ROFL 
LOL
Sounds to me like the OP wants a thread for GLBT Dopers. Admins, your thoughts? I like the idea myself, and it should be considered.
As the plumber said to the lady whose house was flooded by a burst pipe, “Please don’t cry Madam, it’ll only make matters worse.”
You’re right, there does seem something mysteriously fascinating about gay threads. Perhaps it’s that it’s a very topical issue, about which many people feel very strongly.
What would be really cool would be if it’s an urban industrial area of the SDMB that’s long since fallen into disrepair but is full of interesting architectural details and just begging to be reclaimed and restored into an area filled with coffee shops, nightclubs, overpriced lofts and Ikea appointed studios.
Naw, keep those old ruins exactly as they are. Modern ruins rule.
A good place for an apartment would be a Kirkbride style insane asylum from the 1920s. They had great architecture, and would make a great apartment building.
Personally, I see ** Lizard**'s point, and it just aint the Straight Dope.
I was listening to NPR yesterday, and they had a puff piece about a woman whose longtime friend/locer died, and about how, you know, …sad it made her feel. Midway through the interview, I realized that, were theirs a stereotypical heterosexual relationship, the piece would have been utterly uninteresting and pointless. However, because they were gay, suddenly it had relevance and heft. It made the tacit assumption that I see in many threads, articles, books, and TV shows that being a homosexual automatically makes you interesting, and simply MUST be shared. The interview in question really wasn’t about the loss of a loved one (which has a universal pathos that any reasonable empathic person could get behind) but was merely a vehicle for the author to talk about herself and her sexuality, which had to be injected into the interview at three-second intervals.
So, sorry if I don’t reflexively jump on the Lizard-bashing bandwagon.
That said, I think all of this needless focus on ones sexuality will ultimately be a good thing. Americans, with their notoriously short attention span, will eventually become saturated with the issue and finally reach a point when they too don’t care what a person’s sexual orientation is. Then we can all start talking about more substantive issues, like hockey.
I completely agree that a person’s sexual orientation is a matter that should be of no interest to anybody they’re not sleeping with.
Unfortunately, George Bush, every Republican, every other Democrat, Anita Bryant, the Pope, the fucking Christian Coalition and the governments of most states don’t seem to share that opinion and even want to rewrite laws particularly and for no other purpose than to say “silly faggots, rights are for straights”, and that wounds our inner child in such a matter as to make us fucking furious and we turn to a place to rant about it. As said before, if you don’t want to talk about it then do what I do when I see a post about the Super Bowl or Ashton Kutcher: make like Dionne Warwick and Walk on by….
If you cannot even see the MENTION OF HOMO-STUFF IN A TITLE, then you have some serious issues (rather like the men who go to gay bars every other weekend and complain that they’re a freak show).
One of the claims to fame of the city where I live is that we’re home to the world’s largest abandoned insane asylum. Several of the buildings are from the 1920s era; there are some photos here , though I must admit it’s not as pretty as most of the smaller abandoned asylums on the same site.
I dunno, I can see both points of view. OTOH, anti-gay prejudice must be exposed and confronted wheneve it appears. OTOH, I’m having gay fatigue, growing ever wearier of fighting the same battles, rolling the same rock of fundyist hate up the hill of the GOP over and over again, like a lavender Sisyphus (or should that be Sissy-phus).
Well, I have just stated another “queer thread” over in MPSIMS, about David Reimer, the boy who was raised as a girl and who just commited suicide. As long as these things go on, we’ll keep talking about them. So, Lizard (what an apt, cold-blooded name!), I suggest you either not read my MPSIMS thread, or you do read it, and jump up your own ass.
Is the proposal that we have one general “gay” thread, in which talk about relationships would be mixed together with complaints about personal discrimination, worries about coming out of the closet, questions about personal identity, reports on abuse and so on and so on?
Great idea. While we’re at it, why don’t we one thread titled “Political Discussion”, one titled “Straight Stuff”, one called “Entertainment”, and one called “Sports”? :rolleyes:
I say we just need one thread, called “stuff”. All these damn multiple threads, clogging up my screen…
Don’t forget the ones titled “Retail Clerks”, and “Tailgaters”, and “Refrigerators”. Oh, and how could you miss “Is my 10 1/2 inch penis too small?”
yah, but then it would split into stuff and gay stuff 
The year is 1968. And we are in an alternate, Harry Turtledove, universe where some genius perfected the PC 40 years earlier than our home universe did. And we are discussing the state of civil rights. And yes, there are a few black idiots on the lunatic fringe calling for rebellion. And there are a number of people who believe, for whatever reason, that a system that systematically keeps blacks in a second-class role does not need changing. And the majority of us are supportive of blacks’ quest for legal, political, social, and economic equality, though we differ strongly about how to go about getting them that and about the tactical details of what’s appropriate at any given time.
And Lizard’s opposite number is bitching about the disproportionate number of threads devoted to black issues.
I found it very telling that he was prepared to reduce gay issues to whom they wanted to have sex with. News for you, Lizzie – according to Lawrence v. Texas, they’re free to have sex with whomever they want (presuming adult consent) so long as they don’t “do it in the streets and scare the horses.” D’you think perhaps you can stretch your mind to grasp that, in their view at least (and mine too), what they’re asking for is precisely what blacks were asking for back when, with appropriate changes rung – the equality before the law that everyone else gets as a matter of choice. That perhaps matt_mcl and Potter want precisely the same treatment before the courts, in the schools and offices and hospitals and such, that Skulldigger and I get as a matter of course?
Yes, we do need more gay threads. Because the message that they’re people like you and me, with the same wants and needs and dreams and sorrows as you and me, doesn’t seem to have penetrated to a long-time member’s brain.
With the broader category below, Gay threads make up 1/5 of the current pit threads. That’s a lot. That only leaves you 4/5 of the board to read. Now, your rant is not unprecedented. The Personal Annoyances category has been bashed several times over the years, as whinyness gets tiring.
Now, obviously, the gay threads could fit into several categories, if they weren’t objectified by one component of their content. This thread, for instance, could go in Board pittings, and Eve and KellyM’s threads could go into Moral Objections. Any Phelps thread belongs in Humor. That would leave you with 5 threads to avoid, leaving you almost 90% of today’s BBQ Pit for personal enjoyment.
However, I sympathize that you may innocently click on a thread where the plaintiff or the defendent or the issue happens to be gay. Thank the Asgard that they’re clearly labeled to prevent that.
Personally, I tend to avoid the Middle East threads (unless I’m looking for a train wreck or cathartic horror), and the Moral Objections threads (same reason), and the Object-Oriented pittings (I find ranting about problems that have solutions frustrating), so I have even less to read than you do. My personal favorite is the meltdown thread, and we haven’t had one of those in ages. And yet, I manage, somehow, to hold back from digging nails through my arms.
Middle East (6)
american beheaded in Iraq, video
Congressman Pete Stark (D-Fremont CA), you are a moron.
Palestinian scum
Rumsfeld- Not-Lying or Incompetent? (Again)
Arab militia decapitate American with knife
US military in torture scandal
Gay (9)
What the FUCK is the Virginia Legislature thinking (gay marriage)
What’s up with Camille Paglia?
With Gays Like These, Who Needs Enemies?
We need more queer threads. I mean, a LOT of them. (OMG! If you hadn’t posted, there’d be one less!)
Anti-gay pol dies
Today Mass. starts giving out gay marriage licenses!
So much for the HRC… (How ironic, putting this in the gay category)
Methodists Avoid Scism; Condemn Homosexuals
It’s Phred Time in Rapid City!
Personal Annoyances - Pitting a person the OP knows in real life. Includes Cow-Orkers and Neighbors. (13)
Convince me why I should go out with nerd girl.
Hey, Aftershave Boy! Cut it out!
To the woman down the hall who’s “allergic” to the soap in the ladies’ room…
A Portrait of the Boss As a Turd Fondler
If the door is closed, that means KNOCK FIRST!
Happy Mother’s Day. Here’s your fucking gift
People who cry Racism
All technology sucks
My bike got stolen. I hate bike thieves.
Just what I needed - more spam!
Pests in (and around) my house
I. Am. So. Fucking. Sick. Of. THOSE BIGOTS!!!
Stupid kid and stupider mother
Moral Objections - Pitting Something the OP has Read from a News Outlet (5)
Okay Vermonters, get your asses in here and explain
“Pay up or zip up:” Deadbeat dad told to avoid having more kids
Dang, I had thought Canada was rid of anti-semitism.
Load of Shit Ignorant Fucks (in re: parenting)
Screw asshole drivers who try to roll out of intersections into the flow of traffic
Board-Related Issues and Humor (3)
Roland Deschain - 167 posts in 11 days - What the Fuck ?
Mini Rants. Not just for breakfast anymore!
Irrational hatreds?
Object-Oriented Pittings (Fetish pittings?) (7)
Tripping the Rift, WTF?
HA! Fuck you I-Worm/Sober.F, YOU LOSE!
Hey shithead bee, chase THIS! sprays Raid everywhere
Dyed red mulch does vex me
Fuck you, Ad Aware
Fucking refrigerator
I hate dieting
Spam (1)
If you love this country, don’t buy the Muslim Stamp!
Absolutely.
Imagine if that thread got Slashdotted.
:eek:
The funny thing is, there aren’t a huge number of gay threads by SDMB historical standards. I wonder what the OP would have thought around the time Lawrence was being considered/handed down, when the Dope was the “all gay marriage all the time” message board (or so it sometimes seemed, anyway).
If there was ever a reason to give SDMB rebates for colorful phrasing, this would be one. Heh. Slackjawed schnook. Heh.
Well, the thing is, a lot of people think gays are circus freaks and they need to hear “normal” stories of love and grieving to put a human face on them. That’s the point. They aren’t more interesting, per se…but they certainly aren’t freaks. Stories like that have a purpose.
And I daresay, it is relevant, considering all the legal and religious decisions that are being made today.