This is in No way about me, or did i write this, this is just something I read, and I encourage Everyone who is going through any problems to read it, because it helped me a lot:
I. This is something I’ve been meaning to do for a while.
I joined the forum back in 2006 and was active for a while. I randomly thought to check things out a few weeks ago and saw the post about the fifth anniversary of Insey’s death. I started reflecting on everything that’s happened in that span.
II. This doesn’t really have anything to do with Insey other than the fact that he was the first person on the board I had a conversation with (via private message). Come to think of it, he was probably the first gay guy I’d ever had a conversation with. Just small talk, mostly about Philadelphia (we both grew up in the area) and politics. And then he killed himself at the end of the summer. I got the impression that figuring out all this gay stuff wasn’t going to be easy.
I knew from roughly seventh grade onwards that I liked guys - that much was clear - it was more a question of what to do about it. It’s not like I grew up in rural Alabama. We’re talking rich, liberal Philadelphia suburbs. I came from a big, loving family, and I never thought my parents would have a problem with it. The only time my mother gave me a hysterical “you’re betraying my values” speech was when she found out I’d bought a rifle. It really would have been a perfectly supportive environment.
Whatever anxiety I had about it was internally generated. I didn’t want to associate me liking guys with me being gay. I thought of the two as separate issues. Liking guys was one thing, but being gay was something completely different. Gay was a lifestyle - tight pants and limp wrists and prancing along the margins of society. The gay world had nothing to do with me, or me with it. (Consider that my only interaction with other gay guys at the time was through this forum. When you’re online it’s easier to disassociate yourself. This is the internet, and that’s real life over there.)
III. I was a normal dude. I liked watching hockey and listening to Led Zeppelin and reading military history. I did stage crew but that’s because I liked building things and pretending the nail gun was an AK-47 and shooting it at freshmen, not out of any love for musical theater. I had a great core group of friends (all straight guys). I wasn’t exactly captain of the football team but I’d like to think I was generally well-regarded. I was gregarious and confident and liked it when I was in charge of planning things. I wanted to be an alpha. It mattered to me that I was taken seriously and liked by both friends and strangers.
Being gay flew in the face of all that. Just think about the word ‘gay’ in the way it was originally used. Having a gay old time. Whimsical fun, letting go of yourself, lowering your inhibitions. Why so serious? Have another cosmo and let’s hit the dance floor! That’s why the opposite of gay is straight. Serious and respected. A real man, not a gay man. You don’t expect as much of gay men. That’s not who you depend on. I really flinched at that term - “gay man.” That was not me.
Normal sixteen year old guys are insecure enough about their masculinity. But now this?
(Before you homos start chirping about stereotypes and internalized homophobia, remember that I’m explaining what I was thinking as a scared sixteen year old. I still don’t like musicals, so **** off with your queer studies ******** and take an engineering class.)
I got the sense I’d be letting people down. My friends - they thought I was one kind of person and all of a sudden I’d be something else. My family - they loved me and were proud of me and expected big things. And myself - I expected big things, too. I wanted to be somebody important and successful. Being gay jeopardized everything.
My parents reinforced this destructive line of thinking. They found some “questionable” material on my computer. I said I was just curious. They told me to keep it under wraps. My dad recalled how my pediatrician lost his practice when he came out. My mom told me about these guys she knew in New York who all died from AIDS. It’s okay to experiment a little when you’re young, but, you know, don’t commit to anything. Oh, and by the way, we love you.
Talk about a mind****. I know my parents love me. Here was something totally out of their control that would make my life harder. Can I blame them for maybe hoping it was just a phase? I know they weren’t doing it out of malice, but the message was clear. Not only did they confirm my suspicion that being gay would ruin my life, they also gave me a false hope that there was an out. Maybe it was just a phase. Maybe I could still marry a girl and just keep this as my little secret.
Needless to say, this wasn’t healthy. This was the time I should have started to explore things a little and grow more comfortable with who I was. I was already behind my straight friends in this department. That’s what high school is for. That’s when you’re supposed to figure this stuff out. Instead I drew myself inward. I was paralyzed.
IV. If this all sounds a bit melodramatic, well, no ****. Big swaths of my personality got taken to the woodshed when I had to confront this. Everything up until then was totally up to me - I could do anything and be anything. But this wasn’t fair. For the first time I couldn’t just work harder or argue or ******** my way out the way I could with everything else. This was something constitutional, totally separate from my interests or achievements, that separated me from everything I’d ever thought or been taught I was going to be. It was a body blow to my confidence. I’d lost something - a certain swagger that formed a huge part of my personality and my interactions with people - and I couldn’t get it back. Maybe it shouldn’t have been such a shock to my system, but for whatever reason, it was.
I could still fake it in my social interactions to a certain extent. I still had my dry, sarcastic sense of humor. I’m a pretty good actor. But the additional energy I spent keeping up appearances was exhausting. I compensated elsewhere. I ********ted and cheated my way through the rest of high school. Even getting elected student President for senior year couldn’t get me that confidence back - in fact, that probably made it worse. I felt like everyone could see through the facade I’d put up. Can’t you see the Emperor has no clothes? Everything I did was suddenly darkened by a shadow of a doubt.
I still got into the college of my choice but I was a wreck from the minute I got there. I was badly depressed. I knew there was something seriously wrong but I wasn’t yet able to put that label on it. My grades were **** from the start. I started having medical issues. It started as a stomach ache every now and then but got progressively worse and I started losing weight. My 6’1” frame had sported a healthy 170 lbs but by the end of my first year I was down to a fallow 148. My hands started shaking (they still do, a little).
The optimism and tenacity of my classmates made it clear what I’d lost. They had that swagger, that confidence about where they were going. That’s who I was supposed to be! They were looking California and I was feeling Minnesota. It didn’t even matter that many of them were (and still are) chasing a hollow dream; at least they had something attainable to chase. I was outshined.
I made a nice group of friends freshman year (again, all straight guys), but that just gave me another thing to lose. Hanging out with that group of guys was one of the few things I still enjoyed and I was terrified of ****ing it up. I didn’t think of them as a source of support, which I should have. I could tell there was a subtle barrier between us, and maybe they could sense it, too. I was holding back and I felt like a dirtbag for it.
There were plenty of gay guys I could’ve reached out to, but I didn’t. I still didn’t associate myself with them - what’d we have in common? I was still clinging to the idea that I would never have to deal with it. I had a few hookups with girls, always initiated by them. I went out with one for a few months. She was a lot of fun to hang out with, but it just wasn’t clicking. I didn’t want to cut it off so I make up excuses. She probably had no idea. Of course, this all just made me feel worse about myself. Who else was I hurting?
Once you get in this depression mindset it’s self-reinforcing. It gets harder and harder to snap out of it. Later on I had a couple of random encounters with guys but I wasn’t totally into it and ended up even more freaked out. I was totally paralyzed and didn’t know what to do. I’m just glad I still had the wherewithal to recognize that things were getting way out of hand when I started drafting suicide notes in my head.
V. So far this story has been pretty ****ing depressing, but honestly, it does get better from here.
I finally talked it out with one or two close friends. I did it out of desperation, really - I just didn’t give a **** anymore and wanted to see what would happen. It seemed more proactive than throwing myself in front of a train. They were totally cool about it. I don’t know what I’d been expecting, but it wasn’t quite that. I mean, aren’t your friends supposed to freak out and alienate you? I was puzzled. Maybe this wasn’t as bad as I’d thought.
The real turning point came one night when I was trying to talk things out with a friend. I was awkward and stumbling (and a bit drunk). In the middle of a sentence I lost it and started crying. I think that’s the only time I’ve really cried since I cracked a rib playing basketball when I was eleven. Everything came together all of a sudden, like a bright white flash.
One of my friends told me a long time ago that you have to find your own happiness - nobody else can make you happy. Happiness comes from within, he said. I hadn’t understood what that meant at the time but all of a sudden it made perfect sense. The whole time I had been chasing someone else’s dream. I had falsely convinced myself that being gay would preclude me from being successful and happy. That’s why I’d been so afraid. Maybe I couldn’t have the exact same life as my parents or other people I looked up to. It wouldn’t be the life that I’d been promised and taught that I deserve to have. But it’d be my life, not somebody else’s. I was just going to have to find my own path.
There was something empowering about my revelation. I almost thought of it as a challenge. So things would be a little different than I’d been expecting. But so what? What was I afraid of again? I couldn’t even remember. It doesn’t make any sense trying to logically parse it out after the fact. That’s not how these things work. Like I said, once you retreat inside yourself it’s not easy to charge back out. It’s like being in a trance with nobody to snap you out of it.
When a kid kills himself his friends and family might tearfully ask, “What was he thinking? What was going through his mind?” It’s an impossible question to answer, because the kid probably couldn’t tell you himself.
VI. Finally, I could see a little daylight. I told the rest of my friends at school over the next few weeks. They were more than cool about it - a few were actually upset that I hadn’t told them. It was a relief to be honest with them, but to this day I feel like a massive douchebag for not trusting them in the first place. I guess my self-esteem was so low that I didn’t trust myself to pick good friends like that.
Still, I hadn’t totally gotten a grip on things. I decided it would be best to get away for a while. I found a consulting job in Shanghai. I graduated the August following my third year and was on a plane a week after summer classes finished.
I lived in crappy apartment on the west side of the city. If I never had to go to my office I could’ve gone days at a time without speaking English. I made a few white friends but we didn’t hang out everyday. My family and friends were 8,000 miles away. I didn’t have to worry about anybody else. In my reflective isolation I grew more comfortable in my own skin. I became more than merely accepting of the way things were; I actually found a way to be happy with myself, by myself. I was finally happy on my own - I finally felt free.
For a while I said to myself that being gay is okay but I’d still rather be straight. I don’t believe that anymore. I don’t know if I’m proud to be gay - it’d be like saying I’m proud to have white skin or brown eyes, it’s not something you can really judge - but it’s still something unique. And sort of special. Not everyone gets to experience it. My guy friends and I respect and care for each other like brothers, but I’m able to have a different, more intense kind of bond with a guy that they aren’t capable of having. Isn’t there something to be said for that?
Being gay isn’t everything about me, but it’s definitely something that colors my personality. I’d be a lot different if I wasn’t gay. I probably wouldn’t be as rebellious or questioning of authority. I probably wouldn’t be as independent a thinker. I might not have started my company. I might be an investment banker chasing a hollow dream of a wife and kids and a house in the suburbs. Maybe my life would have been simpler but I would be a much different person. I wouldn’t be me. And I like me.
VII. This was another important thing I came to terms with: being gay was a part - but only a part - of my personality. I could like guys and keep my football, rifle, and straight friends. I could be a gay guy and still be a guy. I still want nothing to do with most of gay culture, and indeed, I blame it for a lot of the trouble I had accepting my sexuality.
Look, I understand that I’m probably a minority within the gay male population when it comes to my masculine affectations and firearms possession. I also understand that the modern gay community originated as a refuge for queers who felt they’d been rejected by their families or society and found community and solidarity with each other. Gay culture was forged in the heat of social revolution as a reaction against rigid societal hierarchies and expectations. What would Don Draper do if Bobby started trying on his sister’s dresses? He’d beat the **** out of him, that’s what. There was simply no outlet for that kind of behavior in that environment. The social revolutions of the 60s were necessary to make room for, among other groups, guys who didn’t fit the masculine ideal.
A lot of young gay guys still face those same problems. Just look at all these kids still getting bullied at school. I get that. But I was dealing with the exact opposite problem! Here I had this awesome, comfortable life with a loving family and great friends. I gladly embraced the masculine ideal. I didn’t want a new family, I liked the one I had. I didn’t want new friends, I had perfectly good friends and we just wanted to watch the football game and could you toss me another beer dude. Gay culture isn’t equipped to deal with that! Gay culture is specifically designed to celebrate victimhood, but I didn’t want to be a victim. I didn’t want to be alienated by my friends and rejected by my family and run away to San Francisco.
“Gay” doesn’t merely describe a sexual orientation - it’s a whole lifestyle and worldview based around it. It’s not just that you’re gay, you look gay and act gay and vote gay, too. It’s shallow and homogenous, largely focused on appearances and conformity. It’s an instant social group, just add vodka! And it’s specifically designed to draw you in make you feel alienated from everything else. The straights are your oppressors, we’re your real family now. Everything in your life gets redefined around this one thing. The sex and the culture are intended to be a package deal, so it shouldn’t be surprising that’s how most people think of it. Even if you only subscribe to the sex part you automatically get lumped in with everything else. How else would “looking gay” even be a phrase?(1)
I can understand guys who never had a good family or social situation and find empowerment in gay culture, or less masculine guys who gravitate towards it naturally. It’s fine - really! If that’s you, go ahead and be yourself! But it’s not me. That’s not what I signed up for when I was twelve and started checking out John Hartnett in Black Hawk Down. I considered this a relatively minor part of who I was and I didn’t want it to replace everything else. There was never any ‘internalized homophobia’ or moral objection to liking guys. It was all the baggage that came with liking guys that freaked me out. So as soon as I realized I could like guys and still be the same person otherwise, the skies began to clear. I could keep my straight friends and my gay **** and I didn’t have to watch Glee. I could have it all! That was a major breakthrough.(2)
VIII. If you’re looking for the happy ending where I find a hot boyfriend, well, slow down. I was in a much better place by the time I came back to the US earlier this year. My depression was gone. My medical issues were gone. I’d put back on some weight (muscle, this time). While in China I started my own company and it’s doing well. I’m back in Philly now and working on it full-time. Generally speaking, I’m alive and happy. That’s a happy enough ending for now.
Yeah, I have a few notches on my belt now, but I still don’t really know what I’m doing with guys. I wasted all those years where I should have been figuring this stuff out. A lot of young gay guys are emotionally stunted, but I feel like most of those who don’t get to it in high school figure it out in college. I blew both chances. So am I worried about finding someone? No, I’m really not. It’s more of a nervous excitement. I feel like I’m standing on a firm foundation now that I’m happy with me. Some guys never get to that point, even if they’ve been out and dating for years. And I only just turned 22 - if you’re a snot-nosed tenth grader that might not sound young, but honestly it is.
IX. I spent too long chasing somebody else’s dream. I was never going to find happiness that way. I realized I was going to have to find it on my own, for myself. I wasn’t going to be able to get on with my life until I was happy with the person living it. Nobody else can do that for you. Not your parents, not your friends, not even your boyfriend - just you.
Really? Even a boyfriend won’t make you happy? See, you’ve got it backwards. Boyfriends do not bring happiness. The person you’re in a relationship with is not an accessory like a belt. That’s the hollow dream I was talking about. Why do you think all those investment bankers drink so much? Don’t they know they’re supposed to take it easy with the scotch when they’re on antidepressants? House, check. Car, check. Wife and kids, check. Dude, where’s my happiness?
It’s the exact same thing for gay guys. Actually, it’s much worse. Gay culture is even more shallow and materialistic and guilty of this. I feel like a lot of gay guys never deal with their issues, and gay culture intentionally gives them a free pass to remain in perpetual tortured adolescence. The shirtless guy on the club flyer with eight-pack abs and perfect teeth might be fun to get off with tonight but he’s definitely got issues of his own and probably doesn’t care about yours. You’re not going to fill that emptiness inside by filling all your other holes.
Happiness doesn’t come from material things or a certain lifestyle or even from a relationship. All those things are nice to have, but you have to be happy with who you are on the inside first. You can put on a nice shirt but there’s a certain kind of confidence that only comes from someone who is happy and secure with who they are underneath. That’s freedom. People can sense it and are naturally attracted to it. Boyfriends will not bring you happiness, but happiness will bring you boyfriends.
X. Still not convinced you can be happy with your new gay self? Here’s the bottom line: There’s no point complaining about or trying to change things which can’t be changed. You’re stuck with yourself whether you like it or not. Maybe it’s not how you would’ve planned it, but tough ****. You probably have it better than 99% of the world (maybe you’re the 99% in America or whatever other liberal democracy you live in, but you’re still the 1% of everywhere else). Are you going to throw it all away just because you like dudes? I don’t even want to think about how close I came to doing just that. You only get one life so you might as well start living it.
None of us chose this. Maybe you had some vision of what your life was going to be like and this wasn’t in the recipe. But that’s not how life works. It’s like that cooking show where they give a bunch of chefs a basket of seemingly random ingredients and expect them to make an actual dish. “Here’s a live pigeon, two slices of pepperoni, and a miniature Statue of Liberty made out of marzipan. You have 20 minutes.” Huh? Where’s the recipe? Where do you even start?
Just embrace the challenge. You might have to find your own path to happiness, but when you get there it’ll be just that much more awesome. I probably should’ve gotten help at some point, but I’m glad I didn’t just grab a Zoloft prescription and keep muddling through. Drugs might help you sleep at night but they’re no replacement for squaring up with your issues and facing them head on. It took a while but in the end I’m a healthier person for it.
XI. I threw out a lot of **** here and I’m just hoping some of it sticks. That’s my only goal here: I want to give something back and maybe help a younger guy avoid some of the mistakes that I made.
I understand that my situation is unique. Not everyone has a loving, accepting family with a house in the suburbs and money for Ivy League tuition. Most gay guys probably don’t like hockey and classic rock and actually do find some comfort or solidarity in the gay community. Maybe you’re perfectly well-adjusted already, and that’s great! If this only resonates with one random kid who isn’t yet and helps to make his teenage years just a tiny bit less ******, I’ll consider it a worthwhile endeavor.
I don’t know you and I don’t know what you’ve been through, but I can guarantee that somewhere there’s another guy who’s thinking the same things and asking the same questions and dealing with the same **** that you are. That’s why forums like this exist. I don’t know if I would have made it if I hadn’t had a resource like this. Insey didn’t make it himself, but he did make this forum so others would. Each one of us, gay or straight, is searching for our own freedom. So keep helping each other along.
-Harry (aka MooseMan)
1 - And boy, for a culture that’s supposed to be so accepting, it sure is judgmental. You better dress and act and vote a certain way or you’re off the island in a hurry. It’s like the Village People: you can all wear different stupid costumes as long as you all sing the same stupid song. It’s the same hypocritical ******** all the “oppressed” minority groups foment. A masculine gay guy who votes Republican is just a rainbow Uncle Tom.
[Quick shout out here to Dr. Alan Charles Kors, a professor at UPenn. My freshman year I heard him speak a couple of times on individualism. He explained the hypocrisy of the stereotypes and why guys like Thomas Sowell (a black economist/Republican) make leftist elites’ heads explode. I credit Dr. Kors with introducing me to libertarian thought and providing a spark of hope that I could be gay and still remain an individual.]
2 - I know for a fact there are lots of gay guys who also feel marginalized by gay culture. If you’re looking for a more in-depth discussion of this topic I highly recommend a book called Androphilia by Jack Donovan (pen name Jack Malebranche), written specifically for masculine gay guys, who he argues should embrace and honor masculinity instead of rejecting it as gay culture does currently. When I first read it I thought it could’ve been written by own subconscious. I’m sure I lifted bits and pieces for this note without even realizing it.
