Freedom

Five years ago, a friend made an observation about Kent and me. This friend had known us for quite some time (several years). He was a straight man who had no problem with gay men. I know this isn’t totally fair, but if you are a straight man, you have to prove to me that you aren’t threatened by gay men. Yes, I know - it’s my baggage. But, I have come to rely on that baggage to protect me from those who would do harm to us.

My friend said to me, “I never see you and Kent show any affection towards each other.” I immediately turned to him and said without hesitation or thought, “You won’t. We are very well trained.” With that, he laughed. He thought it was hysterical. I didn’t laugh.

I don’t honestly think that he could understand what I was talking about. I don’t really think any straight person can. There was a day that I remember when we lived in San Francisco. We were walking some place and came upon a tag sale. We stopped. I remember that we were holding hands. This was twenty years ago, in a city that had a very large and very present gay community. The yard sale was not far from the Castro, the gay neighborhood in San Francisco. I thought we were safe. We passed this other couple, a straight couple. After we got fifteen feet beyond them, the male turned around and said out loud so everyone could hear him, “fucking faggots!”. We totally ignored him. The guy giving the tag sale looked at us, but said nothing. We became uncomfortable, and left the area.

There were many other instances of harassment that go on and on and on. At some point we made a decision that it just wasn’t worth the risk of being insulted and beaten up. This is the freedom that we have and enjoy in the United States. This is what our life is like. We leave our homes, and we have to try to pass for straight from straight thugs who hate our guts. This is not freedom.

I know there will be gays out there who say, “I wouldn’t do what you have done. To hell with them.” Well, you will say that until you get the crap beat out of you and it takes three months to recover from your injuries - and that’s just the physical injuries. The mental issues to having that done to you will never leave you. Is it worth it? Is it worth the risk? We decided it wasn’t.

I grew up in a state that was not what you would call the center of enlightenment. My best friend in grade school was chased out of our town in the middle of the night along with his family by a bunch of thugs who then set fire to his home. He never returned to the town or the school. His only sin was that he was black.

In junior high (we call them “middle schools” in the East), I had heard about boys who would go out and “roll some queers”, slang for beating them up. I later heard the cops in our town joking about how they let the boys go and told them to go home and go to bed. As for the victim in the crime, the cops threw him in a ditch and told him to keep his sexual orientation to himself. I suppose it’s very ironic that he was straight. He married later in life and now has children. But, he was perceived to be gay.

All of this I learned from. My friends in high school were even talking about how they hated queers. After they found out I was gay, that friendship meant nothing to them. I became the target of their hate.

This brings me to the story I’m talking about today. Chris Chain, editorial director of the gay newspaper chain Windows Media, was attacked and beaten by seven men while in Amsterdam, Holland. He was walking hand-in-hand with his boyfriend early Saturday morning. In his story, he says, “I got another punch to the face, and when they kicked me to the ground, time seemed to stop.”

It’s true. Time does stop. When I was beaten in my home town and thrown down a ravine by boys who used to be my “friends”, it seemed that I was only away from people a few minutes. I was unconscious and the actual time it took me to regain consciousness was several hours. I climbed to the top of the hill to the road. It was a deserted road that used to be used heavily. But, since the new highway was put in, very little traffic came by. Someone did come by and saw me on the ground leaning against the monument on the hill. I had blood all over me, my blood. It was a couple and a small child. They helped me into their car, and I felt myself getting a sick feeling. I fell unconscious again. The next thing I knew, days had gone by. I woke up in the hospital. I never got the names of the people who helped me. After taking me to the hospital, they left. Time stands still.

Crain described the gay-bashing in a first-person story scheduled for publication Friday in the Washington (D.C.) Blade, one of several papers owned by Windows. Crain and William Waybourn founded the chain in 1996.

“I was covered in blood, mostly from my nose,” Crain wrote, “but I got lucky: no broken bones, no damage to my vision, just some very nasty bruises and a lot to think about.” (source)

A lot to think about indeed. I’m sure Chris is weighing the same arguments that Kent and I went through. People can say that they are against public displays of affection, but most would say that they see nothing wrong with holding hands. To me, it is an extension of what you feel inside towards another person. Should we really have to live in a world (or, our country who claims to be all about freedom) where even that has to be filtered?

If you would have told me when I first came out that at some point in my life I would be beaten up for being gay, I would never have imagined it like this. As a child of the South, where “fag” and “queer” were everyday insults, I would have expected a fist to the face somewhere back home for sure.

For years now, in big city and small, I suppose I’ve tempted fate, living my life as I have always seen everyone else live theirs. If the mood strikes me to hold my boyfriend’s hand, I do it. If a chill in the air makes me want to put my arm around his shoulders, I do that, too. If he says something romantic that deserves a peck on the lips, he can expect that’s coming, too.

As it happens, I tempted fate one too many times in arguably the “gay-friendliest” place on the planet. By almost any measure, the equality movement in the Netherlands was won years ago. There are laws protecting against discrimination based on sexual orientation, there are hate crime laws, and Holland is one of only a handful of countries where gay couples can legally marry. [...]

I was walking through central Amsterdam with my boyfriend back to our hotel. People were still milling about on the sidewalks from Friday night’s revelry. We were only blocks from the most popular gay areas; and we were holding hands.

As we passed two men standing on the side of the street, one of them deliberately spat on us, mainly hitting me in the face. Without saying a word, we stood our ground. We stopped, turned around, and asked why. The man, who looked in his 20s, had Moroccan features and spoke with a heavy accent, murmured something about “fucking fags.”

Within seconds, the two somehow turned into seven — and five of them were ganging up on me, probably because at 6-foot-7 I’m a good bit bigger than my boyfriend. It seemed like every direction I turned, I got another punch to the face, and when they kicked me to the ground, time seemed to stop. My heart still races as I write about it now. It felt like the situation had spiraled completely out of my control.

Then just as quickly as it began, it was over. I was standing up on my own, and our attackers were fleeing. There had been dozens of people on the street corner, but none of them had acted or even yelled anything. My boyfriend had escaped his attackers and had come to my aid, and that finally convinced the others to run.

I was covered in blood, mostly from my nose, but I got lucky: no broken bones, no damage to my vision, just some very nasty bruises and a lot to think about.

Should we have been walking hand-in-hand late at night, especially on a party weekend? Should we have shrugged and kept going after the initial spit? On the ambulance ride to the hospital, I beat myself up on both those points much worse than my attackers had. I could see in my boyfriend’s face the fear that I might be seriously hurt. He had no visible injuries, but the whole nightmare for him had been worse. He saw me surrounded by five men, being beaten and kicked and covered in blood. (source)