Boy am I glad I didn't know this about you until I was moving outta the neighborhood!

The BBQ Pit
1

So I bought a house last week. Pretty cool. Amend that: WAY cool.

I went next door to my neighbor’s house to tell them that we’re moving. They are pleasant people, they’ve been expressing how sad they are that we’re leaving, we’re such nice quiet neighbors. We’ve always had a friendly but cordial relationship.

They invite me in, and I warm to the topic of my great little house, and I mention that it’s beautifully decorated, we’re buying it from a gay couple, one of whom is a costumer.

Then my neighbor, Harry, says [giles] exactly the most appalling thing he could have said [/giles]: “Oh, you’re buying it from gay guys? Well, make sure you sterilize the whole thing before you move in. They have sex everywhere and they have all kinds of diseases.”

:eek:

I had absolutely no clue that for the past four years I had been living next to a perfect asshole. He said this to me absolutely without shame or apology. His wife volunteered that, wonder of wonders, he reserves his homophobic hostility for male homosexuals exclusively, lesbians are hot. And that she herself ignores the whole matter, since her childhood best friend was a gay guy. Well, gee, I’m glad you managed to overlook it, especially sinc eyou have to fuck the guy and everything, but I’m pleased to note that I have no such need or desire.

While I didn’t see the point in making a giant stink about it, I did tell him he was a hypocrite and I was glad I didn’t know this about him before and now that I do I’m glad I’m moving. But I said it with enough of a joking attitude in my delivery that we don’t need to declare war our last two months on the block.

I still can’t get over the fact that anyone, but most particularly someone in 2003, someone who lives in LA, and someone who lives next to ME, could say such a perfectly awful thing without the slightest shame. Really. I’m astonished.

On the other hand, I’m delighted to contemplate the fact that my house and my move couldn’t be any more gay. I’m buying from gay guys. My agent is gay. Their agent is gay. The mortgage broker is gay. My agent lives down the street from me, and we both live down the street from some of the biggest gay bars in the valley.

And as a result, MY property values are going to go through the roof while Harry’s will languish. Living well is the best revenge.

Idiot.

2

Ha.Tell Harry to fuck it and enjoy your tastefully decorated house. Gay people, gay MEN especially, seem to have this good design gene that makes everything they do look mahvelous.

IDBB

3

Dude you are surrounded by gay guys… you better make sure the drapes match the carpet and everyrthing else or you may be asked to leave the neighborhood by the gay enforcers. :smiley:

I still think the best part of that was that the neighbor dosen’t like gay guys but thinks lesbians are hot. :wally

4

Holy crap, do you live in Homo-opolis or something? :slight_smile:

Congrats on the house. Be sure you sterilize all of your stuff before you move into the new house. Some of his bigot germs may have wafted in on a breezy day. Wouldn’t want them to infect the new place.

5

Oh, I dunno about that “gay MEN especially” business. We bought our house from a lesbian couple and the place looked wonderful. :slight_smile:

6

Heh. Friends of mine bought a house from a gay couple and everything was decorated in bright pink and turquoise, except the bathroom, which was purple, yellow, and gray. Sadly, it was not tasteful, but I guess you could call it gay, if by gay you mean bright and cheerful. I guess every stereotype can be broken.:slight_smile:

7

Two things Stoid:

Did you all sit down and discuss your sex lives? If not, how do you know all of these people are gay?
and

Aren’t you being somewhat intolerant of your ex-neighbour? Why didn’t you explain a case, and try to break a stereotype rather than just call him an ‘asshole’?

8

I just wanted to tell you that all gay men are not by nature excellent designers. The idea that we are is a stereotype, and as such…

[sub]aw, hell. The boyfriend and I spent yesterday evening at Lowe’s and we’ve finally found the perfect color for the living room walls, that’ll really set the drapes off. Now all we need is a nice rug…[/sub]

9

Heh my bf is also pretty homophobic but is turned on by lesbians…I know, I know… I’ve tried to convince him of the inconsistancy of this position but he won’t have it.

I’m not at all happy about his slightly homophobic tendency at all. If I try to arge against it he goes on about how I am a lefty sixth form studenty harridan or something stupid like that…peh.

He’s not as bad as his brother though…he said on a message board that he refuses to go to Brighton (a large town in southern England if you don’t know that has a large gay community) because of all the gay people. I thought that was bizarre, what does he think the gay people are going to do to him??? I wanted to pull him up on his bigotry but bf wouldn’t let me 'cos brother is apparantly very touchy and it would make life difficult for him in various and sundry ways if I offended brother.

Bah. Having to censor my own bit in the war against ignorance for the sake of filial interpersonal politics sucks! :mad :wink:

10

Um…I meant argue not arge of course. I have no idea how you would ‘arge’ :o

11

So, Infectious Lass, not to be an ass but why are you still with him?:slight_smile: I mean, hell, Ryan_Liam is still single and he’s not a homophobe;)

[sub]So, so, so going to hell for that one. But it’s okay.[/sub]

12

Ummm…would you believe he’s a nice boy apart from that? And he likes his mum? And he pets kittens and puppies? And that sometimes he buys me pizza? (okay that is a rather self centered reason…bad me!)

errm…can I get back to you on that one? :wink:

13

Well, the guy has the right to his opinion, ridiculous, but I agree - hard to imagine anyone thinking like that in this day and age is it not?

14

Well, that’s because when all those lesbians get together for those Wesson oil parties, they put plastic sheeting down first, and that makes it much easier to clean up afterwards. :rolleyes:

Wait until your house is sold, then tell him you’re gay…

or better yet, tell your buyers that he’s gay…

15

He’s afraid some gay will rub off on him and he will suddenly no longer be able to repress his desire to have sex with men.

16

Can you catch gay like that? I always thought it was a sexually transmitted thing.
Please, help yourself to this rotten fruit in order to express your opinion of this post.

17

** Spit, ** I appreciate your sensitivity to assumptions. The answer is yes, as a matter of fact, we did discuss our sex/love lives. My agent and I bonded totally and had a big hash about our love lives the afternoon we found the house, he mentioned that the selling agent was kinda hitting on him, and my mortgage broker, quickly getting that we were all on the same page, declared himself “The Queen of Mean” and showed me a picture of his life companion of 26 years.

However, I woulda known anyway, even without all the frankness. I’m an old fag hag, honey, and we have our own brand of gaydar.

And I didn’t call my neighbor an asshole to his face, and I did point out to him that he was being ridiculous, but I don’t have the time or interest to try and penetrate a 40 year old man’s hardcore bigotry in a casual neighborly conversation. I just call him an idiot on the internet.

18

This gay guy once made me crack up by telling a story about how his sister came over, saw what he’d done to his apartment, and then asked him to come over and do her house. To which he replied, “I don’t do Country Kitchen.”

19

Stoid, you’ve described a common-enough situation that is, indeed, hard to know how to deal with. It astonishes me that people will just say things like this, without considering it might be offensive. Or not caring if it is offensive. Or something. I don’t get it.

I had a dentist who was racist. There I’d be with cotton and tooth fragments in my numbed mouth, and he’d be talking about some store he likes, except for all the scuzzy Mexicans that go there. It took two separate remarks like this for me to switch dentists, and I never told him why. I wish it had taken only one remark, and I had gotten right out of the chair in outrage the instant he made it.

I hope you do say something more to your neighbor before leaving. What he did is just gross.

20

This is how racism and homophobia survice, because good people say nothing because they don’t wish make a scene or cause trouble.

When somebody makes a racist or homophobic remark, I call them on it immeidately. That kind of garbage should make the utterer anathema in polite society insatead of merely tolerated.