Betrayal

Looking over old emails, between me and Henrik, Jack and Arn.  Each claimed to be my friend, and each betrayed me, in their own way.  Even 5 years later, it still hurts.


Ah well, as Ennis Del Mar says to Jack Twist in Brokeback Mountain: If you can't fix it, Jack, you gotta stand it.

Straight guys loving

I've maintained for a while now that gay lib would also lead to straight lib.  As society gets to accept that gay men are "normal" and that it's OK for gay men to love each other, straight men will feel more comfortable hugging, holding and even kissing each other.  Not because they find each other sexy, but because it's no longer "evil" to love another man, and therefore things which might be interpreted as "loving" a male friend are no longer taboo.  And actually, even if you do make love to him, so what?

So with that thought in mind, I share with you these pics of Colin Donnell and Stephen Amell from the series Arrow (which I haven't seen).  They're both "straight".  But they're not afraid to show their affection for each other.  It reminds me of Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal, obviously also very fond of each other.

Brokeback Mountain

Ennis (Ennis del Mar, played by Heath Ledger) not admitting to missing Jack (Jack Twist, played by Jake Gyllenhaal), in the motel scene.  Consummate acting.  Both men are (were for Heath Ledger -- what a huge loss to the world)  straight.  Yet they could show such depths on conflicting emotion.

Majorca Flats -- 249

“G'day, mate. Thank you for ...”

“... no worries, mate.”

Obviously a real man, thought Luigi. No wasted chatter.

“What's your address, mate?” he asked, matching tone and diction. “I'll come and pick Cody up.”

The other man gave his address while Luigi looked around Keith's sitting-room for paper and a pencil. “Hang on a tick! Just looking for a pencil … Right, what was it again? And what's your name mate? Michael? Good, Michael. I'm Luigi. Mate, thanks again for helping Cody.”

At the other end of the line, Michael clearly had several questions he wanted to ask but couldn't work out how.

“We'll talk when I get there, Michael. See you in 45 minutes.”

When Michael asked whether he wanted to talk to Cody again, Luigi shook his head, forgetting that Michael couldn't see that. So Michael asked again.

“Yes,” said Luigi.

“Lou?” Cody was tentative. Luigi could hear the strain in his voice, and he felt his heart wrench. Once he'd loved this man more than anyone he'd ever loved, in all his life. And that someone'd proved to be … flawed. Did he still love him? Yes, blast his eyes, he did.

“Coad … I'll see you in three quarters of an hour. Take care …” and then, hesitating, instead of “love”, he ended with “mate”.

“Yeah,” Cody replied, his voice full of doubt and hurt.

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Episodes 1 to 220 (without pictures, 10 episodes per chapter)

Jake Gyllenhaal

Some might not like his looks.  But I think he's sexy.  Very.  I know he's straight, but he was able to act a gay-shaded bloke with complete conviction in Brokeback Mountain, and he was obviously very close to Heath Ledger.  Every time a straight actor acts a gay or bi man without resorting to cliches, every time we are shown to be real people, then the homophobic bias against us is diminished.

Alas, his lawyers have just written to Queerty demanding that they take down a photo purporting to be him in his undies as it "defames" him.  I wonder whether he asked for this to be done?  If so, he's gone down somewhat in my esteem. 

Either way, enjoy the pics.

Jake Gyllenhaal & Heath Ledger

I remember when Brokeback Mountain was just whispered about.  Like everybody else who was a bit or more than a bit gay, and all those straight women who support the gay cause, we read everything we could, discussed every snippet of info, and planned for our first viewing of the film.  Which was an amazing and wonderful, a subtle and marvellous masterpiece.  (For those who've not seen this incomparable film, here is a rather bloodless summary from Wikipedia.  Now go out and see it!)

Here are two of the photo stills from the film, which show an extraordinary closeness between Ennis del Mar (played by Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (acted by Jake Gyllenhaal)   Real or acted?  If acted, it's consummate acting.  Look at the look on both their faces, especially in the first picture.  This looks like love.  Examine Jack Twist's face, with the downcast eyes and the serene happiness.  Look at Ennis del Mar's fierce possessiveness and love.  Remarkable.

Recently, I came across two photos of these actors off camera, and was astounded to see their closeness.  Not love ("in love") as Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist were, but an obvious and unashamed intense affection.  I know these blokes weren't gay, in the sense of the word when we use it as a label to describe sexual orientation and sexual culture.   But the love and affection for each other, the playful way they transgress the boundaries of straight male public affection is telling.  And heart-warming.

It is said that Jake Gyllenhaal was extremely distraught at Heath Ledger's death.  Understandably.

I felt I had lost a friend, even though I didn't know him -- perhaps not a friend, a beloved and admired patron, because as a straight actor he had the courage to play a gay role, which might have destroyed his career, but which instead altered the world, and made ordinary people realise that we homos can love and we do, and that that love is as valid and real and worthy as the heterosexual kind.  I wonder how much of the rapid advance of acceptance of us by the straight world over the last five years is due just to this film and this act of courage by these two guys.

Thank you Jake and Heath (wherever your spirit is).  You did good.  You helped make the world a better place, and there is no higher calling.

Frank Lampard, Robbie Williams and other things

I was half in love with a bloke who looked at lot like Frank Lampard. A lot. Same thin face, same piercing eyes, same gorgeous colouring. Must be the Irish in both of them.

That's him in the blue. Handsome bloke, isn't he?

Now that's also him in the pink swimsuit. Pink? Pink??? Is there a message there?

And c'mon guys, by the way, are you really telling me that swim shorts are less revealing than swimbriefs? We don't have an image of the front of these pink wonders, but, judging from the back.....

Just for the record, just because I have a pic or two of Frank Lampard on these pages does not mean I think he's gay or even gay-shaded. And nor, despite the jokes, do I think a pink swimsuit suggests anything more than a mild metrosexuality. (Unfortunate judgement, perhaps.... )

But then, on the other hand, there is the tryst between Robbie Williams and Gary Barlow in several Brokeback Mountain type scenes in this video. Do they mean anything? Um.... Robbie's just got married. Hasn't he? OK, I get it, it's a joke. But every time a celeb makes a joke like this it erases a bit of our shame and self-hatred, and makes it easier to let ourselves feel love and affection for another man.




Oh, and again.... Robbie Williams is very, very sexy. Not beautiful. Sexy. As clear an example as any that you do not need to be a sculpted gym-rat to be hot.

Male Intimacy

Male intimacy. Three vignettes showing different aspects of it, yet all in a way related.

The first one: when I went to pick up my son at the airport, there were two young men -- 19? 20? -- also waiting for someone. Their parents came from somewhere in south-eastern Europe or the Levant -- olive skin, with one having warm coffee-coloured eyes and the other greenish-hazel; glossy dark brown hair; absurdly slim in the way so many boys turning into men are. They weren't of Greek or Italian extraction, because they would occasionally drop into their natal language, and I didn't recognise it. Perhaps Turkish or Yugoslav. They were both pleasing to look at, but the hazel/green eyed one was beautiful, in a way that perhaps only boys on the cusp of manhood can be.

At the arrivals hall, there is a sort of safety-glass barrier, and about a foot away from it, a stainless steel handrail. The one young man was slim enough to contrive to fit in between the glass barrier and the rail, so that he could be as close as possible to his friend and still face him. He rested his hands on the rail on either side of the other man, about 3 or 4 centimetres from his friend's body. I got the impression he was the one who longed more for physical contact, yet all the same his friend didn't move away. He stayed right there, in an almost embrace with his mate. They talked pretty much exclusively with each other, even though they were with two youngish women of the same ethnicity (sisters? girlfriends?) Their eyes would meet and hold often. They talked softly together, and from time to time the one between the barrier and the rail would move his hands from their position either side of his friend. Once he clasped his friend's shoulder, for several seconds, and the friend just smiled, his body totally relaxed. Another time he moved his hands up and down his friend's torso, not actually touching him, but as if that's what he wanted to do, to caress him. I would say that they probably weren't lovers, yet there was the intimacy and closeness of lovers, the way in which lovers in public will mould themselves and their space to each other, their physical and sexual intimacy making them a comfort to each other. It was very touching.

Annie Proulx said she wrote Brokeback Mountain after seeing an old cowboy in a bar wistfully watching two handsome young cowboys. And I wondered what any author watching me would have seen in my face, my body language. Embarrassing, really.

It made me think about a party I went to a couple of years ago (this is the second vignette).

As soon as the party started, the men and the women divided into two groups by gender. I went with men: it would not have done to go with the women. On ne se fait pas! But as I knew no one, and I didn't want to let them see what I was, I didn't speak unless spoken to. I just watched and listened.

These blokes were truck-drivers, foremen at factories or car-yards or tyre-shops; they had plumbing or electrical businesses; they were utterly manly and normal. As the evening progressed, and their inhibitions were loosened by the beers they were downing, they would reach out unconsciously to touch each other, and then, their hands halfway raised, would stop as the inhibitions drummed into them since childhood took control again. They laughed and smiled at each other, they were obviously growing to like each other or already did (because many of them seemed to be already acquainted) but every tentative reaching out was aborted. I don't think these guys were gay or bi (though no doubt there were the usual percentages present). They were straight. Because it might be misinterpreted if they physically expressed their liking for each other, they didn't touch. They couldn't bring themselves to do it. It saddened me so much.

And lastly, my son at 11 or 12 and his then best friend, standing in a line at school with their arms resting casually on each other, as close to each other as they could get, their love entirely innocent, and entirely untrammelled by any fear of sex or others' interpretation of what they were doing. My son wouldn't do that now, because he would be too aware of what it could imply.

The overriding point of these three vignettes? The Christian hatred for homosexuality and homosexuals has poisoned the wellsprings of straight men loving each other too. Men are afraid of touching other men, of getting too fond of other men. The deep cultural aversion to gayness, continually refreshed by churchly poison, makes straight men lonelier and less happy. The two young men at the airport were noticeable precisely because one so seldom sees this. And it was a lovely sight to see. How long until expressed affection between men is normal? How long before men stop not doing things because they're "too gay"?

Gay lib is straight lib too. Getting acceptance for us will in the end shift the male landscape, and make straight men less lonely. Eventually.