Oy Vey! Gay Weddings and Sex and the City 2

The problem I've always had with the admittedly humorous show Sex and the City and the movies thereof was its decidedly stereotypical treatment of gay men. [Also the fact that lead character Carrie is rather shallow and uncultured. Supposed to go to the opera with a guy on one episode, she decides to forgo the Metropolitan and hit McDonald's instead. Huh?]

The two main gay characters on the show were both big queens [not that there's anything wrong in that], one of whom was kind of sweet and likable, and the other of whom was bitchy, grotesque and altogether repulsive. These two went out on one blind date and hated each other almost on sight. So what happens in Sex and the City 2? These two get married in the Big Gay Wedding that occurs early in the film.

Yes, yes, I suppose it's okay to poke fun at gay stereotypes at times, but am I the only person who's getting tired of references to gays and musicals, gays and Liza Minnelli (who officiates at the wedding, which is mildly amusing), and the like. Virtually every gay guy depicted at the wedding is a screaming queen. In one scene at the bar, Carrie's husband "Big" [I never quite understood what she saw in this guy, who is quite a bit older than her in addition to other problems] is hit on by a gay guy who is played by an actor who resorts to such "faggot" mugging that you'd swear you had temporarily switched to The Gay Deceivers or something along those lines.

Then the girls go to an Arab nation on a junket and are each assigned a kind of butler/personal concierge. The gay one is, of course, effeminate and nicknamed "Paula" after Paula Abdul. There are the usual tiresome jokes about gays and hairdressing, decorating, dressing skills, even though most the gay guys I know have little knowledge of any of that shit. It's the old gay-guy-as-straight-woman's-accessory all over again.

What makes it worse is that Sex and the City 2 -- which seems to go on forever -- was written and directed by openly gay Michael Patrick King, who I have to assume must be a Big Ol' Queen or Swishmeister Deluxe with that painfully awful old-fashioned queer sensibility that thinks and/or suggests that All Gay Men are limp-wristed hairdressers. [And a reminder here that even out-of-the-closet gays can be dealing with issues of self-hatred.]

Sometimes if you object to stuff like this you're told by gays and straight alike to get over yourself, because -- after all -- there are gay guys like this out in the real world. This is the justification for a lot of gay humor/fag jokes that can be well-intentioned or mean-spirited. But I mean, the world already knows that some gay men are Big Queens -- can't we just get past it? Surely there's some humor to be mined in the bear community with its chubby chasers and big fat guys strutting around like sex symbols? [Then again -- maybe not. There's a kind of bearish gay couple on a show called Modern Family but they seem to be a couple of Big Queens as well.] Let's see something different and more diverse, please!

The thing is that stuff like Sex and the City -- while it has a large gay following I imagine -- is not directed specifically at gay people. I know that I am tired of the constant linking of gay men with fashion and hair-dressing, transvestism, and "girlie" attributes -- and the snide attitudes this engenders in even gay-friendly straights, many of whom are much more comfortable with obvious gay men and lesbians they can feel superior to [don't get me started!].

Gay men have had a perpetual problem in being taking seriously as men and stuff like The Producers and Sex and the City 2 -- no matter how supposedly good-natured -- don't help at all.

Coming Out with Codicils

Okay, so I was at my favorite watering hole one night when American Idol came on. [I'm not a fan of the show.] I'd heard one of the front runners was gay and I asked someone to point him out to me when he came on. Naturally, he turned out to be the one male contestant I would never fuck [and I'm sure he'd feel the same way]. Adam Lambert is nice looking in that "queeny" sort of way --not that there's anything wrong with that -- but why is it when celebrities or pseudo-celebrities or people famous for five minutes come out a.) you can sort of already tell that they're gay because they ring all the stereotype buttons and b.) if they're guys they have to have the whole teased hair, lip gloss kind of thing going on. If you knew how many gay men I know who are nothing like that ...

Of course the teased hair/lip gloss business is as much -- if not more -- theatrical than it is gay. I mean, we have to remember Gene Simmons of the rock group Kiss in his outrageous make up and he, presumably, is straight. [Why is it that so many hetero lover boys are well, repulsive -- you know, Charlie Sheen almost turns my stomach. It's not even their looks so much as a certain oily factor ... anyway, I digress.]

Some things never change. Lambert was interviewed on 20/20 -- not exactly a hard news program -- and they made a big fuckin' deal out of something he said late in the program. They even announced that Lambert was going to say something surprising. The presumably straight and nerdy male interviewer was practically smacking his lips over this announcement.

No, it wasn't that Lambert was gay, which he confirmed to 20/20 as he had to Rolling Stone in his interview there. No it was that Lambert, although not bisexual, wasn't opposed to -- gosh -- a little pussy. He claimed he made out with women when he'd had a few drinks [no surprise there] and that someday he might go all the way. "Who will be the lucky woman?" he wondered.

Give me a break! Lambert seems like a nice guy, but when he goes to bed with a woman it will be an act of lesbianism. I could be wrong, but I suspect he's a bottom -- nothing wrong with that -- so if he isn't interested in fucking guys he's going to be a big disappointment with whatever starstruck can-I-borrow-your-lip gloss gal he decides to hit the sheets with.

But there's a bigger question here. Who put Lambert up to this business and why did 20/20 have to make such a big deal of it. It was as if they were saying "Sure, he's a fag, but he's part normal, he might fuck a woman someday." What is this shit?

If Lambert made his remarks on his own it's due to his need to seem like a "regular guy," after all, to America. [Hint, Adam: Lose the shiny lip gloss.] But I suspect it may have been his advisers or business manager or agent. After all, many of his fans are young straight women. They might not buy his records or stay fans of his if they come to the conclusion that he's a hopeless, total fag. [To be fair, Lambert may have had nothing to do with the assholes at 20/20 playing up this part of the interview as if it were the most important thing Lambert had to say. Still ... ]

So again we have someone coming out, saying they're comfortable with their sexuality.

But if they're so comfortable -- why the hetero codicil?

You sometimes wish some people would just stay in the closet.