Somebody to Love

In my previous article, I wrote about how it's quite okay to be different and to be yourself, and that if you're not liking the said "different" person around you, leave that person alone instead of resorting to bullying. I was being somewhat vague, in not stating that I was writing in response to the string of anti-gay hate crimes. Well, Vanity Fair posted this article online. Reading about this very sad incident happening in the city that is supposed to be very liberal, and also in the city that I love - it just breaks my heart.

I'm not trying to change people's opinion; everyone's entitled to their own belief system. I'm making my voice (somewhat) heard in hopes that people may see things from different perspective. If what I'm writing makes you want to stop reading, there's no one stopping you from doing that.

So really, what's up with the hate? Just because some people prefer to have a relationship with people of the same sex doesn't make them any less human than people who prefer to have a relationship with people of the opposite sex. For that reason, I personally don't like to label people based on their sexual orientation. Here's a question for straight people: Do you go out announcing that you're straight? I bet the answer's no. I mean, I never came out as straight. So why is it that there's an unspoken expectation for gay people to make an announcement, and when they do, it's a huge deal? The notion of dating is personal enough, so let's not make an event out of it. And FYI: posting other people's sex tapes online is so last decade, Heidi Klum would Auf Weidersehen you off of runway in a split second.

Speaking of runway, it is a very well known fact that gay men have amazingly great taste in fashion. So really, if a person is to be anti-gay without being super hypocritical, that said person should swear off all designer clothes for the rest of his/her life. How is it that a person can love the designers' work, but fail to respect them as a human? Don't you think that's very contradicting? If I'm going to have a favorite designer - Alexander McQueen - I'm going to love his work, and respect him as a talented designer. He deserves that much. Going along with that logic, there is a song played and sung at every major sports event, written and sung by a gay man I absolutely love. We Are the Champions, written by Freddie Mercury, performed by Queen. Again, isn't it going to be very contradictory to be anti-gay and yet love Freddie Mercury and Queen, when some of the well-known Queen songs - Bohemian Rhapsody, Somebody to Love to name a few - were written by Freddie Mercury, and are about being gay, being rejected from society, and dying from AIDS? Food for thought.

Homophobia, along with hammer pants, are better off left in the 20th century. If we have enough common sense to not wear that hideous pants, I'm pretty sure we can turn the unconditional hate to unconditional love.

xx-N