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Sunday, Mar 21, 2010
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What I meant to say is.... |
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| That Gay cowboy | ||
| The network
by Beau Burriola -
SGN Foreign Correspondent When I moved to North Carolina, I fully expected to be the lone Queer ranger. I expected it to be hard to find a Gay doctor or simpler things like a safe, unbigoted place to take my boyfriend for dinner. I imagined it would be a very straight existence and that's what I was mentally prepared for. What I didn't expect and what I was surprised to find, was a small, tight-knit network of Gay folks so helpful and inviting that it has completely redefined my concept of "community." My road into this Gay network came in the form of Joseph, a kindly, good-humored guy at work who came up to introduce himself on my second day. Right away, he invited me to after work dinner with a whole bunch of "family," and within the week I had been referred to a Gay doctor, a new Gay hair guy, and a decent Gay-owned eatery to take my boyfriend to. I was invited to game nights and parties. With open arms, I was given in one week the type of Gay associations that it took me a full year to build up when I moved to Seattle. Over the weeks, as I've met my Gay doctor and he's referred me to a Gay specialist, or as the Gay guy at my gym has referred me to a decent Gay-friendly bike shop, I've started to appreciate the existence of Gay folks like never before. I've started to appreciate the existence of Gay businesses like never before. In Seattle, everything is already Gay or Gay friendly. You don't need a Gay network because Gay is everywhere. Gay folks and Gay businesses are as common as any other group, and perhaps as a consequence of all that abundance, we don't always seem to have as much need or care for one another. We don't always reach out to one another. Here, in smaller towns, these Gay people genuinely need one another as a matter of sanity. They rely on one another. That reliance, that care for one another, is exactly what makes the community here every bit as powerful - and in some ways more powerful - than any of the big-city Gay places. Necessity creates a strong bond. When I lived in Seattle, I remember thinking how divided our community sometimes seemed. Younger Gay men avoiding older Gay men out of irrational fear of trolling, older Gay men avoiding younger Gay men out of fear of snap judgment, HIV positive men avoiding negative men out of fear or rejection, HIV negative men avoiding positive men out of fear for themselves; divisions on race, on class, even on hearing or non-hearing - we can sure be a patchwork group of people who still manage to find room to divide ourselves. Sometimes, like in disagreements about pride parades or distributing HIV prevention dollars, the Gay community's divisions run deep. Without the benefit of the size to create many divisions, small-town Gay communities almost seem simpler; Gay people reaching out to Gay people in a network of diverse Gay folks. It's what Gay communities were before they were so big and so complex. Now I better understand why people like Joseph, a Gay man who has lived in North Carolina his whole life, is happy to stay here. For him, there isn't anything missing. There is a strong community of Gay people in a place he loves. It's all he needs to make a good home. Seattle and all those bigger Gay cities will always have unbeatable offerings for Gay folks: an environment almost completely without anti-Gay bigoted idealism; freedom to live and love openly, freedom from discrimination at work or in housing, and confidence in knowing your family is protected. In places like that, it's the bigoted wackos like Ken Hutchinson that are the rare exceptions. In smaller towns, they just don't have quite that type of freedom. There's no protection and not much confidence. It becomes those accepting, affirming folks that are the rare exceptions. But what amazing exceptions they are. I used to believe that to be a happy Gay man, I had to live in a big, Gay city. Now, having stumbled on a whole Gay community of amazing people where I was sure there would be none has shown me just how wrong (and perhaps arrogant) I was. If "community" is defined as a supporting network of people that have a genuine care for one another, then small towns throughout this country have really got it right. "The universal brotherhood of man is our most precious possession." - Aristotle Beau Burriola is a Southern-born Seattleite exploring the world. beaubrent@gmail.com |
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visit Beau at www.beaubrent.com
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