Labels and Identities

Some people in our community have problems with those of us who have "gay identities."

There are many, many things that make up me -- make up all of us -- as an individual, and being gay is only one of those things, but it's important to me. I don't define myself by my sexuality, but I don't pretend it doesn't exist or has absolutely no importance. Yet you can tell from the title of my blog that I have many identities and all of them are important to me. [It's amazing how some people focus in on the "Jewish" or the "Gay" and ignore everything else. Perhaps my most imporant identity is "Author."]

You often come across people who say "I don't like labels." If they're celebrities, it generally means that they're gay but don't want to say so publicly, no matter how often they've been spotted making out with a guy by Perez Hilton or his spies. It's rather comical at times. You feel like saying, "sure you don't like labels, but you do like guys, don't you?"

Non-celebrities who hate labels -- or at least the "gay" label -- often are dealing with perhaps unacknowledged issues of shame. They're gay -- they just don't want to call themselves that, or have anyone else calling them that.

Recently, on a gay message board, I came across two opposing posts on the issue. The first ended with: "Labels are dangerous. They cause us to question ourselves by forcing us to conform to perceived niches of difference, rather than an ever-changing spectrum of existence."

But the very next person posted: "Labels are only as bad as we allow them to be. We label to help us make sense of our world and our place in it.

I've never understood this terrified run from simple identification. I suspect more often than not, it has more to do with abject terror of what accepting a particular label (in particular gay or bi) means for a person's feelings of self-worth. So I can stuff my face with cock but as long as I say I'm straight I'm still normal and ok and acceptable? There's a river in Egypt full of these people. Me personally, I'd rather follow the dictum, 'Know thyself.'

And frankly, the only way labels for sexuality would not be necessary is if every single person were bisexual and even then everyone would have to be equally bisexual in the same way. I dare you to find a room full of bisexuals and get them to do that. HAhahaha!"

I which I could give this person credit for his wise remarks, but he's, unfortunately, anonymous. I love his statement: "I've never understood this terrified run from simple identification." It's called "internalized homophobia." And may I add that labeling yourself -- gay or anything else -- does not mean that you're forcing yourself to "conform to perceived niches of difference." That's just a lot of double-talk. You can be gay all your life and go through a lot of changes and broadening experiences on many levels. as it isn't all about sex.

For minority groups like ours, having a Gay [or Black or Jewish etc.] identity is generally an expression of pride, the opposite of the shame that inflicts some members of our and other communities. There are African-Americans who bleach their skin, straighten their hair, and date only white people, and others who are intensely proud of their blackness and -- while they may date or marry a non-black -- do not do so because they think non-blacks are superior. There are Jews in this country who changed their names to one less obviously Jewish [such as the filmmakers even in the days before the holocaust], which was the Jewish equivalent of going into the closet.

What's wrong with being proud of who you are?

What's wrong with having a gay identity and labeling yourself as gay?

As this is Valentine's Day, let me add that there's nothing wrong in loving [that is, not hating] yourself.

Questioning?

A newspaper in Portland, Oregon reported:

"Sharing a meal at a Loaves & Fishes Center gives senior citizens the opportunity to save money, get out of the house, catch up with old friends and make new ones. Now GLBT seniors can enjoy these activities at a new Loaves & Fishes site designed as a safe, welcoming space for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, questioning and intersex seniors. This is the first program of its kind in the Northwest."
Don't get me wrong. I think there should be special spaces and programs for LGBT seniors, but what made me laugh is the inclusion in the news story of the word "questioning." [The inclusion of "intersex" also gave me pause, as I doubt if there's any -- or many -- intersexed individuals in Portland or anywhere else. Not putting anyone down, here, just being factual. At least they didn't include "asexual!"]
I mean, imagine being a senior citizen and you're still "questioning" your sexuality!
Of course, this probably isn't as bizarre as it sounds, as there are many repressed and closeted individuals-in-denial of all ages within the fringes of the gay community. Larry Craig, anyone? And all those "straight" guys seeking regular sex with men that gay therapist Joe Kort thinks are really heterosexual. Give me a break!
Still, imagine that you're pushing eighty and you're still confused about your sexual orientation!
Confusion is understandable in youth. You don't fit the stereotypes, you have some (minor) interest in the opposite sex, you're dealing with internalized homophobia and so on. But after awhile one has to face the facts.
In other words, if you're questioning whether or not you're gay, you're probably gay.
And as I've said many times, it's okay to be gay.

The 24th Day: A Gay Misfire

LOGO has been showing a 2004 film called The 24th Day a lot lately. It comes off to me as a film that exploits gay and HIV subject matter, throws in some interesting tidbits, but doesn't really know what to do with them, mostly due to the insufficiencies of the screenwriter. Based on a play by one Tony Piccirillo, it was also written and directed by him. According to Piccirillo, he got the idea for the play after he got strep throat or something after a brief affair with a woman (sic), and a nurse suggested he should get tested for AIDS. He confronted the woman, who told him he was making too much of it. This somehow evolved into an essentially gay film (what -- heteros don't get HIV?) about a married-and-in-denial guy, Tom (Scott Speedman) who ties up an out-of-the-closet gay man, Dan (James Marsden of X-Men) because he thinks he gave him AIDS during an encounter years before. It turns out that Tom was married, and his wife committed suicide after learning she had AIDS. He claims that he is essentially straight and had only one sexual encounter with a man -- Dan. He feels that Dan to all intents and purposes murdered his wife and ruined his life. Dan says he didn't force him to commit adultery with a man and it's Tom's fault if he passed HIV along to his unknowing spouse. Tom takes a sample of Dan's blood, gives it to a friend to take to a lab, and says he'll set Dan free if he's HIV negative, and kill him if he's positive.

Yuchhh. First let me say that the main problem with the film -- and there are many -- is that we've got a situation where a self-deceptive, self-hating, homophobic closet queen somehow holds himself to be morally superior to an out-of-the-closet gay man. There doesn't seem to be any indication that Dan knew he was HIV positive (assuming he is) at the time of their encounter, and Tom himself takes no responsibility for having unsafe sex. Dan does suggest that Tom may well have had many more homo encounters than he's admitting to, and also advises him that since his wife had symptoms first, she actually might have given the virus to her husband. To be fair, this is an intriguing (if melodramatic) situation, but the movie doesn't make the most of it, going awry long before the conclusion.

Unwisely, the film tries to be trendy when it comes to sexual identity. Dan admits that just because he has sex with a woman now and then doesn't mean he's straight (or even bi), that he has absolutely no intention of giving up men and getting a wife. Fine. But he seems to agree with Tom that an occasional episode with a man doesn't make a man gay or bi, which is ludicrous at its core. If we didn't live in a world that was full of homophobia and yet devoid of heterophobia (which affects every gay person even on a subconsious level) I might buy this notion of "bicuriosity." On the contrary, I think it's bullshit. Bicurious men are men who can't quite accept their homosexuality, plain and simple, political correctness and bisexuality be damned.

Instead of really exploring this issue -- one of internalized homophobia -- Piccirillo gives Dan a ludicrous speech about not putting people in boxes, and how men who are essentially straight but also attracted to men have a more difficult time of it than women in the same (if opposite) situation. "It's totally messed up for guys who prefer women and have a slight curiosity about men. ... "

And : "Being with a man or wanting to be with a man doesn't make you gay ... "

Uh, sure.

Let me make it clear that this speech is not given to Tom, the closet case, but to Dan, the gay guy! But it's just the sort of thing that gay guys in denial are always saying. [Read my controversial post, Seriously in Denial.]

Now another problem with this project is that it doesn't seem to be the product of what you might call gay sensibilities. The two lead actors are apparently straight. All I know about Piccirillo is that he had a four-year-old son at the time of the film's release and once upon a time was afraid he'd caught AIDS from a girlfriend. And isn't it ridiculous that in the 21st century we still don't really know who's gay or who isn't or who's in denial and who's supposedly "bi-curious" and even if we do know we can't come right out and say because even though there's nothing wrong with being gay saying someone is gay can still be considered as libelous as saying someone is a serial killer or a terrorist. (All right -- take a deep breath after that sentence.)

That being said, I also must say that I have no personal knowledge of the private lives of Marsden, Speedman, or Piccirillo. Another truth is that The 24th Day comes off as the project of straight men who are totally out of their depth (and closet cases -- not that I'm saying that that's what we're dealing with here -- might just as well be straight due to their lack of any gay sensibility). One has to ask why Piccirillo couldn't have used heterosexual characters in the same situations - after all he supposedly got the idea from an encounter with a woman. Did he think The 24th Day might get more attention or support as a "gay" movie? Does he still think AIDS is a "gay disease?" It's like having a Caucasian writing a play about African-Americans and inevitably getting it all wrong. Sometimes going for publicity-generating controversy is the worst way to go. (By the way, the title refers to the fact that Tom learned he had HIV 24 days before the film proper begins.)

The film is also a disappointment on the artistic front. A really great play could have been written employing these two characters and dealing with the same themes -- certainly personal responsibility as well as responsibility to others is important these days when it comes to the HIV pandemic (but this is as true for straights as it is for gays) -- but Piccirillo is stepping out of his league in tackling these matters. As a director, he fails to imbue his film with enough thrills or tension (it's supposed to be a thriller, after all, but mostly comes off as a talky videotaped stage play). The performances of Marsden and Speedman are certainly not awful, but the actors aren't quite up to the script's challenges, and soft-spoken Speedman is often unintelligible. They don't really seem to understand the characters -- but neither does Piccirillo. [Does he relate at all to Dan? Does he relate to the pathetic Tom?] To be fair to Piccirillo, he makes an effort, but whether the problem is lack of identification or lack of talent or both, it just isn't enough.

And why on earth does Picirillo have the two men go on and on about the show Charlie's Angels, which these characters, given their relative youth, could only have seen on TVLand if at all? I have had countless conversations with gay men of all types and ages over the years but I've yet to have a conversation about Charlie's Angels, be it TV show or movie.

I don't know if Dan was originally conceived as a "pig," a gay man who will try just about anything, safe sex be damned. There's no denying that men like this exist, but they also have their heterosexual equivalent. But there are a great many gay men who are constantly conscious of safe sex, carry condoms at all times, and are responsible to themselves and to their sex partners. Straight characters [a widow whose husband died of AIDS confronts the male drug user who gave her HIV, for instance] might have actually made the play/movie even more controversial and timely, given how HIV infection is rising in the heterosexual community.

Given its subject matter, I guess I can't fault LOGO for airing the film so that the three or four people who've heard of it can make up their own minds. Frankly The 24th Day muffs so many great opportunities for drama and enlightenment that I can't think of a better place for it than at 5 AM in the morning. Too bad. Interesting situations and discussions are sort of frittered away in a two-man acting exercise where the uncertain actors sort of sink to the level of the exploitative material.