What it used to be like

Preventing Fatalities

I'm referring to the above previous blog. As I reread this blog I wanted to give some perspective for younger people of what it was really like for straight people before gays were openly accepted in the U.S. and Europe like they are now.

 

For example, I was at a party where people were drinking alcohol and  were pretty high in San Diego when I was in my 20s. There were over 30 or more people at this party and I only knew about 5 or 10 of them. Luckily, I had a girl on one of my arms that I either was dating or was about to date. A very high gay man came up to me and stuck his tongue in my ear. If I hadn't had a girl on my other arm in the 1970s I would have had to hit this other man to demonstrate my straightness. This would be something like how a woman slaps a strange man for being fresh when receiving unwanted attention. But, since this guy was a friend I didn't want to have to hurt him to demonstrate my straightness. But he put me in a terrible position as a straight man. Luckily, because I had a girlfriend on my other arm I wasn't forced to hit him to maintain my straight status publicly.  Instead I could simply say to him, "I'm not into that", and the problem was solved. I was very grateful not to be forced to hit my friend that obviously had a gay crush on me.

 

Since I'm now 62 I'm not sure what would be appropriate today. However, for a happening college age or after generally straight crowd this was the necessary stance to maintain one's reputation for straightness then in the early 1970s in San Diego.  These kinds of situations could very easily with people of all kinds of points of view lead to violence of all kinds then. So how these kinds of situations were handled the words "Very carefully" come to mind. However, now it is 40 years later and everything is different. Or is it?