By Matteo D. Hudson
Greetings dearest readers! I hope this column finds you well. My ankle is much better, thank you all for asking. Also, the weather is very typical Oregon for me: foggy, raining, cool, and moist. Which I think is Fabulous! This week�s column is about the amazing preponderance of LGBT people in Creative roles.
We have all seen the creative Gay guy. You can hardly turn on the TV and fail to see a Gay interior designer (Color Splash with David Bromstad), or fashion guru (Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and What Not to Wear), or talk show host (Ellen, or Richard Simons [allegedly straight]). Not to mention shows like Queer As Folk, Will and Grace, The L-Word, or Noah�s Arc. But is the Lavender community really just more creative or is it all Hollywood?
Of course some of it is stereotyping from Hollywood. A lot of the older Gay characters (and recent ones as well) held the extra-sensory power of fashion and design. Partly this is due to the effeminized (representing the feminine trait of creativity derived from birthing roles) knee-slap drag queen character used to juxtapose the straight hero. But also this is due to images which the LGBT community ourselves create and promote. Everywhere our sense of hair, d�cor, and fashion reinvent the world. Even the Metrosexual is the creation of the Lavender community.
So perhaps it is more than just Hollywood. And I will argue that it is also more than only our own promotion of the image (which may count as a new gender role?). I have often heard anecdotally that the �Gay-gene� may carry with it the creative spark, or promote left-brainedness (or was it right-brainedness?). However, I know of no academic source that has made this claim. This does not mean one is not available, only that I have not yet run across one.
There is a more compelling thesis for creativity in the Rainbow Warrior though. For most of us, there were no role models for how to be Gay, or Lesbian, or Trans, or Bi. This is especially true of generations before my own when there were virtually no positive role models. Even the academic sources chastised us as mentally ill until 1974 when the APA finally removed homosexuality from the list of disorders. So what choice did we have? How were we to move forward? There was no roadmap to our lives, no checklist of coming-of-age events (or Coming-OUT events either), no ceremonies to recognize our growth and maturation, no older generation to teach us, no recognized culture, and no clue as to what we even were sometimes.
And so the LGBT person had no choice but to create them because we could not stop growth or progress. Time is an ever-consumed resource. And so we found each other, and created rules and symbols for our culture. The use of the Judy Garland lexicon was used by early Gay men to find one another. To the straight, Judy Garland was just a singer-actress, but to the homosexual she was �Judy� and we knew all her lines and trivia. And we created other rituals too.
Eventually the Coming OUT party was created to recognize our birth into LGBT identities. And then we held Pride marches that resembled nothing ever seen in the straight parades. Heroes like Harvey Milk, Ru Paul, and Ellen DeGeneres gave us role models of a new kind. The AIDS plague gave our people culture, recognition, and for the first time a face which the world could not pretend away. When we began to think about marriage and families we had to start new social roles and practices. The Lesbian couple had to reinvent choices for procreation. The Gay couple too. And in some cases the bisexual couple created a bigymous family (see esp., Three of Hearts: a Postmodern Family). Not to mention the gender-specific pronouns used with Transgender/Transsexual persons. Even the mainstream culture is now recognizing our social rules and structures. The courts and legislatures are beginning to recognize them and codify them with the advent of Same-sex marriage, Same-sex divorce, domestic partnerships, civil unions, and adoption.
Finally, the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s (and for many of us even today) forced us to invent new fetishes, sex roles, positions, and equipment. I won�t go into graphic detail here, but you know what I mean, and if you don�t then just Google search word Gay Porn and you will have a good basic understanding. Do be cautioned though that not all LGBT persons engage in all sexual practices, and there are many which the Lavender community at large denounces politically.
Until next time, here�s me wishing you a Fabulous and Gay old time. Take care.
I may be contacted with any feedback, bashing, or commentary, even a hello, at [email protected].