I'm not comfortable being gay

[JayQueer]

Okay,

So in one of my previous threads in the Politics section, under "Sarah Palin is a gay icon", somebody here on JUB decided to research all of my prior posts and outed me as an "overweight Asian Indian American whose parents are embarrassed and want me to stay in the closet." He also referred to me as a "self-hating homo loner."

While what he wrote about me was rude, he was unfortunately correct. My parents are immigrants from India, and even though I was raised in the U.S., my cultural outlook and views of the world have undoubtedly been shaped by my upbringing. My parents know that I am gay, but they believe that I have an incurable disease, and that me being gay is a punishment for bad karma that I accumulated in my past life or lives.

I have accepted that I'm gay, but I'm not comfortable with it. Most of my friends are (straight) Indians, and many are getting married (most in traditional Hindu weddings, some of which were "arranged marriages").

When I was growing up, everyone knew me as the most traditional kid around. All of my friends joked that they would still be single by the time I had my arranged marriage to an (obviously) Indian girl. But instead, it's my friends who are the ones getting married, settling down & having children. And I'm the one who doesn't know where my life is headed.

It's like learning Italian your whole life, in preparation for a glamorous, romantic trip to Italy.........but ending up in Holland instead, with no idea how to speak a single word of Dutch.

I'm still a virgin & I hoped to save myself for sex until after getting married. I find the concept of "one night stands" or "friends with benefits" and "no strings attached" to be totally foreign to me. I don't want to sleep around with random guys & troll for sex on Manhunt, Grindr, Adam4Adam, or Craigslist. I don't want to contract HIV. I don't want to be 50 or 60 and be that older gay guy at the gay bar who chases the younger boys.

I just want to get married to a man, and have a boring life in the suburbs. Fabulous, I know....

Sometimes I pinch myself and hope that this is some kind of nightmare or cruel joke. And when I wake up, I will be an Indian guy married to an Indian woman, with children screaming & running around the house.

 

[Twistedup]

a: what is grindr?

b: it is young women, not men, that are the main spreaders of AIDS nowadays.

c: if your family accepts it and you are in no sort of physical threat for it; run with it.

d: nightmares are always the most interesting dreams. it doesn't have to be scary. make it awesome.

e: holland is like 1000X more fun than italy, i promise.

 

[medic1]

Whoever that guy is DICKHEAD springs to mind .

 

[8tomtoms8]

The sad reality is it doesn't matter how ashamed of being gay you are, you will still be gay. Just go about your life. Try and get a good education in a field you like and do your best there. Eventually you'll find a fellow who compliments you. Being the best person you can be will make you much more attractive to others.

 

[medic1]

Even if that thread did provoke some strong reactions for someone to do what
they did i just think is such a mean act.
Coming from the UK the only way that i know this womans name is through the
forums here i am assuming that she is some sort of politico?
Also from the forums i get the feeling that she is pretty much disliked by almost
everyone who has posted about her.
Back on topic i still think that it was a nasty thing to do .

 

[KaraBulut]

As a long-time moderator in the support area here at JUB, I want to state something very clearly:

There is a zero-tolerance policy about dragging arguments between forums. And very specifically, personal things that are said in the support forums should never and will never be be used in personal attacks.

It is a shame that it took a personal attack to bring you back to this forum but here we are...

I recall your earlier thread.

There are two themes in both of your threads:
1. There are things that I can change and I want to change.
2. There are things that I don't want to change.

So, what are you doing to change the things that you can change and you want to change?

 

[Telstra]

Okay,

So in one of my previous threads in the Politics section, under "Sarah Palin is a gay icon", somebody here on JUB decided to research all of my prior posts and outed me as an "overweight Asian Indian American whose parents are embarrassed and want me to stay in the closet." He also referred to me as a "self-hating homo loner."

While what he wrote about me was rude, he was unfortunately correct. My parents are immigrants from India, and even though I was raised in the U.S., my cultural outlook and views of the world have undoubtedly been shaped by my upbringing. My parents know that I am gay, but they believe that I have an incurable disease, and that me being gay is a punishment for bad karma that I accumulated in my past life or lives.

I have accepted that I'm gay, but I'm not comfortable with it. Most of my friends are (straight) Indians, and many are getting married (most in traditional Hindu weddings, some of which were "arranged marriages").

When I was growing up, everyone knew me as the most traditional kid around. All of my friends joked that they would still be single by the time I had my arranged marriage to an (obviously) Indian girl. But instead, it's my friends who are the ones getting married, settling down & having children. And I'm the one who doesn't know where my life is headed.

It's like learning Italian your whole life, in preparation for a glamorous, romantic trip to Italy.........but ending up in Holland instead, with no idea how to speak a single word of Dutch.

I'm still a virgin & I hoped to save myself for sex until after getting married. I find the concept of "one night stands" or "friends with benefits" and "no strings attached" to be totally foreign to me. I don't want to sleep around with random guys & troll for sex on Manhunt, Grindr, Adam4Adam, or Craigslist. I don't want to contract HIV. I don't want to be 50 or 60 and be that older gay guy at the gay bar who chases the younger boys.

I just want to get married to a man, and have a boring life in the suburbs. Fabulous, I know....

Sometimes I pinch myself and hope that this is some kind of nightmare or cruel joke. And when I wake up, I will be an Indian guy married to an Indian woman, with children screaming & running around the house.

That will only happen if you are married to a woman.
If you want to marry a man. You must have sex many times with a man first and try out who is compatible with you.

 

[Seasoned]

Personal attacks aren't permitted. Report them and they will be dealt with. Cultural pressures make things really rough for a lot of gay men.

Do some online research to seek support from gay Asian Indian groups. You are not alone.

 

[TX-Beau]

There were no innocents in that other thread.

Jayqueer, I didn't respond to you in that other thread because by the time I got back to it you had already posted that post about wanting to be a masculine man.

Which is frankly when all the pieces clicked into place. It's relevant here because your political position is being driven partly by your definitions of masculinity.

You don't want to be associated with stereotypical gay paradigms because you perceive them as emasculating. You also have a rigid idea of what masculinity is that frankly, is just as stereotypical and inaccurate as the other.

This has nothing to do with whether you're a slut or not, it has to do with thinking that sleeping with men is going to make people think you're a woman on some level, and that the worst thing a man can do is act like a woman - you're trying to run as far and as fast from that as you possibly can.

Well, that's bunk pretty much. No matter how effeminate a gay man is he's still a man. We all know why guys get caught in this trap, and we all know how incredibly common it is.

You've internalized the stereotypes and insults homophobes throw at us, accepted the misogynistic view that effeminate is somehow traitorous, and you believe this over your own actual experience.

Are you a woman? Do you feel like a woman? Do you want to be a woman? Ask the vast majority of gay men those questions and the answer to all of them will be no.

You are not going to solve your problem until you stop worrying about how other people tag you and start looking at the reality of your own existence.

You are not a woman, that gay guy down the street who likes his fashion is not a woman. In many ways gay men are truer to their masculine (and I'm not using that word with some kind of adolescent Rambo shit definition) nature than straight men are, simply because there is no mitigation from actual women to stop us. Which is where all those promiscuous stereotypes come from.

If straight guys could get away with it (and a lot of them do) they'd be doing the same damn thing.

You dislike yourself, and that is coming across loud and clear, you're also projecting that dislike on other gay men, and that is also coming across loud and clear.

Don't think I'm up on a soap box here - I did the same thing. When I was first out, I ran around calling myself straight acting/straight appearing and had all of your issues.

Your problem is inside yourself. No one in here can change that. You have to do the work, and you start by actually looking at reality and tossing the homophobic crap you're clinging to for dear life.

Whoever you are, masculine/effeminate, gay, straight, bi, whatever, it's fine however you are, and if other people don't like that, that's their fucking problem.

It's your life, take control of it.

 

[hotatlboi]

I don't want to come off as putting down your beliefs or anything, but if you don't want to be the older single guy at the gay bar, I would advise thinking about jettisoning the "saving sex until marriage" position, because I can tell you that an extremely small percentage of gay guys will be interested in that.

I'm not saying you have to sleep around and do random hookups, you can certainly look for a relationship. But I can honestly tell you that I haven't met a single gay person who was interested in a relationship without sex until marriage was in the cards.

edit: I see Telstra beat me to it.

 

[rareboy]

Hey.


Everyone.


I'm apparently the asshat who did nothing more than to extract information from JayQueer's earlier posting on CO&R that I believed was relevant to understanding his position on women's equality and his perspectives on conservativism and the politics of being a homo and the proposition of Palin being a gay icon.


And before you all judge, check out the thread in question, including my thoughts on the parallels between the west hollywood homos who recently dissed the OP and the Republican party he supports.

Same advice still holds.

Be happy that you are a homo.

Own it.

Protect it and fight for it.

Be happy. If this means being content with being overweight, be that. Work with it.

If it means dieting and getting more exercise, get on with it.

If you want to get married to some guy, get yourself out there and start dating and meeting guys and being open to all kinds of experiences and ideas. At the moment, I don't get the sense that you are particularly open to life experience.

It doesn't mean you have to fuck them on the first date, but I think that the saving myself for sex after marriage thing may indicate some confusion and discomfort with the idea of enjoying your own sexuality.

Become your own man and not your parent's boy. It is time that you make it clear to them that you are rejecting utterly, their ignorant and ridiculous notion that you being a homo is a disease. They are only going to destroy you with this kind of parental terrorism. And they don't have that right.

If you live at home, move out. If they are your meal ticket, change that.

What I hope will happen is that you are shaken out of your fears and discomfort with being a homo and shine.

As someone else has suggested, maybe one of the ways to find your comfort zone is to check out asian-indian gay groups who may have other members who are going through some of the same difficulties as you.

If you start laughing and finding joy in the world instead of closing down and living in a box, you'll get a boyfriend. I guarantee it. He may break your heart. He may not. The first one or two or ten might not be the guys of your dreams, but if you start living your life as though it is an enjoyable and wonderful journey, the likelihood is that there will be others who want to be on the same voyage.

So. Sorry if your feelings may have been a little bruised over in CO&R, but if it makes you believe that you can change even only one thing for the better, then it is worth all the shit that everyone here wants to pile on me for doing it.

Because, whether you believe it or not, everyone, including me is on your side.

 

[JayQueer]

@ Rareboy,

All of your "advice" to me aside, I DON'T appreciate what you said to me on the Sarah Palin thread. You didn't just "extract information that you thought was relevant".......you used it intentionally to attack my character and degrade me as a person with statements such as "overweight Asian Indian", "parents who are embarrassed", and "self-hating homo loner." Even now, you couldn't even apologize, even though you knew I was hurt by your remarks.

Please disagree with my beliefs or opinions, but please don't attack my character. If I tell you, hypothetically, that I am going to volunteer for Sarah Palin's presidential election campaign, then please feel free to voice your disapproval of my decision, but don't attack my character, integrity, or physical appearance.

I am a gay man who happens to have many conservative political beliefs, as I'm sure you are aware. Am I willing to listening to people with liberal points-of-view? Sure. How willing are you to listening to conservatives?

I find it very interesting that you recommend that I reach out to Asian Indian gay groups, but you never suggest for me to reach out to Log Cabin Republicans, or other groups of gay conservatives. Just as it's important for me to find other gay people of my same cultural background, wouldn't it also be a good idea for me to find other gays who share most of my political beliefs as well?

Getting rid of my "discomfort of being a homo" will take time, probably more time than if I was White. I come from a very socially traditional culture where the family unit is more important than the individual. It's not considered "parental terrorism" -- it's just the way it is. In my culture, obeying your parent's wishes & making your parents proud, is more important than satisfying your own urges or desires. I can't just break off my duties & responsibilities to my parents. Most White (Anglo) people can't understand that. But if you are Asian, Middle Eastern, or Latino -- you might understand what I'm talking about.

While my journey to becoming comfortable with myself will be a difficult one, in some ways, I feel more free to chart my own course. I know that a lot of Asian Indians & conservatives & Republicans will never accept me as being a gay man.........but at the same time, I know that all the liberal, Democrat, White, West Hollywood boys with their perfect bodies and immaculate skin will never accept me either. I will never be a part of their world. I will always be the "overweight" Indian "loner" they laugh and say "ewww" to.

 

[rareboy]

Hey.

Hang out with as many different groups of homos and straights as you can.

There's got to be a potential boyfriend in the pile somewhere.

And not in the West Hollywood bars. But in places where you will meet people who aren't just looking to get laid or to show off their latest skin-tightening surgery, but who are looking for real companionship, friendship and affection.

There are thousands of people out there that will be just friends. Men, women of every colour and creed. People who will love you for who you are and not in spite of what you are.

From experience, though, I think that I can guarantee that the 'liberals' are far more likely to move easily outside of their own economic and social and racial groupings than conservatives....who by the structural nature of their conservatism are likely to be more bottled up.

And if you really want to be the uber-American, you'll realize that being weighed down by archaic and unhealthy cultural familial baggage is totally at odds with the me-first ethos of the political conservatives that you want to be so much like. Hence the suggestion that you work through some of the issues you have with people of similar background. Because I can guarantee you, most of the ultra white Log cabin Republicans aren't going to be able to identify with anything other than being closeted and wishing they were straight.

I wonder if the need to be the flag waving patriotic American isn't in fact an extension of the concept of the family unit as being more important that the individual. The notion, however, of allowing your parents to dictate to you and define you though, isn't any different than having an oppressive state that does the same thing. It is the same strange dichotomy that is found with the fundamentalist religious conservatives. They are quite content to have their church dictate everything about their lives, but reject the idea that a collective democratic government could do the same thing.

I might also suggest that you would benefit from some one on one discussions with a gay counsellor if you are having difficulties accepting the idea that you can be a happy, healthy and out homo while balancing in a reasonable way, the expectations and demands of parents.

At the end of the day, you're the one who will have to do all the heavy lifting when it comes to being happy and healthy.

Hopefully, along the way you'll be able to set aside the atavistic beliefs that you have about women and homosexuality and that being macho and proving your 'manliness' is far less important than how you prove yourself as a person. And to develop a sense of compassion and joy and belonging to the larger community.

If I apologized for inappropriately taking the information you had provided about yourself in other threads and used it as context to gain an advantage in the debate over attitudes toward women in the Palin thread, would you have believed it? I have been baffled in trying to understand the genesis for the hyper-patriotism, hyper-machoism and exclusionary conservatism that you espouse. And in looking back at other threads, it seemed that there were issues around acceptance of homosexuality and upbringing that illuminated these positions. And so, I wrongfully extracted information you yourself had provided in order to do this.

By posting in this thread, I was quite willing to take my lashes from everyone. Which is probably more meaningful than just saying that I'm sorry your feelings were hurt.

 

[Telstra]

@ Rareboy,

All of your "advice" to me aside, I DON'T appreciate what you said to me on the Sarah Palin thread. You didn't just "extract information that you thought was relevant".......you used it intentionally to attack my character and degrade me as a person with statements such as "overweight Asian Indian", "parents who are embarrassed", and "self-hating homo loner." Even now, you couldn't even apologize, even though you knew I was hurt by your remarks.

Please disagree with my beliefs or opinions, but please don't attack my character. If I tell you, hypothetically, that I am going to volunteer for Sarah Palin's presidential election campaign, then please feel free to voice your disapproval of my decision, but don't attack my character, integrity, or physical appearance.

I am a gay man who happens to have many conservative political beliefs, as I'm sure you are aware. Am I willing to listening to people with liberal points-of-view? Sure. How willing are you to listening to conservatives?

I find it very interesting that you recommend that I reach out to Asian Indian gay groups, but you never suggest for me to reach out to Log Cabin Republicans, or other groups of gay conservatives. Just as it's important for me to find other gay people of my same cultural background, wouldn't it also be a good idea for me to find other gays who share most of my political beliefs as well?

Getting rid of my "discomfort of being a homo" will take time, probably more time than if I was White. I come from a very socially traditional culture where the family unit is more important than the individual. It's not considered "parental terrorism" -- it's just the way it is. In my culture, obeying your parent's wishes & making your parents proud, is more important than satisfying your own urges or desires. I can't just break off my duties & responsibilities to my parents. Most White (Anglo) people can't understand that. But if you are Asian, Middle Eastern, or Latino -- you might understand what I'm talking about.

While my journey to becoming comfortable with myself will be a difficult one, in some ways, I feel more free to chart my own course. I know that a lot of Asian Indians & conservatives & Republicans will never accept me as being a gay man.........but at the same time, I know that all the liberal, Democrat, White, West Hollywood boys with their perfect bodies and immaculate skin will never accept me either. I will never be a part of their world. I will always be the "overweight" Indian "loner" they laugh and say "ewww" to.

Nope, not if they live in western societies where they can make their own money, buy their own home and everyone is too busy to worry about other people's problems.

When these parents are old, i'm sure they will belong in the nursing home.
The kids are too busy working, family life ... etc.

One more, "overweight" is because of bad parenting and now you have to look after yourself to loose weight.
If you don't loose weight, you loose the battle.

 

[Nice Boy]

Politics aside, I think I can understand what you are trying to explain here JayQueer.
Yes, there are societies where the group or family is much more important than the individual.

But, you should realize that it is your life and only you can make yourself happy. The group is not gonna live YOUR life for you. The live too short just to play to the expectation of others, whoever it might be - family, society, anybody...

Just keep that in mind.