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From: chabot@amber.DEC (Lisa S. Chabot)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles
Subject: Re: homosexual associations
Message-ID: <3467@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-Aug-84 12:52:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: decwrl.3467
Posted: Wed Aug 29 12:52:15 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 30-Aug-84 10:31:14 EDT
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Organization: DEC Engineering Network
Lines: 48

Trish >> 
>>       So to repeat my question, why to straight people always think of males
>>  when they speak of homosexuals?

Greg >
>    First of all, since by your own admission, you are not a straight person,
> what makes you an expert on what straight people think?

This is silly: because lots of them make so much noise about it.  They make 
noise by talking, by using words, and, according to what Trish sees, the noise
mostly equates "homosexual" with "male".

[I think "lesbian" is a much nicer sounding word; I don't know, it has a nice
long "z".  And it only refers to women--kind of neat!, where "homosexual" can
mean women or men.]{But then, I can't go around saying people should like being
called something just because I like to say the word, and that's not what I'm
trying to express when I say such.}

Growing up, I hear a lot more taunts about male homosexuals than female 
homosexuals: "lesbo" was only a spook word to teach us we were no longer
allowed to touch each other in junior high (no more running holding hands 
on the playground :-( ), but we'd hear a lot more of "homo", used not only
for no-touch, but also for any boy who was behind in other aspects of
development, or who didn't act down to all the tough-guy norms (and there are
many more possibilities for "defects" and therefore name-calling here)[hey!
and don't forget all those long-hair hippy males suspected by >30ers of 
not-macho behavior].  Perhaps since boys didn't have their own word, but 
girls could (and I would hear "homo" referred to girls too), when we get 
older and use the long words (and maybe not even as a taunt! :-) ) we've by now
gotten "homosexual" tied to some sort of applies-to-men-mostly feeling.

I found some lost memory, faded and listing no references, kicking around in 
the dust here in the cave that refers to Queen Victoria declaring that women 
don't do such awful (her coloring, not mine!) things, and therefore influencing
legistlation against homosexuals so that it explicitly referred to not-women
(==men :-)! ).

Anyway, I didn't think that all straights always mean "male" when they say
"homosexual".  But it is interesting that this is Trish's observation, and it
is worthy of thought that homosexual women find this aggravating.  We can
think about our hidden context next time we say "homosexual".

"Ssssmile when you sssay that, ssssssstranger."
L SssssssChabot

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