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Stories from a man who fails to meet media expectations of what it means to be gay:
white, frivolous, over sexed yet sexless, shrill, single, stylish, a clown, unimportant, et al.
tuesday 04/01/2003
Why girls are smarter than boys
Six random cosas:
One:
"He is all up in the HaterAid and he don't even know what flava it is."
I had no idea what that statement meant, but it was explained to me as meaning that the young man in question had been engaging in antagonistic and antisocial behavior for no apparent cause or reason.
You know you are up there in age when teen slang needs to be explained to you. You also know that adulthood has its grip on you when simple logical facts of teenage life seem alien and incomprehensible.
A recent example of this for me being my inability to 'get' why local Straight, Latino, teenage boys were waxing and plucking their eyebrows. Apparently girls HATE bushy eyebrows, so you have to fix 'em if they're too big, or else you ain't gonna get yourself a girl, and if you don't have a girl, people are gonna start thinking you're gay or something.
I know I am an adult, but conversations with high school teachers tend to cement that knowledge.
Two:
The niece Nicky has some interesting insights. The kind that would take a nine-year-old girl to make. A couple of weekends ago, she asked me why it was that boys could never make up their minds. When I asked her to explain, she told me that for a while all the boys were into pokemon, but then they all had to like Yu-gi-oh, and now they didn't like that anymore, and were all back into pokemon again. Why couldn't boys just decide what they liked once and for all like girls do?
When I asked her what girls liked, she looked at me as if that were a silly question, and then told me flowers, butterflies, ponies, and hello kitty. I told her that girls must be smarter than boys, and she agreed.
Three:
Bend it like Beckham: fun, humorous, and nice. See it, or, if you are like the husband, and require a full explanation of plot before you can even consider the possibility of thinking about maybe perhaps possibly wanting to see a movie, you have a teenage Indian girl in England who is a very good football (soccer) player. So good that she secretly joins a local girls team and has to deal with negotiating between the demands of sport, and the demands of her family and culture. It could have been really bad, smaltzy, and insulting, but it managed not to be.
The movie has been written up in a couple of gay rags, presumably because of one nonthreatening, really nice, young, closeted lad, and for a couple of scenes where a character ends up suspecting that her sport loving daughter is a lesbian. These are minor details in the flick, so someone going into it expecting young sport dykes on parade is going to be sorely disappointed.
On the other hand, it must be getting some press as a wholesome family film, because the audience I saw it with was filled kids & teens and their parents. So if nothing else, those same 'is my girl kissing other girls' scenes could serve as a nice introduction should any teens in the audience need to have a certain conversation with their parents about certain facts of life.
Four:
During a different conversation with Nicky, she asked John and me why it was that there were so many two's. That is, why was there an inspector gadget II, a jungle book II, atlantis II, cinderella II, and even an 101 dalmations II ?
And why were they not as good as the first movies?
Trying to explain how a lack of creativity, laziness, and greed invariably lead to pointless and crappy sequels while trying not to crush a young girls spirit was tough.
Five:
Queer as Folk has among it's small herd of occasional reoccurring characters, the male and female co-chairs of the Gay & Lesbian center. I don't recall if they have actual names, but in truth it doesn't matter, because they are just stock, one dimensional, super politically correct, (supposedly) comedic characters, who exist merely to get offended and outwitted by Brian. Except that it doesn't work because they aren't funny. They are boring.
I was thinking about them during a conversation/gossip session I had with a friend this past weekend. We went over the latest happenings in some GLBT organizations. Largely stories with lots of yelling, anger, petty jealousies, claims of misspent money, and huge clashing egos. In other words, normal every day stories about normal everyday politics. The QAF writers are missing the mark (and possibly interesting stories) by miles.
Six:
The Supreme Court is hearing cases about affirmative action this week. Unfortunately, I do not have high hopes for the results. I have been thinking about a day back in college. Someone had the bright idea to get representatives from various minority student groups together for a panel, which would initiate a dialogue about diversity on campus. Young student leaders made short introductory speeches, briefly explaining the need for such groups and what their goals were.
Things did not go quite as planned when an angry white guy in the audience hijacked the entire meeting. He was furious that he didn't get into his first choice school and had to make due with the poor substitute of the University of California. He blamed liberal politics. He blamed affirmative action. He seemed to specifically blame the woman representing an African-American student organization. Considering the look of anger, it was if she was at fault for everything wrong in his life.
The disparity in our society that had created the need to artificially force diversity into higher education was explained in detail, but he didn't care. Some undeserving, government system abusing, undereducated black man or woman had stolen HIS spot, at his REAL school, and he was the victim of "reverse discrimination." The discussion turned argument ended up consuming the entire time allotted for the meeting.
Eventually a friend of mine who was on the panel decided to explain some facts of life to the angry white guy. Very poorly paraphrased, She said:
"Does it really matter that for the first time in your life, someone else got preferential treatment instead of you? Who cares if you didn't get into Stanford or USC, or wherever. It doesn't matter because YOU ARE A WHITE MAN. In the real world practically all of American society is built for you and you alone."
"When you graduate, who do you think is going to have the easier time getting a job? You, or a woman of color, who will have to deal not only with issues of racism, but sexism as well? Who is going to have the easier time finding a place to live? You, or the African-American man who has been stereotyped by the media as a violent and dangerous criminal?"
The words quit whining were not said, but it was evident in her tone of voice. The kind of voice you use with a crying child when you tell him that the toys are not all his, and yes, he does have to share.
More later,
nico
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