As kids, growing up in the closet makes us more likely to concentrate our self-worth into whatever the outside world wants us to be—good at sports, good at school, whatever. As adults, the social norms in our own community pressure us to concentrate our self-worth even further—into our looks, our masculinity, our sexual performance.
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Then we wake up at 40, exhausted, and we wonder, Is that all there is? And then the depression comes. He has published four books on gay culture and has interviewed men dying of HIV, recovering from party drugs and struggling to plan their own weddings. He sat Halkitis and his husband down on the couch and announced he was gay. James grew up in Queens, a beloved member of a big, affectionate, liberal family.
He went to a public school with openly gay kids. Over the years, James had convinced himself that he would never come out. So I thought those were my two options: James remembers the exact moment he decided to go into the closet. He must have been 10 or 11, dragged on a vacation to Long Island by his parents.
I realize, the second he says it, that he is describing the same revelation I had at his age, the same grief. Mine was in Halkitis says his was in So what are we supposed to do about it? When we think of marriage laws or hate crime prohibitions, we tend to think of them as protections of our rights.
One of the most striking studies I found described the spike in anxiety and depression among gay men in and , the years when 14 states passed constitutional amendments defining marriage as being between a man and a woman. Gay men in those states showed a 37 percent increase in mood disorders, a 42 percent increase in alcoholism and a percent increase in generalized anxiety disorder. The laws were symbolic. They increased though less dramatically among gay people across the entire country. The campaign to make us suffer worked.
Now square that with the fact that our country recently elected a bright orange Demogorgon whose administration is publicly, eagerly attempting to reverse every single gain the gay community has made in the last 20 years. Any discussion of gay mental health has to start with what happens in schools. Only around 30 percent of school districts in the country have anti-bullying policies that specifically mention LGBTQ kids, and thousands of other districts have policies that prevent teachers from speaking about homosexuality in a positive way.
These restrictions make it so much harder for kids to cope with their minority stress. For the last four years, Nicholas Heck, a researcher at Marquette University, has been running support groups for gay kids in high schools. He walks them through their interactions with their classmates, their teachers and their parents, and tries to help them separate garden-variety teenage stress from the kind they get due to their sexuality. One of his kids, for example, was under pressure from his parents to major in art rather than finance.
His parents meant well—they were just trying to encourage him into a field where he would encounter fewer homophobes—but he was already anxious: If he gave up on finance, was that surrendering to stigma? If he went into art and still got bullied, could he tell his parents about it?
The trick, Heck says, is getting kids to ask these questions openly, because one of the hallmark symptoms of minority stress is avoidance. Kids hear derogatory comments in the hall so they decide to walk down another one, or they put in earbuds. They ask a teacher for help and get shrugged off, so they stop looking for safe adults altogether.
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But the kids in the study, Heck says, are already starting to reject the responsibility they used to take on when they got bullied. So for kids, the goal is to hunt out and prevent minority stress. But what can be done for those of us who have already internalized it? People who feel rejected are more likely to self-medicate, which makes them more likely to have risky sex, which makes them more likely to contract HIV, which makes them more likely to feel rejected, and so on. A cluster of health problems, none of which can be fixed on their own. Simply pointing out these patterns yielded huge results: There will always be more straight kids than gay kids, we will always be isolated among them, and we will always, on some level, grow up alone in our families and our schools and our towns.
Our distance from the mainstream may be the source of some of what ails us, but it is also the source of our wit, our resilience, our empathy, our superior talents for dressing and dancing and karaoke. We have to recognize that as we fight for better laws and better environments—and as we figure out how to be better to each other. I keep thinking of something Paul, the software developer, told me: But the fact is, we are different. Twitter Facebook Subscribe. March 02, Whether we recognize it or not, our bodies.
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Read reviews that mention gay men read this book newly single single gay gay single bereznai relationship sex community singlehood adult circuit culture finish points. Top Reviews Most recent Top Reviews. There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Kindle Edition Verified Purchase. This book was not my cup of tea, I did not even finish it.
I thought the book would speak to me on a practical level instead it goes on about history and its effect on LGBTQ people. The book should rather have been titled something else. Paperback Verified Purchase. To sum it up in one word: Written by and about exactly the type of gay man? I am half way through this book and don't think I will be able to finish it.
It seems like a shallow circuit queen's way of excusing her own failure in the relationship arena. Berenzai's book makes for the 11th thing I should know about being gay and single. Michael's Shopping. Almost finished with this book and its been pretty good reading. Makes you think especially if you are a single gay man. Especially if you are a more mature gay man who has been dating for a long while. Good book! Only into it a little, but so far it's pretty good I haven't really read anything that I didn't already know I forced myself to read this book twice..
My second reading was conducted to really go at it with a determination to be both objective and fair.
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I liked some of the realities and some of the socio-evolutionary findings. Yet, unfortunately, the second reading made me far more depressed than the first! Is being a gay single defined solely as a life of clubbing, doing drugs, being obsessed with the body perfect both yours and the body of the one you're interested in , having to work long hours to have money for a "plastic surgery fund", having sex at bath houses or with prostitutes oh sorry..
I tend to call things as they are or F-buddies call it what it is! The advice he gives could have been given succinctly with clear bullet points and other resources; thereby cutting the book's size in half--and thus saving some of us the vapid tedium of wading through what amounts to a cross between "Bitter Sex and the City" and "Confessions of a Circuit Club Queen". After the second reading of his book I was half-tempted to fix myself a Drain-o cocktail and end it all. While there are parts of the book that were pretty interesting and actually hopeful especially the sections and snippets where it's important to have friends who are in some ways truly family , the book as a whole was a total downer.
I had expected much more in the way of positive, real-world realities, and a little less of his cruising confessional.
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Yeah, I'm really disappointed with this work. It's your time to shine. We promise to keep your information safe and will never post or share anything on your Facebook page. We are dedicated to bringing sexy single gay men together! Find Your Match. Finding your perfect match has never been easier with the GayCupid Android app. Available for FREE download now.