THE GLASS CLOSET

I'm gay.

Now you'd think something as simple as two words, would explain, identify and satisfy any question on the difference of sexual orientation, wouldn't you? Ah, well...At 14 I found out to my cost that such a simple proclamation can land one in some pretty nasty bastard-infested waters, I'll tell you that for nothing.

This isn't going to be one of those 'lecturey' blogs, where I instruct you and make you feel guilty about not understanding/not caring/being weird around the whole GAY thing... this is more a treatise on the current phenomena of what 'GAY' means to the mainstream, and obviously where I set amongst it all; it's many-varied and multi-layered and bit wibbly and silly in places, but I will try to condense into something quite simple and interesting!

The thing is, I was lucky to originally 'come out' with little understanding of sex/sexuality or connotations, identity and all those other peculiar things. I was 14, I knew I didn't have that much of an interest in girls, and that I found guys attractive, and lovely, but I was pubescent, I didn't have that much of an inclination of sex really... I can't fathom any reason why I said this fact about myself to all and sundry, there was no gain, except to be honest, although the losses were rather terrific.

You see, I had the rather fortunate circumstance, that I went to an All-Boys School, in a rather less than reputable area of South-East London; a heavy, rough and uncomprimising place, that didn't take too kindly to fay, unco-ordinated, philosophising types... and the school population after asking a long loooooooooooong stream of questions decided that I, who would not defend or argue, simply explain, as I was all calm and dream-like floating through school-life, took umbridge to this and began a systematic yet random course of attacking me in various undignified ways; from aerosol-can spray in the face, to stone throwing, spitting, punching, kicking, strange sexual advances... it was a rather difficult seven months of this, to which I never really responded... I didn't know how, or thought to...

I decided to leave this establishment and they found me a new one. Now at 15, rather war-wounded and introspective about this whole life business... further questioning of my sexuality resulted in me not willing to answer, thus a whole stigma and fear arose whenever sexuality was mentioned, in particular gayness, and I sort of developed an internalised homophobia.

When I got a bit older, and heard that there were 'LGBT youth groups' I popped along to them - but (and please, this is no sob story, just 'what happened') a lot of the other young guys and gals, were more interested in copping off with one another, and they were on this thing called 'the scene' which I didn't understand.

This scene refers to a ghettoised area of soho in which the opening gay outnumbers the arrogant heterosexual, thereby the gay population assume a strange parody of heterosexual life by being comfortable in an outside urban setting... thus making it as isolating, unkind and unwelcoming as the rest of society...

So with my self-loathing and their over-compensating self-loving.... I was a lost cause... and it wasn't until I got into a dodgy domesticated long-term relationship and went to college, that I sort of weirdly labelled myself as BISEXUAL.... something which I had to defend internally... how embarrassing I find it now... but just one note, I have had relationships with women - and I have loved women - I do love women and could fall in love with women - it's about love with me not sex so much - and so yes, Bi - ness is probably a more correct term, but I shall outline why I identify as GAY.

The reason is very simple; it is still a homophobic society, that doesn't allow for tolerance, let alone acceptance of alternative sexualities; we do not teach it to our children from a young age, as they do in other European countries, we don't have Gay Marraige, there is still acceptable prevelant anti-gay humour and a proliferation of gay-backlash in the press and tv... people are always interested in people sexuality because people think these 'closetted' people are ashamed and we like to out and shame, it's the modern witchhunt... so until it's such an ordinary fixture of life FOR THE MASSES (I know a lot of you who read this blog will have already, or have been brought up to see there is very little distinction between gays and straights, imperceptable) that gay men and women should show it - loudly....

I, through trauma, have not been able to be as open as I'd like, and I try my best, I'd never deny even in dangerous circumstances, but I, due to complete accident, I think people correlate my behaivour as 'gay' anyway, and this I do not mind, but I worry people think I mind, and want to keep it secret, or something... now this is THE GLASS CLOSET, (I keep nearly writing COFFIN) that I refer too... it is a term that denotes someone who is openly gay yet never refers to it in public and often asks for it not to be mentioned if giving interviews and so on; prime examples of this are Simon Amstell, Jodie Foster, One of Take That (I cant remember which one) so on and so on, ad infinitum.... people seem to herald these as bastians of LGBT-rights, because they 'don't make a fuss about it' and that they 'appear almost straight' how UTTERLY SICKENING, is that! - it sounds very conformist and middle-class; the only way we accept is through assimilation - no, no, no, no!

People, who through their personality are camp or outrageous, I think of Louis Spence here, are derided as setting the gay-rights movement backwards, and modern gay men go 'ya! boo! for shame!' - how dare they, that's very unkind, untrue and all the rest of it, he is just him - he may be annoying for other reasons but it's nothing to do wit hthe fact that he is gay and flamboyant... the real shaming types are the ones that just 'never refer to it' and try their best to not appear at all like a stereotype of which we are so villified and bullied for...!

Well I shant take part in this horrible display of utter conformity, I don't mind if I am mocked or if people secretly sneer, I am well-prepared now for all that....

I genuinely beleive Modern Gay-Rights Activism is as simple as going to societ 'No You're Wrong! We're Equal and seeing as we've demoralised so; we have to waste all this energy of our life in telling you the reasons OVER AND OVER AND OVER"

Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallowed Cynics (Part 1)

Harry Potter is one of things that have contributed to my recanting the twatty cynic chic, that befall all young silly peoples for a time - although I think due to my anger at the world in general, such vibes stick in to the soul of ones shoe like a Great Dane's shite! But, and it's more to reassure myself that you lot, I am not really that much of a cynic and I fight critical or judgemental instincts on a daily basis. I find it hard to genuinely tear something apart unless it something that is going to cause harm to people; I.E: The Jeremy Kyle Show/War/Republicans and so on, and even then they way one goes about it perhaps doesn't really take that much sugar off the puff!

Silly bitchy personae can be funny, especially in stand-up; we love people being humiliated and having the piss-ripped by societies strange outsiders, and that Schadenfreude is a way of life.... but some people can get confused where the lines blur and be insulted, and for that one is always deeply guilt-striken and apologetic.

This goes further than that... Harry Potter was something that passed me by in the great schema of life, not out of bitter 'Oh it's shit' 'It's for kids', that weird thing that when something becomes overly popular everyone wants to give it a good kicking... sort of franchise-bullying as it were... just busy, and then when you miss the first 4 films/last 4 books you get all -'How do I get into it?'

Luckily I have a boyfriend who likes all this magical and fantastical shizz (every home should have one), and the other week, in preperation for the 7th Installment; we watched all 6 films back to back.

Now I've already glazed y eyes over the first 2, and that's fair enough; pretty standard (don't want this to escape up the arse-hole of 'review' or anything dirty and fetid like that!!!) but it did hit its stride by the tird film, and I did enjoy the cornacopia of A-list british film-stars from Michael to Imelda by route of Maggie to Emma via Alan - oh lovely stuff; that's my bread and butter of the films....

By going to the seventh, all the elements tht have bee built up over a decade really come to the fore, with real cinematic elan, it was compelling as a piece of cinema, and well executed; it is irrelevent if Daniel, Emma and (well not) Rupert aren't the best actors in the universe or that there are silly shmultzy bits; it brings lots of joy and loveliness - and it's an aesthetic point that my boyfriend is making in his dissertation - that Harry Potter lends itself to a Dickensian tradition of writing, which in turn is semi-social/political - there is Boarding House Romps and ancient legends and religious allegory, it's the oral tradition of the Celts to The Canturbury Tales - it's the same story of Good V. Evil, echoeing down the ages - it cant be a bad think that J.K is preserving it with a franchise and Multi-conglomerate it's a pleasing shape, of course if its not to you thats fine, it's got Radcliffe in his pants too! - But as all those 100's of screaming boys and girls squeal with delight and fright, alive with the magic. I had to sit next to the overweight bearded twat in a cheap leather jacket, talking derisvely and sneering scene after scene....

His personality lacked subtly and it is a wake-up call to such people that even dignified 'Oh it's not for me' is far more gentler and self-worthy than bollocky waffle! Although as a parting shot... I'd like to say when I sit entranced by some Lebanese Art-House film about the waterfalls of Nepal, which is just waterfalls for three-hours, meanish discourse on such things is just as unfair... why cant all our arty endevours just get along? All is equal in the eyes of Shareholders (so isn't!)


[GOALS FOR NEXT WEEK: Follow football for seven days and try to minimize the comparison both written/speaking/acting to Stephen Fry!!! TUT!]

Remembrance Sunday

I awoke this morning, 10.20am-ish, on the sofa; to the dulcet tones of David Dimbleby; and the vista of London's Whitehall are, deserted for an oblonged throng of people around the Cenotaph. Something compelled me to stay with the images of the procession; the bands, the ceremony and so on.

   Now, I have lived in London all my live, my Grandad fought in World War II, my Dad in the Fawklands; My Nan was a Royalist on the quiet, well not so quiet - so there is a lot in me, without me knowing, that strikes a cord inside. But they never (as far as I know) ever went to Whitehall on Remembrance Sunday, and neither have I. I always buy a poppy, and then subsequently lose it because I cannot do the pin thing right... None of this is of any consequence, what I am about to do, is qualify something that a lot of people secretly think or do but never dare to say.... 

I for a large chunk of my juvenile life been self-obsessed, and therefore had not been equipped to take in the scope of other people's life, the world or humanity in general; in adolescence, I developed a 'mentally-ill' persona, something I became secretly stuck with and couldn't shake off... well I am shaking now; and now I try to genuinely connect with the outside world.

When faced with WWI & WWII and how we remember all those who gave their lives, and I mean the phrase, because it is a service, a belief of the soldier, armaments worker, civil-servant, shop-keeper, night-warden and so on, that not as an indiviudual but a cog, one of many, many cogs in a wheel that will roll towards the freedom, and the emphatic refusal to give in to pervading evil, that's what is awe-inspiring about these people. The dignity in that idea, that being part of something; this even goes up to something such as Afghanistan; although the political ideals behind it may be more complex, the ideology of the soldier itself is the same; such as the soldier who died clearing a bomb-laden pathway for the fellow soldiers to go forward, gave his life so that could happen - in the inner workings of itself - it does mean something for the whole.

  And the process of understanding why we remember The Glorious Dead, is just as important, it is meme, in our lifetime, all the people that were involved in WW2 will be dead, and all that will be left will be a memory, this memory has to endure; because in the end, all their fighting, all the death and heartache and agony and pain, was to preserve the idea of something; of course, it's a highly emotive subject, and people can be very offended at the lack of respect for War Veteran and people currently serving alike. My heart went out especially to the former soldiers who marched suffering from Combat-Stress.

  Trying to emote to something difficult, outside one's immediate surroundings, to something that does not directly affect them, can be hard, but it is benefitial, and it's not selfish, bad or wrong not to understand, I think people just go 'Oh I don't understand or DON'T KNOW HOW I SHOULD REACT to this' that makes us shy away, made me shy away.

But I sat down and had a good think about it, and it's unimaginable to take in the magnitude of loss of life; to think of the number of deaths and take it in; I just imagine the grief you experience when you lose someone you love, a family member, in the full flow of life, through no fault of their own, and times it by 100 million; to g through each and every one takes more than a lifetime. And of course the remembrance serves as a respectful footnote.

I would like to finish by remarking on the sadness in the eyes of The Queen and even The Prime-Minister, it's a shared grief we all have.

P.S - I will make a concerted effort to attend next year. (And get a Poppy that stays on).