracised.  A man from Dundee also mentioned that
there was no issue of homosexuality where he came from.  "They all go off and
join the theatre." 

A GLC [Greater London Council, now defunct] booklet defined homophobia as a
"fear of the same".  A common sense definition extends the meaning to "fear of
relationships with the same sex, or fear of loving the same sex".  Despite the
more liberal attitudes towards sexuality among the younger generation, being
thought gay is still a fear for young hetero men.  Mike Aiken, a Brighton group
worker and counsellor, describes a youth workshop he runs. "I ask them to
categorise words and phrases as masculine or feminine.  A few years ago people
were clear; strong, for example, was always associated with masculine.  Today
people are less sure, words tend to get put in the middle as not-sures.  But
when I ask everyone to categorise themselves according to the words and
phrases, all the men line up on the masculine side, despite intellectually
knowing they have a feminine side too." 

Talking to heterosexual men, two things start to become clear.  Most consider
that homosexuality has nothing to do with them.  And when its existence is
admitted to, it is seen as occurring somewhere else.  This defensiveness is
evident, even among more aware men.  A life-long supporter of gay rights agreed
that he would be deeply upset if his son was gay.   "I can support it, as long
as it's away from my family." 

And yet the language men use together, particularly at work, suggests that it
is rather closer to home than most would care to admit.  Robert Marks, who
works for a stockbroking firm, acknowledges the erotic content of "City talk". 

"In the City we talk about the penetration of markets.  Good stocks are called
sexy.  Firms that are possibly merging are described as getting into bed with
each other and the directors are likely bedfellows."  And it's not just in the
public school world of the city.  Similar language, jokes and banter exist in
exclusively male workplaces.  It suggests there exists sexual feelings amongst
men.  But rather than acknowledge our homoerotic side, we suppress it.  While
many heterosexual men may feel threatened by homosexuality, our suppressed side
ensures our continuing fascination with it. 

A 24-year old student described this voyeurism to me: "I was sitting on a tube
train.  Two gay men got on and sat opposite me.  I felt impelled to look at
them. Their presence disturbed and fascinated me.  But I could not look.  To
have met their glance would have been an admission of my interest." 

When I was 14 I had a turquoise T-shirt I wore all the time until an older boy
told me it was the colour that "French pouffs" wore.  I was so embarrassed I
took it off and threw it away.  During my adolescence, I constantly needed
assurance from my peers that I had something, that indefinable quality that is
"being a man".  What is clear to me now is that "being a man", both then and
now, has more to do with proving what we are not, than showing what we are.  It
means constantly denying any personal attribute, quality, interest or emotion
that might be deemed feminine. Certainly boys grow up in different cultures and
the process varies but in my middle class, English upbringing it was rigid and
inflexible. At some point I had to disown the deep affection I had had for
other boys. Male relationships became organised around doing things, minimising
intimacy between us. 

In the end, we grew up in fear of each other.  We tread a tightrope of our own
narrow definition of what being a man is.  We are distrustful of other men,
inhibited by our defensiveness.  Men's talk revolves around work, sport or
cars, anything but our own lives, problems and emotions. We constantly guard
against our own subversive feelings.  So while men meet in clubs and pubs, play
sport and share leisure activities, our gatherings are governed by strict codes
of behaviour, about what is acceptable to do and what it is inappropriate to
feel.  Male culture is about minimising those areas of life most of us find
hard to cope with: home, children, our sexual relationships and our own often
subconscious homoerotic desires. 

Picture the image of all the lads in the showers after rugby, or the maudlin,
boozed pair of jocks propping up the bar, singing sentimental songs, arms
around each other.  Such images of brotherly affection would be transformed by
a wrong touch, a hand in the wrong place that lingered, a caress or kiss.  Real
intimacy, such shows of love and concern, were tabooed in our boyhoods. 
Whenever groups of heterosexual men meet, the threat of sexual or emotional
intimacy is locked out.   Far from such feelings belonging only in the theatre
and hairdressing salons of the land, they are present in all men's
relationships.  Heterosexual masculinity is a constant battle to prove we are
one of the boys. 

Gay men present us with our own buried desires.  They blow the gaff on the
masculine myth, the idea of a seamless, unchanging, natural, ordered sexual
certainty inhabited by the male half of the species.  It's a notion of men
without problems, free of doubts and anxiety.  But the reality is a sexual
identity that is insecure, ordered as much around a denial of what we are than
a certainty of who we are.   It's an insecurity that has proved dangerous for
gay men.  For the few, queer-bashing is an attempt to exorcise a man's own
guilty dread of his effeminacy.  While it's an extreme way of proving
manliness, it's colluded with by the majority of heterosexual men who, because
they won't face up to their own sexual uncertainties and fears, make gay men the
threat we must defend ourselves against. 

The American writer and feminist Phyllis Chesler describes men as having
created a culture where "most men would rather be members of the mob at
Golgotha - and not the guy alone on the cross.  And so it has become amongst
brothers."  I was once involved in a discussion group on "bringing up boys".
All of the men present could recall the pain and suffering we had inflicted on
those who fell from favour; the fat boy, the weak boy, the effeminate boy.  It
ensure we all kept our heads down and strove to conform, desperate to prove we
would win or achieve, that we were strong or hard.  Growing up male forces boys
to take an impossible regime of demands and performance. Rather than admit to
its stupidity and acknowledge we can't manage it, men learn to persecute
instead. 

Being a heterosexual man can be a lesson in self-deception.  As it's
constituted now, it's an impoverishing sexual identity.  For some men, it's
enough they have power and privilege.  But there are plenty of men who want
something different.  and there are plenty of men, black and working class,
whose masculinity doesn't connect them to power and money, who experience other
men as oppressive and threatening.  The dissatisfaction is definitely there,
but where's the change going to come from? 

For Frank Mort, writing in the "New Socialist", the answer is young men's
attitudes to style and fashion.  It's here and not in the men's groups
propagating soft and caring gentleness, that it's open season on conventional
masculinity.  It's a visual politics that encourages men "to look at themselves
and other men - visually and as possible objects of desire - and to experience
pleasures around the body hitherto branded as taboo or exclusively feminine". 

And dressing up requires courage, too.  Chris Bond, an 18-year old from Bolton,
described getting on a football special [bus] in eyeshadow and quiff.  "They
asked me if I was a queer.  I told them it wasn't their business.  To have said
I wasn't gay would have been a cop-out."  It's this challenge to conventional
forms of masculine behaviour and expression that can blur the division between
gay and straight.  But, as Frank Mort notes, dressing up is not enough, it's a
beginning. 

When we straight men starting talking about our own sexuality, then the
masculine myth and the regime of silence and retribution that has sustained it,
will begin to collapse.  When that starts happening, not only will we be less
fearful, but gay men and our sons will be able to rest more easily. 

	Last year, my friend and I had ocassion to visit Sloppy Joes,
	a seedy little place in the vicinity of Reading railway station.
	This particular night was the last Wedensday in may 1986. I remember
	it well, my friend and I paid our money and went in, the dance floor
	was vacant, there seemed to be a lot of men, and not too many women.
	The women were on one side of the place, the men on the other, you
	know just like a school dance. We got our drinks, and moved over to 
	where the women were sitting, nudge nudge, "mind if I sit here love?"
	Nope, she said, (she was American) so we did, and we struck up a 
	conversation. I mentioned that I thought it was funny that the two 
	sexes were split like they were, "don't you know what night it is?"
	she said, "Yes, you can't catch me with that one, it's wedensday night"
	"Yes" she laughted "the last wedensday of the month, it's Gays night!"
	"I see", Nodding knowingly, trying to drag my friend of the young woman
	sat next to him, "and are you.....", "yes", "Sorry, I wasn't....."
	Anyway, I wasn't under threat, so I decided to finish my beer, as I 
	looked around I saw a considerable number of attractive women, several
	in rather risque embraces, I must confess, I found it rather erotic,
	there were also, a lesser number of men in similar embraces, I didn't
	find that too erotic though. I don't know why that should be, I haven't
	tried to probe it at all, it has never really been that important to me.

Richard.

    wonderful .0 reprints of cosmo in mennotes 
    a new all time nadir of noting
    

    re:  .2
    
    An all time zenith of self-awareness and understanding

    If .0 wanted to take the time to type it all in, then I can find
    the time to read it.  I found it enlightening.
    
    Spence

    Note 87.5 was set hidden by the moderator.
    
    Please, people.  I will not allow notes that are personally insulting
    to other noters.  Take your insults elsewhere (SOAPBOX or MAIL).
    
    	-- Jeff Coffler (Co-moderator of MENNOTES)

    this is really a reply to note 90.8, but it seems more appropriate
    to post it here.
    
    >> i'll cripple the first bloke who steps forward.
    
    i assume it was a joke, but why such a violent image to protect
    one's own sexual persona?
    
    
    i basically thought that this cosmo article was a lot of crap, but
    comments such as the above make me wonder if there isn't a little
    truth there.
    
    i also think that rutherford cops out at the end of the article
    when he says "we straight men need to ..."     as tolerant as we may
    be, we still want everybody to know that we are straight. *i* sure
    do!
    
    /bruce

>         as tolerant as we may
>    be, we still want everybody to know that we are straight. *i* sure
>    do!

    Why? If one is looking for a woman then I can understand wanting
    ones availability known. On the other hand why would a man with
    an SO care what others thought his preference was? It doesn't
    matter. Unavailable is unavailable.
    
    Is there a sound reason that a man should be any more afraid of
    a man making a pass at him then a woman should be? Or even that
    a woman might make an pass at a man?
    
    			Alfred

Hmmm.  I put the article in MENNOTES because I wanted to see what kind
of a discussion would ensue.  (The discussion in
QUARK::HUMAN_RELATIONS is long and quite good.) To tell the truth, if
I was trying to put together a reasonable argument about men and
sexuality, I would NEVER quote from Cosmo.   :{) 

Seriously, I thought that the part about business lingo being 
homosexual in context is nonsense.  That kind of talk has more to do 
with sexuality in general (most often MALE sexuality) than either 
heterosexuality and homosexuality.

The pieces of the article that I liked described the differences 
between what a lot of men SAY about their sexuality and what those men 
DO about their sexuality.  I thought that the description of the two 
men in the pub, singing with their arms around each other, was very 
accurate.  The idea that the article tried to get across is that there 
are so few socially acceptable ways for men to show friendly physical 
affection for each other and, if you cross those boundaries, then you 
are accused of being queer, a faggot, and so forth.

For instance, I'm sure that it's pretty easy to imagine two male
friends in a bar, slightly buzzed with their arms on top of each
other's shoulder, singing a song.  But, what if one man's hand slipped
from the top of the shoulder to the round part of the shoulder?  What
if one man removed his arm and put it on the other man's waist?  What
if, at the end of the evening, one man kissed the other man, either on
the cheek or on the lips?  What if one man touched the other man's
face? 

Now take all of the gestures I mentioned in the previous paragraph and
replace the two men with two women.  If one woman touches her friend
in those ways, most people wouldn't think twice about it.  If one man
touches his friend in those ways, then he is accused of being queer,
even though there need not be any sexual intent behind the physical
contact.  It's a double standard. 

Sorry if I've been too long winded.  To sum it all up, I enjoy the 
freedom I have with my gay friends.  I can hug and kiss them goodnight 
without them thinking that I'm trying to make a move on them.  With my 
straight friends, I am limited to the few socially acceptable ways for 
men to touch their male friends.  It stinks.  If I have to give 
another one of those phoney 5-second bear hugs again, I think I'm 
going to go crazy!   :{)

What does everyone else think?


						--Gerry

    i think that's one of the reasons that straight men are so anxious
    to protect their straight image... it allows more freedom of expression
    by preventing ambiguous behavior from being interpreted the 'wrong
    way.' i think i may be 'suspect' in certain circles, because i am
    often deliberately extreme or provacative a lot of the time. however,
    while one part of me says 'f**k 'em if they can't take a joke,'
    another part of me wishes to be clearly understood. 
    
    touching is ambiguous. it can be a sign of intimacy or a display
    of power... and of course, anything in between.   a clear definition
    of sexual preference makes it easier to interpret intent.
    
    i agreen completely with your (.9) assessment of the author's remarks
    about language... total b.s.
    
    /bruce

    Re .9, none of my girlfriends and I ever hug or kiss each other.
     I'm not sure that straight women are any more physical with each
    other than straight men are.
    
    A couple of weeks ago I tried to give my 13 yr. old daughter a
    spontaneous hug and kiss in a movie theater lobby.  She jumped away
    from me and said, "Cut it out Mum!  People will think we're lesies!"
    
    Lorna
    

    I agree with Lorna, I don't think that women are *that* much more 
    ?allowed? to hug and kiss each other.  Maybe a little bit, but not
    extremely so.  A lot depends on the intent.
    
    Come to think of it, my mind is still working in the 70's.  I really
    don't get out enough to see what goes on today.
    
    Disregard this reply.
    
    Spence

    Dworkin has a hypothesis in _Intercourse_ about why male homosexuality 
    is regarded as it is by too many.  (1987 book, forgotten the publisher)

    Re:  .0
    
    Good article and responses, Gerry.  I enjoyed the information and
    learned something about myself in the process.
    
    Regards;
    
    Ed