Don’t underestimate the power of desensitization. I can probably count on one hand the number of homoerotic scenes I’ve seen in cinema. The number of violent deaths I’ve seen are beyond count.
Also remember that violent deaths in movies are always fake. Men kissing are almost always played by real men really kissing. Show an actual, close-up murder in a movie and I’m betting you’d get a good number of walkouts.
Well, duh.
Now if the gimp had been singing Fred Astaire that would have been a whole 'nuther story.
I’m reminded on a comedian I heard a long time ago talking about gay bashing. “How stupid do you have to be to walk into a gay bar and get upset because of all the ‘queers?’”
The only part of your rant that I disagree with, and this is a pretty teeny one, is the mocking of guys who don’t like to sit next to one another. I have different personal space comfort with men than I have with women. I don’t know why, and I don’t particularly care why. I don’t think that sitting next to a guy is going to make me catch cooties or Teh Gay; it just makes me feel vaguely uncomfortable, so I’ll sometimes give myself an extra seat’s distance. Sometimes I don’t. No big deal either way, but I don’t think my personal-space issues translate into homophobia.
I agree that the problem isn’t with being grossed out by same-sex affection: the problem is with being vocal about it. I can barely stand to watch a scene in a movie wherein a character gets an injection, but that doens’t mean I’m bigoted against diabetics; it’s just something that squicks me out. At the point where I was going off about how wrong taht was, then folks would have a legit complaint against me.
(Men kissing in movies doesn’t bug me at all: I think it’s kinda cute).
Daniel
Is kissing really a sex act? I have a hard time considering it such, or being in any way akin to a facial. (Although it would make European greetings much more interesting if you could choose between a kiss and blowing your load in someone’s face). If kissing is a sex act, I bet I would have been disappointed in those roadside places in Indiana that advertised “Live Sex Acts.”
Look, it’s two people kissing. Get the fuck over it. Go home and rent Six Feet Under, you’ll love it. At the very least, shut your pie holes about it. Suck it up and be a man about it, not a whiny little pussy who has to show fear about it.
Homophobia, at least among American males, is a socially programmed experience. There is a period in early adolescence where everything undesirable is “gay,” where most emotions, particularly those expressed towards other men, is “gay.”
What I find interesting about myself, in terms of self-reflection, is that I have a strong feeling of what some might call “homophobia” about the mincing, flaming, catty aspect of some gay (or straight) people’s personalities. I’m disgusted by that type of thing, but I couldn’t give a rat’s ass if they want to show guys kissing, fucking or sucking.
I willing to claim that I know it’s not hardwired. What reason would biology have to hardwire into you an ‘ick’ when seeing men kiss?
If I got irritated every time I heard a white person’s voice, but stayed cool about it, would you commend me for being “civilized” or would I still be a racist?
If someone wants to boo, hiss, jeer and so forth in private, that’s one thing. It’s quite another for a few people to disrupt a movie in a cinema because they refuse to control themselves. I actually find that more objectionable than whatever problem or hang-up they may have, because it’s just plain rude to treat a movie theatre as if it were one’s own home theatre.
The problem exists even when there is no gay theme in a film. I remember being disgusted by the audience when I saw **A History of Violence**; they insisted on clapping, laughing, cheering and yelling whenever someone got beaten up or shot. The movie wasn't supposed to be a celebration of violence, as far as I could tell, but apparently that's some others were hoping for and what they thought they were getting. Of course, they couldn't keep from giggling during the lovemaking scenes between a husband and wife, either. It's infantile at best and rude at worst.
Once again, if I see BBM, it will either be at a late show or in a small arthouse theatre.You know about my genetic makeup? Cite, please.
Maybe it’s to remind me that I’m supposed to propagate the species. Maybe it’s not biological; I don’t knowand I doubt you do either. But assuming, as some here have, that it’s just the result of fundamentalist upbringing is pretty foolish.
Yep, I’d call you civilized. You have very limited control over what you like or dislike.
Note that in that case it would almost certainly be a cultural predilection, not a biological one; but whatever the cause, it wouldn’t be your fault you didn’t like white people’s voices. You only go wrong if you go around telling white people to shut up, mocking them for the way they talk, or the like.
I, as a funny-talking white dude, have the right to demand tolerance and respect. I do not have the right to demand your love and approval. I think the principle is universal.
So, if being icked out by seeing men kissing is hard-wired or societal, how come women don’t seem to have as strong an aversive reaction as men do? “It’s because it’s men kissing,” you say. Well, I don’t think women have as strong a reaction to two women kissing as men do to two men kissing. I don’t have any cites beyond my personal opinion, but it seems to be much more of a non-issue for women.
Not saying I agree or disagree with this, but the only point you seem to have made here is that men and women might not be hardwired exactly the same.
So - my take on this discussion is that it’s going to be difficult to find a theatre to watch “Brokeback Mountain” without giggles or rude comments…
The reactions of the movie goers to “Rent” don’t surprise me that much - The kids at the high school where I work go “eww…ugh…ick” over anything vaguely connected with gay people. Of course they’re children and so act like children. One expects slightly more from adults.
Thank you, IMDB.
By the time I went to watch “The Crying Game”, Oscar night had come and gone. That year’s coverage, pre- and post- as well as during the event, was mostly about whether Jaye Davidson should have been listed as “best actor” or “best actress”.
OK, so here I am at the movies, small theater (original version with subtitles), about 30 people in total. There’s this dumbfuck sitting about two rows back and one to the left of me, and every time Dal comes up he hollers, wolf-whistles and generally behaves like a gorilla that’s gone for too long without getting any.
And then we get to the full and quite male frontal nude: the guy about throws up, stands up and leaves, cursing. The rest of the theater clapped loudly and booed him.
Man, but that was one sweet moment.
The series Queer as Folk, which was essentially weekly gay soft-core porn (at least one nekkid boy coupling in every episode) was meant to appeal to a mainly gay male audience but ended up having far more straight female viewers than gay male. It seems they liked seeing nekkid boys going at it. (Of course anybody who’s ever watched the hysterically funny comparisons of men at strip clubs v. women at male strip clubs knows that the Maenads didn’t all die off in ancient Greece.)
People are hardwired to be disgusted by gay displays of affection? Men are hardwired to respond to gay displays of affection differently than women?
Horseshit.
There’s not a scrap of evidence that human behavioral reactions beyond fight or flight and sexual response have a damn thing to do with genetics, and there are in fact serious logical problems in explaining behavior when you start with the assumption that there is a biological basis to it.
Biological reductionism (which is basically what we’re talking about, here) and evolutionary psychology both make me go :rolleyes:.
So do people who can’t keep their traps shut for a perfectly sweet, completely not-disgusting man-man kiss. And so does the “public displays of affection” excuse. If you’re so uncomfortable with PDA that an acted kiss (not even a make-out scene, for Pete’s sake, not even any tongue!) in a movie squicks you, why do you attend any movies at all? 95% have a freakin’ kiss in them. And extra :rolleyes::rolleyes: for people who find gay kisses gross, and then go to see freakin’ RENT.
So substitute out “blacks eating in a restaurant” and replace it with “Jewish man kissing non-Jewish woman” and see if you think it’s excusable to find it disgusting.
Look, being so disgusted by two men engaged in a non-sexual kiss that one feels the needs to make nasty noises about it is bigotry. Making allowances for such people is supporting their ignorance. Why is this even complicated for you?
I went home to visit my parents for a weekend a year or two ago, and since they had Showtime (and we’re too cheap to get it right now), I went downstairs to ask my dad if we could watch Queer as Folk at ten, since I hadn’t seen it since I moved.
You could’ve knocked my ass over with a feather when he answered “Yeah, I watch it every week. I’m still hoping Michael and Brian might get together.”.
My dad’s about as relaxed about anyone being gay as a straight, 55 year old man could be (my godfather, his best friend, was gay, so it was never a big deal to him), but I guess I just didn’t expect my dad to be watching QAF.
That was a fun hour of television:D.
And I hate to say it, but the people getting squicked out by RENT aren’t any better at the Broadway shows sometimes. I hit a Sunday matinee while living there one week, got a ticket to the mezz, and when Maureen and Joann kissed, these two obnoxious girls sitting in front of me looked at each other and audibly said “Ewwww!”. This went on ad nauseum for awhile, every time there was a male/male kiss or a female/female kiss. They got up and left halfway through the second act, thank God.
Oddly enough, the theatre we saw RENT in on Friday was silent for the most part (aside from a few tears that we could hear). And this is in Podunk, Ohio, not a very gay-friendly kind of town.
E.
Sampiro, you rock like a camper-van parked up Gropecuntelane at five minutes to midnight. 
Actually, in psych world, the jury’s still out on that. But thanks for playing, and next time enjoy our delicious brewed decaf.
But what does it matter? Whether genetics or socialization, some men are uncomfortable with the idea of men kissing men. Some simply don’t want to see it. A lot of men don’t want to see women’s menses, either. Or breastfeeding. If there’s a genetic component (which there probably isn’t), then it’s a socialization component, which likely happened in very early childhood. Few kids have complete control over how they are raised, so to hold them accountable for their deep prejudices is foolhardy and irresponsible. Wouldn’t it make more sense to judge people on what they do with those prejudices when they are adults?
And Otto, before you go into full-blown Godwin mode, are you sure you want to claim that anyone who has ever been uncomfortable around kissing males was actually a member of the SS?
Sampiro, I’ll sit next to you in a theater anytime.
Of course, I’ll probably be trying to get you to talk about your family the whole time and ignore the movie…
Could you, um, maybe quote what it is I said that could in any reasonable way be interpreted as meaning anything even close to this?
Maybe you weren’t headed off to Godwin country with that, but it sure looked like your bags were packed and you were hitching a ride East. I just wanted to that possible conversation off at the pass. 