Gay Homosexuality And Gay Culture

“At the beginning of the twentieth century, a homosexual subculture, uniquely Afro-American in substance, began to take shape in New York’s Harlem. Throughout the so- called Harlem Renaissance period, roughly 1920 to 1935, black lesbians and gay men were meeting each other [on] street corners, socializing in cabarets and rent parties, and worshiping in church on Sundays, creating a language, a social structure, and a complex network of institutions.” Richard Bruce Nugent, who was considered the “perfumed orchid of the New Negro Movement” said, “You did what you wanted to. Nobody was in the closet. There wasn’t any closet.”

In the 1980’s and 1990’s, society wasn’t the most accepting of places for people who were different from the “social norms”. Now I know, people today still struggle with trying to fit in and be “normal” but it was different. Being a gay man living in San Fransisco at the time, which had a large gay population, Richard Rodriguez had a hard time dealing with the discrimination he faced. Richard Rodriguez was an American journalist who wrote and published a memoir about his life as a gay man. In October of 1990, Rodriguez published his memoir “Late Victorians” in Harper’s Magazine, a critically acclaimed publication of the time. In his memoir, Rodriguez describes what it was like to realize he was gay and watch as the country changed to become a more accepting place. He does this by setting up how things can change and then explaining the actual ways things change for the gay population.

Life for most homosexuals during the first half of the Twentieth century was one of hiding, being ever so careful to not give away their true feelings and predilections. Although the 1920s saw a brief moment of openness in American society, that was quickly destroyed with the progress of the Cold War, and by default, that of McCarthyism. The homosexuals of the 50s “felt the heavy weight of medical prejudice, police harassment and church condemnation … [and] were not able to challenge these authorities.” They were constantly battered, both physically and emotionally, by the society that surrounded them. The very mention or rumor of one’s homosexuality could lead to the loss of their family, their livelihood and, in some cases, their

This investigation assesses the New York City Stonewall Riots of 1969, concerning their influence on the rise of the modern gay rights movement, specifically regarding political emergence, social unity, and demographic shifts. The investigation will attempt to answer the following question: To what extent were the Stonewall Riots of 1969 a catalyst for the LGBT social movement in America?

Throughout the 1950’s, the United States belonged to the Leave It To Beaver era. Families were structured around a strong, hard working father and a wonderful homemaker mother. Children were brought up with solid ideologies on what society expects from them and were warned about living a different and dangerous life. Only one-year separates Tennessee William’s Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room from there publishing dates during this decade of unwavering beliefs. These texts were seen as extremely controversial during their time due to their themes of homosexuality. Sexual orientation was an awkward topic during such a “to the book” time period and these texts pushed the limits, making them remarkable and memorable works. Both Tennessee Williams and James Baldwin explore the panic men experience while trying to comprehend what sexual orientation they belong to and highlight the masculine gay man. These texts also examine the woman’s role in the mist of it all.

The word “gay” has gone through drastic changes. Traditionally, it was a positive term that meant to be “happily excited” or “jolly” (Merriam Webster, “Gay”). It was used regularly to express one’s feelings about life. Today, it has a far different meaning. Now people use the word gay to label homosexuals, those with feminine qualities, or those who do something thought to be outside of the norm for their gender. “Being gay” went from expressing someone’s happiness to describing his sexual preference. The definition of gay has changed so much that its original meaning has become archaic and lost to the times.

Post-World War II, everyday gay life and consciousness transformed. The war stressed the segue from connecting gender inversion with sexual non-conformity to constructing and adhering to the binarism between homosexual and heterosexual identities. The pre-war notion that anyone could capitulate to homosexual temptations was replaced by the omnipresent fear of contracting and developing homosexuality as an indeterminate hybrid of both illness and mental disorder. A homosexual was considered and regarded as a security risk to the sanctity of a functioning society. The diaries of Donald Vining and Martin Duberman, both well-educated gay men working within academia, shed light on the lives and consciousness of gay men in the years following the end of World War II. As they both recount, the post-war years witnessed widespread fear, policing, and marginalization of homosexuals, and this resulted not simply from the construction of homosexuality as an entity separate from gender. Rather, this marginalization stemmed largely from the recognition that homosexuality, in the way that it was expressed by gay men such as Vining and Duberman, defied the constraints that constituted the heterosexual paradigm of relationships.

Two Diaries, Donald Vining’s A Gay Diary Vol. Two and Martin Duberman’s Gay in the Fifties look into the everyday life of gay males in the post-World War II Era. While World War II increased freedom for men to sexually explore within the male community, post-World War II extended the freedom of exploration but also created a subsequent backlash against homosexual practices. Vining and Duberman’s diaries document an extension of gay freedoms in the post-World War II period. Although Vining and Duberman give contrasting accounts of their lives as gay males in the postwar period, common themes could be drawn in the form of friendships, sexual activity, relationships, and backlash by heteronormative society.

George Chauncey’s Gay New York Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World 1890-1940, goes where no other historian had gone before, and that is into the world of homosexuality before World War II. Chauncey’s 1994 critically acclaimed book was a gender history breakthrough that gave light to a homosexual subculture in New York City. The author argues against the idea that homosexual men lived hidden away from the world. Chauncey’s book exposes an abundant culture throughout the United States, especially in New York. In this book Chauncey not only shows how the gay population existed, but “uncovers three widespread myths about the history of gay life before the rise of the gay movement which was isolation, invisibility, and internalization.” Chauncey argues against these theories that in the years 1890-1940, America had in fact a large gay culture. Chauncey book is impactful in the uncovering of a lost culture, but also works as an urban pre-World War II history giving an inside view of life in the city through sexuality and class.

Howard, John. Men Like That: A Southern Queer History. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1999. (hb). ISBN: 0-226-35471-7.

Gay men and women in the 1940s learned very early on in life just how detrimental it was to keep their homosexual identities a secret. It was not as simple as playing a fun, innocent game of secret identity, but rather a tactic employed to avoid the violence, the discrimination, and the many other ways that heterosexual Americans attacked homosexual Americans. Hiding their true selves was the only way for gay people to ensure their safety in at least one manner during the 1940s. In The Evening Crowd at Kirmser’s, Ricardo Brown implicated the secretive nature of gay men in the 1940s as imperative to their survival. Brown continually acknowledged the challenges accompanying the concealment of their true identities and divulged some of the various complications that arose both within and outside of the gay community, contributing to the need for their secrecy.

The process of asylum itself can be tool for creating trauma, in the hands of untrained adjudicator becomes a weapon that tears apart these vulnerable, traumatized, LGBT asylum-seekers and leaves lasting wounds that may never see a mental healthcare practice. The issue centers around the focus on the homosexual identity over homosexual acts, and the burden to prove this western, homosexual identity. Homosexual practices are analyzed with scrutiny and many times prejudice to no avail. Closeted, bisexual, and those of non-binary gender identities are downright rejected or humiliated in asylum court for not conforming to the standard homosexual identity. The literature review reveals stories of gay men and lesbian women being rejected on the

Homosexuality is the act of developing sexual desire to people of the same sex and even engaging in sexual relations with the people of the same sex. The theory of utilitarianism which was founded by Jeremy Bentham basically lays its foundations on the theme of morality. It advocates that morality should only be measured by the contribution to achieve happiness and pleasure amongst all people though the maximization of utility. It is true that happiness is relative and hence should not be in a quick conclusion that when for example I am happy then my neighbor or partner should be equally happy too, (Crawford, J. Shakespeare en.al). That could be a hypocritical thinking which shouldn’t be alive in

A qualitative research study conducted by Miller (2007), interviewed ten gay men living with AIDS about their experiences with church. One participant expressed cultural ramifications like feeling “unsafe both in church and at home, much like how Chris could feel (p. 57). Another researched study mentioned that “institutional barriers have been set in place in the United States to marginalize same-sex sexuality”, thus, creating a homophobic culture (Walsh, 2016). In Chris’s school, his peers are very homophobic to him; and culture plays a huge role in using derogatory times like “faggot” to express the negative connotation of being gay.

In this new generation the belief that we are free to make our own choices is in constant battle with traditional religious views; causing violence, separation of families, and discrimination. Homosexuality is just one issue that has caused much controversy in the past due to the religious views of The Christianity culture. Many Christian argue homosexuality is frowned upon in the Bible and even use direct verses from the scriptures to justify their actions when taking a stand against homosexuality. However, aside from analyzing direct scriptures the concept of Christianity is to love one another like yourself, and just because someone has opposing sexual preferences is no reason to abandon them from what is right.