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Loading ...Corvino: What’s real for gay men
Recently I’ve been reflecting on mentoring, and the various ways we introduce newcomers to aspects of gay life-the good, the bad, and the ugly-in an effort to help them navigate their own path. This brought to mind two stories, both involving gay bars.
The first happened about 20 years ago, when I was a volunteer for the AIDS Center for Queens County. My “buddy” and I were enjoying drinks at Uncle Charlie’s, a (now-defunct) Greenwich Village watering hole. I was 20, fresh out of Catholic school, and still pretty conservative. Uncle Charlie’s was known as the “S&M” (”Stand & Model”) bar for preppy youths like me.“I need to take you to a REAL New York gay bar,” my buddy announced.
So he took me to the Spike, a notorious leather bar. At the time I was wearing pressed khakis and a pastel multi-striped Ralph Lauren Oxford shirt, and I couldn’t have stuck out more if I had walked in dressed as a nun. (Actually, there may have been someone there dressed as a nun, but the details of the night are blurry.)
The second happened a decade later. By then I was a recently hired professor at Wayne State University in Detroit. I was enjoying drinks at Pronto, a suburban gay bar not unlike Uncle Charlie’s, when an African-American friend turned to me and said, “I need to take you to a REAL Detroit gay bar.”
“Here we go again,” I thought.
So we left the bar and drove over to the east side of the city. I was the only white person in sight, and as we stood in line I focused intently on my friend so as not to look overly curious. We reached the door, and the bouncer, who towered over me like a sequoia tree, leaned down to give me a hug.
“This is weird,” I thought, but not wanting to appear conspicuous I went ahead and wrapped my arms around him. My friend started laughing hysterically.
Suddenly I realized that the bouncer was not trying to hug me. He was patting me down for weapons. So much for not looking conspicuous.
There are several lessons here-aside from, watch what the other people in line are doing.
First, there’s the common human tendency to have strong feelings about what’s REAL, whether we’re talking about a REAL bar, or the REAL Detroit, or REAL sex-whatever.
Yet Uncle Charlie’s and Pronto felt (and were) perfectly real to me. There’s a danger in confusing what’s personally comfortable with what’s authentic. And while there’s nothing wrong with sharing one’s likes and dislikes, we shouldn’t dismiss others’ preferences simply because they’re different.
Take, for example, the tendency of some gays to consider anal sex “real” sex, and other forms as mere foreplay. This mirrors the heterosexual tendency to do the same with penile-vaginal sex. As a result, some deep, meaningful, exciting, positive sexual experiences get dismissed as less than real, and some people routinely engage in forms of sex that they don’t really enjoy. How foolish.
Second, because there’s value in expanding one’s horizons, and because new territory can be fraught with risk-even if only risk of embarrassment-ambassadors are crucial. I never would have explored those other places had those friends not taken me. And even though I decided that the places weren’t my scene, my friends helped expand my notion of what’s possible.
Of course, this is true not just for bars-which are (for me) a relatively minor part of gay life-but also for political and charitable groups, art openings, public lectures, dinner parties, sports events, whatever.
It isn’t just true for gay life, either. For example, my identity as a Detroiter has become important to me, and it’s been formed largely thanks to the people who have introduced me to the city in all its aspects-the good, the bad, and the ugly.
And so, those who mentor have a delicate job-inviting but not pushing (at least, not beyond a gentle nudging); advocating but not forcing; witnessing but not indoctrinating. I’m grateful for the many who have done it for me. I hope I can pay their effort forward.
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John Corvino, Ph.D. is an author, speaker, and philosophy professor at Wayne State University in Detroit.
For over seventeen years he has traveled the country speaking on homosexuality and ethics. His writing has been featured in regional and national periodicals, at the online Independent Gay Forum, and in numerous scholarly anthologies. His column “The Gay Moralist” appears Fridays on 365gay.com.
For more about John Corvino, or to see clips from his “What’s Morally Wrong with Homosexuality?” DVD, visit www.johncorvino.com.
Appaerntly PhD’s are getting very easy to get!
The blah blah blah blurb about Corvino at the end of this article is kinda pretentious and reinforces the fact that he’s not that talented an editorialist.
I wish Dr. Corvino would utilize the same depth and humor he offers in his lectures and other articles here…this Opinion column seems rather pale and somewhat superficial by comparison…this particular ‘article’, like others here, seems shallow and only skirts and tap dances around a real opportunity to truly explore gay mentoring,to which he only briefly eludes and buries deeply…overall reducing it to mental masturbation and almost reducing a mentor’s role to that of a tourguide. Please Doc, a little more substance for those of us who admire your “Real” work!?
Dear Dr Corvino
As we are about the same age and have trolled the same bars (in Detroit and NY), I think you will make a great mentor.
While gay bars make for a good start – From Pronto, the Gas Station, the Woodward, Menjos and Gigi’s in Detroit – to the heights of gaybardom in NYC: these are the places to show your mentee.
But also show your mentee all those things we didn’t have: gay bowling, school groups, hiking, camping, political centers, etc.
I have long been haunted by the fact that when I was a teen, gay 40somethings were dying left and right. Our only chance at finding a mentor was in bars or nightclubs – and I needed no mentoring in how to end up drunk by last call. Nor did I want an older man as a lover, but as an older brother who could show me how to be gay and survive the homophobia of the early AIDS years. Again, bars were not the place to find what I was looking for.
May I also suggest that you expose your mentee to a city that has made tremendous progress in making our community feel like we are absolutely equal to all other members of society. That city is Montreal. While the rest of Canada eventually catches up with Quebec on gay rights, it is this city that pushes the envelope. As I write, there are massive posters all over town decrying homophobia: it is part of the provincial education system’s current mandate. Posters of 2 male hockey players kissing are found near school playgrounds, blatantly exclaiming ‘This is not weird’. A vast majority of people here simply do not care about your sex life. They take your right to privacy, freedom, and self-expression VERY seriously. There are far more social clubs than bars for gays here; bathhouses are as sleazy or spa-like as you want them to be; and the city is on a rampage, yanking out the last roots of homophobia with a passion that lifts the heart.
I was someone who sorely needed a mentor. I moved to Detroit from Belgium as a teen: having never experienced homophobia, I was terrified by the “faggots: hate ‘em, shoot ‘em” mentality of the Detroit area. As an American, I was supposed to be able to fit in – which is impossible if you didn’t grow up there. Before being known as the Murder Capital, Detroit was known as ‘The Unfriendliest City in America’.
Things aren’t the same anymore, thank goodness. Even Michigan, while very very chilly toward its GLBT community, is getting better. In NYC, it seems that St. Vincent’s hospital has finally found some respect for gay patients (as opposed to the Reagan era hostility visited upon gays who had the misfortune of ending up in the West Village’s major hospital).
But please, Dr. C, bring your mentee to see a place that treats our community with all the dignity afforded to all groups. Show your mentee that North America can be different in his or her lifetime. Montreal is a town that knocks chips off shoulders.
I say all of this because I think your idea is a great one, and because I would have loved to have had a mentor in the dark years. Imagine this, however: ideally, here in Quebec, REGULAR SCHOOL TEACHERS are expected to serve as mentors to their gay students – as well as their straight students. They are trying to create a society in which mentors are not needed for “lost” GLBT citizens, as gay life is carried out in the open, in schools and non-nightlife activity. Show your mentee that gay ghettos exist, but are not necessary. Show your mentee a society that has simply decided we are not abnormal in any way. Nor, of course, are we “special” – we are Montrealers.
You will find nowhere on the continent that is so rabidly anti-homophobic, yet so rabidly “normal”. Your mentee needs to know that such hope exists and is being lived by thousands of foreign gays who are very grateful for the opportunity to live in such a place. Only an 8 hour drive from Wayne State.
Your mentee is truly blessed; as we might have been were our elders not dying when our generation needed them most.
Thanks for walking the walk.
Were not the best behaved animal in the animal kingdom. Although: Since we are outside our natural habitat, the night clubs offer some of us, a much need break from the streets of America…
“John,John,John! How old is your head-shot? Or are you playing into the myth that only the young are beautiful let alone credible? Please show us what you look like today”
While I don’t know John well, we’ve met and I run into him around town once in a while. That is what he looks like. Definitely looks at least ten years younger than his age. bastard.
HMM Food for thought. Dr. Corvino makes some astute observations. When I came out( was I ever really in) let me rephrase that , When I went to my first gay Bar it was called the “Blue Bugle” in Stroudsburg Pa, now closed in 90 something, It was for a feeling of comfort and sameness. I admit I too went to Places like the “Anvil, “The Cellar’ & RamRod” in NY City; different tastes. It was a Place to hook up for sex. There is a difference in being GAY and being a Screaming in your Face Flaunting your Life Style Obnoxious Queen instead of a Gay Man. Im sorry but We “Men” seem to do that drawing attention in all the wrong light.
Another keeper John, I am going ot clip this one and remember it for a time.
Seems like a slow news day. Why is it that this guy’s stories are always top header here on this website. Seriously?
John,John,John! How old is your head-shot? Or are you playing into the myth that only the young are beautiful let alone credible? Please show us what you look like today!
There was a time when being gay meant being in a gay bar with other gays. As a gay person, I was required to dance, drink and hook up. This was my first impression of the gay “scene.” That was in my early-20’s.
Now, at near-30 (and loving it), being gay has become less a defining thing. I’ve since stopped drinking and going to the bars, really. Looking back, I was never really mentored by anyone and I am always somewhat envious of those who are newly-out and find someone to show them the ins-and-outs of their respective gay scene.
At the same time, I’m thankful that I didn’t have anyone to do that. Being told what is “REAL” has almost always lead to disappointment in any instance. Thanks for the thoughts!
Ah. Gay bars. I don’t drink and I don’t smoke – so I don’t go to bars, period. Several years ago I got Read The Riot Act for not going to gay bars. Apparently I was “not supporting the Community”. Please. Defining “The Community” in terms of a bar is, gosh, a damn good reason why alcohol is such a Huge problem in The Community.
When I came out, I was not so fortunate. I was sheltered from most of the world by my parents and was confined to an “inner circle” of friends, who were of the same faith. At any rate, I came out with a bang and had no idea what it meant to be gay. My impressions of the gay world were what I was taught to believe while growing up. Because of this, I felt that I was a sexual deviant, as opposed to just a “gay man”. The first gay person I met was in a bar and was less than virtuous. I followed in his footsteps, thinking that this was the “norm” in the community.
Now that I am almost 40, I look back at my perception of the gay world and wonder if it would have been different, had I had a mentor to show me the “real” gay world. I am assuming I would have been a little more balanced and less risky. I think that it is very important that we have someone like Dr. Corvino that talks about this subject. I also believe that it is up to all of us to mentor others, so that they may learn from our experiences.
I was a very ignorant 21 year old and I am still learning how the ”real world” works. Some of my previous impressions haunt me to this day, but thank god I did eventually find someone to mentor me.
This might sound funny, but the only time I ever go to a gay bar is when a charitable event is being held in one … I’m just not a bar person.
“Take, for example, the tendency of some gays to consider anal sex “real” sex, and other forms as mere foreplay. This mirrors the heterosexual tendency to do the same with penile-vaginal sex.”
Brilliant analysis!