What the frak?-queer politics version!
AWP post will come when I'm off Friday and have time to devote to it. But hey, here's weird gay scandal stuff!
Assuming we all know of Ted Haggard, the former fundamentalist, homophobic, Christian pastor of the New Life Church who was exposed as a hypocrite by Mike Jones, an escort Haggard had done stuff with-sadly Haggard (after completing a 3 week "cure" program that even some of his former cohorts thought was kinda fast...) has been on Oprah with his wife and kids, Nightline, AND had a documentary about his attempts to "put his life back together", ie. still saying he's straight, just straight "with issues," YET he's been accused again of trying to do the whole gay thing (this time unwanted advances, not anonymous payed sex) by a former member of the church, who also claims the church gave him hush money not to go public with it. The church does admit to giving the other guy money, but like, it was TOTALLY unrelated to their former pastor hitting on him. Seriously. And the ex-prostitue, Mike Jones, who exposed this guy? Is apparently close to broke, finding it difficult to find any kind of actual job, and has been completely ignored by the mainstream (and any other) gay rights group. People volley back and forth that, "dude, you were a prostitue! you had to know doing something like that would affect your life aka prostitutes are looked down upon in life" to "the guy gave undeniable proof to the frakin' hypocrisy of the Christian churches on issues of homosexuality that's been going on for years, cut him some slack!" Jones has (in my view) been possibly naive about this whole situation-unfortunately Mr. Jones, you probably weren't going to be embraced by the mainstream gay community, and would not get wads of cash from them either, or new channels to go down new, better paths in life. BUT...like I said before, the guy exposed the vile hypocrisy of the church's hushing up and protecting of all their gay priests ("Reverend's not really gay, he just has issues with finding dick in his mouth. here's money, go away."), while always using glbt people as targets for the downfall of moral civilization. And Haggard, the guilty one, is on Oprah and shit? Give Jones a break!
Ah, but apparently us gay people know how to do this tango too- as Obama was being sworn in as our President, the news broke across gay media blogs that recently elected, (first) openly gay mayor of Portland, Oregon, Sam Adams, actually DID have a relationship with a teenage male intern! First denying the relationship, Adams, on inauguration day, left DC to return to Portland to admit that yeah, he did have sex with Beau Breedlove, an 18 year old former intern-they met when Breedlove was 17, had a mentor/protege relationship, before, according to Adams, began a brief (less than a month) relationship-but said relationship began AFTER Breedlove was 18. So says Adams. And Breedlove-who did admit Adams told him to deny the affair when the initial reports broke about it. So yeah-gay mayor (hurrah!) has an unethical affair with an intern (who may have been underage, making it way, way more unethical..), tells him to lie about it, and then decides to fess up after it's exposed. (BOOO!) Adams is still in office, and while apologizing to the people of Portland, says he has no plans to step down. Nothing further yet on this, or the investigation of the affair.
Tonight though, we have the utterly strange twist that made my eyes bug out: Unzipped, a gay porn magazine apparently found photos of Breedlove on a now deleted myspace account and after posting them on their site, somehow contacted Breedlove-and this 18 year old kid in one side of a political sexual/ethic scandal is going to be the coverboy next month for the gay porn mag!
Seriously folks...Philip Roth couldn't have written it any better. (Human Stain anyone?) Obviously I thought back on how I viewed the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, but one big possible difference-Clinton and Lewinsky were adults. This Breedlove kid may have been 17 when he and 45 year old Mayor Adams began their relationship. Not to mention, there's unfortunately a feeling of Adams taking advantage of the whole mentor/protege relationship, regardless of whether Breedlove was actually 18 when they began it, and that, as both Adams and Breedlove have stated, the sexual relationship was mutually wanted at the time. So if he was 18, then technically, ok, they didn't do anything illegal. Just questionable. Gay or straight, led by heart or dick, that was a foolish thing to do.
Maybe I'll do my own riff on the Human Stain with this though, and write a great American novel! On politics, gay sexuality, moral ethics, conflicting emotions of mentoring and hormones!
Or...
maybe I'll just stick to my fantastical stories and punk novel, and glower at the knotty mess of politics, religion, and sex in this country.
Assuming we all know of Ted Haggard, the former fundamentalist, homophobic, Christian pastor of the New Life Church who was exposed as a hypocrite by Mike Jones, an escort Haggard had done stuff with-sadly Haggard (after completing a 3 week "cure" program that even some of his former cohorts thought was kinda fast...) has been on Oprah with his wife and kids, Nightline, AND had a documentary about his attempts to "put his life back together", ie. still saying he's straight, just straight "with issues," YET he's been accused again of trying to do the whole gay thing (this time unwanted advances, not anonymous payed sex) by a former member of the church, who also claims the church gave him hush money not to go public with it. The church does admit to giving the other guy money, but like, it was TOTALLY unrelated to their former pastor hitting on him. Seriously. And the ex-prostitue, Mike Jones, who exposed this guy? Is apparently close to broke, finding it difficult to find any kind of actual job, and has been completely ignored by the mainstream (and any other) gay rights group. People volley back and forth that, "dude, you were a prostitue! you had to know doing something like that would affect your life aka prostitutes are looked down upon in life" to "the guy gave undeniable proof to the frakin' hypocrisy of the Christian churches on issues of homosexuality that's been going on for years, cut him some slack!" Jones has (in my view) been possibly naive about this whole situation-unfortunately Mr. Jones, you probably weren't going to be embraced by the mainstream gay community, and would not get wads of cash from them either, or new channels to go down new, better paths in life. BUT...like I said before, the guy exposed the vile hypocrisy of the church's hushing up and protecting of all their gay priests ("Reverend's not really gay, he just has issues with finding dick in his mouth. here's money, go away."), while always using glbt people as targets for the downfall of moral civilization. And Haggard, the guilty one, is on Oprah and shit? Give Jones a break!
Ah, but apparently us gay people know how to do this tango too- as Obama was being sworn in as our President, the news broke across gay media blogs that recently elected, (first) openly gay mayor of Portland, Oregon, Sam Adams, actually DID have a relationship with a teenage male intern! First denying the relationship, Adams, on inauguration day, left DC to return to Portland to admit that yeah, he did have sex with Beau Breedlove, an 18 year old former intern-they met when Breedlove was 17, had a mentor/protege relationship, before, according to Adams, began a brief (less than a month) relationship-but said relationship began AFTER Breedlove was 18. So says Adams. And Breedlove-who did admit Adams told him to deny the affair when the initial reports broke about it. So yeah-gay mayor (hurrah!) has an unethical affair with an intern (who may have been underage, making it way, way more unethical..), tells him to lie about it, and then decides to fess up after it's exposed. (BOOO!) Adams is still in office, and while apologizing to the people of Portland, says he has no plans to step down. Nothing further yet on this, or the investigation of the affair.
Tonight though, we have the utterly strange twist that made my eyes bug out: Unzipped, a gay porn magazine apparently found photos of Breedlove on a now deleted myspace account and after posting them on their site, somehow contacted Breedlove-and this 18 year old kid in one side of a political sexual/ethic scandal is going to be the coverboy next month for the gay porn mag!
Seriously folks...Philip Roth couldn't have written it any better. (Human Stain anyone?) Obviously I thought back on how I viewed the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, but one big possible difference-Clinton and Lewinsky were adults. This Breedlove kid may have been 17 when he and 45 year old Mayor Adams began their relationship. Not to mention, there's unfortunately a feeling of Adams taking advantage of the whole mentor/protege relationship, regardless of whether Breedlove was actually 18 when they began it, and that, as both Adams and Breedlove have stated, the sexual relationship was mutually wanted at the time. So if he was 18, then technically, ok, they didn't do anything illegal. Just questionable. Gay or straight, led by heart or dick, that was a foolish thing to do.
Maybe I'll do my own riff on the Human Stain with this though, and write a great American novel! On politics, gay sexuality, moral ethics, conflicting emotions of mentoring and hormones!
Or...
maybe I'll just stick to my fantastical stories and punk novel, and glower at the knotty mess of politics, religion, and sex in this country.