Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site linus.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!bellcore!decvax!linus!rjd
From: rjd@linus.UUCP (Robert DeBenedictis)
Newsgroups: net.motss
Subject: "Discriminating" against potential roommates
Message-ID: <295@linus.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 31-Mar-85 12:58:11 EST
Article-I.D.: linus.295
Posted: Sun Mar 31 12:58:11 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 3-Apr-85 01:15:27 EST
References: <22@bbnccv.UUCP> <350@cmu-cs-k.ARPA> <49@bbnccv.UUCP> <354@cmu-cs-k.ARPA>
Reply-To: rjd@linus.UUCP (Robert DeBenedictis)
Organization: The MITRE Coporation, Bedford, MA
Lines: 53
Summary: 


This discussion has gotten a little heated.  Kinda like the old days
when all we ever did was argue about religion and our right to be
human.  Anyway, the original ad, that sparked this conversation read
like this:

    HOUSEMATE - Male (gay), 22, seeks 2 housemates
    (male or female) for 3 bedroom ranch at the
    Billerica end of the Middlesex Turnpike; 4 miles
    from MITRE.  ALL utilities included (Bay State
    phone/ht/hw/elec).  NO couples, tobacco, or pets
    with fur.  Available early April, $325/month.
    Call Robert, x2260 or 369-1848 after 5 p.m.

As you can see, I wasn't excluding straights.  However, I would really
rather live with a gay person.  Discrimination you say?  Not really.
It's more like an all-girls school.  Right Now, in my life, I could
use a few examples of gay men.  I live out in the suburbs and my contact
with other gay people is somewhat limited.

There are certain things that I can count on from almost any gay person,
that I can't count on from some of my straights friends.  Sometimes, my
straight friends can inadvertently make me feel real shitty about being
gay.  I don't know that they mean it; but let me give you an example:
	I was over at a friend's room in his frat house the other day.
	He knows I'm gay.  I recently told one of his roommate's that
	I'm gay.  I think my friend's roommate is a real cutie, but I
	don't know if he'd ever consider romance with a gay man.  Any-
	way, the cutie answered the phone.  We were listening and his
	tone of voice was real formal.  At one point he said something
	like "I look forward to that very much."  To this my friend
	commented (though not directly to me) "Yeah, he sounds like he
	looks forward to that about as much as having a hot stick shoved
	up his ass."
Now, I never quite know how to deal with comments like that.  And something
tells me that if I had a gay roommate, I wouldn't have to worry about things
like that.  Would anyone deny me the right to live with others of my kind?

You know, being gay in a predominantly straight environment can be
lonely.  That experience I just described happened last night.  This
net is really the only place I can talk about it.  Oh, sure, I could
give my best gay friend in New York a call; but he's usually out or
sleeping on the weekends.  And I've got some gay friends in Beantown,
I could call one of them up and tell them.  But how much nicer it would
be to be able to come home and cry on a sympathetic roomies shoulder.

O.K., you got that?  You see, there are good reasons for being allowed
to choose whom you live with.  And just because I might only want to
live with a certain kind of roommate doesn't make me an asshole.  It
just means that right now I maybe don't have the fortitude or stamina
to justify my existence on a daily basis.

Robert DeBenedictis