17.2Û0Û
42
H U M O R
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Locals
Only1
Thursday nights on OPB-TV
Where have all the sissies gone?
y partner and I are having an argu
ment. This in and of itself is not
unusual.
I’m an Italian boy from New Jersey;
m
Floyd s a Jew from Long Island. We’re both
genetically wired to yell across rooms at the
people we love, all the time making appropri
ately emphatic and vaguely threatening hand
not afraid to admit I saw The Bridges of Madison
gestures.
County and own a bottle of Nair?”
Our latest argument, however, involves get
Either way, 1 couldn’t help hut notice the
ting another dog. We both agree we want one;
palpable satisfaction in those who rated the
we both agree we want a bulldog.
most “straight-acting” and the slight superiority
Where we differ is the naming of this still-
they exhibited toward poor, swishy me. Now,
theoretical canine. Floyd, perhaps because he’s
it’s one thing to feel demeaned by butch
been saddled with the unfortunate name of
straight guys, but it’s another thing entirely to
Floyd all his life, favors a sensible bulldog name
feel demeaned by butch gay guys.
like Bruno or Spike.
Naturally, 1 have another idea in mind. I
Starting with the mustachioed clones of the
want to name our bulldog Precious.
1970s, gay boys seem determined to out-butch
I don’t know why. I just love the idea of
the straight guys. Gay pom, for instance, is rife
standing on our doorstep in a paisley silk robe
with construction workers, cops and athletes,
but just try finding a hot video about a florist
screaming “Precious!” at the top of my lungs
and a flight attendant.
and having a floppy-faced drooling mass of dog
come trotting around the comer.
Sure, pretty boys abound in pom, but
Yes, th at’s a good boy, Precious. Daddy
they’re always being dominated by some
loves you.
straight-acting top. Just once I’d like to see a
pom video in which an interior decorator
My straight friends object to the name
because it seems to them a rather cruel joke to
screws all the frat boys and then redoes their
draperies and pillows. T hat’s my fantasy.
play on a defenseless animal, which 1 suppose it
is. O n the other hand, most of their dogs have
Certainly I’m pleased young gay men feel
names that make them sound like little old
comfortable wearing baseball hats backward
Jewish people: Max, Tillie, Sadie...I imagine
and talking about fly-fishing, but when 1 hear
the dogs talking to one another in the park:
them disparage the Hermes scarf-wearing
“Sadie, you vant we should chase the ball?”
antiques lover, it chills my blood. “Why do
“Vat, in this heat?
they have to act that
Tillie, are you crazyF
way?” they say. “It’s
The reaction of
got nothing to do
my gay friends is
with sleeping with
stranger still. “T hat
men.”
just reinforces the
But to these
stereotype of the
young men I say the
gay man as an
screaming nelly
effeminate swish,”
queen is probably
says one. (“Well,
braver than they’ll
excuse me, Miss
ever be. A big fairy
T hing,” reply I.)
can’t “pass” in the
“Marc, why don’t
straight world. He
you get a real dog
defiantly announces
like a black Lab?
to a hostile society
That way you can
who he is and what
take him with you
he does, just by being
running or when you
his own fabulous
go camping.”
effeminate self.
I ask you,
Running? Camp
M any of the
ing? Black Lab?
young
gay m en who
when aid
a ia e queers
I ask you, when
drive trucks and
g e l so butch?
did queers get so
play pickup games
butch? Whatever
of
basketball seem
W hatever happened
happened to sissies?
to have forgotten,
1 was at a party
to sissies?
indeed perhaps they
recently when I
d o n ’t even know,
mentioned StraightActing.com, "Your online
th at the freedoms they enjoy today were
politically incorrect source,” where you can
first won by Judy G arland-loving drag
take a little quiz to see whether you rank as a
queens who threw the first bricks and bot
"macho man or a lilly queen.” The notion
tles at the Stonewall Inn. To me, these
piqued everyone’s interest, so we fired up the
young m en in their Dockers and Nikes are
computer and turned it into a party game.
standing on the shoulders of giants, giants
And who do you suppose rated the most
who are taller still because they’re wearing
effeminate in the room? The guy who wants to
heels.
name his bulldog Precious, of course.
And that, my friends, is T he Gospel
1 wasn’t terribly surprised at my score, but I
According to Marc. j n
was surprised at just how “straight-acting” my
friends rated. I looked around the room at the
M arc A cito has not only seen The Bridges
wrists flapping like so many birds taking wing,
of Madison County, but he also cried through the
and I thought: "Am I really the faggiest one
last half-hour of it like a little girl.
here? O r am I just the most honest because I’m
THE GOSPEL
ACCORDING I
TO MARC ’
b y M a r c A c ito
(
Oregon Art Beat
The sculptural creations of jewelry artist
Sasha Samuels and a visit to the Sitka
Center for Art and Ecology.
8:00pm
4
m
Oregon field Guide
A behind-the-scenes look at the Oregon
Coast Aquarium s "Passages of the Deep."
8:30pm
JP B
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