Two links and a book review, or: a tale of (wrong) perceptions

[selenak]

Today is Elementary day, and here is a good meta post about Joan Watson, complete with lovely illustrations. :

In other news, during the last months I've taken part in a discussion about Mary Renault's The Charioteer - our discussion posts by chapters are here - which on that occasion I had read for the first time. (My previous Renaults were all

Comments

[amenirdis]

I guess the thing that strikes me is that when Ralph says, "You have no idea how low it can go," he's right. It can. It's not internalized homophobia to say that yes, as a community we have some really severe problems. We need to acknowledge the culture that victimizes very young and powerless men, that objectifies youths who are hopefully of legal age, and that abuses drugs and alcohol to a dangerous extent. In working for LGBT organizations, the level of sexual harassment of employees that's considered acceptable for young gay men would NEVER be acceptable if they were young women and the harassers were men. I had one wealthy man in his fifties offer my organization a donation of $5,000 if I would send my handsome, boyish 23 year old assistant to "pick it up" and spend the night at his house! When I demurred, two of my board members urged me to do it!

The drama queen is a stereotype for a reason. The drunk parties, the substance abuse, the suicide attempts -- OMG I have been to that party! I know Bunny and all the rest. This is how some subcultures really actually are. When I read The Charioteer, I thought "how realistic!"

Which brings me to what I think the point is -- how do you be queer without being part of that scene? Is it possible to have community, to have queer identity, without having toxic community? That's a really important question then and now. How do you live by a code, Classical or otherwise, when it's at odds with what queer identity is in your place and time? How do we transcend toxic community?

[selenak]

But you see, I really doubt that either in the 40s or now sexual exploitation wasn't present in the het variation as well. As for the level of sexual harrassment and what's deemed acceptable for young women versus young men, I remember reading late year a story where on a film set, one of the stars demanded a girl from the camera crew took of her sweater to show him her breasts, and held up production for an hour until she gave in. The only one protesting and defending the girl was another actor. Not the director or anyone from the team. And every waitress I've talked to mentioned that basically the patting, pinching etc. were something they had to get adjusted to instead of complaining. Or: apparantly Dominique Strauss Kahn thought it was self evident a maid should only be too happy to give him a blow job. And that's today, not decades ago. So I do think that Ralph's comment is internalized homophobia, because preying on the weaker in a sexual way isn't a vice more dominant among either subculture. (To say nothing of drinking or substance abuse.)

[amenirdis]

No, it's not more prevalent, but in certain parts of the community it's completely acceptable! That's the thing that's problematic. If I had worked for Greenpeace or the Sierra Club or certainly the Democratic Party and had a donor trying to rent my assistant for $5,000, I wouldn't have had board members saying that it was ok. Can you imagine if it were the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders having a meeting, and a national board member brought three eighteen year old girls to share his hotel room, college students who he was paying tuition for in exchange for "companionship?" Nobody blinked an eye. Nobody said it was inappropriate. Nobody did anything at all. I can say with absolute certainty that if that had happened at a DNC meeting, the board member would have been told that his escorts could not stay. Possibly he would have been censured or removed from the board. We have an acceptance of these kinds of abuses in a certain part of the community that really, truly, is not ok.