# The oldest gay men I've ever seen **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 27, 2006, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043 "2006-10-27T00:16:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/41 "2006-10-28T01:49:26Z")
Well said. ---
**Author:** ![pizzabrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e9c0ed/32.png) [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/42 "2006-10-28T02:24:26Z")
[QUOTE=astro] This really needs to be one of those times where a grown man can appreciate that while most people might get the playful nature of his observation, that some people live to be offended, and just move on. She’s a brat after all, what do you expect? [/QUOTE] I said I was offended? What was I supposed to say? That was my genuine sentiment - I didn’t force it. You saw old gay people, okay, what the hell are you telling me? It’s genuinely amusing to me that that’s a share-worthy story to someone, which is exactly what I said. What would you be like if someone wrote a long post about how they saw a little girl climb a tree? You wouldn’t be tempted to snark at his naivete? ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/43 "2006-10-28T02:33:20Z")
It’s naiive to _not know_ that there are older gay people. It’s not naiive to know that there are older gay people, but be mildly surprised to see a group of them when you have never seen them before. I know that there are aircraft carriers. It would still be very exticing to take a tour of one. I know that there are polar bears. I’d still be very surprised to see one up close. I know that there is a moon. I’d still be amazed to walk on it. I’m not a moron. I know that there are such thing as older homosexual men. I had just never seen a group of three of them sitting right next to me on a bus, calling each other “girls.” I don’t think most people in Southern Indiana experience something like this often. So I’m sorry if I’m acting like it was a unique and unusual thing for me - because it was. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/44 "2006-10-28T02:55:36Z")
[QUOTE=pizzabrat] I said I was offended? What was I supposed to say? That was my genuine sentiment - I didn’t force it. You saw old gay people, okay, what the hell are you telling me? It’s genuinely amusing to me that that’s a share-worthy story to someone, which is exactly what I said. What would you be like if someone wrote a long post about how they saw a little girl climb a tree? You wouldn’t be tempted to snark at his naivete? [/QUOTE] It’s not naivete as much as an mundane, pointless, shared observation about something you don’t see every day re a gaggle of graying gay guys. I am 48 years old, and beyond the IRS agent and his boyfriend I rented a room from in my first semester at college, the number of older male couples I have seen making an overt PDA is precisely one, when I was Radio Shack trainee in 1981. I’ve seen lots of gay male couples, but like the OP, relatively few older gay male couples that made themselves evident by flirting with each other. Don’t be so irritable when people post stuff that exactly fits the forum description. It makes you seem unnecessarily disagreeable. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/45 "2006-10-28T02:59:38Z")
[QUOTE=Argent Towers] I was going to say you were being too optimistic, and then I noticed that your location wasn’t in America. [/QUOTE] Oh, cool: Spain’s in Africa and Canada is… where? OK, Canadians, come and join the EU, we’re a mess but we have more official languages than anybody! And better beaches than Mexico 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/46 "2006-10-28T03:01:09Z")
Jesus Christ, I meant the USA. ---
**Author:** ![Caridwen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c89c15/32.png) [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/47 "2006-10-28T03:33:00Z")
Argent Towers, you crack me up! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/48 "2006-10-28T03:37:59Z")
I’m glad…I think :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/49 "2006-10-28T03:39:38Z")
[QUOTE=Argent Towers] Jesus Christ, I meant the USA. [/QUOTE] I got it. Canadians know that Americans call the States “America,” and that’s fine, except that whenever you say it immediately that song from _West Side Story_ starts playing in our heads. Or maybe that’s just me. ---
**Author:** ![Caridwen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c89c15/32.png) [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/50 "2006-10-28T04:21:41Z")
[QUOTE=Argent Towers] I’m glad…I think :rolleyes: [/QUOTE] I was just picturing you sitting on the bus and got a hilarious mental image. Tell me, did one of them look like Daniel Craig? ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/51 "2006-10-28T04:30:56Z")
The oldest one looked a little like Craig. He was more handsome, though. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/52 "2006-10-28T04:48:59Z")
> [@](#): > > I plan to surround myself with adoring young muffins to hear my war stories from back before there was a cure and when there were still such a thing as fundamentalists “Grandpa Sir, is that really a photo of you on the '99 Gay Pride float wearing nothing but Mardi Gras beads?” ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/53 "2006-10-28T04:57:47Z")
[QUOTE=Shoshana] “Grandpa Sir, is that really a photo of you on the '99 Gay Pride float wearing nothing but Mardi Gras beads?” [/QUOTE] We all thought he was a bit overdressed, at that… ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/54 "2006-10-28T05:26:55Z")
[Here is an illustration](http://www.freeimageshare.com/show.php/5578_gaymen.JPG.html) of what the whole scene looked like. Just to give you a clearer idea of what it was like. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/55 "2006-10-28T05:34:33Z")
Exquisite! A very helpful graphic. Now draw \*\*matt\_mcl \*\* as described in post #52! ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/56 "2006-10-28T09:56:38Z")
Late to the party…my SO and I just went to Hawaii last February for our 25th anniversary (I wrote a few threads, it rained non-stop, and Maui is the most boring place on earth, but Honolulu was fun). We ain’t spring chickens, but when I was a whippersnapper like you, I used to go to a Gay bar called Paulchin’s Oldtimer in Berlin…most of the guys were over 60 and I met a few in their 80’s and older. I was a kid then, but loved to stop in early at that bar and talk to these guys before I set off to the other bars for my night of fun… I remember meeting an older guy (mind you, this was in 1980) who started to tell me a story and then cried a bit, and then finished his story. In WWII, he was young and met another young man…they fell in love but his friend was caught in the park late one night by some SS soldiers. They took his friend to a concentration camp and his friend never came back alive. The reason the older guy still wept? He was supposed to have met his friend in the park that night, but was running late. He still felt the guilt…if he had arrived on time, maybe his friend wouldn’t have been caught; if he had arrived on time, maybe they would have both been away from the park before the SS arrived; or if he had arrived on time, maybe he might have been caught and taken to the camp as well…either way, this guy still felt the pain decades later. The Pink Triangle represents the symbol that Gay men were forced to wear in concentration camps in Germany during WWII. Gay men were murdered, simply because they were Gay. My generation has lived through AIDs, that past generation lived though equally bad, if not worse, times. To any young Gay guys reading this, count your blessings…things have been far worse thay they are now…it ain’t perfect today, but you are all better off than the generations who suffered before you, and don’t fuckin’ forget it. ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/57 "2006-10-28T10:15:28Z")
[QUOTE=DMark] In WWII, he was young and met another young man…they fell in love but his friend was caught in the park late one night by some SS soldiers. They took his friend to a concentration camp and his friend never came back alive. The reason the older guy still wept? He was supposed to have met his friend in the park that night, but was running late. He still felt the guilt…if he had arrived on time, maybe his friend wouldn’t have been caught; if he had arrived on time, maybe they would have both been away from the park before the SS arrived; or if he had arrived on time, maybe he might have been caught and taken to the camp as well…either way, this guy still felt the pain decades later. [/QUOTE] Wow…tragic stuff. Thanks for sharing the story, **DMark.** ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2006, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043/58 "2006-10-28T15:20:02Z")
[QUOTE=Shoshana] “Grandpa Sir, is that really a photo of you on the '99 Gay Pride float wearing nothing but Mardi Gras beads?” [/QUOTE] “No, that wasn’t in '99.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-oldest-gay-men-ive-ever-seen/378043.md?page=2)