Why do Gays focus on the subject so much?

Question

I have two employees who are gay. Half the time, this is all they talk about. Here's my take: I don't care if people are gay or not, and I'm conservative for godsakes!!!

It's 2006, I need these two men I work with to focus on marketing strategy and how we can beat the competition. I need their creativity, imagination.

Yes, our society is always going to have the hillbillies who hate gays. So what? To hell with them.

When I sit down with someone who is gay, I don't care one way or the other who they sleep with. Who cares?

I believe that with so much attention focused on this subject they are robbing me of their true gifts. Can we move on?

Who people sleep with should be like 2% of the conversation. Where's the business plan? How should we market this service? How do you believe we can outthink our competitors?

This is what I need from these two people: Their brains. Period.

Jeff

I'm not gay so yes, I don't understand that position.

Answer 1

Your question is a valid one, but it also points to a number of assumptions that straight people tend to make. On a day to day basis, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transexuals are innundated with images and references to heterosexuality that are so incredibly pervasive that they're actually INVISIBLE to straight people. As a gay guy, I can tell you that it's often straight people who flaunt their sexuality. It's on billboards, it's in books and in magazines, it's on bathroom walls for crying out loud!

Just turn the tables for a second. Imagine that the majority of society is homosexual (gay or lesbian).

Now imagine that only 10% of that society is heterosexual. How would you feel?

Now imagine that you're in your 30s or somewhere thereabouts. This is likely to mean (if this alternate society is like THIS society today) that homosexuality went from being grounds for murder to simply grounds to get the living crap beat out of you if you hold hands with your partner in the wrong public place (assuming you're male, you're not allowed to call her your girlfriend or wife, because that's flaunting your deviant heterosexual mores). Religous leaders are continuously pressuring the government to make Constitutional ammendments for prevent you from getting married, and on top of the fact that heterosexuals in your state had to wait until the year 2004 to have non-descrimintion laws put into the state constitution.

Now imagine that you have a good job and a reasonably tollerant boss/manager who recognizes your skills as a worker, and credits you with actually having gifts that will help both the company and your career, but doesn't exactly get the whole "weird straight" angle of things.

Chances are, you're gonna be like "most of those wacky heterosexuals" which means that you aren't really interested in flaunting anything, BUT the moment that you meet another heterosexual co-worker, you're gonna feel as if you're in a foreign country in which nobody speaks your native language, but you've just met someone who DOES speak your language. What are you gonna do? Chances are, you're gonna speak to that person in your native tongue, just for the absolute JOY of hearing someone respond back in that same language. Chances are you're just gonna say something, and it probably won't be particularly profound or insightful. It'll be fluff. It'll just be something to illicit a response that you've been so starved for...it'll be small talk. Are you flaunting? Ultra-ultra-ultra-to the nth degree conservative gays and lesbians are going to say YES you are, but they're not going to take into account that as ultra-ultra-ultra-to-the-nth degree conservative homosexuals that they can advertize their love lives and personal lives in ANY WAY that they choose, including mock sex on public transportation.

They're not going to consider that as a minority heterosexual you're accused of "flaunting" if you so much as SIT next to heterosexual woman and accidentally touch her pinky finger with yours, because she's handing you a newspaper.

Now, back to reality:
THIS is what sexual flaunting is all about. It's not about who's talking about what in the workplace. It's about whose assuming what in every single moment of every single day.

Of course, if these guys are allowing the fact that they are gay to interfere with the work that they're getting paid to do, then there is a problem and you DEFINITELY need to address that. There's even a measure of personal decorum that is required in the workplace in which people's personal lives shouldn't be a subject of boardroom or cubicle discussion when the company's bottom line is really the thing that everyone is there to discuss. And this goes for gay and straight, and anything in-between.

So, rather than focus on the fact that gay people are talking so much about being gay, try looking at it from the opposite point of view, and I'm sure that you'll probably see something that gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered people see EVERY MOMENT of every day...straight people talking about their heteroesxuality SO MUCH that they don't even have to use words anymore. And I think from THAT position, the most effective changes can be made, and I'd hope that THOSE changes will actually benefit EVERYBODY.

Answer 2

When you say that "half the time, this is all they talk about," what is that based on?

What do they talk about? My only clue is that it might be homophobia.

Are they talking about marketing to the gay community? Is this only when they are around you or around others as well?

If they are not producing anything they should be told to focus or go. That's just business.

Do they contribute anything to the company? Of course, theoretically, who people sleep with should be 0% of the conversation in a business setting, but that's not realistic, is it.

One thing that is different for gays is that we have had to undergo the process of cominig out -- it's one of my issues that so much gay literature focuses solely around this one thing. But, it remains individually traumatic for each person.

Incidentally, most of the conservatives I know don't care about other people's sexuality and, in fact, support gay marriage. If only the leaders would let themselves be led by the people...

Answer 3

Okay, so imagine you'd lived the earlier years of your life feeling different to what's generally accepted as how you should feel.

You cannot, therefore, identify with anything or anyone and so you have difficulty obtaining your own personal identity. Then, when you become more sexually aware, you realise that you're gay and so you have something to identify with and it's a joy to open up this part of life that previously never existed.

Consider a small child in a toy shop with a limitless credit card, but the child has always had whichever toy he or she likes at that time.

Now consider that small child again but this time, the child has never had any toys.

Answer 4

I am bisexual and I am closeted. I have a gay friend who I am out to at work and we share an office. He is the only person that is in my life who I am out to. He is an older gentleman and not my type and I am definitely not his. He is as far out as a person can be and still function in our society. When we are alone in our office is the only time I can talk about how I feel about things from a homosexual standpoint. I have to say it is refreshing to have this person to talk to. He is very effeminate and I am definitely not in to fems. He is a bottom and I think Anal sex is just nasty. He thinks oral sex is nasty, so we are even. We are as opposite as can be except that we both like hunky men and ususally not the same guys. And yes there are times we discuss things that I would never discuss with a straight person. But I would not say that we talk about homosexual issues even a third of the time we are alone in the office. Most of the time we are talking about work or something we heard on the radio or a message we heard at church last Sunday.
Maybe your perception is just off because the "gay Issues" you are hearing discussed stand out because you are unable to relate to them.

Answer 5

I think homosexuals just want attention. I've worked around gay people before and you are right that is all they talk about. And no...straight folks (I'm talking about real life non TV people) don't walk around all day promoting who they are having sex with. We don't put it on our bumper stickers or wear anything that would give a hint as to "This is who I have sex with." We don't have parades in which people are pretty much naked and committing lude sexual acts in the street (I.E. gay pride San Francisco). All of these things just add up to some social deviants trying to get attention.

That is what is so offensive about the homosexual lifestyle. Anyone who defines themselves by who they have sex with and then promotes it to the world deserves the ridicule the get.

Answer 6

Well, if people condemn you about your attitudes even though you think there's nothing wrong with it and it just the way you are, every seconds of the days you can't help but try to show other people that you like being you and proud if and prepare defending yourself in case someone give you a look.

If all people just accept gays and treated them equal, gay subjects would be gone in no time.

Answer 7

It's hard to be gay. When you are with someone else who is gay, you automatically want to bond with them for support against this crazy homophobic society. It helps to talk about it because it makes you feel more normal, when you rarely ever do. I know it's a pain to deal with that in the workplace, but try to give them a little space on the issue. If it continues to disrupt their work, just let them know that talking about sex at work isn't something you aprove of. But make sure you treat your straight employees the same way.

Answer 8

That's difficult. I'm sorry.

I'm in a different world of course (I'm an academic) -- I have a picture of my partner on my desk. We go to some University functions (appropriate ones) together. I don't really talk about sex or sexuality at work. I don't know why I ever would.....

May I suggest showing them this directly and saying "Please, I need your brains, can we move the other subjects to lunch and after hours only?" Then they see what other gay people think as well, and I think it will clear up.

Good luck.

Regards,

Reynolds C. Jones
http://www.rebuff.org
[e-mail]

Answer 9

You're obviously gay for focusing on this question. My advice is, have an affair with one of these guys. Then, when it's time to strategize and plan some marketing, just say "You know, I am SO tired of gossip today! I mean, like, who cares? Let's work this marketing strategy so we can all get rich and vacay in the greek islands! Who's with me girls!?"

Answer 10

It's typical for them to flaunt it just to get your reaction to it. Also, they think they're a minority and they are not.
Get them in your office, tell them you don't care what their orientation is, but you do care whether or not they do their work and keep their jobs. Tell them that this is to stay out of the office, for it has nothing to do with business. Let them know how remarkable their brains are, but personal things do not come to the office any more than you take the office home with you. If you cannot change their habit that way, then you will probably have to fire one or both of them and replace them, praying you get samely gifted persons. Good luck.

Answer 11

Just tell them to focus on their work. And i do know men who will talk about gay things and being gay all the time to try to desensitize straight people. One in particular really over does it but his intentions are usually to turn the person bi. If the two guys are just out of the closet its very typical of them too.