I'm gonna respond later. i'm at work and i hate webmail. but i want to think through these responses. your reminding me of them reminded me why the issue is so hard. i think i have my position all staked out and then you'll give me a run for my money and making me change my mind!
shag
>> i don't think people are afraid of queers.
>
> I think some people are afraid of queers for what disturbances
> they may bring to the neighborhood. Sexuality is so fluid that
> to build an identity on it is iffy, but nonetheless build
> we have. Homophobes do assert the superiority of heterosexuality,
> but I think that some are also afraid that they might be one
> of us, and that continued exposure to queers might gnaw at their
> (in)secure sense of heterosexuality.
>
>> i think, in general, there's a lot of sympathy for the idea that
> the people opposed to gay struggles, who often do the most damaging
> things to queer struggles, are closeted.
>
> And that has turned out to be true in certain cases.
>
>> When queer people are doing it, though, and not hets I think the
> argument is something like: well *I* can call others like me what
> I want to.
>
> There is a sense that we are looking after our own garden. Also,
> many of these figures are closeted only in the sense that the public
> at large does not know that they are gay. Within the gay community,
> they are known. So it is often a case that we will no longer be their
> enablers in keeping their sexuality a secret from the outside world
> while they go about being open in selected areas/places.
>
>> Just because someone argues that something is wrong, it doesn't
>> follow
> that, by doing it, they have somehow invalidated their argument.
>
> But often the argument is that being gay is morally wrong. But these
> people then lead gay lives that must, therefore, be wrong, but out of
> an irresistable impule they continue to do so. It may not invalildate
> the argument, but there is some expectation that when a person argues
> that something is morally wrong that they at least try to live in
> a consistent way with what they proclaim.
>
>> I suppose, if the goal is to humiliate the target of criticism, but
>> why?
>
> Because one does not want to play hump the hostess or get the guests?
>
>> As you suggest, such humiliation is precisely the sort of thing
>> we're
> supposed to be opposed to if we are trying to dismantle heterosexism.
>
> But to out someone is only humiliating if they are ashamed of being
> gay.
> And if they are, that is their problem. Noting that someone is gay is
> like noting that they have blond hair or blue eyes or prefer knits
> over
> polyester blends. They have put themselves in the awkward situation
> where they run the risk of being exposed and humiliated as a hypocrite
> and a homosexual.
>
> Brian
>
>
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