‘Gay’ Is Not Enough

October 1999

Not so long ago, when homophobia was omnipresent, calling yourself "gay" meant that you challenged prevailing sexual values. People interested in replacing fearful attitudes about deviant sexuality or chucking out the foolish notion that jealous possessiveness signaled love could welcome those claiming a gay identity. All sexual outlaws had a common enemy: the nearly-universal condemnation of sexual expression outside narrowly proscribed boundaries. Being gay defined you as a sexual renegade, a rebel with a cause.

But the successes of the gay movement have changed the equation. Homosexual expression is more widely tolerated; thus, asserting a gay identity no longer necessarily marks one as a sexual dissident. In fact, the gay movement has been largely co-opted into twin campaigns to reassure the sexually uptight. First, many of our organizations trumpet a political agenda of respectability; according to them, we want nothing more than to be monogamous spouses, loyal soldiers, and tidy neighbors. And second, our new status as a lucrative marketing niche has muted voices that formerly promoted challenges to deadening sexual values. When Toyota offers to buy pages if only newspaper X will "tone down" their sexual content, we get auto ads instead of steamy personals– and insipid editorials extolling how this shift to contentlessness represents a "maturation" of the gay community.

It is lamentable how the gay movement has devolved and maddening to see some gay people chase worldly approval by joining in the condemnation of boy lovers, bush sex aficionados, S and M practitioners, and promiscuous sex hounds– the true perverts who "give us all a bad name." But such frustration stems from a now-faulty premise: that claiming a gay identity signals a willingness to challenge society's creation of sexual monsters and scapegoats. When being gay itself was monstrous and disreputable, the gay movement promised to change prevailing inhumane sexual attitudes. But now that one can be a cocksucker and a bank president, it is revealed that simply being gay is not enough. You have to use your gayness to understand that the world remains profoundly fucked up about sex– that outlawed sexual affection lands record numbers of people in prison today, that sexual possessiveness is still touted as a virtue instead of a crippling insecurity, and that "normal" gay people are just a whisker away from being branded the "sexually dangerous persons" that can now be locked up forever in newly-created sex gulags that only the foolish think are for "real" monsters.

As frustrating as it is to watch so many gay people campaign to join the sexually privileged elite, true sexual liberationists can take heart that receding homophobia offers us new possibilities. Enlightened folks of all sexual preferences are less likely to be blinded by mindless anti-gay sentiment, creating the potential of a wider alliance of people who embrace a less fearful view of sex. Instead of simply urging gay people to come out, we must encourage everyone of any and all predilections to renounce society's destructive sexual attitudes.

Our real allies in the sexual liberation struggle include prostitutes, hetero anal sex fans, non-sexually exclusive married couples, and all others who've seen their sexual values and desires demonized. "Being gay" can be a useful tactic, but only if it means more than aping uptight straights. Our larger strategy remains promoting an understanding of sex wherein arbitrary rules about age, gender, race, numbers of partners, or orifices employed are swept aside and replaced by meaningful standards of honesty, responsibility, and love. And that sort of coming out is for everyone, "gay" or not. **

Pasted from <http://guidemag.com/magcontent/invokemagcontent.cfm?ID=E0BE2487-C7B8-11D3-AD8E0050DA7E046B>