a sort of [peeved]

The following is in response to the June 30 Huffington Post article by Joan Z. Shore, “Gay Day or May Day.”

Dear Ms. Shore,

Yesterday you posted what amounts to probably the most impulsive, flaky, privileged-sounding article I’ve read in weeks. About how gay people are too loud during Paris Pride. I’m actually quite surprised the Huffington Post entertained what amounts to the equivalent of those really cheap bic pens they sell at the five and dime — you know, the ones that write about one sentence before they bleed all over the place. Anyway, I’m not opposed to reading what “the other side” has to say about our crazy, abominable gay “lifestyle.” In fact, I spend a good part of my week reading various excerpts from the anti-gay industry: stuff that will either make you swell up with tears and splash to the ground, or cause you to do real damage, like pick up the nearest blunt object and destroy some sheet roc, or a glass window or something insane like that.

Truth is, your little “memoir” of an article doesn’t even make me angry. Not annoyed either. Just a sort of peeved. Peeved that there are hacks of society like you who mire in the big lie that is their “intellectual” life, writing as much sh*t that will spill onto an 5 x 7 piece of paper, vomiting the rest out at some conservative circle jerk dinner party in a boring part of town — you know, where the air is so thick with useless ideology that any creative impulse that crops up in your brain is liable to jump out one ear and slap you upside your head for even thinking about it.

So while you are wondering miserably, as you pop another aspirin, why it never rains on the Paris Pride parade, I’m wondering why you don’t spend more time reading Valerie Solanas’ SCUM Manifesto and less time bitching to readers who just don’t give a damn about whether or not “the decibels could shatter your eardrums.” Frankly, I’m shattered that someone picked up (graciously, no doubt) by the Huffington Post, a woman who has more likely than not, experienced sexism in her lifetime, would really feel inconvenienced by a party that strolls through her neighborhood once a year, banging a drum, wearing ass-less chaps. Obviously you’ve never been to Mardi Gras. Or the Love Parade. Who f#cking cares about your comfort, Ms. Shore? Do you honestly think that 39 post-Stonewall years of discrimination and hatred and dehumanizing, from Brandon Teena to Matthew Shepard to countless others who have suffered and died at the hands of such ignorance and fear, really need your permission to celebrate?

You write, “Before you label me as homophobic, let me assure you that some of my Best Friends, and people I’ve worked with, are lesbian or gay.” Are you serious? You read like some second-rate SNL skit gone bad. Mad Libs. Fill-in-the-blanks, what have you. I’m sure you have black friends, too. Just so long as they don’t play the hip-hop too loud, eh? Is there any sentient life at all behind those cold glass eyes, Ms. Shore? Do I sound angry? Not even close. I’m not even annoyed. Just a sort of peeved.

Seventeen years of being gay and out of the closet will teach you how to pass off curt remarks. You’ll learn how to dodge spit, too. And looks of pure hatred coming from strangers. And remarks from family members and “friends” about how “sissy faggots don’t deserve to live,” and how “someone should round them all up on an island and shoot them because they f#ck each other in the ass.” No biggie. Deal with it.

You say you believe that “however you can be happy — without harming others — go for it,” but wonder if you need to flaunt it. I say, if you’re really going to live and let live, just shut your mouth and give the gays their one day to be happy amidst the madness that is the ever-controlled world of patriarchal-enshrouded legacy, their one day to feel safe amidst those who would invite them into their homes and shops and lives, rob them blind, then stick a knife in their backs and shove them out the door because they’ve served their purpose: to spend money (because, you see, we are also blamed for having more expendable income because the government hasn’t as yet woken up and allowed us our own families, so we can too be sucked into baby-debt with the rest of straight humanity. Homophobic, Ms. Shore? No, you’re not homophobic. Just misinformed.

You write that “the irony of the gay rights movement is that on the one hand, it demands that sexual differences be seen and accepted and legislated as normal, but on the other hand it portrays these variations in an exaggerated, ostentatious and ‘un-normal’ way. It’s self-contradictory.”

But can’t you see? That’s why the gays exaggerate. Because they want to piss you off. Because they want to subject you to one minuscule sliver of discomfort they’ve had to feel their entire lives, simply because people like you can’t understand the concept of difference. You have a bee in your bonnet, Ms. Shore. And perhaps your biggest pearl of wisdom (size queens, take note):

“It is also a form of propaganda, or proselytizing, which I find unreasonable. People in conventional male-female relationships are not parading their lifestyle. And yet, perhaps they should! They are a singularly silent majority who are losing some of the best words in the English language: gay, queer, pink, rainbow.”

Last time I checked, a good number of “people in conventional male-female relationships” were quite comfortable (and safe) using the word “gay”: to describe something that is stupid, or dumb, or unworthy of introspection, or undesirable. Quite comfortable using the word “queer”: right before they bash some fem’s face in, sending him to the hospital because he made the terrible mistake of showing his partner how much he loved him, with a kiss. Quite comfortable using the word “rainbow,” you know, “taste the rainbow?” Haven’t you ever heard of f#cking skittles?

Your May Day is everyday, JZS. Because you’re a woman living in a man’s world. And don’t forget it. Because even though you work just as hard as any man but make half as much as he does, and menstruate gallons each year for him, and raise his children, and remain subjected to his sexist remarks and suffocating ideals, you’re still just a woman living in a man’s world. Don’t waste your breath. You’re not raining on our parade today, Ms. Shore.

But seriously, don’t you think it was about time you left that comfortable flat of yours and marched your own Pride parade?

Yours ostentatiously,

Another Gay Who Just Can’t Keep His Mouth Shut

p.s. Readers: don’t hate the Huffington Post. It’s a wonderful publication. To prove it, Joan Garry (one of my Huff-Po heroes) wrote this inspiring article just one day before that other lady wrote the article I just slighted above. And when you’re done, celebrate with my NYC Pride pic collection.

~ by cdelatorre on July 1, 2008.