The Intelligent Conversationalist

by Imogen Lloyd Webber

  The debate about the label of feminism is counterproductive—this should shut that down and open a more constructive dialogue.

  Crisp Fact: “Switzerland didn’t let women vote until 1971; even Iran managed it in 1963 (the USA was 1920).”

  This still staggers me every time I read it. 1971? If you feel like making jaws drop, this will do it.

  Pivot: “The average woman smiles sixty-two times a day, the average man only eight. Who couldn’t love women? You have a beautiful smile, who’s your dentist? I’m not sure I entirely trust mine.”

  It is rare you will find someone who hasn’t had a dental drama, and sensitive teeth will be a safe topic to turn to if feminism is proving a little too sensitive a topic.

  CHEAT SHEET 26—HOMOSEXUALITY

  BACKGROUND BRIEFING

  Labels, labels. It wasn’t until 1869 that the term homosexuality even made its appearance—it was coined by Karl Maria Kertbeny, an Austrian litterateur who was against sodomy laws. Homo comes from the Greek homos, which means same, and the root word for sexuality is the Latin sexus, which means male or female sex, gender. Thus the hybrid’s literal translation is “of the same sex or gender.” Meanwhile the word gay has been in the English language since about the thirteenth century, with the word taking on sexual connotations—for lively and merry activities got up to by everyone—by the seventeenth century. It wasn’t until the twentieth century that gay was applied to homosexual behavior.

  * * *

  ALPHABET CITY

  A: Ally, usually applied to straight people who supports LGBTQ rights

  B: Bisexual

  G: Gay

  L: Lesbian

  P: Pansexual (person who is attracted in some way to members of all gender identities/expressions)

  Q: Questioning

  T: Transgender

  * * *

  Science has no specific unanimity about why someone is LGBTQ—other species are noted to be so as well. Nature and nurture are believed to play a complex part. What is certain is that the majority of us feel only a modicum, if that, of choice about what we are when it comes to our sexuality and that homosexuality is not a mental disorder. In 1973 the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses—“praying the gay out” is not something that professionals condone. What is also for sure is that homophobia can cause serious psychological damage. It is notoriously tricky to put a specific number on those who are LGBTQ, but studies indicate anything between 2 to 11 percent of us have same-sex sexual contact in our lives and that around 4 percent of Americans consider themselves as LGBTQ.

  Same-sex attraction has thus always existed. There is evidence that same-sex marriages were tolerated in parts of Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt. Plato’s Symposium discussed same-sex relations in a philosophical manner, arguing that there should be an army made up of same-sex lovers. There are depictions of same-sex relations on Greek artwork and vases. The Greek god Zeus had stories of same-sex exploits attributed to him. In real life there was Alexander the Great and Socrates and then the Roman emperors Hadrian and Nero, who both reportedly married men. Apparently when Nero wed his freedman Pythagoras, the emperor was the bride.

  The Roman empire got more intolerant over time and the more Christianity took hold. Abrahamic religions frowned on sodomy. Sodomite was understood as an act, rather than as a type of person. But same-sex attraction never went away—think Venice during the Renaissance. As cities flourished, so gay communities grew; people could be themselves without family constraints. The Napoleonic code even decriminalized sodomy. Oscar Wilde became a poster boy of sorts in the late nineteenth century. Before Nazism took hold in Germany, there was a tremendously influential homosexual movement there. The Nazis murdered hundreds of thousands of LGBTQ people in concentration camps. The Nazis’ pink and black triangles, used to demarcate for persecution homosexual men and lesbians respectively, were reclaimed by the gay movement in the 1970s as a symbol of commemoration and inspiration to battle persecution.

  * * *

  NOTEWORTHY NUGGET: THE RAINBOW FLAG

  • The iconic symbol for gay pride was originally designed in 1978 by Gilbert Baker, a Vietnam vet who had settled in San Francisco.

  • Baker knew Harvey Milk.

  • Baker has said about the flag: “It’s beautiful, all of the colors, even the colors you can’t see. That really fit us as a people because we are all of the colors. Our sexuality is all of the colors. We are all the genders, races, and ages.”

  • Baker assigned a meaning to each of the original eight colors he used: hot pink (sexuality), red (life), orange (healing), yellow (sunlight), green (nature), turquoise (magic/art), indigo/blue (serenity/harmony), and violet (spirit).

  * * *

  The year 1950 saw the foundation of one of America’s first homosexual political organizations, the Mattachine Society. McCarthyism helped restrict its impact, and it was the Stonewall riots in the summer of 1969, just after Judy Garland’s death, that marked the real turning point for the gay rights movement. Patrons at the Stonewall Inn, a working-class lesbian and gay bar situated in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village, resisted what was then a routine police raid. The riots and protests it sparked proved a watershed moment. In 1970 came New York’s first gay pride parade, and it spread to other cities and countries. June is now Gay Pride Month around the world. Pride, being the opposite of shame.

  * * *

  NOTEWORTHY NUGGETS: HARVEY MILK

  • Milk, a former US Navy man, teacher, Wall Street banker—and associate on Broadway musicals—was elected to San Francisco’s board of supervisors in 1977, becoming the first openly gay person to hold high public office in a main American city.

  • Sean Penn won the 2009 Academy Award for his portrayal of Milk.

  • Milk was assassinated in 1978 by Dan White, who also shot and killed San Fran mayor George Moscone. There has been some conjecture that White, a former city supervisor, was in the closet. The contentious trial went down in history as White utilized what became known as the “Twinkie defense”—his judgment was impaired because he ate too many Twinkies. He was convicted only of manslaughter and served just five years in jail. Described as “perhaps the most hated man in San Francisco history,” he later took his own life.

  * * *

  The appearance of AIDS in the early 1980s caused the nature of the LGBTQ community’s campaigns to change. If you’ve not yet watched Ryan Murphy’s HBO adaptation of Larry Kramer’s award-winning play The Normal Heart, do so. A public backlash against the movement in Reagan’s America took hold, although perception was aided through the community’s work and with films such as Tom Hanks’s Philadelphia, for which he won the 1993 Oscar for Best Actor.

  * * *

  KEY TERMS

  • Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. In 1982 Reagan issued a defense directive saying homosexuality was incompatible with the military. Bill Clinton promised to lift the ban when campaigning in 1992. In 1993 came the compromise—a defense directive from him stated that military applicants should not be asked about their sexual orientation, DADT. Obama repealed it in 2011. Arguably the military, as they did with integration, was leading the way on LGBTQ rights.

  • The Defense of Marriage Act, of 1996. DOMA banned federal recognition of same-sex marriage and defined marriage as “a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife.” Bill Clinton signed this into law, saying later that he regretted doing so, finding it “incompatible with our Constitution.” On June 26, 2013, SCOTUS rejected parts of DOMA in a 5–4 decision.

  • California’s Proposition 8, of 2008. Defined marriage as between a man and a woman. This stemmed from San Francisco’s 2004 decision to begin issuing same-sex marriage licenses. After campaigns that cost around $72 million, Prop 8 passed. Legal challenges commenced. Also on June 26, 2013, SCOTUS dismissed a case to overturn a lower-court decision striking Prop 8 down, paving the way for same-sex marriages to resume in Californ
ia.

  * * *

  WHY IT MATTERS TODAY

  In 1980, polling data indicated that only 11 percent of Americans supported same-sex marriage. By June 2015, with poll after poll confirming that same-sex marriage is supported by the majority of Americans, the Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage is a constitutional right. States can no longer ban gay couples from marrying. The decision was the most significant ruling made on marriage since Loving v. Virginia in 1967, which struck down laws that banned interracial marriages, and there are striking parallels. Since nobody has shown that interracial or same-sex marriage harms anyone, discrimination against it cannot be justified by the government.

  It’s an incredibly swift advance. President Obama’s evolving on the topic somewhat reflected the nation’s; he went from publicly, at least, opposing same-sex marriage for religious reasons in the 2008 election, to saying that states should decide (thanks to some “prodding” from Vice-President Joe Biden) in 2012, to declaring that the 2015 SCOTUS decision has “made our union a little more perfect.” Most Americans, such as the Republican senator Rob Portman, know or are related to someone who is gay and realize that gay people are not social revolutionaries, they just want to participate in the same institution already open to their straight fellow citizens. The personal is the political, as the maxim goes. Millions of American kids are being brought up with gay parents. The arguments that same-sex marriage is “nontraditional” and marriage should be about procreation were also used against mixed-race marriage and women owning property. Popular culture is also making same-sex marriage acceptable. Will & Grace. Modern Family. The Simpsons. Sesame Street …

  There are of course fights still to be fought both inside and outside the United States. It took until 2013 for a first openly gay player in the four major North American professional sports to come out, NBA player Jason Collins. It would be mischievous of me to point out that studies show homophobia is more common among those who have a hidden desire for others of the same sex, right?

  * * *

  WISE WORDS

  I don’t support gay marriage in spite of being a Conservative, I support it because I am a Conservative.

  —David Cameron, prime minister of Britain

  * * *

  Internationally, same-sex marriages are now legal in more than twenty countries around the world. However, as of 2015, in sixty-six countries homosexuality is still criminalized; in more than 10 percent of those, it’s punishable by death. We still have a ways to go.

  TALKING POINTS

  • “Friend of Dorothy” is a term that became popular in the 1950s, as Judy Garland reached the status of quintessential gay icon. Garland’s seminal role as Dorothy Gale in The Wizard of Oz gave gays and lesbians a secret code phrase to use to identify each other in public. Some speculate that the “Dorothy” actually refers to satirist and poet Dorothy Parker.

  • Early gay icons include the shirtless Saint Sebastian (Oscar Wilde used the name Sebastian after he got out of jail) and Marie Antoinette.

   To attain gay icon status, one has to demonstrate appropriate levels of flamboyance and triumph through tough times. An extraordinary approach to fashion and a powerhouse voice doesn’t hurt. So Barbra Streisand, Liza Minnelli (Judy’s daughter), and Diana Ross with her “I’m Coming Out” anthem all qualify.

   Actually looking like a drag queen really cements status—think Cher (who then went on to have an LGBTQ child) and Dolly Parton.

   A dose of tragedy definitely helps the cause—Maria Callas lost her voice and died.

   It’s very possible to be male and a gay icon—the Latino community has provided the classics of Ricky and Enrique.

  • Gays are good for the economy—they tend to be DINKY (Dual Income, No Kids Yet). As of 2013, conservative estimates of the Dorothy Dollar market put it at around $830 billion in the US.

   Targeting the LGBTQ community in marketing can seriously bring in the big bucks. American Airlines focused on getting gays on board in the 1990s, seeing earnings from the community rise from $20 million in 1994 to $193.5 million in 1999.

   The Dorothy Dollar is one of the top-level political contributors to … Democrats.

  • One of the reasons the LGBTQ community in San Francisco became so vibrant is that at the end of World War II, many lesbians and gays were dishonorably discharged from the military—and were left in port cities. Not wanting a shameful return home, they remained.

  • In 2014 Laverne Cox was the first openly transgender person to get nominated for an Emmy in an acting category, for her performance in the hit Netflix series Orange Is the New Black. Caitlyn Jenner’s 2015 Vanity Fair cover was a further sign of a cultural revolution in America.

  RED FLAGS

  • When in doubt, don’t use the moniker gay, use LGBTQ—the former can be a minefield, while the latter is seen to accurately represent everyone.

  • Some American states really were very backward in decriminalizing homosexuality, although the argument is that there are many rules on the books that now make no sense. It took until 2003 for SCOTUS to finally invalidate the sodomy laws that still existed in fourteen states (which included Florida and Texas).

  • Homosexuality was decriminalized in Poland (1932), Denmark (1933), and the UK (1967). It was actually decriminalized in Russia in 1993, BUT then came Vladimir Putin’s war on gays …

  • It is discourteous, to say the least, to comment or be turned off by any of the following if you’ve got someone naked. So just in case you’re really wondering what is going on in your (male) date’s pants, here’s some clues before it gets to the point of rude return:

   Approximately 75 percent of men in the US are circumcised, whereas those in Canada take a more European perspective on the issue and the numbers are estimated at 30 percent. Across the Pond we’re talking less than 20 percent.

   The first evidence of circumcision comes from early Egyptian wall paintings that are more than 5,000 years old. Estimates of the proportion of males that are circumcised worldwide vary from a sixth to a third and have been mostly for religious and cultural reasons.

   Religious perspectives vary widely. In Judaism, religious male circumcision is considered a commandment from God, representing the covenant made by God with Abraham and his descendants. On the other end of the spectrum, you have the Catholic Church, which condemned the observance of circumcision as a mortal sin and ordered against its practice in the Ecumenical Council of Basel-Florence in 1442. In 2012 a debate emerged about circumcision in Germany, of all places—the definition of inappropriate.

   The health debate is not really worth having with someone who isn’t circumcised. Circumcision may be able to prevent some diseases, including penile cancer (if done in childhood) and some STIs. Views conflict on whether circumcision can prevent HIV infection. There is an argument that circumcision may be appropriate as a routine preventive measure only in regions that have a high rate of HIV infection, such as sub-Saharan Africa. But the foreskin is not simply a useless piece of skin; it is very rich in nerves and provides some of the pleasurable sensation experienced during sex. Adult males that were circumcised as infants do not usually report sexual problems linked with their circumcision, but those who are later frequently do. Studies have shown that penile warts and urethritis are more common in circumcised men. The evidence is inadequate to recommend circumcision as a preventive measure against cervical cancer.

   Since we’re in the area, know that globally, the average flaccid penis is 3.61 inches long, while the average erect penis is 5.16 inches.

  • With someone LGBTQ? Don’t mention and don’t take them to Chick-fil-A. There was a debacle of a debate about the place after its president and COO came out as basically not for those coming out in 2012.

  * * *

  WISE WORDS

  Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. In all of his teachings about multiple things, he never said that gay people should be condemned.
>
  —Jimmy Carter

  * * *

  SOCIAL SURVIVAL STRATEGY

  Argument: “The personal is the political on gay rights. Most Americans, such as the Republican senator Rob Portman, know or are related to someone who is gay and realize that gay people are not social revolutionaries.”

  There is inexorable change in the air. If people even try to disagree with you on this, they are swimming against an unwinnable tide, and at some point they will have to acknowledge this.

  Crisp Fact: Approximate circumcision numbers if you’re trying to work out what’s going on in your date’s pants: 75 percent of American men, 30 percent of Canadian men, Brit blokes less than 20 percent.

  Useful information for quite possibly more than 50 percent of you reading this to have in your mind.

  Pivot: “Let’s play sleep with, marry, or kill these gay icons: Judy Garland, Madonna, and Barbra Streisand.”

  Everyone will have an opinion. And it should be amusing. Thus the perfect pivot out of anything prickly, one might say.

  SUBJECT EIGHT—CULTURE

  CULTURE SUMMARY

  The key theme to think about when discussing anything related to this subject is Nietzsche’s maxim: “There are no facts, only interpretations.” The phrase is actually applicable in all sorts of situations, but the arts are everything to do with interpretations. Often people ignored or pilloried in their own lifetimes later undergo entirely different analyses—El Greco, Puccini, Tchaikovsky, even Gershwin. Of course, those who can’t, criticize, so one should always be wary of the reviewer. A wonderful, mind-bending fact to drop into chat is that supposedly, of the 17,000 words Shakespeare used, he invented about 1,700 of them. And a pivot to get out of a cultural conversation? Ask those you’re speaking with to name the people they’d thank in an Oscar acceptance speech. It will be telling, even if they lie and say they haven’t thought about it. Everyone at some point or other has looked in the bathroom mirror and uttered the phrase: “I would like to thank the Academy…”