ABL - Pride Article.
So my friends Mike and Troy asked me to write an article for the Pride edition of A Bear's life. I'm posting it here for those that asked..
Despite often being asked, I still find it difficult to talk about ‘Bear Pride’ in general terms. It’s hard to sum up such a wonderfully diverse and broad reaching community in just a few words. I am even somewhat hesitant to do so for fear that by overly defining the community, I am in someway limiting it. It is hard to pin down exactly what it is that has made this community so attractive to so many people and frankly so successful. There really was no ‘Bear Community’ fifteen years ago, but look how far we’ve come in such a short time. For me the key question is not ‘what’ we are, but ‘why’ we are.
To paraphrase something I read once in an Andrew Sullivan article, for me the Bear Community is “being gay for adults”. Too often the 'gay community' at large is trapped in adolescence harboring an unhealthy fixation on things that are critical to the life of your average high-schooler - what you look like, what you wear, who you hang out with, and what rigidly defined social stereotype you have adopted. As someone who rallied against that clique environment in high school, I certainly didn’t want to start being exclusionary as an adult.
I think that’s why, for me, finding the Bear Community was a huge revelation. I feel that in this community it is acceptable to embrace our individual uniqueness. We are very blessed in San Francisco, to have an amazingly diverse gay community. There are bars which cater to every possible taste, race, size and shape in “The City”. So perhaps it is not surprising that, as some people claim, the bear movement in the U.S. would start in San Francisco and that the Lone Star was arguably the first official bear bar. What is certain is that walking into the Lone Star for the first time was, for me, like coming home.
I found a great group of guys, who were comfortable being gay, but not obsessed with it. They had a variety of interests that moved beyond the typical gay topics of dicks, drugs and DJ’s. They were maybe a little older, maybe a little less body conscious, maybe a little more masculine, but there were clear exceptions to all of those generalities. Because more than anything else, it was a community of real people who weren’t all trying to look, sound, and behave identically. This community is diverse, dynamic and evolving: each year I notice new trends and new ideas that continue to redefine who we are and thwart attempts to categorize us.
One wonderful trend I have noticed in the Bear Community of late is that it is becoming more and more international. We have several wonderful events like International Bear Rendezvous (IBR) and Lazybear weekend in the Bay area, which bring in men from all over the world. San Francisco hosts so many international visitors each year and I have noticed more and more of my American friends traveling overseas for their vacations. Everywhere I go nowadays, from London to Munich , Istanbul to Sydney , I find a vibrant and welcoming Bear Community.
Another fantastic trend is that our community is expanding (no, that’s not a fat joke). I peruse the crowd at recent Bear Events and see a waxing diversity of size and shape, age and ethnicity, gender and attitude. One less encouraging trend is that with this increasing diversity has come a backlash from some factions of our community. I have actually heard people complaining at events that someone ‘isn’t bear enough’ or is a ‘bear tourist’ and doesn’t belong. I often caution these people to be wary of turning us into the very thing that our community supposedly is a departure from, an exclusionary clique. I think it is wonderful that gay men are ‘bear identifying’ much younger than before. Why would you want our community to consist only of 40+ men? And if some 20 year old, slightly effeminate, smooth boy would rather be ogling the fur at IBR than heading to Palm Springs for the White Party - that’s a good thing! The circuit’s dead, bears won, we should be celebrating.
Despite often being asked, I still find it difficult to talk about ‘Bear Pride’ in general terms. It’s hard to sum up such a wonderfully diverse and broad reaching community in just a few words. I am even somewhat hesitant to do so for fear that by overly defining the community, I am in someway limiting it. It is hard to pin down exactly what it is that has made this community so attractive to so many people and frankly so successful. There really was no ‘Bear Community’ fifteen years ago, but look how far we’ve come in such a short time. For me the key question is not ‘what’ we are, but ‘why’ we are.
To paraphrase something I read once in an Andrew Sullivan article, for me the Bear Community is “being gay for adults”. Too often the 'gay community' at large is trapped in adolescence harboring an unhealthy fixation on things that are critical to the life of your average high-schooler - what you look like, what you wear, who you hang out with, and what rigidly defined social stereotype you have adopted. As someone who rallied against that clique environment in high school, I certainly didn’t want to start being exclusionary as an adult.
I think that’s why, for me, finding the Bear Community was a huge revelation. I feel that in this community it is acceptable to embrace our individual uniqueness. We are very blessed in San Francisco, to have an amazingly diverse gay community. There are bars which cater to every possible taste, race, size and shape in “The City”. So perhaps it is not surprising that, as some people claim, the bear movement in the U.S. would start in San Francisco and that the Lone Star was arguably the first official bear bar. What is certain is that walking into the Lone Star for the first time was, for me, like coming home.
I found a great group of guys, who were comfortable being gay, but not obsessed with it. They had a variety of interests that moved beyond the typical gay topics of dicks, drugs and DJ’s. They were maybe a little older, maybe a little less body conscious, maybe a little more masculine, but there were clear exceptions to all of those generalities. Because more than anything else, it was a community of real people who weren’t all trying to look, sound, and behave identically. This community is diverse, dynamic and evolving: each year I notice new trends and new ideas that continue to redefine who we are and thwart attempts to categorize us.
One wonderful trend I have noticed in the Bear Community of late is that it is becoming more and more international. We have several wonderful events like International Bear Rendezvous (IBR) and Lazybear weekend in the Bay area, which bring in men from all over the world. San Francisco hosts so many international visitors each year and I have noticed more and more of my American friends traveling overseas for their vacations. Everywhere I go nowadays, from London to Munich , Istanbul to Sydney , I find a vibrant and welcoming Bear Community.
Another fantastic trend is that our community is expanding (no, that’s not a fat joke). I peruse the crowd at recent Bear Events and see a waxing diversity of size and shape, age and ethnicity, gender and attitude. One less encouraging trend is that with this increasing diversity has come a backlash from some factions of our community. I have actually heard people complaining at events that someone ‘isn’t bear enough’ or is a ‘bear tourist’ and doesn’t belong. I often caution these people to be wary of turning us into the very thing that our community supposedly is a departure from, an exclusionary clique. I think it is wonderful that gay men are ‘bear identifying’ much younger than before. Why would you want our community to consist only of 40+ men? And if some 20 year old, slightly effeminate, smooth boy would rather be ogling the fur at IBR than heading to Palm Springs for the White Party - that’s a good thing! The circuit’s dead, bears won, we should be celebrating.