"Gaymers" Speak Out On Homophobia

[Geoffrey42]

In case anything suggested I was a Christian or even religious, I'm not. Christianity isn't about one single individual's relation to God, but about humanity's relation to God. And with that in mind, a Christian would be offended since any reference to God would be to the one and only God of Abraham (I don't really get it either, but I don't need to).

My point was whether or not we should remove certain words from daily usage just because certain groups are offended by them. And if we are, then there shouldn't be exceptions.

By saying that Christians shouldn't be offended by someone else using their Lord's name in vain is a cop out argument that doesn't address the double standard that is present.

I guess we're talking about slightly different things then. I'm not for restricting offensive speech. People can be offended for all sorts of reasons; I don't care that much. I'm for restricting speech which promotes discrimination or denigrates a particular group.

"Oh my god" may offend a group of people, but it does not denigrate their way of life. Using a colloquial term for female genitalia to indicate that someone is weak? Using any of a variety of nationality or race-inspired slurs to refer to someone in a negative light? Using the term "gay" as a synonym for "bad"? These things cause damage. This is my point.

P.S. Outside/irrespective of my point, I think it is inane for someone to be offended by me breaking the commandments. If they want to pity me for my eternal punishment, fine. I didn't break their law. I broke their deity's law. That's between Her and me. They should thank me for making their adherence to the laws meaningful.

 

[Aries_Split]

For people that wonder why places like Gaygamer.net exist, here's a pretty decent explanation.

I am the boy who never finished high school, because I got called a
fag everyday

I am the girl kicked out of her home because I confided in my mother that I
am a lesbian

I am the prostitute working the streets because no one will hire a
transsexual woman

I am the sister who holds her brother through the painful, tearfilled nights

We are the parents who buried our daughter long before her time

I am the man who died alone in the hospital because they would not let my
partner of twentyseven years in the room

I am the foster child who wakes up with nightmares of being taken away from
the two fathers who are the only loving family I have ever had. I wish they
could adopt me.

I am not one of the lucky ones. I killed myself just weeks before graduating
high school. It was simply too much to bear.

I am the man who fears I will never be able to be myself, to be free of this
secret because I won't risk losing my family and friends

We are the couple who had the realtor hang up on us when she found out we
wanted to rent a onebedroom for two men

I am the person who never knows which bathroom I should use to avoid getting
management called on me

I am the mother who is not even allowed to visit the children I bore, nursed,
and raised. The court says I am an unfit mother because I now live with
another woman

I am the domesticviolence survivor who found the support system grow suddenly
cold and distant when they found out my abusive partner is also a woman

I am the domesticviolence survivor who has no support system to turn to
because I am male

I am the father who has never hugged his son because I grew up afraid to show
affection to other men

I am the homeeconomics teacher who always wanted to teach gym until someone
told me that only lesbianshat

I am the woman who died when the EMTs stopped treating me as soon as they
realized I was transsexual

I am the person who feels guilty because I think I could be a much better
person if I didn't always have to deal with society hating me

I am the man who stopped attending church, not because I don't believe, but
because they closed their doors to my kind

I am the person who has to hide what this world needs most, love

I am the person ashamed to tell my own friends I'm a lesbian, because they
constantly make fun of them

I am the boy tied to a fence, beaten to a bloody pulp, and left to die
because two straight men wanted to "teach me a lesson"

Homophobia ain't pretty. Places like Gaygamer exist to provide places for people to be themselves without fear of bigotry.

 

[Cahlee]

Here is my two cents!

Homosexuals are (in my opinion) the most discriminated group in society at the moment. They're denied the right to be open and honest about themselves without fear of verbal or even physical abuse. Two of my best friends are lesbians and they've been together for 4 years now and they've gotten to the point where they feel comfortable enough to embark on a little PDA every now and then. No more then a kiss. And most of the time nothing absolutely horrible comes of it but they get weird looks and on occasion insults and horrible comments. Now, my boyfriend and I do the same and nothing. Nothing comes of it, nothing has ever come of it.

They're denied the right to marry in most countries around the world, even those whose laws are supposed to be separate from religion. (But that is a whole other thread)

The internet is a place where people can go to and express their opinions without the fear of repercussions. And unfortunately many choose to abuse this resource by spreading hatred and their ignorant ideals. And this is by no means separate from gaming. Whether you announce your sexuality or not is irrelevant to me. Even if no one knows on the internet you still know yourself the kind of feedback you'd get if you ever were to let anything slip, like the name of your partner.

My point is that homophobia is a horrible stain seen on politics, the internet, society. And the only way this can be fixed is by discussion, and acceptance.

This was my post. I didn't know I was on my boyfriend's account.. Oops

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

@Aries_Split: Good point, but there are other categories of people that fit into that circle. The support state fails a lot of people, but like a lot of 'protection' groups, they also carry their own agenda above the support of their members.

Ask a lot of Gay people how they feel about Peter Tatchell for instance. Similar to how most of us feel about Jack Thompson.

Look at "MIND", "Fathers for Justice", "SCOPE".

@Cahlee/David Allen : There's a big set of groups that could be called 'the most hated/feared members of society'. What it doesn't do to have is just one group who are aggressively pushing them, because that reinforces the xenophobia.

What I think should happen is that Gay/Bi have an actual adult epitome of all they stand for. Someone who young gay men can look up to who isn't just about Man on Man love. Hetero Males have Legends like Batman, Chuck Norris, Bruce Lee, Spidey. Lesbians have Jodie Foster, Ellen Degenres; but the best Gay Man 'Hero' is someone like Oscar Wilde, who also had some major flaws to his character.

Unfortunately, the WASP media will try to tear that down, as they do with any Legend these days; and the Gay Community will break themselves up over catfighting about whether they are any good or not.

Most Gay, or Straight/Transexual/Bi/Lesbian, people I've met want little more to live their lives in peace with the partners of their choice; but like everyone else, they're constantly reminded of 'WHAT THEY SHOULD BE' rather than just what they are.

That's what accounts for the pain in Aries poem BUT there are times and places for PDA, much as I dislike it. (and really dislike it when I catch myself doing it)

When your entire childhood is filled with "You are a BOY, Someday you NEED to be a MAN!", it's not too hard to see why both the scared homosexual and the violent heterosexual are formed. If there was an acceptance of male emotions from an early age, and more information given to them other than "Don't kick other males between the legs", then we could kill two birds with one stone.

Enhancing the divisions with tags like "GAYMER" though, just pushes us further apart. That's why male tears are "SO Gaaaaaaaay", because that's what all of us are taught, wrongly.

 

[Dommyboy]

This thread is perfect for rooting out the homophobes and twits that stalk the forums. People call others fags and gay all the time, while its childish and stupid its still one up from saying your mum jokes or your face jokes. Same with females with online gaming, they receive huge amounts of sexually perverted questions and insults. One way we could stop this is cut it off at the source, by destroying XBL and CS.

 

[Phoenix Arrow]

Ain't life a *****?

But seriously, what's the point of introducing this into the forum? Going for shock value? Human history is filled with atrocities. What's going on in Darfur is way worse than the occasional gay who's killed by a homophobe. Over 400,000 dead, and that's a conservative estimate. In 6 years.

You're not going to shock us with the horrible plight of the gay gamer. His daddy doesn't love him? Oh noes! Someone called him a fag? Alert the masses! We must right this injustice! Ban him from the internet before he hurts someone's feelings again!

Edit: Wait, how the fuck are you all these dead people? Are you a ghost? That's spooky man. A gay ghost.

*OoOoOoOoO, your shoes don't match your purse*
*OoOoOoOoO, that outfit is atrocious*

What does any of that have to do with anything? Apart from you acting like a dick to get attention. I can't get my head around how you apear to be saying "oh there's not as many gay killed as compared to people killed in war... it's not that big a problem". A remarkable piece of ignorance which I applaud you for. Must take effort to be that closed minded.

 

[Hawgh]

I just found this little tidbit while going through random quotes;

[quote start]

Camille Paglia
Homosexuality is not 'normal.' On the contrary, it is a challenge to the norm; therein rests its eternally revolutionary character. Note I do not call it a challenge to the idea of the norm. Queer theorists - that wizened crew of flimflamming free-loaders - have tried to take the poststructuralist tack of claiming that there is no norm, since everything is relative and contingent. This is the kind of silly bind that word-obsessed people get into when they are deaf, dumb, and blind to the outside world. Nature exists, whether academics like it or not. And in nature, procreation is the single, relentless rule. That is the norm. Our sexual bodies were designed for reproduction. Penis fits vagina: no fancy linguistic game - playing can change that basic fact. However, my libertarian view, here as in regard to abortion, is that we have not only the right, but the obligation to defy nature's tyranny. The highest human identity consists precisely in such assertions of freedom against material limitation.

[Quote end]

I rather like it.

 

[SunoffaBeach]

1) very simple solution: devs who make game include filter for words like g**, fa***t and Den**e Ric*a*ds

2) i like gay people who tell me theyr gay. i dont like gay people who DONT tell me theyr gay. imagine this: your a girl who has to take a shower with 10 male strangers. this how it feels when your a boy and dont know if teh other 10 are gay or hetero. it does matter. maybe this homophobic but tehn all girls are manophobic.
ok, you never have to take shower with people in online gaming. sorry for off-topic.

 

[SunoffaBeach]

Kyprioth657:
"What's going on in Darfur is way worse than the occasional gay who's killed by a homophobe. Over 400,000 dead, and that's a conservative estimate. In 6 years."

What's going on in outer space in way worse than the occasional 400'000 soldiers killed in Darfur. 400'000'000'000'000 planets completely destroyed. In 6 seconds.
So why you even care about war?

 

[Hybrid_Element]

No, homosexuailty is not a norm in our society, but that does not mean we should be punished for it. I would love to point out that homosexuailty is praticed by hundreds of animals other than humans but so does murder, rape, and cannablism so it falls mute when applied to humans (I.E: Naturalistic fallacy: What is 'natural' is not 'right')

Anywho, gaybashing is wrong, pure and simple.

 

[Mariena]

How you could be further from the truth :/

I don't know, what is the truth?

I'm starting to get sick of these answers, they don't answer anything. If I say something wrong in your opinion/fact/whatever explain it to me so I know what the hell it is you're getting on about. It started with Areis_Split saying he was distgusted by my post, but I have no clue what he's "disgusted" about so I don't know what's wrong with it. Don't leave me scratching my head wondering "What's he talking about?", tell me why I'm "further from the truth". It's a forum after all, debate a little.

Sometimes it doesn't hurt to do a little thinking

Very well, let me explain. First of all, you're not going to get the usual "omg a girl the things I would want to do with you" but more like "uh, yeah right. Prove it". At that point it's better to just ignore them. .. you can probably imagine how much more skeptical they become when you tell them you DO have a girlfriend. It's really annoying how some people continuously pester me throughout the game even though I already tried to ignore em in the first few 'stages'.

I mean, it's not like I explicitly told them "I AM A GIRL AND IN LOVE WITH THE SAME SEX!!" but I either I put it subtly and someone actually got it or it just slipped (as said before, partner's voice being picked up when you're gaming or a few too many details accidentally made public)..

Then we have the downright gay-bashers that simply hate you because of your sexual orientation. And of course, as you said, the occasional ('pix plz' and 'cam plz', 'msn plz') but I encounter those far less often than you'd imagine. Usually a firm "No, go away." will do the trick.

I've learned to either ignore such people or don't give them any information on the subject..

Edit: Erhm, minor typo.

 

[Aries_Split]

Ain't life a *****?

But seriously, what's the point of introducing this into the forum? Going for shock value? Human history is filled with atrocities. What's going on in Darfur is way worse than the occasional gay who's killed by a homophobe. Over 400,000 dead, and that's a conservative estimate. In 6 years.

You're not going to shock us with the horrible plight of the gay gamer. His daddy doesn't love him? Oh noes! Someone called him a fag? Alert the masses! We must right this injustice! Ban him from the internet before he hurts someone's feelings again!

Edit: Wait, how the fuck are you all these dead people? Are you a ghost? That's spooky man. A gay ghost.

*OoOoOoOoO, your shoes don't match your purse*
*OoOoOoOoO, that outfit is atrocious*

This post is so ignorant that I actually laughed at it. Because of course, all countries should strive to be as unruly as a third world country ravaged by war, right?

No, wrong. Think about this, all this shit happened in a FIRST WORLD fucking country. To even compare that to Darfur is idiocy. I'm not sure what YOUR point in posting this is, to show us how immature you really are? Because your doing a great job of it. Either way, it's clear you going with the time tested "LALALAL I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" approach, so I applaud you.

People like you fucking sicken me.

 

[I'mANinja]

Just remember, gay = happy

 

[Mariena]

And fag is a cigarette..

 

[Hybrid_Element]

...and queer is odd or unusual ^.^;

 

[friedmetroid]

Being a bisexual gamer, I've been on the recieving end of some of this, but I've never found it to be that big of an issue. I guess it could be because I usually play in mature communities, but in general I just treat it like any other insult closed minded bigots make.

Did you know the mute button in TF2 also blocks text?

A wonderful feature.

 

[Mariena]

I've given up on public gaming... well, the only public environment I play in is with my 'clan'. Otherwise, it's private servers or a public server where I'm admin myself

It's not just the reactions from people you get in public environments, it's the general attitude. I find a lot of 'pubbies' to be ridiculously immature, asshats, and whatnot (not to mention the way they spell: "how r u wats goin on", Argh!).. but I'm drifting off topic.