CIGAR,
WHISKEY AND FIRESIDE AFFIRMATIONS OF A
MAN’S
MAN…
There’s nothing particularly unusual about being
a man’s man or just a regular naturally masculine guy and also being gay. I am always shocked when I hear other people
stereotype gay men under a feminine umbrella when my gay experience to the
contrary is filled with masculine gay men who unwittingly fail to set off societies
Gaydar whilst living comfortably gay
lives. When I look around seeing family
in so many masculine brothers all around me it highlights an entirely invisible
world of gay men who are never given a chance to represent the gay community in
the eyes of those looking from the outside in.
Why some men are qualified as gay and others are not is purely a matter
of prejudice and in many cases benign ignorance on the part of those who
honestly do not know or care. The end
result is a perceptual stereotype whose faulty Gaydar scans all men but erroneously
seperates them within a narrow meter-band of gay and straight or
female-identified or male-identified based on a superficial evaluation of
behavioral characteristics. What gets lost
is the broad spectrum of diversity embedded within the definition of what a gay
man can be. This fault is not isolated
to the non-gay community; I have met gay men who have become so inundated in a
world of femininity they no longer have the ability to identify with what you
and I might call regular, masculine gay men.
Likewise and perhaps by default, many men who fill the broad category of
what we might call regular, naturally masculine gay men have also surrounded
themselves with themselves and through this type of social isolation they
run the risk that they may lose their
ability to relate to their more feminine brothers. It is a common social characteristic that
people who share cultural similarities gravitate toward each other and there
can certainly be no harm in forming Gemini-alliances as long as the attraction
does not become a study of isolationism.
I came out to my father at 15 years of age a
rusty-butt teenager still catching turtles and crawfish, climbing trees and
riding my 10-speed and dirt bike through the woods behind our house. At that time he advised me that it was a sign
of integrity to intelligently confront the nature of my sexual orientation but
that otherwise nothing about me had fundamentally changed. I was still the bright and ruggedly
adventurous adolescent I had been a minute before that revelation and
invariably the same held true that I had not transformed from the person I had
been 2, 3 or 5 years before my unveiling as a modern homosexual in late
twentieth century America and there was no reason to change in the seconds, hours,
months and years hence. My father has
always been a master of rational thought; he possesses the ability to
communicate complex messages in a simple, immediately digestible form. What my father was saying to me that day was
that regardless of what my sexual orientation was I was still the man I had
always been and he expected me to fulfill his, my mother’s and my own high
expectations for me. Nothing, absolutely
nothing had changed except that I had verbalized what my parents and I already
knew. My parents knew that I loved being
a boy and that I was fascinated by the promise of manhood. I was
expected to continue growing in my exploration and accomplishment of manhood,
to complete college and to become a pillar of my community. If you had grown up in my family these values
were sacrosanct and for my part I had no problem adopting them as my own. My parents knew me better than I knew myself
and in his way my father was also telling me that in my exploration of my gay
manhood I should be careful not to affect the mannerisms and lifestyle of a culture
I knew nothing about merely because it would embrace me as an openly homosexual
man. Today I am thankful that he
challenged me that day all the while being a living example of the man and
gentleman I should aspire to become… For
when I entered the gay lifestyle as a verdant youth I saw a world that did not possess
any of the strong , wholesome family values to which I was accustomed. It was a narcissistic world obsessed with sex
at any cost. It was also a world
comprised of men whom I admired for being openly gay activists but whom I otherwise
shared nothing in common besides my sexual orientation. I was immediately dismayed at the strong masculine/feminine
polarization and at that tender age did not understand the overlay of effeminacy
in men who might otherwise be perfectly masculine. I will
admit that I was appalled at effeminate men at that time but it was because I
had not the ability or interest to understand them. Today
I understand and respect the right of any man to be whatever he desires
including his right to explore his feminine side to whatever extent he chooses;
but that it is not the road for me… I love being a man and I am enamored of the
manly things in this world… it is my right and privilege to feel this way…
There is a new and amazing kind of gay man waking
up all around this country. He is not stuck
at one of the absolute poles of what we define a man to be or not to be. There is nothing wrong with being at those
extremes but what is wrong is society’s insistence on fitting all gay men into
those absolute and outmoded cubby holes.
As more gay men become
comfortable with their new freedom of expression and acceptance in mainstream
culture they will also begin to demand that society represent them in a manner
that better represents reality. That is
to say that all gay men are not effeminate so in time they will demand that the
media and society stop misrepresenting them as feminine. Since society disproportionately represents
gay men as effeminate the backlash from gay men will be to lobby for revised media
images that portray gay men closer to be standard for heterosexual men. Rule number one of marketing is that consumers
can be reached more effectively by media that utilizes images they identify with
personally. I remember the first time I walked into a
popular gay bar called “The Delta Elite” in 1977. What I experienced was completely beyond my
comprehension, the men there, (or at least those whom I saw in my brief sojourn),
appeared to be a grotesque caricature of feminine or masculine. I evacuated myself from that club immediately;
it was far too real for a 15 year old adolescent who had naively set upon a
cool expedition to experience others of his kind. As the kids say, I couldn’t get ready for
what I saw that night; I have always admitted that. At that time I had never heard of butch or
drag, top or bottom I had no idea what trade was or prison trade and to be
honest after my immersion in that world I was cured of all curiosity and went
back to my turtles and to climbing trees.
Fast forward 4 or 5 years and the landscape of that club radically
changed as did my ability to identify with what I experienced there. But ever present were the words of my father
reminding me that somehow this world was not an extension of the warm gracious
home and family that nurtured me into manhood.
It represented a self-absorbed consciousness launched as an escape from
the rapidly changing socio-economic structure of a once quiet southern
metropolis. It was the hush before the
storm. Within the next few years
beginning with 1980 Aids would consume the lives of nearly all of my gay
friends with no explanation whatsoever for why they were claimed and I was
spared! I watched them die as I became a
man graduating from high school, entering and completing college and following
in my father’s footsteps as a professional man.
When I finally woke up the world and I had radically changed and there
was a quiet movement afoot pioneered by the two gay black activists Essex Hemphill
and Marlon Riggs who would be consumed by Aids but whose legacy would transform
the way the world thought about gay men.
Marlon and Essex defied the stereotypical image of a gay man they were
robustly masculine and when I first saw them in the media it was a life
transforming experience. At the time I
had no idea that I would actually meet and get to know them, to befriend
them. Without debasing anyone these two
men proclaimed that a gay black man could look, act, talk and achieve the same
if not better than any straight man and also stand as an example of robust
masculinity. The world had irreversibly changed
and when Essex published his poem “American Wedding” the soil was sewn for the
cultivation of gay marriage in America. These
men were not just image they were historic icons of the gay movement and they
forced all men to confront the fact that gay men could be as masculine as
anyone else…
What we see before us are a growing number of
naturally masculine gay men or men who more closely mirror heterosexual men
behaviorally except for their sexual orientation… Enter the new generation of
gay men enjoying a rich, unprecedented time when homosexuality is as normal as
fried chicken, potato salad and collard greens… this new generation of gay men
does not have to affect campy behavioral stereotypes in order to belong to an
insular community they are free to be whatever it is that defines themselves. A gay man who more closely identifies with
the behavior of traditional heterosexual men should not feel pressured to
falsely emulate established gay behavior in order to be down with his peoples…
they must accept him the same as they expect straight men who meet society’s
standards for masculinity to accept feminine gay men.
So what do I mean by the term, “Naturally
Masculine”? I consider it to be a no brainer that all males are naturally males when viewed from a purely genetic
perspective. How much does genetics figure
in a game that focuses more on tangible qualities considered to be norms for
masculinity and manhood. Genetics is an
evolutionary process growing from infancy into boyhood then to adolescence and finally
manhood but society has established behavioral overlays that qualify and
quantify boyhood and manhood according to centuries old traditions. So when I say naturally masculine I mean genetic
manhood enhanced with the behavioral overlay of traditional, cultural
manhood. Because sexual orientation
appears to be more subjective it is probably not genetic in most cases it is
the result of individual preference and therefore not related to genetic or
traditional-behavioral aesthetics of manhood.
I believe it is not clear rather sexual orientation is genetic or
learned and I honestly believe it can be a healthy admixture of both but
patently unique to the individual and therefore should be respected as a
beautiful mystery… Traditionally homosexuality has not been associated with
manhood as a social norm so it is not a hallmark of what the majority of people
would call natural masculinity but historically many men fitting the
classification of being naturally masculine have been homosexual suppressing
their sexual orientation but adopting and cultivating the societal customs
defining manhood. We know that just because a majority agrees
that masculine means this and not that does not make them right! Nor does it make them or anyone else wrong
for identifying with what is considered to be the societal norm whilst also
adapting features that do not conform to social stereotypes such as
homosexuality. The bottom line is that
we can launch a high-fallut’n debate on this issue until we can no longer draw
breath but the simple and most elegant solution is to be tolerant of everybody.
In order to be tolerant we first have to be able
to identify and understand the problems with our ability to quantify qualify
and process differing values of masculinity.
It is a commonly accepted truth that when we are intolerant we oppress
the freedom of others. The gay movement
has fought hard against intolerance and its war has begun to show miraculous
evidence of a successful revolution. Can
it be possible that those presumed to be oppressive simply because they
represent a majority are not actually so, that they are simply being themselves
and have no real ill-intent? Try to convince the underdog? Well, during their struggle as gay men push
father away from being the underdogs they really must thank their heterosexual
comrades for proving they are not the oppressors. I think there is enough room in this world
for gay and straight men to both carve out and enjoy their own slice of
paradise!
I overheard a man saying that, “The flamboyantly feminine and masculine
behavior patterns that typified gay culture of previous decades are no longer
necessary as mainstream acceptance and cultural assimilation begin to open up more
options in the broader spectrum of human culture”. But that argument seemed to reduce gay men to
a “Behavior Pattern” ignoring them as living breathing human beings and men. So I reexamined my definition for “Natural
Masculinity” and now I caution everyone to stay away from being overly clinical
in your understanding of the human condition… manhood and masculinity cannot be
totally defined though behavior and certainly not by cultural norms and
folkways, there must be a great deal of flexibility to allow a male to insert
his unique brand of self into the equation.
So what we can qualify as naturally masculine may or may not conform to
societal norms or traditions and there should be a vast range of interpretation
allowing a male to be the man he desires… that is if he even desires to be a man or
not.
As for the
fear that due to cultural assimilation the extreme values of homosexual
behavior will disappear as gay men assimilate social norms of masculinity and gay
men will not find each other in the absence of these cherished hallmarks we can
safely expect that being open about ones sexuality will certainly allow gay men
to easily identify communicate with each other.
It is absurd to expect that gay men will all move away from traditionally
gay behavioral patterns through cultural assimilation into the mainstream but
it will certainly occur to a greater extent by default. What is most important is that gay men are
able to be accepted by society as men no matter how masculine they appear and
that gay men are able to accept their more traditionally masculine bothers
allowing them their own freedom of self-expression within the gay
experience. Last of all it is essential that
gay men are not pressured to revise themselves to conform to traditional gay
camps in order to be accepted and that such men understand that they coming out
does not mean they have to literally discard their old selves for a new
one.
I’ve written on this subject many, many times and
each time I explore a different element of the theme of masculine gay men. They are here, they have always been here
and they will continue to grow in number.
Not that there is any gay challenge afoot between masculine and feminine
gay men. But many masculine gay men, not
all, feel as if they have something to prove about their manhood because they
do not want to be identified with their feminine brothers. In the spirit of the day they want to live
their lives out in the open but they dread the possibility that someone will
treat them like a woman even though they clearly project a naturally masculine
image and personality. Feminine gay men are very often correct to
assume that they are ostracized from the ranks of what have formerly been
called “Butch Men” or masculine men who
gravitate toward each other in their pursuit of ultimate manhood. Change is always difficult. The changing way that the world views gay men
will ultimately place the more male-identified man in his proper position
dispelling the myth that all gay men desire to be women. This means that the more feminine gay men
will have to share the limelight with their masculine brothers. This means less “Canne-Canne” and more “Camp-Fire”. So I have to thank my father and mother for
helping me to appreciate where I stood along my journey to manhood. The gay lifestyle was a loud and compelling
argument but there was always something alien and ingenuous about it to me that
did not speak to my passion for being a man in the traditional sense. And I am a traditional man. Had I chosen to digress from or abandon my
passion for traditional manhood to assimilate the gay culture at the time I came
out I should have grave issues to face at 52 years of age and be faced with the
prospect of making up for 38 years. Fortunately
that is not the case, I followed my bliss and cultivated manhood for 38 years,
looking back and seeing the man I have become juxtaposed to the awesome example
of my princely father I should not have chosen any other way…
FIN
BIGDADDY
BLUES
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