Male
Intimacy and Homophobia
From Menletter October 2010 By Tim Baehr Taunting of gay men and boys has
led to some well-publicized tragedies. One of the latest was that of a
Rutgers University freshman, Tyler Clementi. When
his roommate posted on the Internet a video of a sexual encounter between Clementi and another man, Clementi
took his own life by jumping off the George Washington Bridge. Clementi's case was not unique; there have been other suicides
among gay men who were taunted. The suicide rate among gay teens is at least
three times that of straight teens, according to a study reported in 1999 in
The Archives of Pediatric and Adolsecent Medicine.
Other studies show suicide rates among gay men and women of four to eight
times the general population. It's easy to think of the
typical taunter as a homophobic asshole who may be
protecting his own fragile sense of maleness. But homophobia is a strong
undercurrent among most of us guys - maybe not in the way we think and feel
but in the way we're immersed in a society that fosters the idea that being
gay is somehow not "right." It starts among young boys.
Sometime after the primary grades, one of the most insulting things a boy can
say to another boy is that he's gay, queer, a fag, a homo. Any sort of
gentleness or touching is labeled as gay. Flash forward to adulthood and
we see men relating to each other in superficial ways. We talk about work and
sports and cars and tools but not about our emotions. We make contact with
fist bumps, high fives, claps on the shoulder - or fistfights. We're afraid
that anything more intimate will be seen as gay, and we don't want to mess up
the tenuous male friendships we have (if we have any at all). Our behavior -
ritualized, attenuated, timid even - is what passes for masculinity nowadays. One particularly insidious
effect of our shying away from emotions is that we hide them not only from
other men but from ourselves and our intimate partners. So when our wife or
girlfriend says, "I can never tell what you're feeling," our
response is often an uncomfortable silence or the equivalent of "Me
neither." When we do express emotion or tenderness, even if we're not
labeled gay, we're told that we're expressing our inner feminine. As if there
were no place in the inner masculine for emotion or
tenderness. So it looks like expressing all
of who we are as men feels dangerous in the current social climate. We
stumble around, half-men, cut off at the knees. Where is it safe to be a
whole man: competitive, zany, strong, protective, assertive, focused - and
tender? One safe place is at a men's
gathering. In the "container" provided by a community of men, we
can do and say things that we'd never think of in the broader world. I've
seen real men, straight and gay, share their deepest fears and sorrows, joys
and victories. I've seen and heard tears and laughter, howling rages,
thoughtful silences. I've witnessed helpfulness and compassion. Some men feel
truly heard and appreciated for the first time in their lives. And some of us
discover a tenderness, physical and emotional, that
is different from what we experience in the broader world or with our
partners and that grows out of our understanding, finally, that we are not
alone. Another thing I've noticed is
that gender identity, gayness or straightness, ceases to be an issue. We have
become a community of brothers, and in the end we're more interested in who a
man is than what a man is. The men involved in these
gatherings are not, in my view, showing any peculiar vulnerability or goddess
energy or feminine side. We are simply being fully men. And the curious thing, or maybe
not so curious, is that the experiences we have and the connections we make
at men's gatherings carry back into community and family. Our wives find us
more available. Our kids see a renewed commitment to family. Our co-workers
may find that we listen better. We haven't worked on any of these things
directly, but our so-called men's work has brought us closer to being more
fully masculine - more fully human. The societal homophobia we all
marinate in isn't going away anytime soon, and we're all affected by it in
one way or another. It will continue to drive men apart and isolate us. And I
realize that men's gatherings are not for everyone. But they're worth a try
for those of us willing to explore new possibilities. (An excellent short essay on
this topic appeared in the Christian Science Monitor on October 6. Here's the
link: http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2010/1006/Homophobia-hurts-straight-men-too.) ©Copyright 2010 by Tim Baehr |