I’ll take “Names from high school” for $1000 Alex. Yup, I heard them all. Now I wonder how they knew about me back then when I never acted on my feelings. Okay, there was that one time at band camp, but I’m not sure that mutual masturbation under the covers truly counts as a sexual encounter. Quasi-encounter maybe. But my first full blown (no pun intended) gay sexual experience didn't occur until I was 21.
I debated about putting a warning at the beginning of this because that language isn't what I normally put into my writing. But I figured the shock might be good for readers to have - if they’re shocked at all. I certainly was when I was reminded of how strangers are during an online debate about marriage equality here in Indiana. Once the other guy pulled out the queer word I thanked him for the reminder of what people really think and that I mistakenly thought I had left the bullying shoved into a corner of my high school locker like some wadded up piece of notebook paper. Luckily though I was never stuffed into one - even though back then I probably would have fit. I did however have books knocked out of my hands, got tripped in the hallway one day, faggot and cocksucker hissed at me in passing, and once had my school t-shirt ripped off one shoulder in the lunch line. That was a fun afternoon going around from class to class with my shirt held together on one side by a couple of safety pins all because two of school jocks decided they couldn't wait behind me.
So even if I did leave all that back in high school, there are plenty of people to remind me that they haven’t. People like Mike Delph, Micah Clark, Mike Pence, and a cast of several dozen internet commentators (not here) who remind me on a daily basis that the “home-sek-shuls” are not fit to breath the same air as the fine upstanding, God fearing, bible thumping, people of the Great State of Indiana! Why how dare I say that I’m a Christian? How dare I raise a child in this god-less house with my deviant husband? How dare I still live? Why I should just go kill myself and save humanity from my evil wicked ways. Yes, I've heard that one also.
But I’m the bully. Any guesses as to why? Because I demand to have my civil rights is why. Because I refuse to go “back in the closet” or better “see the sickness and depravity of” my life by opening my eyes. The latter help came from a man who said he lived the same “sick deviant” life that I live until he woke up one day to see how sick it really was. I wanted to say that he apparently wasn't doing it right (or maybe he was?) but instead I just said that my family and I would be praying that one day he would wake up and see that judging people wasn't his job and that he would be able to accept all people just as Christ did. I think I actually heard his head explode all the way from northern Indiana at that one.
Here’s the irony of the whole marriage equality debate. I’m already married. We were married in a church in a very traditional ceremony right here in Indianapolis. The difference between our wedding and state sanctioned marriages? There were two grooms at the altar and no license. We had called it a commitment ceremony, but that changed once we heard the minister introduce us at church services the next morning as having been married in their sanctuary the previous day. We were stunned when the whole congregation cheered. They cheered for two queer men who had stood at the front of their church and declared in front of our families, our friend, and our God that we would be spend the rest of our lives together.
Here are a few things to consider if you're on the other side from me on this issue: A county clerk's office issues a marriage license, not a church. You don't have to be married in a church for it to be legal. Without going into all the other "arguments" what a marriage is at it's most base level is a legal contract between two consenting adults of legal age witnessed by two other adults of consenting age. A person can't marry a toaster or their dog because the first is an inanimate object and the second is an animal and neither is capable of signing a legal contract.
Faggot. Six letters, one really harsh word. But you know what? I would rather hear it than have someone be told they aren't allowed to use it. At least then I’ll know who I’m dealing with once it escapes their lips. Call it gay marriage if you want, it doesn't make it any different than what you and your spouse have. If allowing me and my husband to be legally married somehow threatens your "straight" marriage then I strongly suspect there are other issues at work that have nothing to do with two men or two women getting married.
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| October 30, 2004 - Central Christian Church |
4 comments:
sorry you experienced what you did in HS & sorry you are experiencing anything of the sort now as an adult. I enjoyed reading your blog & must say I agree. Best of luck in your marriage.
Nicely put, Jim I am glad you and Robbie found each other and I totally support your happiness not because you are two men but because you both are living a quality life and believe it or not so many married couple same sexed or opposite sexed wish they could have that kind of peace in their marriage. I have been married 22 yrs. I and my husband are happy and I don't think anyone has a right to deny you happiness.
There will come a time in the lives of those with tunnel vision when they have to scold themselves for being so small-minded and judgmental. A daughter will come out, a sibling, a parent, a friend. And then the issue will not be so far away, so abstract. You think you are pro-life until someone close to you sees abortion as her only option, and because you love her, you try to see things through her eyes. Then, instead of trying to tie her hands so she can't drive herself to the clinic, you hold them while a rickety transparent vacuum cleaner sucks the life out of her womb, and you are sure she has just broken your hand because she is squeezing it so hard. And you want to take the pain away from her, but you can't. She didn't "feel" pregnant before, but now she realizes she was. Her life will never the same and neither will yours. Life gives us the opportunity to grow, to take our hearts and minds to places we never dreamed they could go. If we could see each other without reference to sexual orientation, would not that immediately double our opportunity for endless love and happiness - and the possibility of new physical pleasures we never before realized? Every day we close doors on friendships, on lovers, just because - and we don't know what we are missing. Where we think we want the population to move forward on this is only the first step in a journey towards infinite possibilities for us all. States finally allowing gay marriage doesn't seem to me to be the milestone it is cracked up to be. It's just the decent thing to do. We have a lot further to go than that. One thing I have learned in life is that at the very moment you reach out to touch the fire, it will turn to water. Then you can't seem to remember what all the fuss was about. - Lisa Frazeur
This is a civil rights issue, and abominably overdue. Anyone weighing in on the side that it isn't will come to live with regret once it is moot, as the effect of all this legislation properly characterized as hate "bills" will push it so far that civil rights for all (not just marriage equality, but the lack of LGBT protections in work, etc.) will eventually be law. My favorite part of this story is how you and Robbie have found your people, lived your lives so beautifully and with such integrity, and now have your lovely Riley to mirror that integrity, love, insight.
I am so sorry you've had to live with the pain of all that crap. I would like to say something here about toxic male culture keeping the good men down (gay and straight), but that is a another discussion.
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