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Get it out of your system
PAIN AND PLEASURE
By Dennis Highland
While being fully aware that the title of my article this month could easily give rise to several interesting, but very different, interpretations, I found it nonetheless appropriate in order to convey an axiom which all too many of us are ignoring. And since emotions in the gay scene are often highly sensitive and fragile, this variation of "taking the bad with the good" has particular applicability here.
No one likes to "be hurt" by someone else. Whether it be a casual rejection at the bar or the spurn of a longtime lover, some amount of pain is still felt. This emotional trauma is experienced at one time or another by nearly everyone; granted, its universality does not make it any less unpleasant, but it is still a fact of emotional life which cannot be ignored. Such sadness is something all of us will encounter occasionally throughout our lives.
Whereas it is natural and understandable that many people have tried to protect themselves from this type of mental pain, some have sought to protect their feelings far too much. Through the use of "mind
friends, only acquaintances. And they live as though they have no commitments in the world and don't want any, restricting their gay lives to shallow, mindless encounters with strangers at bars, baths, and parks.
For these people, it seems a blatant waste of time to have bothered to "come out" and acknowledge their gayness in the first place. Why should they have spent so much emotional anguish and mental deliberation in order to accept themselves as gay when, after this battle is done, they live their lives in denial of the very emotions they possess by sheltering their feelings? For there is a necessary, and numbing, consequence involved in shielding oneself from pain: pleasure is shielded out as well.
It is impossible to guard oneself from pain without also guarding against pleasure. The two emotions are inextricably intertwined and neither can be fully experienced nor appreciated without allowing exposure to the other. A "system" of checks and balances requires
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some gays learn to "play the game" by using nearly every conceivable device within their knowledge to shield their feelings from possible damage inflicted by others. They avoid emotional involvement with others to minimize any possible hurt in the future. They have no
perience the full gamut of emotions, from despair to joy, in order to fully appreciate that joy.
The gay culture has more than its share of automatons, with their glassy stares, expressionless faces, and artificial poses. We have enough people whose gay life is centered around
casual sex with anonymous bodies. We need people who care more, who are willing to figuratively "stick their necks out" and allow their emotions to play an active part in their lives. Without this emotional commitment, the true meaning of the term "gay" cannot be applied to such a self-shielded life.
The gay life, admittedly, is fraught with heartaches and sadness. Some people get a perverse delight by taking advantage of others; such people are to be avoided. But shielding one's feelings before finding out what another person is like can be equally undesirable, for the other person could be a warm, loving individual who can be the source of much happiness. First impressions are not as reliable as many of us would like. Often, it is necessary that one keep himself emotionally open in order to know someone else. This way, the true feelings of both are most likely to be revealed to each other.
It is a matter of being human, of accepting one's emotions and living out these emotions fully. "Putting up a front" can only result in a hard shell that is impervious to the emotional effects brought upon it by others, whether these effects be pleasant or not. To fully appreciate laughter, one must cry as well. Genuine experience and expression of all types of feelings are what is needed to help develop a full life out of a mere existence.
This is my fourth time at trying to write this letter, probably to no avail, because ! intend to day things that may offend bourgeois advertizers (sic) and you might not print it, but I've got some rellivant (sic) issues to address to the gay community:
Your August '78 issue disgusted me! how dare you print an article on inter-racial gay love in the same newspaper, same issue even, as an ad for a slave auction at the Lambda Bar?! I realize that the Capitalist system forces some people into slavery or prostitution, but I must protest your paper trying to pass this off as chic!
There's nothing possitive (sic) about slavery! and I believe you "queens" and your whole feudalistic mentality are oppressive. Our people should be outraged and more determined than ever to throw off the yoke of this Capitalist regime's oppression, seems obvious more than ever our only road to liberation is through REVOLUTION! And some whites ask "why aren't more non-whites joining the gay movement", if they'd just look, the ans:ver would punch them in the nose!
Che Burundi and I are inter-racial gay spouses and revolutionary comrades, unfortunately Che is a political prisoner and I am unable to be with him just yet, I intend to struggle against the contradictions enslaving our gay community, and to resist the Capitalist-fascist regime with passionate fury!
Uncle Sam is a male chauvinist pig!, smash all oppression, and bring him to his knees. Boycott slave auctions and all bourgeois bars that hold them, we may have to struggle a little harder to find each other, but we don't need the bourgeoisie's oppression.
More and more, we are finding that the capitalists are no friends of ours, they're the one's that are financing Anita Bryant and other reactionaries, without their finance capital what Bryant says would have no more importance than what Jane Doe or Mary Smith says. I've been boycotting Florida Orange juice, but I think it just as important to boycott slave auctions, the bourgeois bars that hold them, and the Capitalist parties (Republican Democrat) that keeps this oppression going thru (sic) campaign promises that are never kept and their lies about repressenting (sic) the people, when they represent only industrial capitalists.
Revolutionary Gay Power, Gary Du Gai (People's Party Socialist Party)