my grandfather, The Price is Right, and homophobia
Recently I visited my grandparents upon the occasion of my grandfather's 84th birthday. I joined Grampie in the living room for much of his daily television routine, which includes The Price is Right. One of the contestants that day was a man who set off my gaydar from the moment he started down the aisle. He did well on the show and was very excited when his spin of the big wheel meant that he was headed for the Showcase Showdown. At that point my grandfather said with a frown, "Something's wrong with him--the way he's putting his hand over his mouth..." "There's nothing wrong with him," I said. "There's not?" Grampie asked, surprised. "Oh, I think he's gay, too," I replied, "but there's nothing wrong with that, so there's nothing wrong with him." "Oh," was my grandfather's only response to that, but he wasn't frowning, and he seemed at least outwardly willing to accept my statement.
I've been thinking about this exchange in the last day or two. I would have thought that he'd see this man, and read his behaviors as gay, equate gay with something wrong, and decide there was something wrong with the man. That's how I understand the thought process behind homophobia, and I think, in a lot of cases, that's how it operates. But in that exchange it occurred to me to question whether my grandfather knew what he was responding to in the man on the gameshow and to go ahead and break it down for him. I suspect that my grandfather was kickin' it old school with his homophobia: he was responding to the man's apparently gender-inappropriate behavior and deciding there was something wrong with him, without necessarily being able to articulate what that would be.
A friend of mine pointed out that this is how the word "queer" started to be applied to gay people. It just didn't occur to me that in 2002 someone could be responding to "queer" behavior without knowing what it meant. I mean, obviously, he knew he didn't approve. However, if I'm right about the way his mind was working, then it gives me hope for starting to reroute his thought processes. There's very little to be done about his well established instinct of queer behavior=distasteful, but if he can learn to simultaneously, consciously recognize that queer behavior=probably gay person AND gay person=okay, then he can consciously overcome the instinctive response. (That's a common idea for overcoming one's prejudices in all of the diversity training programs I've ever been a part of, and I like seeing how I can slip it in to my interactions with my grandfather.)
I do think there is potential for my grandfather to realize that gay person=okay. Not only did he seem willing to listen to my opinion, but he has a gay nephew he likes (although he's not crazy about the gay thing and is polite but doesn't say much to Bruce's partner), so there's the whole humanizing-face-of-gayness thing going on. All right, it's also true that his only two granddaughters are bisexual and his ex-daughter-in-law is a lesbian, but he doesn't know about any of that. Yes, this whole Price is Right contestant conversation has had me examining my decision not to be out to my grandparents. It's never seemed worth the tempest in a teapot that it would stir up, so, basically, I've been waiting for one of two things to happen: either a) I'm in a serious-enough-to-bring-home-to-the-family relationship with a woman or b) my grandparents get old and die. It's a toss-up at this point as to which is more likely. I really hope a), of course, but I'm not holding my breath.
Yeah, so see what can happen when you watch The Price is Right with your grandfather?
I've been thinking about this exchange in the last day or two. I would have thought that he'd see this man, and read his behaviors as gay, equate gay with something wrong, and decide there was something wrong with the man. That's how I understand the thought process behind homophobia, and I think, in a lot of cases, that's how it operates. But in that exchange it occurred to me to question whether my grandfather knew what he was responding to in the man on the gameshow and to go ahead and break it down for him. I suspect that my grandfather was kickin' it old school with his homophobia: he was responding to the man's apparently gender-inappropriate behavior and deciding there was something wrong with him, without necessarily being able to articulate what that would be.
A friend of mine pointed out that this is how the word "queer" started to be applied to gay people. It just didn't occur to me that in 2002 someone could be responding to "queer" behavior without knowing what it meant. I mean, obviously, he knew he didn't approve. However, if I'm right about the way his mind was working, then it gives me hope for starting to reroute his thought processes. There's very little to be done about his well established instinct of queer behavior=distasteful, but if he can learn to simultaneously, consciously recognize that queer behavior=probably gay person AND gay person=okay, then he can consciously overcome the instinctive response. (That's a common idea for overcoming one's prejudices in all of the diversity training programs I've ever been a part of, and I like seeing how I can slip it in to my interactions with my grandfather.)
I do think there is potential for my grandfather to realize that gay person=okay. Not only did he seem willing to listen to my opinion, but he has a gay nephew he likes (although he's not crazy about the gay thing and is polite but doesn't say much to Bruce's partner), so there's the whole humanizing-face-of-gayness thing going on. All right, it's also true that his only two granddaughters are bisexual and his ex-daughter-in-law is a lesbian, but he doesn't know about any of that. Yes, this whole Price is Right contestant conversation has had me examining my decision not to be out to my grandparents. It's never seemed worth the tempest in a teapot that it would stir up, so, basically, I've been waiting for one of two things to happen: either a) I'm in a serious-enough-to-bring-home-to-the-family relationship with a woman or b) my grandparents get old and die. It's a toss-up at this point as to which is more likely. I really hope a), of course, but I'm not holding my breath.
Yeah, so see what can happen when you watch The Price is Right with your grandfather?