Oh, if only this were really true, at least for me!
No one can say definitively except for him, but I’d wager that he is. Stereotypical behavior aside (much of which can be excused as being cultural differences), he completely dodged the question when Barbara Walters asked him a few months ago (“I don’t think that’s what’s really important…”), and she asked him twice. George Michael did the same thing way back when, as have other closeted gay figures - they aren’t ready to come out, but they feel disingenious lying to the public (or maybe it’s just Barbara). I just hope he comes out before he’s outed or does something stupid.
{ahem} No doubt I fall somewhere in the top five, if not #3 (even though I should be number one).
That’s easy - Freddie White, 4th grade. Followed him around like a puppydog until he moved away a year later. Looking back, it was my first realization that something was up. I was 8 or 9 years old.
Ricky Martin dodged, yes… good! He was asked specifically because if he had said yes, the media would have said something to the effect of “My GOD he’s gay!!” and made a big deal of it. His response was perfect: “Who cares?”
If someone asked me, I’d probably respond in kind, and I’m straight. It’s silly, to me anyways, to drag that out of someone for the sole purpose of creating a “scandal”. Let them guess. Some people would say “he should say he is and be proud of it”, yes, true, but if he really feels that it shouldn’t matter then he made the perfect choice. How many times have celebs been asked, “Hey, so-and-so, there are rumors that you like members of the opposite sex… is this true?”
Re why there are still gay people: I read a study “somewhere” that said that the area of the X chromosome which has been tentatively associated with gayness mutates very quickly. What this would mean is that even if no gay people and nobody related to a gay person ever reproduced, the next generation or the generation after that would probably still have gay people.
Not that you’re not cute, Esprix, but the only picture I’ve seen of you shows you as a teenager or something. And that’s not exactly the sort of thing I’m into. I mean, I know you’re older than that, but still ick.
… and after seeing the big dream-sequence dance number at the end, I can only echo the words of Crow T. Robot: “Oscar Wilde only wishes he were this gay!”
And also, I swear, it seemed like every character in that movie was on Prozac. Even the grumpy concert pianist guy – he was just taking less than the maximum legal Prozac dose, unlike Gene Kelly and the rest of the cast.
My religion celebrates and affirms gay people. While there are individual homophobic Wiccans, the religion itself regards love and sexual pleasure as things to be celebrated and rejoiced in in all their forms.
I am not religious. But that wasn’t your question. How has being gay affected my religion? It has not. I was raised Episcopalian. The church accepts gays. My being an atheist is not in any way a result of my sexuality.
As to why evolutionary pressure has not eliminated homosexuality: There is a similar question as to why do women survive menopause (chimpanzees don’t survive menopause.) Gaudere has hit on the answer, non-reproducing members of society can help their relatives raise healthier offspring and pass on genes indirectly.
Is Ricky Martin Gay? Gaydar™ is not 100% accurate. I think he is. Is this wishful thinking? Maybe.
Never mind Ricky Martin – was George Gershwin gay? The only biographical webpage I found, http://www.gershwinfan.com/gershbio.html, says he died at the ripe old age of 39 and makes no mention of his love life or lack thereof.
As long as someone has brought religion into this discussion, I’ll ask the question I’ve been pondering for more than a week.
Background: The United Methodist Church just had General Conference in Cleveland. Several “controversial” topics were raised. (I put controversial in quotes to indicate that I’m using it as Pastor W. seemed to: meaning relating to homosexuality or homosexuals). To the relief of Pastor W. the delegates did “obey God” and voted that homosexuality is incompatible with Christianity, gays and lesbians can not be ordained as ministers and same sex marriages can not be performed by ministers.(Note: “obey God” is in quotes because it sure sounded to me like Pastor W. would not have considered it a message from God had the delegates all voted in favor of gay rights). Pastor W. and others have made it sound like if the votes had gone the other way the church would have split irreparably along geographic lines (with one half being for gay rights(or is that gay rites?) and one half being opposed) and all sorts of nasty things would have happened. As I listen to the radio/read the newspaper, it will be a “miracle” if the UMC is still united in four years(next General conference).
OK, now for the question.
Imagine the votes had gone the other way. Imagine that all united methodists everywhere had taken the votes as a message from God and now believed that there is nothing wrong with being gay. Do you think that this sudden reversal would have a significant impact on the gay community? (Especially for those who are not Christians. I’m pretty sure that such a reversal might cause gay Christians who aren’t methodist(or those who are but have not been in congregations where gays were accepted) to seek out the UMC in much larger numbers than in the past, but that isn’t what I’m curious about. I’m really curious as to whether the issues relating to gay methodists are more significant to gays or methodists.)
Sigh, I really hope my question does not get lost in excess explanations. That’s why it took me a week to post it, I couldn’t figure out a way to ask it in just a few words.
I could see a hypothetical United Methodist Church vote for gay acceptance as having the following effects on the Gay Community [TM]:
[ul]
[li]Gay Methodists would, of course, be overjoyed.[/li][li]Gay non-Methodist Christians would seriously consider switching churches.[/li][li]Gay non-Christians would shrug and say “So what?”, unless they were talking to a Christian, in which case they have the option of pointing at the Methodists and saying “See there?” if the topic of Gay Christians came up.[/li][/ul]
These are just wild guesses of mine, of course, seeing as how I’m not gay. (Sorry, Esprix Otto and Matt, but An American in Paris didn’t convert me – guess you don’t get your toaster. )
Dodging the question is acceptable, but cowardly. It’s not like being gay has affected, say, Melissa Etheridge’s or Elton John’s careers. Hell, Steven Gately of the British boy band Boyzone came out and their record sales went up. But I do understand why he didn’t - he’s been singing about women for so long, people would likely laugh now. He’ll keep on dodging it until his career wavers, at which time he’ll come out, have a few more minutes of fame, and then start touring in gay bars.
The difference is that all people are assumed straight until proven otherwise, so asking that question isn’t necessary.
jenkinsfan asked:
Interesting assumption - why?
I was raised Methodist, but it wasn’t an obligatory thing - we didn’t go to church every Sunday (Hell, I was never even baptized at birth), but we did belong to the church around the corner and went on Christmas and Easter. When I was in my early teens I went through a religious phase, and attended classes to join the church on my own (and at the time got baptized in order to do so). I also started attending church youth group. This lasted about a year or so before it petered out. It was just an experience - not good, not bad, just was.
When I was 18 and a freshman in college I came out to myself and my friends and family, and one of the people I first came out to (in fact one of the first openly gay people I’d ever met) was my friend Myke. We got to be friends while I was coming out, and he introduced me to his circle of friends, the very wacky bunch known collectively as The Medians, and I’m happy to report we’ve all been the very best and closest of friends since 1985/86. One of the things they did as a group was hang out at the local Unitarian Universalist church, which is how I was introduced to that particular denomination, and I’ve stayed with them ever since.
Their creeds just make sense to me - respect each other, respect others’ beliefs, do good, etc. Common sense type stuff, really, and it jived with what I believed as a person. On top of that, they’ve been gay-affirming since the 60’s, so I felt completely comfortable there. Eventually I joined the church myself, and even went on to be a choir director at another UU congregation for 7 years. Although I haven’t attended services or any particular church for about 3 years now, I still consider myself UU and you’ll find me preaching about it here from time to time.
waterj2 wrote:
The picture posted on my web page, which is the same one that went on the "Men of the Straight Dope web site, was taken in 1994 when I was 25. I am now 31, and don’t look substantially different (even just got re-blonded). I appreciate being called youthful-looking, but I’m not prepubescent.
tracer wrote:
Huh, I still haven’t seen that film. I’ll have to go rent it sometime.
DrMatrix wrote:
Top five what? Should I be frightened? :eek:
tracer asked:
I don’t believe so, but I’m fairly certain Ira was.
Eureka asked:
Very interesting. Was this the same conference where the delegates protested silently at the Assembly itself and had to be taken out by police? I read that article - that’s some conviction. What saddens me is that Methodists are some of the most liberal-minded of the mainstream Christian denominations.
Would it impact on the gay community? Yes - it would be a bit of a coup to have such a large Christian denomination take such a stand. But in the overall it’s a spiritual victory - important, but certainly not the end-all-be-all of the gay rights movement. In the end, I think it’d be more important to Methodists than the gay community, but mostly impacting, of course, gay Methodists. tracer summed it up fairly well. (I addressed this a bit in the very old “What will religions do when same-sex marriages are legal?” thread.)
tracer wrote:
You flatter yourself - who says we wanted you anyway?
And you also mentioned that people are “assumed straight.” True, true! That’s part of the problem! At the moment, people are assumed to be “normal”, i.e. “straight”, so being gay is considered “abnormal.” This is a bad thing. If more people just made it clear that it didn’t matter, and that we should’t give a hoot either way, then maybe we could stop the assumption of “normality=straight” and people would begin looking at sexual orientation like they look at, say, eye color.
If people keep harping on whether people are gay or not gay, then people are going to keep noticing whether people are gay or not gay, is my point. In the Shadenwawa perfect world, people just don’t care one damn way or the other. Perhaps I am projecting, since the few times I’ve found out people I knew were gay my reaction was something akin to: “And…?”
Esprix,
Yes, the United Methodist General Conference to which I refer is the same one which had the silent protesters and the really annoying and disruptive singing of “We Shall Overcome” after the third and final vote on “controversial” issues. (At least, it is my impression that as long as they were just standing there silently, the protesters were permitted, but when they started singing and being disruptive, they were removed. I found it annoying because the singing says to me that those who are in favor of gay rights in the UMC aren’t about to just shut up quietly and go found the Gay Methodist Church or something, ((whispering)and well, I’m really not in favor of gay rights in the UMC or anywhere else, though I have somewhat mixed feelings on this subject))
Interesting post from Eureka. I can certainly see how many heterosexuals who don’t know the issues would wonder why gay folk are constantly harping on their rights. As a gay man, I can tell you when we talk about gay rights, we really mean equal rights, the same rights that all heterosexuals take for granted. Let me share a few examples:
A quickie marriage in a Vegas chapel is valid in every state. A gay couple who have shared decades together are legally just roommates.
Straight partners automatically inherit property after
the other dies. Gay partners don’t.
Straight couples have property rights. Gay couples don’t.
In the case of hospitalization or incapacitation, straight partners are automatically granted visitation rights and retain custody of their children. Gay couples do not.
Now you may say that these rights only pertain to heterosexual married couples. This is true, but then heterosexuals may be legally married; gay people may not.
