The other day, I was talking to some people about music. Specifically, we were talking about songs and performers that we used to hate that have sort of grown on us, or at least done something like demonstrating a willingness to poke fun at themselves. The names Neil Diamond, Barry Manilow and Michael Bolton were among those that came up. When I mentioned George Michael as someone who I think should fit into that category, my friend Chuck reacted strongly.
"Ugh. I hate George Michael. He's one of those."
"Wow, nice restraint in not using the word 'faggot'!"
"No, it's not that. I don't care if he's gay. But he's one of those guys that likes to slink around and hook up anonymously with other guys in public restrooms and parks. That's creepy."
"So your problem isn't that he's gay but that he has a penchant for having semi-public gay sex?"
"Half right. It's got nothing to do with being gay."
"Um, I'm pretty sure that's exclusively an all-dude thing. You never hear about hetero couple or lesbians getting picked up by the cops sweeping a park after hours."
"That's true. But these guys are different from gay guys who have sex with their partners in an apartment or a house or a hotel or even make out in a bar. These guys are into doing something forbidden and they get off on the shame factor in that. True, they may be engaging in what can be classified as homosexual acts, but they would never identify themselves as gay men. Outside of these kind of scenarios, they're probably not even attracted to other men. They're not attracted to men; they're attracted to doing something they see as perverted, dirty and disgusting. After Idaho senator Larry Craig got busted trying to solicit sex from a male cop in an airport restroom in Minnesota, he vehemently denied being gay. And that's because him and guys like him aren't gay. They're doing gay stuff, but they aren't really gay."
"All right. So if they're not gay, what are they?"
"Oh, I don't know. I really haven't thought about it that much."
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