Alone and Unobserved

I got the April issue of the tooleriffic magazine Details the other day. Why I have a subscription to Details is not the point (was there some kind of free promotion? and was Details really the best of the lot? the mind boggles); just accept that fact that, once a month, my mailman does his level best to wedge the magazine—glossy and homoeroticism-laden—into my minuscule mailbox. (We REALLY won’t be getting into why I also have a subscription to Complex, which occupies an enviable position between Maxim and Details in the “for the discerning douchebag” hierarchy.) Normally I don’t even open it, instead just tossing it aside like a two-pound junk mailer, but this time I did a double take. Wedged in with “The Ultimate Vegas Cautionary Tale” and “What You Need to Know before Buying Your Next Suit” was this provocative headline: “Would You Really Be Okay if Your Kid Was Gay?” Of course I had to read it.

Two fathers were interviewed for the article, with each of their contributions prefaced by progressive, open-minded credentials: “Jerry” is a “Hollywood liberal,” drives a Prius and supports Obama; “Geoff” is a New-York history professor and author. The former produces TV comedies and “might as well be the mayor of Gayberry,” because he worries if there aren’t any gay people on set; the latter “is surrounded by a veritable gay army” consisting of his friends and publishing contacts, who are “[g]ay, gay, way gay,” according to him.

What kind of progressive credentials are these? This smacks of the facetiousness with which white people argue that since they “have black friends” that makes them open-minded and accepting. A note to straight people: listing all the homosexuals you associate with makes it sound like you are completely hung up on these people’s sexual orientation. Saying they are “gay, gay, way gay” only heightens that impression.

And then we get to the way the fathers were just, like, TOTALLY uncomfortable when their sons pushed any gender boundaries. “Geoff” was disturbed when his son watched the Hannah Montana movie “with a little too much glee”; “Jerry” was worried about his son’s desire to dress as a princess at Hallowe’en, but his fears were allayed when his son attacked another child who made fun of him—apparently violence is masculine enough to outweigh dressing up as Cinderella.

What the article really highlights, more than the repressed homophobia of any particular parents, is the not-so-well-disguised homophobia of the author, or perhaps of his audience—the readers of Details magazine. Also, Hochman’s sloppy, amateurish writing.

So what does this tell us? Anyone could have guessed that readers of Details are homophobic idjits (in spite of the reverent homoeroticism splashed across every other page). But I think this illustrates a real problem: if guys who think they are progressive—or who think it’s important to be thought of as progressive—still have this kind of reaction to their gay children, what hope do the gay children of the truly closed-minded have?

I was lucky. My dad never made fun of me, even when I was dressing up in high heels and playing diva, or learning to needlepoint, or taking ballroom dance. But I never felt that he was comfortable with me, either. To be honest, though, I’m not sure how it would have been to be understood by my father, or what a straight father “understanding” his gay son would even look like. A man’s masculinity and virility are very tied up in his sons, so how can he react to a son who doesn’t conform to society’s conception of what is masculine and virile?

In a way, I suppose, this is just an extreme example of the learning curve all parents face: your children are not tiny replicas of yourself, they are developing human beings with their own personalties, thoughts and desires. You won’t always understand them. Adults have to learn to deal with babies, toddlers, teenagers, twentysomethings; fathers have to learn to communicate with their daughters, mothers with their sons; and sometimes heterosexual parents have to learn to love and accept a homosexual child. THAT IS GOD’S PLAN. Amen.