Tuesday
March 7, 2017
Spring · 1 entry
A follow up/ companion piece to the article on gay loneliness. This rings true to this reader-- but I'm left with a curious quarrel-- does it all boil down to privledged folks using privledge to get ahead and feeling the sting of its effects?:
"In the community, we have a name for these people: âA-gays." They enforce the social rules of a certain kind of urban gay space, implicitly or sometimes explicitly excluding other types of gays (and almost all queer people) who donât fit their strange standards. They are the donors and board members of the big gay nonprofits, the setters of the mainstream gay agenda.
Crucial to understanding the A-gays is seeing their cultural and economic complicity in the systems that both benefit them and, ironically, make them feel miserable. Please do not misunderstand: No one is responsible for suicide or mental illnessâthese are both complex phenomena that deserve to be addressed regardless of whoâs experiencing them. But part of taking a problem seriously is understanding where it comes from. If Iâm rolling my eyes at Hobbesâ piece, itâs not for lack of sympathy; itâs just the same way I might roll my eyes at an article about miserable hedge fund managers that didn't interrogate their exploitative profession and the way it might contribute both to their sadness and their privilege."
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2017/03/06/gay_loneliness_is_real_but_toxic_gay_cultures_isn_t_the_problem.html
"In the community, we have a name for these people: âA-gays." They enforce the social rules of a certain kind of urban gay space, implicitly or sometimes explicitly excluding other types of gays (and almost all queer people) who donât fit their strange standards. They are the donors and board members of the big gay nonprofits, the setters of the mainstream gay agenda.
Crucial to understanding the A-gays is seeing their cultural and economic complicity in the systems that both benefit them and, ironically, make them feel miserable. Please do not misunderstand: No one is responsible for suicide or mental illnessâthese are both complex phenomena that deserve to be addressed regardless of whoâs experiencing them. But part of taking a problem seriously is understanding where it comes from. If Iâm rolling my eyes at Hobbesâ piece, itâs not for lack of sympathy; itâs just the same way I might roll my eyes at an article about miserable hedge fund managers that didn't interrogate their exploitative profession and the way it might contribute both to their sadness and their privilege."
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2017/03/06/gay_loneliness_is_real_but_toxic_gay_cultures_isn_t_the_problem.html
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