Since gay people have existed since time began...?

Question

can any of our seniors tell us a little something about their experiences of knowing anyone who was gay a long time ago?... and what it was like for them...and for you to know about them?... times have changed an awful lot... please give your age also...

Answer 1

This is your lucky day! I am 79 and came out as a gay man 58 years ago. I came out in the army in Europe where it was no big deal. When I came home to America I hit the beginning of the "McCarthy error" While the public was told he was hunting Communists actually he was using that word as a code for gay people. The next several years were a living hell as every law enforcement origination and petty politician jumped on the McCarthy band wagon. It was against the law in every state to have same sex relations and we were hounded into the ground. An example of how it went. If a gay man happened to pick up a hustler and he was rolled and beaten he had no recourse to law. If he reported it he would be arrested under the sodomy laws. When, as a minority, our backs were to the wall we rebelled. Riots in New York and San Francisco brought the persecutors up short and kicked off the 'gay lib movement". We did manage to retain our gayness through it all and had good times. I was living in New Orleans. The French Quarter was relatively safe. But at election time the cops would raid the bars, Take every other man sitting at the bar off to jail. Collect $25 fines and let us go. I got caught once. When we went to pay back and they went to back off it was really fun and games for several years. The bars were wide open, anything and everything went. Then came AIDS and the community sobered up. I still tear up thinking of all the friends I lost. Why not me, I often wonder.

Answer 2

Back in my day (60's)...

Homosexuality was still a "treatable mental disease" that no one talked about, and the only visible gays were camp, mincing queens, so naturally everyone thought that's what being gay was all about.

My best friend from high school was also gay, and I had a crush on him, but was so ignorant of what it meant to be gay and what to do about it that nothing came of it. When he went to MSU, he had an affair with a younger student, was "outed" by the campus secret police, and the other boy was made a ward of the state of New York and sent back home. When graduation came around, my friend was told he didn't have enough credits to graduate, but the week after the ceremony, he got his diploma in the mail!

The Detroit Free Press at about that same time did a feature story on gay teenagers (nearly all closeted), and the assistant principal at one of the schools immediately held a press conference to assure everyone that there were NO gay teens at HER school!

Most of my life I've been so ignorant of what being gay means and that there are others who really do feel like I do and who really do appreciate my affections that I've let one relationship after another slip through my fingers (literally and figuratively) while trying to live the straight life that society holds up as the only acceptable model for happiness.

Answer 3

I remember in high school the first time I ever knew what it meant. I had some buddies that I overheard talking about going to a park and beating up the queers. I thought it was awful.

I believe there is a large difference between the term "queer" and "gay." Old movies used to refer to being gay as having a fun time.

I truly think that some are born with more male parts or more female parts, (depending on the gender) and we are learning more about this. I know what it says in the Bible. It was considered a common practice among the Greeks to take advantage of a male in this manner. This to me is the sin of it. When straight people plays games and use their own sex for satisfaction. That is the abomination.

I think all of us have to search our minds and hearts for an answer to this situation. I am a straight female and I think we can hate the sin but still love the sinner, if this is a sin as explained in the Bible. That is my only explanation I can give. I also think a person's sexual preference should be kept private. Even straight people should not display open practices. Yes, I know some gay people that are very kind people. I also think that judgment is left up to God and not people.

Answer 4

I was friends with a gay man in San Diego over forty years ago. He played at the piano bar in an Italian restaurant which was one of my favorite hangouts at the time. He was "out" as the expression goes. But, as a career Navy man, I did learn of a time in his life when he had to "stay in the closet". He was in the Navy during World War Two and was the Flag Lieutenant for one of the most senior Naval officers in the Pacific Theater of Operations.
Over the years I've come to adopt the feelings expressed by the late Barry Goldwater about the issue of homosexuals in the service: "I don't care if the soldier is straight. I just care that he can shoot straight".

Answer 5

I have only known one gay person personally. He was a lonely
guy, who was to become very dear to me as a friend. He had
left San Francisco after a major earthquake there. And came
to Phoenix for a better life. But he hadn't found it, and had no
friends. So he attached himself to me for someone to talk to.
He had the sweetest German Shepard who was sickly when
I met him and I would go over daily to see how the dog was
fairing. Luckily the right med pulled him through, and was the
dutiful companion to his owner again. But the gay guy and I
built up a rapour and we had alot of discussions about life.
And he braved his shyness and became friends with my
husband also. I can't pinpoint what we learned from this young
man, but he had a special something about him.He proved
to have a natural talent in decorating a home. And his interior
was amzaing with things he put together as focal points in
his rooms. And I told him that had to be his special gift he
should get something going for a business.
We moved out of state and returned back home, and I often wonder how he is now, since we didn't stay in touch.

Answer 6

I was a teen before I realized there were gay people. My grandmother sold the home I grew up in to a gay couple. Several years later I took her to tour the house. After we left she ask me if I knew how two men were together (with a raised eyebrow). She was asking me for information I didn't know.
My mother has always been a homophobe. She thinks any unmarried man is gay and all women roomates with short hair are also.
I've known many gay people of both sexes. I find them just like anyone else. We don't discuss their sex life. I am in my early 53.

Answer 7

One of my best friends in high school was a gay. He and I did a lot together and watched over each other. He was like a brother who like to go shopping and do silly things with me. My family all liked him, I don't know if they knew he was gay or not. Then...my first serious b/f was in college and I was a senior in high school. We had mutual friends who set us up and both were into the music scene, I played violin seriously and he was a music major who played the organ (no pun intended here ;) ) Anyway, the night of my senior prom he dumped me for another guy. Wow, was I surprised!! I then realized why we never went "parking." LOL

Answer 8

I'm a 56-year-old man, and I'm happily married. I did have a friend in school, who I realized was gay. I was rather shy and a year younger than most of my class, so I didn't date girls until I was a senior in high school. I began to realize that most guys were keeping distant, but girls were still friendly. A rumor had been started that I was gay and finally, someone I knew fairly well asked if it was true. I had a lot of female friends, but never had sex until after a year of college. The 'gay' rumor faded away, but I still wonder how it got as far as it did. Probably because I didn't shun my gay friend.

Answer 9

I never heard the word "gay" before 1970 (when I was 18 years old). Prior to that, you were labeled "queer", f-g got" or something even more derogatory. Even in large cities, contact between gay men and lesbians was confined mainly to out-of-the-way bars and really sleazy places: there was nothing in the way of clubs, social organizations and certainly no one to represent us in a legal way or present a positive spin on the gay lifestyle.
I came out to my parents two years later because I was tired of the hypocrisy of having to sneak around and cover my tracks. It was not a smooth process. My parents were both very upset. My mother even had the audacity to say, "I would have preferred you to tell me that you were a drug addict rather than a queer. At least then we'd know how to treat the problem!" (Hmm....there's a grain a truth to that, too!!)
As time went on, both mom and dad "accepted" my lifestyle, although I believe that, until the day they died, they never truly "approved" of it. But they became quite amused at my various adventures, loves, loses and the basic problems I had with just trying to make a living and survive on the planet just like everyone else. And both of them were very nice and loving to both of my lovers. (The first relationship lasted 5 years, the second began in 1987 and we will be celebrating our 20th anniversary together in November!)
If I may express one other thought before I leave this section for others to respond:
What troubles me most about today's younger gay people is the tendency to not remember the legacy of our community. Persons like Harry Hay, Reverend Troy Perry, Ivy Bottini and the various people who participated in the Stonewall Movement of the late 60's laid their lives and reputations on the line to fight for what they truly believed. They are all but forgotten today. But then again, that's the beauty of it all. They fought hard and long so that the negatives could be turned into positives.

Answer 10

I am 57, and I never knew anyone that was gay when I was growing up. It was not until I became an adult that I found out that one of my best friends from childhood was gay.

We usually referred to guys that acted girly, as a sissy, and that was all it meant. Sexuality never entered the picture as I grew up when this type of information was not mainstream.

He told us when we were teens, that he was going to be a priest. He was the only one I could dance with, we enjoyed the same music (went to stone concerts together), and had the best record collection on the block. Wonder what he is doing today?