Children of the 60s and beyond...

Born in 1968, here, grew up in northern Michigan...I'll have to tell more when I have some time, but just wanted to chime in, and say I enjoyed reading the thread, and will have more to say soon!

 

Haha. I've got a boatload to say. I just need the time to organize my thoughts!

 

I remember there was a lot of talk about AIDS and speculation about which teachers/students were bi/lesbian/gay. With MTV, David Bowie, Madonna et al. it didn't seem quite so far out as it would have been even 5 years earlier. One of the first students who was out at school was a friend of mine, he was genderqueer and bi. I think we must have been about 14 when he started to come out.

I actually knew quite a few guys who were bi or gay in the 80's and early 90's. I don't know if my area or my crowd were particularly progressive, or if they just felt more comfortable telling me about their sexuality. I didn't know too many lesbians who were out, not to me at any rate, but I think I sort of avoided them *cough cough*.

 

Yes, very rich thread! Thanks for starting it Adam1969.

Its made me wonder whether the biggest change since ‘then’ (when we were kids) isn’t so much about acceptance of LGBT people per se, but acceptance of difference. Back then social expectations of boys and girls were so narrowly defined. It was all about conformity and rules. If you didn’t ‘fit in’ it was your fault for being ‘weird’.

I feel here in the UK at least, the greatest social change has resulted from the realisation that ‘normal’ people aren’t all the same. Normal people (i.e. human beings) are by definition different. Somehow society has learned that, but only in the last couple of decades. Makes you wonder: why?

 

I almost forgot ... I also knew a DFAB "tomboy" whose family allowed him to be a boy, and the other children accepted him as such so much that we used to forget he had girl parts (I used to get envious that he had the courage to go that far) ... that was more late 70's and early 80's, and before high school. All the adults assumed that "he" would become a "she" once puberty hit -- which did in fact happen, at least for a while.

 

Organized religion is fading fast...

Fewer and fewer of these guys;

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/31/scott-lively-lgbt-rights-_n_5050615.html

 

My school was very small (the year I graduated we had 50 students from kindergarten to HS seniors - my graduating class was two people) and there were no openly gay students (I had no notion that I was gay at that time, so don't count). But neither was there really any mention of gay people or comments along the lines of 'that's so gay' or the like.

There was one guy in town who was apparently rumored to be gay, but my only recollection of discussion on the matter was 'oh yeah, X, he's gay' and then the conversation moved on. He largely kept to himself AFAIK and I think the general attitude was, he minded his business and everyone else minded theirs.

I did actually confirm he was gay when I was in HS because he came in to tutor me on computer programming (I was in the gifted student program and expressed an interest and he actually has worked with computers in college). We turned a tape calculator into a printer and wrote a program to run it. One day he took me and another student out for a soda or something and when we got back to the school he mentioned something about having broken up with his boyfriend who was following him around. I just kind of though 'huh, ok' and went on with the day.

I had more exposure to 'gay as a concept' in college, starting with getting an earring (my mom and wanted me to get one years before, but I declined). Friends warned me to make sure I got the 'correct' ear pierced so people wouldn't think I was gay:lol:

Todd

 

My earliest awareness of the word gay (and other more derogatory words for it) was as a put down. I was called gay by bullies in school as early as the second grade. And I've pr the years, teased, bullied and beaten for not being like the other boys. It left me with a strong message that it was not acceptable, and something to be afraid of. I had a friend in class who was rumored to be gay, although he was always surrounded by a group of girls who,protected him, and I never saw him date anyone. (It turns out he was/is)

One reference that I recall from TV, was the series SOAP. Billy crystal played a gay man- and his 'lifestyle' was an ongoing joke in the series, but he had an ironic dignity which overcomes the stereotype.

When I would come upon references to gay in books or articles,I would read them closely. And sometimes re read them. They described homosexuality as a choice, as a lifestyle, as a disorder, as evil. There were no positive descriptions, nor were there any role models that I could see of living a healthy life as a gay person. Shortly after, AIDS began to spread, and where I lived, they blamed it on gay men.

I was terrified at the thought of being gay.
But here I am now, many years later, beginning to accept it, and glad to know that it was not the horrible malady I imagined, but to the contrary, a good thing. It is still terribly hard coming out- but the actual feeling of being attracted to others feels wonderful.

 

I have recently come out. I was told it was a bad thing by family.
Tried living a straight life but it was crippling my.
My sister dragged me out of the closet and I'm not going back in for anyone..
I will be moving back in with my wife, staying married but we canlive or own lives.
The kids are so happy mom and dad are getting along!
Life is fantastic!!!
Family knows, friends know and co-workers know.
An extremely positive experience for me.
And the crippling affect is all gone.

 

And so I suppose they accidentally pierced the wrong ear, and TURNED YOU GAY!!!

:lol:

 

OMG...Rachel Maddow HS picture. OMG!

 

That must have been '84. We didn't have so many labels back then, so we wouldn't have called him genderqueer, and I don't think we ever thought about being trans. There was just gay, straight, or bi = "will try anything" . I think most people just assumed he was gay. He dressed and acted like an androgynous-to-femme pop star, like Bowie or Boy George. I was actually less femme than he was, more Billy Idol/Duran Duran, but people didn't think as much of it when a girl did it. I remember that my friend was controversial, but there were also a surprising number of people who thought he was pretty cool for having the courage to be himself. Maybe it was just a punk/rebel kind of thing, or because it was a very big school, and extremely diverse ethnically.

The thing is ... she didn't transition. Everyone assumed that when she got into High School, she'd start to act more like a girl, and she did -- whether because she wanted to or because the pressure was too much I don't know. I know myself that the fact that I did, in fact, like guys in a romantic way pushed me towards a more "gender-conforming" role than if I had been exclusively attracted to women.

I see that a lot even today ... parents get worried about their little boy liking nail polish and pink, and other parents will rush to assure them that "it's not a big deal, they usually turn out perfectly normal in the end and get married and have kids." I know people mean well, but it kind of bugs me when they say things like that.

 

Hi,

In looking back I never thought about being gay in the 70's, it just "was". It rolled out innocently enough at age 10 playing strip poker, which became strip poker for penalties and then moved straight to penalties forgetting the cards.

Yeah, we were closeted to protect ourselves but "gay" or "closeted" never crossed my mind. Shame never crossed my mind either as it was purely natural.

People called me and my buddy Pete&Repeat or "each others shadow" (always together) but we were never confronted with "homo". Well at age 29 my partner got pressure to date, marry, and produce grandchildren which broke him. He admits now he was a coward.

But in hindsight the closet was about protection from society and not shame. Anybody with eyes would have known Pete&Repeat were in love. It was simply not discussed and since we had no stereotypical mannerisms we were left alone.

My problems only came when we broke up (late 20's) and I could not find a stable guy looking to commit to a relationship. That was the AIDS crisis too... Did not help the situation.

I imagine that we flower children who lived through the AIDS crisis have an exaggerated fear of it.

Tom

 

This is a quite interesting thread.
My experience is kind of similar to greatwhale's. I grew up in the middle east (mainly Muslim) in a Catholic high school (around 3000 boys)! all boys K-12 education. I don't remember any one to be labeled as "gay", but we had a couple of "feminine" acting guys, they were the geeks of our class and I don't believe that they got bullied, at least physically. I grew up to see it all happening in front of my eyes without realizing that this is going to be called "homosexuality": rumors about what was going on in the dorms (I did not stay in), some teachers were rumored to be gay and doing it with some of the kids at high school, but I was always the quite kid who played the religious role, so no one doubted that I'm gay hiding behind the "lower your gaze" when present in front of a woman thing.

I wasn't really into the arts .. although I tried the choir but was kicked out of it (my voice was that bad??), and not into team sports until 10th grade when I joined the rowing team, I wasn't that fit but I worked my way up in the weight room. The locker area was an interesting area to be at, since most of the kids did not really get totally naked there, most had speedos and shorts when taking a shower .. nevertheless, I had good times viewing!

The topic of homosexuality was never discussed at school, or at home or anywhere else for that matter, other than as a disgraceful behavior .. "fag" was a normal insult word (very vulgar) that was used everywhere to and with straight people and not necessarily to a gay person.

The strict environment at the school was probably one of the main reasons that I was happy when I graduated. I never miss a day from my school years.