Coming Out of the Ghetto

Being one, I have nothing against homosexuals. But for an agglomeration of reasons, they piss me off a lot here in San Francisco. I previously ranted about the cheapening of sexuality which seems to have been brought on by "sexual liberation" and the culture of Pride. One thing I have also been pondering, however, is whether we're just pandering to age-old caste systems by engrossing ourselves so frequently in our individual subcultures and ghettos.

I think about this every time I see one of the many parades and street fairs which imprison me in my home on various Sundays every few months. A peek down the street or a futile attempt to move my car exposes me to gaggles of gays in their preferred clone attire, attending an event which is advertized to portray the liberation and normalizing of their "preferred lifestyle" within their society.

I do not agree with that line of reasoning. San Francisco has very successfully marketed itself as the homo capital of the world. It is very safe to be queer here. You can peck your husband goodbye on the bus, casually pop by the bar waving the banded flag, enjoy multiple blowjobs for the cost of a movie with impunity, and once every month or so attend a fair showcasing just how undressed your peers can get in public.

I'm sure this is all very "empowering" for out-of-towners; but it is, ultimately, no more "liberated" in my eyes than drug dealing in the projects would have been for the young OJ Simpson. Ultimately, this is culturally isolated behavior which has been voluntarily sequestered by its participants to a ghetto in which they can get away with it.

I don't see the point. If you are into the random anonymous sex scene (which I ultimately have little against), then you have a reason to go. If you enjoy wearing and catwalking leather or naturist fashions, then by all means, have your street party. Just don't try to attract your audience by designating it as some sort of protest, community-building activity, or display of "liberation". It's a party for a specific group, held in a place where it's being permitted by a society which, by and large, still would rather you crawl back into a poisoned closet.

These weekend leather queens at Dore Alley today probably don't spend a whole lot of time contemplating the larger philosophical side of their activities. In fact, most other people don't, either (with which I guess I have the biggest problem...). Not everyone is willing to ponder issues to the point of being as jaded as I on them. But it's definitely something that our "community's" leaders should contemplate when they're organizing their events and planning for their future.

We can't go on voluntarily containing ourselves in urban ghettos and adhering to defacto segregation. Homosexuals come in all flavors, and the increasing pressure to conform to community standards or encapsulate ourselves in bubbles of tolerance can ultimately only lead to the type of permanent glass cieling from which most blacks and all women still suffer. To paraphrase a common quote in the eary 20th century, a Carnegie "Free Sodomite Library" in our part of town will not make us equal.

I'm not into leather or bondage, nor naturism or public sex. That's why I'm not at the Folsom or Dore Alley or Hairrison or Castro fairs. I'm not for preaching to the choir or cheapening the value of sexuality. That's why I avoid San Francisco Pride. There are many people who attend these events out of a feeling of obligation to their "community", rather than for any specific preference for the aesthetic or behavioral commonalities upon which such events are ultimately founded. These are the people to which I address this.

I ask them: are you really helping make a better world for you and me?