Real love -- I'm, like, searchin' for that Queer Love -- LGBTQIA+ Love // A Thread for the Real Ones

I love the lot of you.

Friends, what movie should I show this year for my Pride movie morning. I've done this for like 7 years running, inviting friends late Saturday morning (the highest non-drunk energy of the weekend in my experience) and shown a movie and given a nourishing brunch. Previous years' attractions included:

PARIS IS BURNING
DEATH BECOMES HER
TO WONG FOO
BUT I'M A CHEERLEADER
TOP GUN

... and a couple more I'm spacing on. The point is to find a movie everyone can talk through even if they haven't seen it before. Here's my current shortlist:

SERIAL MOM
CAN'T STOP THE MUSIC
THE WIZ
DRESSED TO KILL
CLUE

A milkshake?

Friedkin’s The Boys In the Band, as overwrought as it was, still feels fresh and is a film I think can be watched in a glancing manner

It's older than the ones on your list, though. Also, I haven't seen the recent version and don't know if that negates it for people today

The recent Boys in the Band is grotesque.

I don’t remember much about Parting Glances (1986) except that I really liked watching it at the time. I have been meaning to see it again. It is probably really dated. Does anyone else remember it?

Not dated at all except for the grotty budget. Buscemi is warm and cute and queer in a way he wasn't again.

I have issues with both versions of TBitB, but the original at least has Leonard Frey in one of the all time great queer roles

Parting Glances is lovely. It totally holds up.

Frey is terrific in the original Boys, which only makes Zachary Quinto's unconvincing take on the character all the more ludicrous.

We have a few gay friends— three fag couples, two dyke couples, and about five straight couples that we see on a regular basis. The fag couples are the ones we see the most, no surprise there.

I have no RL friends. Not sure if I want any until I get into a place and a life where I can be openly trans and queer. As for my online acquaintances...it's been a bizarre situation, at least to me. It's something I'd like to write about eventually, but if I write about it here it will be on 77.

Friedkin’s The Boys In the Band, as overwrought as it was, still feels fresh and is a film I think can be watched in a glancing manner

― Dan S.

I gotta say my recent experiences have given me a lot more understanding of the whole "Boys in the Band" thing, the whole "self-loathing gays" thing seemed so weird and overwrought until I transitioned. Now it's more like "Oh, yeah, shit-tons of trauma, we're all gay disasters. Got it."

Almost all the people I hang out, aside from co-workers, are trans, gender-diverse, genderqueer, something along those lines, these days. I'm not consciously doing the "trans separatist" T4T thing Torrey Peters critiques in "Infect Your Friends And Loved Ones". It is still a thing, in that people still do it, but I'm really skeptical that a community made up entirely of severely trauma-damaged people is going to be anywhere near utopian. There's just a shit-ton of us around where I live, and a lot of them are people I wind up liking. There's also just like a lot of misconceptions about trans folks in general and it's nice to hang out with people who I know won't be weird about it when, for instance, I say I'm a non-binary trans woman.

It's also only been about three years for me, and I'm not going to say for sure my social circle might not change in another few years. Honestly I'm still going through some pretty intense personal changes that make hanging out with cishets not terribly practical a lot of the time.

I am schizoid and have gradually withdrawn from social situations starting in my mid 20's, reaching the point of 'social isolation' probably in the last 4 or 5 years. I keep in contact with a few close friends who I occasionally see, almost always one-on-one at this point. But I can quite happily go months without speaking to anyone.

Previously my main friend groups had been "diverse only in terms of racial makeup". And I remain on friendly terms with most of the guys I've dated but I've really only had one close platonic friend who is a gay man. He is very involved in his local bear scene and his main social group consists entirely of gay couples (all male).

When I was a witch's apprentice there were a lot of gay men around, and I received a lot of unwanted attention. One former apprentice in particular was relentless. Either I'm really bad at making it clear when I'm not interested or idk. I spent the day with them once and unwanted attention was a problem. And actually, it was a problem too when I was a witch's apprentice. One former apprentice in particular was so relentless that I stopped going. Either I'm really bad at making it clear I'm not interested or idk.

I was also friendly with a younger (by 8-10 years) gay couple in my neighborhood in my early 30's, very soft boys who were really the most fun, even though there were tensions in their relationship. Hanging around with them was just like an hours-long giggle session every time.

sorry, that's a mess.

(It's probably in part b/c i'm very bad at reading social cues in general, and tend to be totally oblivious unless somebody is really forward and unambiguous)

Following up on the social circles convo from yesterday, I just realized, having watched both Fire Island and the first season of Somebody Somewhere in the past week, that my own queer existence is much more like the latter than the former.

Most people’s is I bet

Depends on age range. From 25-27 or so, my life was much more Fire Island, but yknow

I had a memorable week on Fire Island in the 90s - White Party, drugs, beautiful vistas, deer on the beach, an anonymous blowjob in the meat rack, and a sexy guy I got to spend the night naked with, without having sex, which made it all the better. I met David Geffen and thought he was kind of creepy

I'm sure I will never go there again

good story.

gay youth is so idealized, i wish we had a more fulfilling place for queer elders in society other than homeownership, interiority and fleeting connections with nephews and nieces. what i've seen of palm springs does not appeal tbh.

"i wish we had a more fulfilling place for queer elders in society other than homeownership, interiority and fleeting connections with nephews and nieces."

yes

i think about that old dead fingers talk song a lot.

ok wait the band is named "dead fingers talk"

I read that as Dead Ringers.

I’m not sure I get yr drift— like of course there should me more representation of older queer people, but what do you have in mind?

Also not really sure what the hell is wrong with homeownership or doting on ny friends’ kids. Not everyone wants to party and have anonymous hookups until they die.

good story.

gay youth is so idealized, i wish we had a more fulfilling place for queer elders in society other than homeownership, interiority and fleeting connections with nephews and nieces. what i've seen of palm springs does not appeal tbh.

The thing is that there are fulfilling roles, it’s just that they’re invisibilized— so the problem seems more about representation than about what actually happens in queer circles.

Finally just to say that I’ve been with my husband for 11 years, and in the circles that we run in, our relationship is seen as a model, not as some sort of decline into normativity. And our circles are radical circles.

I had a moment around age 35 where a subplot involving “my then-boyfriend’s affair” was causing me gay confusion, like, existential stuff. Feeling like every other family member was speeding toward grandparenthood, second home ownership. Was confused about the long-term implications of queerness, not of “dick in bum” forever, but more like, “what is the meaning of queerness when the basic features of it dry up and/or become less important?”

Like, are you queer if you’re not having sex? (Conversely, are you queer even if you embrace a capitalist life trajectory?)

I invited a dignified actor friend over for dinner, guy is in his 80s and if I told you his name you’d be like “ohhh HIM?” (Google Sissy Boy Slap Party). I wanted to pick his brain about “growing old gracefully as a gay” and see what he had to say. I didn’t preemptively let him know I desires to discuss this as a topic.

The entire dinner, he was loudly reminiscing about dicks and asses and Fire Island— it was a bawdy summation. His term for a penis was “a pee-pee”, and he’d bark it loudly at the end of a punch line. “And when I turned around… he had pulled out his PEE-PEE!!!”

I remembered a little later about Gore Vidal in his dotage sadly saying to a friend, “hey, why don’t we invite [x] over? Remember, he had a dick as big as a baby’s arm” and the interviewer noted that [x] had been dead for years

Anyway, all this is to say that there hasn’t been much luck in the “devising a long term model for gay men’s psychological retirement plans” over here. I definitely think turning to writing seems to be a recurring thing though

“Gay men’s psychological retirement plans”?!?

Please elaborate, because I am absolutely lost.

Honestly this has been a major factor in my depression adventures— feeling like most of the gay dudes I know have just grown MORE depressed and MORE alone as they age and age. The “well, what the fuck do I have to look forward to?” question definitely informs my own periods or lethargy and wantingtodie-ness

I'm having less sex but my friendships are growing profounder. Maybe that's queerness at its best.

tabes idk if it’s deliberate but I always feel as if you respond in such confrontational ways toward my posts and it’s been going on for years. If it’s unintentional then I guess there’s nothing really to say about it. I’ve had side convos with other boarders like “am I crazy? Is his tone always so hostile toward me?” and I’ve been agreed with, idk. I know we never had a bad hookup because I can count the names and faces of every dude I’ve hooked up with, all twenty-five of them

Anyway

I’ll explain what I meant by what I typed later I want coffees first

I’m truly not trying to be an asshole, but I have to say that if your gay male friends are getting more depressed and alone as they get older, there is the distinct possibility that you need to find new friends.

My best gay friend is a trans faggot who is ten years younger than me. These are the kinds of queer friendships that are sustaining and bring me hope, because he has friends who are a few years younger and I meet them, too, and know that there are plenty of weird queer young folks running around.

If this is about not being able to run with the young folks anymore, then it seems more about gay mens’ hangups about youth.

fgti, I just think our experiences are so diametrically opposed that I have a hard time understanding where you’re coming from a lot of the time.

But truly, it’s nothing personal— I’m just often baffled by the things that you post, particularly in the queer threads.

That said, I’m sorry and I’ll be more mindful of how I interact with you here. I like many things you write on other threads and admire your art.

Thanks for that, and I mean it. Sorry if I come off as baffling.. I feel somewhat invested in this topic and wanna type more when I’m not on my phone

No need to apologize— your experience and how you make sense of it is your own!! I think that one of my biggest faults is that my own bafflement comes across as aggro and investigatory, like I’m cross-examining or something. It’s not a good look and I appreciate being called out on it.

I’m also deeply interested in this topic, happy to continue conversation whenever.

Nooooo it's actually kind of part of the "table" package, don't consider it a fault, I just hoped to clarify.

I keep starting to type and it turns into a life story kinda post. Trying to condense things rn

Essentially, I'm trying to figure out, on a psychological level, what my desired pattern of behaviour looks like as I approach my 50s and 60s

One of my defining acquaintanceships in my adult life involved a sexual assault that occurred in 2009; this assault was not an expression of horniness, or a by-product of my assaulter's alcoholism, so much as it was an expression of social dominance.

My continued friendship with my assaulter, writing off what had happened as having been "a drunken mistake", was itself a mistake, and a learning experience. I realized just the extent of how gay men weaponize their sexuality to "feel big" and "feel powerful". Me, sex is something that I associate only with love and comfort and care, I don't go to bathhouses, I don't hook up with strangers, I like dating men and falling in love with them and having loving sex with them.

Another of my defining acquaintanceships was a relationship that followed many of the same archetypes as my relationship with my assaulter. My then-boyfriend used sexuality as a method of belittlement and power-assertion. (Among a plethora of abusive behaviours he engaged with toward me, he spent a week sending dick pics to my assaulter, tittering "omg fgti would be devastated if they knew were were sexting like this".)

When I was in a thirteen year relationship, I felt at times like I was with my boyfriend in a bathysphere. We were descending slowly, beautifully, through the ocean, and things were getting darker and colder and eventually we'd die. But we were together. I do not have that feeling any more, I feel confused.

I wish I could echo Alfred and say that my friendships are growing more profound. It is somewhat the case in certain circumstances-- my current friendship with my now ex 13-year boyfriend is deeper and more profound than any friendship I've ever had. But generally I feel as if I'm losing friends, they're becoming exhausted with me, or I with them, or they're settling into suburban coupledom/families/polycules and being less present.

I feel like so much of life is geared towards heteronormativity. You want to do well at school so you can go off to uni so you can get a good job so you can save money so you can buy a home so you can raise a family. But my end goal isn't to raise a family, and there's essentially a non-existent chance of it happening accidentally, so suddenly all these markers of achievement and success don't make sense to actively pursue.

I'm settled with my boyfriend of a decade but that doesn't mean I want to live in idyllic domestic bliss, I want to keep going out and do all kinds of fun things and be as free from responsibility and obligation as I can be. What will that look like when I'm in my 60s and 70s - will I still be trying to go to gigs and clubs, will I still be having big weekends in my pals' homes drinking and dancing? Will they all have settled down and will we be forced to join in, or will we make new pals and who would those new pals be? I don't know, and I think I'm quite happy to just keep postponing the thought and enjoying myself just now. I'm really lucky, in that a lot of my pals are straight people who are firmly committed to not having kids, settling down etc. But I do worry that it will change.

I'm also lucky in having str8 pals who have remained single well into their 40s. Even the ones w/families have promised me a room when their kids move out; they're not kidding either.

I have several great friendships with people over 60– oldest is 88– but they’re most-of-them divorced (or widowed) heterosexual grandparents

I think that I’ve been lucky in this regard, in that my grandparents on one side were getting arrested at street protests well into their 80s, and I know a lot of older queer people through writing community— I mean, as much as someone like Dennis Cooper could be my dad, he is also my friend and colleague, and I know plenty of other queer people around his age who are living fulfilling, interesting lives well past their 60s.

For me, much of this is related to the heteronormativity that creeps into the consciousness of even the most strident among us— that’s not a knock, just a reality that needs to be acknowledged. Lord knows I feel it sometimes.

Part of this, too, especially for men who love men, is that so many people who could have been examples of alternative ways to live were killed for being who they were. With fewer living elders to look up to and learn from, it becomes more difficult to find examples that might work as guides for our own lives as we age.

thanks everyone for sharing where they're at, much food for thought.

i guess i've just been reflecting lately about what's important to me. which makes me think of ways i may not be living up to that. i still have internalized hetero desire like boxedjoy was describing on the one hand, on the other hand, what does thriving look like? how much do i really need? where can i scale back? things like that. balance is probably the main thing i've been leaning into lately. sometimes i feel like i need to shift my balance? maybe i don't need to do anything, and i'm just growing as a person.

to be clear, i'd love to own a home, the security of that sounds amazing, but i'd be terrible at it! because how my parents did it sucked ass. i'd have to learn so much. learning for me is .. a little goes a long way, haha, it's often overwhelming and exhausting.

I love that, table

I think I have had more "almost" elders in my proximity, people who do function as legitimate people to whom I look up, but haven't wholly taken on a "role model" place in my life. Most of the happiest queer elders individuals who I've met have had the advantage of a steady long-term rental or an early property purchase... they've been living in the same place for decades. Wish I could say the same! although my ex-partner has held on to our formerly co-habited unit for almost ten years now and I love to see that. Me, I can't even decide what city to put down roots

Also not really sure what the hell is wrong with homeownership or doting on ny friends’ kids. Not everyone wants to party and have anonymous hookups until they die.

― broccoli rabe thomas (the table is the table)

i don't see that anyone's saying anything is _wrong_ with those things, look, i don't want to do the diversity lecture but we are, like, all different. what works for you may not necessarily work for all of us!

Like, are you queer if you’re not having sex? (Conversely, are you queer even if you embrace a capitalist life trajectory?)

― flamboyant goon tie included

hi, phoning in from the Lesbian Brigade here! as far as i'm concerned, the answer to your first question is "yes". i mean i'm much more "on our backs" than "off our backs", don't get me wrong. i also want to tread gingerly here because i know there has been some... disagreement in the past as to what extent asexuality is a queer identity, and my experience is that it very much is for me, in... a particular sense.

one will see in some cases feminizing HRT called "chemical castration", which is in a technical sense correct, but the _desexualization_ or even _unsexing_ inherent in that is something i really disagree with. estrogen and (particularly) progesterone horny is a beautiful thing in and of itself, for me it's a classic example of "quality over quantity", just going into this _space_ where _everything_ is charged with the quality of the erotic in some sense. being, like, a blackpilled incel isn't queer, but i do some _extremely gay shit_ even if i don't find penetrative sex to be particularly worth the time and effort involved. hell, even that... i mean look one of the major reasons i had the sort of genital reconstructive surgery i did was because the idea of being someone for whom PIV intercourse in _any_ fashion was biologically impossible was _very appealing_ to me. to me, that's pretty fucking queer.

as to your second question, being on a capitalist life trajectory i don't think has much bearing one one's individual queerness, but in terms of existing in solidarity with queer comunity it can cause certain problems in practice. like, caitlyn jenner is a trans woman but i don't really think of her as part of the Trans Community.

I'm having less sex but my friendships are growing profounder. Maybe that's queerness at its best.

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn)

to me there's like this aspect of _homosociality_ that a lot of guys don't have, and i don't think homosociality is _queer_, normative womanhood is hugely homosocial to the point where it causes genuine problems for those of us who are also homosexual (the "sappho and her friend" thing), but as a queer person i find that homosociality is... i mean being trans i don't have a "retirement plan", psychological or otherwise, it doesn't seem particularly viable to me right now, but if i had the luxury i think homosociality would be a big part of it.

Also not really sure what the hell is wrong with homeownership or doting on ny friends’ kids. Not everyone wants to party and have anonymous hookups until they die.

― broccoli rabe thomas (the table is the table)

i don't see that anyone's saying anything is _wrong_ with those things, look, i don't want to do the diversity lecture but we are, like, all different. what works for you may not necessarily work for all of us!

you do a lot of reacting on here. just an observation.

growing a little tired of the shouting in a box mode a lot of people seem to be locked in lately, i do it a lot too. the thing that rubs is when i express interest in what someone else is saying and it isn't reciprocated. (probably not going to try again with that person.)

Well, it's a little hard to not be reactive or defensive when your post implies negative judgment on some elements of my own existence— like, sorry we own a house, I guess those years of being homeless and living on scraps don't matter much.

I also don't really understand the lecturing tone from kate— part of what I was getting at in my original post was that not everyone wants the same things, so merely repeating that back to me as if I don't already know is a bit, well, insulting?