Lance Bass: I'm Gay — Page 13

What harsh response? I'm sorry but I'm NOT going to apologize for the fact that a high-profile name just came out and then immediately apologized for being gay. Because that's what he just did.
And the term STRAIGHT ACTING has absolutely nothing to do with straight men at all. As has been said again and again here, it is about a gay man trying to affix vague and undefinable traits to himself in order to assimilate back into the heterosexual world.
"See! I'm just like you!"

"see! i'm just like you!"

i understand the the backlash against the statement because as it's said it seems to imply that there is something wrong with the way some gay men behave. however, isn't the above statement exactly what we should all be striving for in some sense? a day when the glbt community is seen as no different from anyone else simply due to their sexuality (is gender the right word here?)? or for that matter when a person whoever they are is not judged based on their color or race or gender or relgion but on who they are as people?

---

I think when Lance used the term, he had no idea that it was insulting to many gay men who don't particularly see the need to adhere to any stereotypical images of masculinity--as well as to Addy!

Addy--I think the posters here universally abhore the use of the term. Your admonishment could be turned toward Lance and others who feel that the only appropriate way of being gay is to "act straight." As you said, that could mean many things, but to recently-out-of-the-closet gays the phrase is most often used to say "I may be gay but I don't act like THEM."

We could get into a whole other discussion about how the putting down of effeminate gays or "bottoms" within the gay male community is actually transferred misogyny--yes, misogyny directed toward other men...but I think this thread is confusing enough as it is.

Rath--you're probably right: I think he's clueless about a lot of stuff. Lance also said that he didn't want to be a spokesperson or riding on floats, as if that's a bad thing--despite the fact that his boyfriend, your rugged AND effeminate cousin, has been proudly (and handsomely) riding on floats ever since he and his ex-lover Chip first came out on network TV.

---

I miss Chip...

---

And for the record, I still hope that he and Chip will get back together.

But then again, I still hope that Rod and Bob will get back together.

---

"I want people to take away from this that being gay is a norm," Bass said. "That the stereotypes are out the window ... I've met so many people like me that it's really encouraged me. I call them the SAGs — the straight-acting gays. We're just normal, typical guys. I love to watch football and drink beer."


Where was he apologizing for being gay?

---

If you don't see it, I certainly can't point it out to you.
the whole point here is that no one in the gay community is saying there's only one way to be gay.
But, seriously, Addy, you don't see "Straight-acting Gay" as an apology? A defense of what you are?

Papa, again, that's the point. There isn't, nor should there be, a template. What Bass says in his interview there is the standard quote of, "oh, yeah, I'm gay, but I'm not STEREOTYPICALLY gay. You know, I drink beer, I watch football, I'm a guy!"
Well, so are the guys who put on pink tu-tus and do impromptu ballets in the streets.
He's the one who's making the comparison and finding the alternative lacking.

RobbO, you should probably put diesel.

---

And, bway, stop with the ballet in the streets. Last time you almost took someone' eye out!

---

Doodle, I don't usually dance in the streets.
I'm the gaywad who sometimes starts singing random snippets of showtunes and Whitney Houston.

Well, you're right, RobbO, but it's still not fun to hear a high-profile guy come out in a major magazine and put out into the universe how "encouraging" it is that there's all these "straight-acting gays." How that can be anything but derogatory is beyond me.
But I'm with you and I will henceforth cut him some slack. I can't say my first action as an out guy was to go find 5 drag queens and high heel it through Harlem at 3 AM with them.

The intolerance is calling one normal, implying any other behaviors not normal.

---

Addy, I don't think this is limited to gays and lesbians.

Like I said, I often wonder how we fight for tolerance yet are quite intolerant among our community.

But, like I said before, there were divisions within the black community depending on how dark you are; there are divisions among the cuban community in Miami.

It has to do with not being comfortable with what we don't know. The same way people look at those into S/M like they're strange, for example, regardless of orientation.

---