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QUEER WINDOW
THE "Sad"
GAY LIFE
by
BYRON BECK
bbeck@wweek.com
Lesbopalooza!
Take
the Michigan Womyn's gathering, wrap it with Olympia's Ladyfest and
you get this lesbo music confab, complete with appearances by old-schoolers
Phranc and Ferron and the new sounds of Magdalen Hsu-Li and Americunt.
Friday,
March 2: Red Lion Hotel, Eugene. Saturday, March 3: W.O.W. Hall,
Eugene. Call (541) 246-3360 or (541) 346-4095 for more information.
Performances begin at 8:30 pm. $7.
It's surprising
what you'll find when you start digging through the trash.
A case in point:
Last weekend I was bit by a spring-cleaning bug. To alleviate my
anally fixated illness, I carted my queer "lifestyle" mags off to
the recycling center. But before I had the chance to pitch my well-worn
copies of Out magazine into the rubbish bin, I was confronted
by a spread that left me speechless.
Inside the hopper
was what looked to be a lifetime of Look, Life and
Time. I scooped up as many copies of these 20th-century treasures
as my grubby mitts could carry. And you'll never guess what I found
buried at the bottom of the stack.
It was a Look
magazine dated Jan. 10, 1967. A mint-condition issue of this baby-boomer-era
publication, it was entirely devoted to the state of "The American
Man." Flipping through the pages, I found articles on athletes and
astronauts, as well as a fairly lunkheaded piece on "Big Men (and
the women behind them)."
But what pricked
my interest the most was a supposedly probing exposé titled
"The Sad 'Gay' Life." Written by Look senior editor
Jack Star, it displayed a fascinated revulsion in describing '60s
homo life. And it would be truly sad if it weren't so damn funny.
Here are a few
of Jack's conclusions:
The most
important issue to gays in '67 was where to find a gay store that
sold pre-Halloween wigs or gay cufflinks (whatever those are).
According
to the president of the Mattachine Society Inc., "it's not uncommon
for a gay man to have sex with a thousand different men in a year."
(No wonder gay men walked so funny.)
On Chicago's
North Side, there were more male hustlers than female prostitutes.
These hard-eyed teens were kept busy servicing not only milkmen
finishing their routes, but office workers, salesmen and married
men (working stiffies).
As easy as it
is to laugh off, each giggle still gets stuck in my throat. Imagine
how hard it was for gays to survive in the pre-Stonewall age. Luckily,
the article also glimpsed our rainbow future. "We don't bother men
who dance together in an ordinary way," said one Chicago cop. Likewise
in San Francisco, a few doctors had stopped trying to "cure" homos
of their "illness" and were trying to help them find relief from
their troubles. The article also warned of the emergence of "homophile"
organizations and their influence on elections (our political muscle
was already being compared to the farm vote). The biggest shock
of all, though, was the piece's final sentence. Rather than suggesting
that gay men be punished, it asked for understanding.
That's one Star
report I can really get behind.
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