> Well, Garance Franke-Ruta said it, I said
it, and I've heard many other say it,
including some right-wingers. So it's not
really nobody.
I should have been more clear. People will make comments on it, but there will be no change in the practice of queers continuing to be targeted. It is the same kind of inanity that allows men to go topless in public but not women.
I have never understood the right not to be "disturbed" by the behavior of others. It is like people want the world to be child-proofed for their peace of mind. They cannot abide witnessing anything that does not conform to their operating system: women should not wear the veil, it disturbs me. Women who do not wear the veil disturb me. Men should not wear their pants below their waists. Men should not wear floodwaters. Who the fuck cares? Society is awash in a sea of weak sisters who need to be presented with a continual stream of affirmation of their worldview. What happened to pluralism?
WD:
> Call me crazy but I prefer to take my shits in
peace.
A little disruption can be most pleasureable.
> I would be offended and disturbed if any person
(male, female, attractive or otherwise) peered into
my stall a put his/her hand underneath it. Should
such behavior be criminalized? I don't think so,
but that's not what we're talking about.
Yes, that is what we are talking about: whether or not a person can be charged with a crime for offending someone.
Another unspoken part of the issue is straight men's uncomfortableness with being the object of sexual attention. If a man is cruised in a men's room and he is not interested that is all he has to stay. No need for indignancy. Just a polite "No thank you" and that is it. If the queer were to persist in his attentions, then that could be considered harrassment, but the initial approach is only disturbing if the object of desire is sexually uptight. His discomfiture deserves no more consideration than that of a racist who is upset if a black person takes a seat next to her on a bus.
> Again, Craig was being accused of far more than merely
"hitting on" the cop.
What did he do beyond that? He was trying to find out if the cop was interested in a little tearoom joy. If proper etiquette had been followed, the cop would simply have indicated no interest and Craig would have moved on. But the cop was trying to enrap him.
> For me personally (and for most people of all genders
and sexual preferences I would assume) I would draw the
line somewhere ahead of trying to look at me while I
poop.
But a queer would not know if you were there for a poop or a suck without looking. If you are that needful of privacy, either avoid public men's rooms or hang a strip of toilet paper in the crack to indicate that you are there for shit and not sex. Is that so difficult?
> This is a very interesting question, about which reasonable
people can disagree.
They can disagree, but if their diagreement is based on homophobia or sexual uptightness, such disagreement is not worth much consideration?
> I take the position that if the legislature calls it a crime,
the police call it a crime, the prosecutor calls it a crime,
and the courts call it a crime, then it's a crime whether you
like it or not.
So if something has been called a crime just go along with it?
> The question of whether the activity in question *should* be
crime is a different one.
Agreed, and if it should not be a crime it should be campaigned against with vigor.
> No doubt homophobia plays a role in the enforcement and
prosecution of offenses like Craig's.
That is putting it mildly.
> *But*, I think most Americans would be offended by the type of
behavior described in the Craig arrest report regardless of the
gender of the person engaging in such behavior.
I disagree. If bathrooms were not segregated by sex, and a woman peeped a straight man's stall, he could be in the middle of the greatest, most sacred dump of his life, and he would flirt with her.
> Rightly or wrongly, we are conditioned to strongly prefer to
shit undisturbed.
Then what is needed is a less sexually uptight citizenry and not the criminalization of innocent sexual behavior.
Brian