We’re kind of in love with this man: Dave Muskera. From what we gather, the Ohio-based former counselor married a woman, had two children, divorced said woman and has now set up shot with his “life partner,” John. In addition to being a great example of queer courage – coming out post-marriage in Ohio can’t be easy – Muskera wrote an adorable critique of the right wing’s rhetorical “gay lifestyle”:
If I read or hear the words “the gay lifestyle” one more time, I’m going to chew nails, or yell like a summa wrestler whose butt’s been kicked. I’m fed up with this phrase and the people who use it… It’s really a meaningless, worse yet, a misleading term. But somehow, the fundamentalist far-right religious camp has actually managed for years to successfully use this phrase in very negative ways to bash homosexuals.
…
Sometimes, when I see videos of the supposed gay lifestyle, I wonder if [I’m] missing out on something. I wonder if sometime in the near future, the doorbell will ring and I will open it to men in black (tights of course) – sent by the local gay agenda group to yank my gay male credentials because I haven’t been depraved enough.
Eeks! What happens if someone takes your gay credentials? Would you instantly become straight or do you get to ween yourself off the same-sex? Can you imagine the withdrawal?! Also, we think we misplaced our gay credentials. Where does one usually keep such things? (Don’t answer that.)
maverick69
I keep mine in my ass.
So if they want to cum and get it…..
Well you know the rest
Gregg
He critiques the use of “gay lifestyle” by bashing a segment of the gay community. Sounds like another self-hating gay man who doesn’t want to be associated with “queers” for fear of being rejected by straight society. “I’m just like you, Straight People! See? See? Love me!”
Why must a defense of the breadth of the gay community indulge in calling other gay folks “depraved?”
ProfessorVP
“The gay lifestyle” is a code for promiscuity and shallowness. Like most politically correct terms, it is, at core, mean-spirited.
Tonic
Definitely in agreement with you ProfessorVP.
My mother uses the term “gay lifestyle” and I tell her to compare my life before (3 years with a woman, paid taxes, 2 cats, a condo) and now (4 years with a hot man, pay taxes (ugh), 2 cats, a condo) and ask her to point out the huge lifestyle difference. The biggest difference is Happiness (or is that a-penis?).
When people use “gay lifestyle” it usually means “they’re having hotter and more sex” – which scares them to death.
hells kitchen guy
agree w/Gregg. I give guys like this points for courage (Queerty’s right on that) for coming out & staying in the boonies and fighting the good fight.
But why does that entail putting down those who live in cities, work out, go out dancing once in a while or even (gasp!) to a circuit party or (double gasp) Fire Island?
Rowen
I don’t see how he’s putting down the gay community. When wideos mentioning the “gay lifestyle” are shown, they’re shown by the right. It’s also been stated that “gay lifestyle” is a phrase used by the right. This guy is complaining about the use of that phrase, since the right wing takes a small sampling of the gay pride parades and the seedier aspects of our community, then uses them to show that ALL gay men sleep around, do drugs, are big into S&M, etc. I see nothing about how he’s putting down the gay community.
hisurfer
Men in black tights? I’m going to yank his gay credentials for that faux-pas.
His article isn’t so bad; he spends most of it trying to deconstruct the right’s focus on “gay lifestyle” and why the term is damaging. I agree there’s a bit of the old “I’m a red-blooded American and not one of those depraved city boys” – but I blame that on Ohio more than internalized homophobia.
Gregg
Rowen – I did not say he’s putting down the gay community. I said he’s putting down a SEGMENT of the gay community.
hisurfer – agreed, but I think there’s a fine line between Ohio city-gay-phobia and internalized homophobia in Ohioans.
hells kitchen guy
Um, Rowen, you’re not making a good case for this guy when you refer to (I presume) semi-naked drag queens, semi-naked leather queens, semi-naked go-go boys and semi-naked lesbians on motorcylces (the ones pictured in those tired videos to which you refer) as “the seedier aspects of our community.”
In fact, you drive home Gregg and my point.
Rowen
I didn’t refer to any of those, Hells Kitchen Guy. So don’t presume. What this guy is saying is that he’s tired of the right wing taking a SMALL segment of the gay community, villianizing it, and then applying it to ALL gays so as to villianize all of us. The only references he specifically made were the images when Fox comments on the parades (which is usually leather men with parts blurred out) and public sex. As for seedy, like bath-houses, doing drugs, and promiscuity are signs of healthy mental attitudes? Yet, he didn’t say anything against any of that. He just said he didn’t do that, so please, conservatives, stop acting like all gay men are sexual predators.
hells kitchen guy
Rowen,
OK! But batthouses, drugs and promiscuity are not necessarily seedy. Depends on who’s doing them and if they’re sharing 🙂
floodlite
he thinks he’s not part of the “gay lifestyle” but wait until he or his partner get sick or worse die. they may not relate to the poor stereotype of the gay life style, but they won’t be protected in the same ways that the straight majority enjoys.
Dave Muskera
Wow…I had no idea my little article would make it over here. Like most writers, sometimes what we have in our heads just dosnt come out the way we want it to in written form….but I think those of you who see me as critical of something in the gay comunity should really read the whole article…I just happen to believe there are also a whole lot of us gay singles and couples living out in the rural world…not insulated by city life and just doing everyday things…..didnt mean to offend…especially my gay brothers and sisters.
hisurfer
Aloha Dave! Queerty has its tentacles everywhere …
I was raised in Michigan, so I had to get some little slam on Ohio in there. It’s genetic. I also remember how the Midwest folks view the coasts. When I moved I promised my mom I wouldn’t become one of “those gays.” She was fine with me being a nice small-town gay Catholic boy (side note: oops. Sorry mom. Guess what?). And I still sense a soft anti-big city bias when I’m home visiting from other queers. I’ll do a circuit party once a year, but am always amazed at how many people will define me based on those three days and not the other 362.
Anyways, welcome to Queerty and hope ya stick around! And if those men in black tights ever do know on your door and tempt you into depravity, I know for a fact that one of my friends is using his AARP card to get a discount room at the Wyndham for White Party this year. It’s never too late!
(now about those depraved videos your church is showing – can you get a copy?)
Rowen
Hells Kitchen . . . how are they not seedy? The American Heritage Dictionary defines seedy as (among other things) “somewhat disreputable.” I think bathhouses, drugs and promiscuity fall into that category. I’m not saying we all should embrace an ideal of human interactions that dosen’t even work among heterosexuals, but, frankly, doing lots of drugs and then having random hook ups every night isn’t exactly the mindset of a mentally healthy person. I’m not attacking anyone who does anything socially, or has hooked up, but there’s a part of our community who are addicted to drugs, sex, ceramic kittens . . . and I . . . really don’t know where I’m going with this. Frankly, I don’t care what most people do, as long as it’s not fucking with me. So, I’ll just go back to my barstool and quietly judge the tweeked out twinks and hope they O.D. outside.
Dave Muskera
Hey hisurfer….thanks for the words. Seems Queerty has given my little article a lot more exposure than I realized….wish folks would read some of my other stuff….Out of 14 articles I have up on the American Chronicle, ony two have the word “gay” in their titles and those two account for almost 40% of hits. And I think you hit the nail on the head so to speak….it seems a humam tendency to make judgments about others based on little real information….like your few days of circuit v. the rest of the year…and that’s the point of the article itself….that people conclude a whole bunch of things about gays from the little bit of mean and nasty stuff given them by fundamentalist types….
I take it your in the Islands. I am where I am today because of a surfer boy I met on Kauai in 1990….but that’s a whole nother story….I tell it in a book I’m trying to get prepared for publication…called “Babe In the Ironwoods…the Adventures and Misadventures of an Ex-Married, Ex-Heterosexual Gay Psychologist”….wish me luck in getting it published.