Originally Posted By Inspector 57 I think having sex in a public restroom is sad. That's not a moral judgement. It's a comment on how desperate guys must be for some sexual contact with other guys to be willing to take the chance of being caught and having their lives ruined. This case is pretty tragic. Now, backing up and looking at the bigger picture: WHY would someone be desperate enough to take this chance? It's because he'd been taught all his life that homosexuality is perverse and shameful. All aspects of American culture reinforced that message up until... what? 35? 30? 25 years ago? (When did we first see a non "gay activist" take a bold public gay-is-okay stance?) These days we have positive gay characters on TV shows, "out" gay musicians, and respected straight role models unapologetically and unselfconsciously having close gay friends. But we still have plenty of institutions and individuals preaching the "gay is evil" message. What do these preachers think they're accomplishing? They're certainly not changing the number of gay people in society. They're only making gay people: miserable; closeted; and prone to having sex in bathrooms because they can't feel free to pursue relationships in healthier ways. The Republicans/fundamentalists, for one, need to get a clue. You can't credibly demonize and try to suppress a human condition and then be mortified when your actions cause people with that condition to act out in inappropriate ways. If we want to stop all the unhealthy behavior that goes with being closeted, we need to stop sending the messages that put guys in the closet in the first place. This is exactly why cities should send firefighters to gay parades, just as they send them to all the other parades. You can't have it both ways.
Originally Posted By Inspector 57 <<Well, other than not having a hit record for another 10+ years. ;>>> LOL! I want your s**! Er, "vote!" I meant "vote!" I want your VOTE!
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan Here's a great oped piece from earlier this summer by Michael Kinsley. <a href="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0" target="_blank">http://www.time.com/time/magaz ine/article/0</a>,9171,1633076,00.html
Originally Posted By Inspector 57 <a href="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0" target="_blank">http://www.time.com/time/magaz ine/article/0</a>,9171,1633076,00.html
Originally Posted By Inspector 57 Oops. It's worth doing the cut and paste. It's a very well written essay arguing that Republicans' unchanging stance on homosexuality is increasingly showing them to be embarrassingly out of touch both with truth and with an enlightened society.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan Sorry about the link, you'll have to cut & paste it. The gist of the article is that the GOP is lagging way behind the curve in America in its understanding of the need to treat gays with equality. i posted it because Inspector's post addressing the shame and backwards attitudes of someone like the good senator is an example of how behind the curve they are as a party on this issue. >>The debate of 14 years ago about gays in the military seems almost quaint. Kids grow up today with gay friends, gay parents, gay parents of friends and gay friends of parents. If only blacks and whites were as thoroughly mixed together in society as gays and straights are. Kids are also exposed constantly to an entertainment culture in which gays are not merely accepted but in some ways dominant. You rarely see a reality show without a gay cast member, while Rosie O'Donnell is a coveted free agent and Ellen DeGeneres is America's sweetheart. The notion that gays must be segregated out of the military for the sake of our national security must strike Americans younger than, say, 40 as simply weird, just as we of the previous generation find the rules of racial segregation weird. (O.K., run that by me again: they needed separate drinking fountains because ... why?)<<
Originally Posted By gadzuux A republican cannot win without the support of the christian right. Ergo, they either have to be one of them or pander to them. Anything else and they're an also-ran. Watch rudy and romney flame out between now and the convention. They don't have the christian right bloc, so they're sunk. It's an appalling state of affairs for the republican party, but they've only their own short-sightedness to blame.
Originally Posted By Mr X To get back to the serious issue of police, entrapment, and the use of intimidation...anyone seen the interview transcript? <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/08/30/craig.transcript/index.html" target="_blank">http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITI CS/08/30/craig.transcript/index.html</a> Total harrassment. The cop was enjoying embarrassing the guy and calling him a liar (which is pretty much the point of such stakeouts anyway right?). Yet more reason for me to hate cops, but anyway... Yeah, this whole sort of thing is a way to harass gays, and we all most cops salivate at the very idea. As for this guy, I'm starting to think he DID get railroaded (in the sense that it was clearly a case of entrapment and intimidation...I'm not denying that the guy was probably "cruising" for sex).
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <WHY would someone be desperate enough to take this chance? It's because he'd been taught all his life that homosexuality is perverse and shameful.> I'm not saying that isn't an important component, but I think there may be more to it. I read a while ago that sucessful or very bright people often take inordinate risks. They get to be successful because they're willing to take risks, and once they are successful, they've become addicted to risk taking. I think there's a good possibility that Sen Craig wasn't just looking for gay sex, but was looking for dangerous gay sex. The chance of getting caught was part of the excitement.
Originally Posted By Inspector 57 Good point. I'll give you that. Sounds like the thousands of straight people who have supposedly joined the "mile high" club. But it doesn't explain why the majority of guys arrested for public homosexual activity are in heterosexual relationships.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <But it doesn't explain why the majority of guys arrested for public homosexual activity are in heterosexual relationships.> I'm not sure that's true. I think it's just more newsworthy when it's a celebrity who claims to be a heterosexual.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>I think there's a good possibility that Sen Craig wasn't just looking for gay sex, but was looking for dangerous gay sex. The chance of getting caught was part of the excitement.<< Agree... with... Douglas... need... doctor... to... stop... heart attack... and onset... of... shock.
Originally Posted By imadisneygal Risk taking behavior is also a symptom of depression in men, not so much in women. It is possible that he knows he's gay and because he is unable to face it he's suffering from depression. It's not uncommon for people who are gay but haven't come out yet, or are in the process of coming out, to deal with depression. It's also possible that he just wanted a little action and isn't at all depressed. Just a thought...
Originally Posted By Mr X DisneyGal, excellent points. Except that, I would say that a man of his age and the public nature of his rantings leads me to believe that he DOESN'T know he's gay (if that makes any sense)...even in the face of this situation, he can't bring himself to face that fact. The denial of the whole thing is really quite sad, frankly. He could probably do a lot of good for gays everywhere if he had the guts to be honest at this point (like Barney Frank did so many ages ago...reporter "are you gay?", Frank "yeah. so what?"). Of course, Republicans of all stripes would tar and feather him even further, but he might actually find some support from the OTHER side (you know, the awful liberals)... Plus it's not fair for his family for him to not be honest at this point...it's obvious as my skin is pasty white that he DID try to have sex with men in a toilet. It's stupid for him to deny it. Having said that though, the police entrapment crap still ticks me off incredibly...some (most?) cops are such scumbags!
Originally Posted By BlueDevilSF Building on DisneyGal's comments, I read this on the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's website. <a href="http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/26263150D474C4EE8625734800098FDC?OpenDocument" target="_blank">http://www.stltoday.com/stltod ay/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/26263150D474C4EE8625734800098FDC?OpenDocument</a> >>The parallels between Humphreys' research and the accusations against Craig, the Republican senator from Idaho, are striking. The undercover cop described how the senator tapped his foot in a stall at the Minneapolis airport in June and reached under the divider as an invitation for "lewd conduct." Even the senator's very public "I am not gay" protest earlier this week matches the theme of men whose actions do not match their public identities.<< It's an interesting article worth reading...
Originally Posted By Dabob2 (I-57)<If we want to stop all the unhealthy behavior that goes with being closeted, we need to stop sending the messages that put guys in the closet in the first place.> Exactly, Inspector. Great post. (DD): <I think there's a good possibility that Sen Craig wasn't just looking for gay sex, but was looking for dangerous gay sex. The chance of getting caught was part of the excitement.> That's possible, yes, although we don't know. What we do know is that for deeply closeted men of Craig's generation, men's room sex is one of THE ways to get sex, period. He's probably been doing this "dance" for decades. When I read about the whole foot-tapping, foot-brushing, hand-reaching procedure, I instantly flashed back to being 11 or 12 and reading about that very procedure (pretty much step for step) in, of all places, my parents' copy of Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid to Ask. Even at that age, I knew I was gay, so along with reading the rest of the book in the hope (at that time) that I might need it some day, I read the one chapter on homosexuality with great interest, and I remember getting really depressed. THIS is what I have to look forward to? Sad, lonely, furtive sex in a men's room? That's it? Damn. Looking back now, it's amazing how much Dr. Rubin got wrong, and of course he made the mistake I-57 alluded to by confusing the consequences of shaming and closeting with the essence of being gay. But for deeply closeted men of Craig's generation - the men's room was where you went. I'm sure there was no gay bar in Boise (or anywhere in Idaho) when he was a young man, no place for gay people to meet each other openly. So what do you do? You meet where you can, and internalize the shame and what other people are saying about being gay.
