Gay Men, Straight Men, Pride, and The Big Dipper

Check out this article from the New York Times about the most rarely represented relationship in pop culture - that between gay men and straight men. It's a great read, and, for me, strikes some pleasant chords with my own personal life.

From gay journalist Matthew Streib:

"Every time I hang out with my gay friends, we have to spend half an hour talking about how they have to get to the gym or how fat they feel. My straight friends just sit in a crowded bar and drink. It's like a mini-vacation from my life."

There is a superficiality in some of gay culture that I can't stand to be around, and I too find a respite in staying away from it, whether this means socializing with certain straights or gays who aren't so into the physical, or participating in solitary, sometimes lonely, activities. Sure, healthy is good and not every gay man is focused only on body and appearance, but there do seem to be an inordinate amount of them who are, as we are sometimes reminded by those clips from Pride parades that the media love to show with half-naked gym bunnies dancing on flatbeds. Good fun, but only partially representative of the big picture. If everyone, including gay people, saw Pride as representative of gay people, well, then gay people would be like the "Big Dipper," so to speak. As Joseph Goldstein puts it:

"'Big Dipper' is a concept. Humans looked, saw a certain pattern, and then created a concept in our collective mind to describe it. That concept is useful because it helps us to recognize the constellation. But, it also has another, less useful effect. By creating the concept 'Big Dipper,' we separate out those stars from all the rest, and then, if we become attached to that idea of separation, we lose the sense of the night sky's wholeness, its oneness."

Et voilà.