Self Loathing vs Not knowing
Did anyone see Frontline on PBS last night. It was about the conservative, Republican anti-gay mayor of Spokane Washington, (and former state legislator) the late Jim West. and his outing by the local paper after they discovered he cruised www.gay.com and had hooked up with men from there.
When I first heard about this in 2004 I thought typical. Just like the right....to go anywhere in the Republican party and be gay you have to be so deep in the closet you lose track of who you are.
Well after watching this show, I found the whole thing profoundly sad. Unlike many younger gays and bisexuals, many men of his (really my) generation who grew up in small towns, the stigma of being gay was so strong, that their homosexuality became repressed to the point that they didn't even know it was there, until, like this man, much later in life. According to their interviews with him before he died, he didn't start exploring that part of him until his marriage fell apart late in his life.
The newspaper smeared him terribly all under the freedom of the press which I am normally a big advocate of. They accused him of cruising www.gay.com looking for underage boys (and of being a part of a child molestation ring in the 70's) and that he used his office to reward his partners...charges that the FBI later cleared him of. None the less a man's life and reputation was destroyed. To his credit Jim West said in one interview that he would not have sponsored anti-gay legislation pushed by the religious right when he was in state office had he known he was gay then.
So the story begs the question: How can you really define closeted men like him...are they just deeply closeted, unknowing and perhaps to eventually come to terms with who they are, self loathing or somewhere in between? And, should they be outed?
To find out more about this story or watch the whole thing go to:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/hiddenlife/
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
I saw that program too(well I flipped back and forth from House). I think that though it may be painful, outing public figures would ultimately make homosexuality and bisexuality mainstream. It's hardly rare. It is only the social repression of a misinformed and distrusting majority that keeps many of us in the closet. It is truly barbaric, the attitude we have in this country about sexual orientation. The only solution will ultimately be publicity. If it isn't exotic or foreign to the mainstream public then it becomes a non issue. I could probably rant for hours but the point is there is only a painful path to eliminating the repression that causes cases like Mayor West.
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
I have expressed my attitude about coming out of the closet before. I have never been closeted...but at the same time I rarely tell anyone besides my lovers and close friends either, because unless I want to go to bed with them its no ones damned business who I fuck. As for outing... I really don't like the idea at all... again its no ones damned business. Just because somebody else thinks the world should know about your sexuality does not give them the right or responsiblity to out you. As for people like mayor west.... I came to feel by the end of the show that had he wanted to, he would have ample grounds to have sued the shit out of that paper and that what they did (entrap him) was inexcusable. Considering they accused him of child abuse with little if any proof...a charge like the one that he was cruising for underage teens on the internet, or that he tried to use his office to reward or lure his contacts, he was ultimately cleared by the FBI of, they would have deserved it. If they felt that there was enough grounds to accuse him of trying to use his office to reward his lovers...then they should have limited it to that...all the rest was unwarranted.
When it comes to powerful closeted men who do great harm to the gay communities out of self-loathing, such as Roy Cohn.... well in my opinion, that self-loathing is punishment enough... to ruin their lives because you think that they are wrong, well thats just vindictive and no better than their behavior.
In the long run...compassion...compassion...compassion.
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
Personally, I feel that the newspaper's actions are inexcusable.... A person's private life should be exactly that....a private life. I mean as long as he isn't harming or abusing anyone else then what buisness is it of anyone else? As for the whole issue of him sponsoring anti-gay legislation, he apologised for that and as he said, he didn't know that he was gay at the time. Social conditioning can temporarily repress sexuality even to the point that you don't know that you have any same-sex attractions until they suddenly happen. I mean, I didn't come from a particularly conservative background but it was hardly liberal (I don't think I knowingly met any LGBT people until I was about 17/18) and all of my mates were completely straight and although I realsied that girls were very attractive... I wasn't really seriously interested in dating or sleeping with them.... it took me until I was 17 to realise that the reason for this was that I preferred boys. I mean when you are in an area where there are no LGBT people and with any degree of conservative attitudes (even only mildly conservative attitudes), you do tend to feel self loathing (I mean I felt a hell of a lot of self loathing about being a TV/CD...something I have known about since I was 13... but I have yet to meet another TV/CD lol).
Many deeply closeted people use homophobia/biphobia/transphobia as both a way of concealing their own sexuality and to project their own self-loathing onto others (I think there have been a number of studies into this). It does nobody any good... it harms both the victims of their homophobia/biphobia/transphobia and it harms them too as it reinforces their own self loathing. But for the press to forcibly drag someone out of the closet is just terrible... it would certainly make things a lot worse as it would reinforce any self-loathing that they have and it sends out the signal that being LGBT is a 'shameful secret'. I don't know what the solution to this whole problem is but 'outing' is certainly not the answer.
Izzfan
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
Like I said If the newspaper felt that there was enough grounds to accuse him of trying to use his office to reward (or lure) his lovers...and that the only way to report it, was to out him, fine, I can understand that. But if that was the case then they should have limited it to just that. Everything else was speculation. After all they tried to lure him with a supposedly 17 year old boy and he made no moves until they had the 'kid" turn 18. So why try and connect him to a 20 year old scandal? That is where they crossed the line in my book.
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
Speaking from personal experience and as the self proclaimed "Queen of Repression" I can honestly say that at some point I believe that everyone knows or has at least an inking that they have a same sex attraction.
It's the fear of repercussions from society and our peers/parents that cause us to stuff those feelings down and shut them away. It's either not safe or we have been given the message by others that it is not safe to express that part of ourselves.
Look at modern society. The number one word I hear from teens and 20-somethings these days is "gay" as in "That's so gay", ie "That's so stupid".
Who wants to be stupid? So, if courage fails, do the next best thing. Repress.
Hell, that's what *I* did.
In some places it is literally not physically safe to be openly gay or bisexual. Think about that poor kid in Wyoming. That's not just a few radicals. MANY men in Wyoming feel that gays should be killed. They don't see a difference between gay and bisexual either.
When you add up all those factors it's no wonder really that some men have hidden their true sexuality until their later years. It's only really been in the last decade or so that being LGBT has become safe enoughto be somewhat accepted.
I have a great deal of compassion for the man, personally.
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
As I mentioned in my intro that at first when I heard about Mr. West in 2004, I heard Republican/conservative/anti-gay and that he had been cruising for boys on the internet and thought....typical and serves him right.
Of course that is how things are done in this society anymore, all we are given are sound bites and unless we want to know more about something and do the research ourselves, that sound bite is all we will ever know about a subject.
The Frontline show really turned the whole thing on its head. While condemning neither the paper or Mr. West...he was finally portrayed as a human being not a sound bite or a stereotype of a repressed self-loathing politician but as a human being trying to come to terms to who and what he was; and what had been done to him by the newspaper. As a result of seeing a human being instead of a sound bite, my opinion changed to one of profound sympathy.
Re: Self Loathing vs Not knowing
Quote:
Originally Posted by izzfan
Personally, I feel that the newspaper's actions are inexcusable.... A person's private life should be exactly that....a private life.
I agree, right up to the moment when he sponsors legislation that pries into other people's private lives. At that point, his own private life becomes fair game for prying.
Quote:
Originally Posted by izzfan
As for the whole issue of him sponsoring anti-gay legislation, he apologised for that and as he said, he didn't know that he was gay at the time.
That's no excuse, and I'm surprised to see people accepting it. Similarly:
Quote:
Originally Posted by smokey
To his credit Jim West said in one interview that he would not have sponsored anti-gay legislation pushed by the religious right when he was in state office had he known he was gay then.
To his credit? He's saying that if he had known it was against his narrow selfish interests to advance a homophobic agenda, he wouldn't have done it; but he thought it would serve his selfish needs to push anti-gay legislation, so he did it.
That doesn't make him "misunderstood" or deserving of sympathy; it makes him a self-centered opportunist. Quite how a confession of naked selfishness is supposed to make me think better of him I don't know.
