What Was It Like To Be Gay In Los Angeles In 1995?

[methodwriter85]

I came across this pretty interesting question on Reddit, by a guy who wants to write a period piece about Los Angeles gay men in the mid-1990's.

 

I wonder if Private Tim's still around? He'd probably have a lot to say about this. It was his "time", so to speak.

 

All I really have to say about being gay in the mid-1990's would be movies I watched from that time period, like I Think I Do, Kiss Me Guido, Johns, and Bedrooms and Hallways. (Although they're not actually set in Los Angeles.)

 

There was also this book I read called California Screaming. It focuses on mid/late 90's gay Los Angeles society, in a tale of a pretty boy who failed to make it big by 30, who manages to land himself a big media player. It's good trashy fun.

[W_L]

I came across this pretty interesting question on Reddit, by a guy who wants to write a period piece about Los Angeles gay men in the mid-1990's.

 

I wonder if Private Tim's still around? He'd probably have a lot to say about this. It was his "time", so to speak.

 

All I really have to say about being gay in the mid-1990's would be movies I watched from that time period, like I Think I Do, Kiss Me Guido, Johns, and Bedrooms and Hallways. (Although they're not actually set in Los Angeles.)

 

There was also this book I read called California Screaming. It focuses on mid/late 90's gay Los Angeles society, in a tale of a pretty boy who failed to make it big by 30, who manages to land himself a big media player. It's good trashy fun.

 

Aren't you forgetting the most memorable mainstream 1990's LGBT Movie:

 

Late 90's, but it was still an important movie for its time

 

Boy's don't cry

 

Edited October 3, 2016 by W_L

[MrM]

This might be an interesting resource:

http://confessionsofaboytoy.com/2015/06/19/los-angeles-gay-pride-vintage-photos/

 

The 1995 Pride pictures are the last set on the page.

 

I was somewhat out of it in the 90s. It should have been when I was 'picking up my heels' but I was bogged down trying to get work and fighting my homosexuality with every fiber of my being. Sad really.

 

But, from what I recall, at least in San Diego, with the exception of things being a bit more colorful and vibrant, Pride's being a bit smaller and intimate, and the joy of new drugs on the market to combat HIV...not much has changed, really.

 

Its really interesting the images of Prides through the years on this page look very much like the prides of today.

[Ashi]

I remember 1995, vaguely.  I am not from LA area but from Northern California.  I'll confirm some of the stuff I read on the Reddit thread you linked that I think especially epitomize the era.

 

Alex0135's recollection.  I am pretty sure he lives around Chino area (I know..., Chino means Chinese but it's mostly a Latino area).  It reminds me of a movie called Quinceañera, which is set in Chino, so check it out what it is like to be gay in a Southern California ghetto (and how gay people always seem to think they could improve the property value of a ghetto.  LOL). 

 

Yes, lots of tabloid talk shows.  Most famous ones were Jerry Springers, Ricki Lake, Jenny Jones (that's the show when one guest confessed to this guy he's gay and had a crush on him, and that guy killed him in backstage).  Once a while you'd find they'll have a theme like telling their spouses they are going for a divorce because the guy has an affair and it's not with a woman, but a guy, and the audience will be shocked and laugh like some sort of freak show.  Keep in mind this was pre-YouTube, so everyone wanted a five-minute fame would do it on national TV.  I was in high school (junior/senior year in 1995) and I just couldn't wait to watch such stupid shows after school, though it's not appropriate for a supposedly preppy student like me to watch it....

 

One very important fact to keep in mind when writing a fiction set in mid-90's.  The Internet wasn't super widespread yet, and there was no cell phone!  Yes, there was this thing called mobile phone, but only rich people driving a BMW had it.  And mobile phone at the time looked and weighed like a dumbbell and you probably could kill someone with it, too.  Think "Clueless" the movie... AS IF!  My ex-bf didn't have a mobile phone but he had a beeper....  LOL.  If you don't know what a beeper is, google it.  It's too difficult, if not hilarious, to explain it.

 

I don't think Gay.com existed.  If they did..., probably wasn't mainstream yet.  But then, I wasn't out of the closet to be cruising on such place.  I just knew I had BBS, not HTTP Internet at the time.  Internet was dial-up, not broadband at the time, so it was inefficient (and too expensive) to have HTTP.  BBS was all ASCII text.  And I would find where has computer show through BBS bulletin board.  It would take FOREVER for a jpeg image to load (actually most pictures were 8-bit GIF to save bandwidth and download time).  Video?  You probably have to download that overnight....  I mostly used BBS/FTP to download shareware games like Doom or Duke Nukem (you guys heard of those, right?).  LOL 

 

Before Reddit, there was this thing called newsgroup, which was later replaced by Deja News, then Google bought it then now disappeared.  But basically newsgroup is Reddit's predecessor, and where guys like Ashi hung out with other guys talking about games and stuff.  Then before IM, there was IRC and ICQ, those are all chat clients.

 

I was too closeted to use the Internet to hook up.  Don't laugh..., I still don't.  But I was beginning to hear the saying "the Internet is the gay Mecca."

 

Yes, Don't Ask, Don't Tell was a big thing, so was OJ Simpson Trial.  My recollection of DADT was..., it was very progressive for its time.  Bill Clinton told military people not to tell their superiors of their sexual orientation so they couldn't be fired, and those who insisted on asking would be reprimanded.  I'd never heard of such thing where the bully of gay people would be punished, and now we had a law to protect us from being forced out of the closet.  Glen Close starred in a movie about that policy shortly after.

 

Yes, Boys Don't Cry was a good movie, but that was set in rural America.  I think Latter Days is more appropriate.  It felt 90's, too, though I have no idea what time frame it was actually set.  But it wasn't too far-fetched from what late 90's was like.

 

MrM's website is very nice.  Just remember, '95 was sort of a cut-off line.  Late 80's, Early 90's is one era.  1997 onward it's very different.  1995 was an in-between era.

 

You heard Madonna, Backstreet Boys, N'Synch on TV like you hear 1D or Shawn Mendez nowadays.  It was the era of MTV, and VH-1 was deemed inferior.  People ordered cable just to watch MTV.  Teens played Tetris on GameBoy, Sonic the Hedgehog on Sega Genesis.  Kids watched Mr. Rogers and Barney the Purple Dinosaur on PBS.  Back when I was in high school, people discussed about Beverly Hill 90210 and Melrose Place.  Nike's Air Jordan was the coolest kicks you could put on your feet. 

 

Those guys on Reddit talked from a perspective of out-of-closet gays....  I just remember I was scared and suppressed any thread of gay feeling, at the same time I wanted to tell people (but I wanted to tell people what?   That what was a very confused feeling).   And like vVvOrganicBear's experience..., when I finally told my mom (albeit in late 2000's), my mom just told me not to tell anybody about it.  It's just such a shameful thing to say..., what if other people find out?

 

The Toga Pop Rally of 1995.  One of the nerdy guys, I don't even remember his name, except he was tall and full of acnes, showed up in toga.  Wow..., he never showed that much skin, so I was surprised how much muscle he had.  I was smitten, but of course like all people, I avoided making any remark that would implicate myself as a deviant sex.  All I remember was the guy who usually walked with him wasn't by his side.  But he was really handsome that day.

 

The Halloween Rally of 1995.  In my PoliSci/Econ class, another nerdy guy (incidentally also full of acnes) showed up in Frank N Furter costume, completed with black mesh stockings in need of mending.  He probably thought it was funny, and it was our Senior year so what could he possibly lose?  Guess what? he was openly ridiculed by a girl in our class.  Even with my super poor English at the time, I had to tell her she should be ashamed of herself.  For crying out loud, the guy was about to cry with all her bullying.  I dunno...  something must've come over me to defend a sissy, nerdy, dorky faery.  I probably was defending him because nerds gotta stick together..., not because I was gay..., right?  I didn't even have that kind of feeling....  The guy smiled at me, but he couldn't thank me....  Why guys have to be so lonely?

 

The Women's Lacrosse Playoff.  At the end of the game, the all-male cheerleader team dressed in short cheering squad skirts and wore fake boobs.  At the end of the performance, they popped their balloon boobs and flipped their skirts to moon everyone.  It was amazing.

 

The Prom of 1996.  My school was progressive for its time.  It announced over the PA system it's okay to bring your same-sex partner to the Prom.  I had a feeling the suicide of a student might have played a role in it.  I was not even out of the closet..., wasn't even connected with other gay people (we did have a Gay/Straight Alliance, but I was too afraid to join... as a straight supporter... ), but I just had a feeling, a very empathetic and sad feeling, nobody so bright and otherwise normal would commit suicide if it wasn't because of IT....  And worse, nobody openly talked about IT.  But it was suffocating.  I didn't even know him.

 

My cousin and I went to a theatre to watch Pulp Fiction.  It was one of those movies left you shocked and speechless.  There was so much to discuss but at the same time it would be like describing what you saw through a peeping hole.  It's just not done, at least, not by a socially awkward and morally uptight boy liked me.  Though I could remember there was a narrow alley next to the theatre.  Goths guys and gals were squatting on the floor smoking, looking up and staring at us in those begrudging eyes.  Maybe behind all that heavy make up, the guy in leather jacket, studded boots and raven colored hair was a sweet guy with tender feeling.

 

Another cousin decided to tell everyone at a family gathering an incident he found while he was working as a campus security.  A male student was apparently sodomized and left on the ground.  He said it as if it was funny.  I didn't know why I wasn't more angry, but ashamed, ashamed that guy could have been me.  Sad really..., but that's how much internal hatred I had, as if I deserved to be raped and then be the butt of the joke.  But that's what 90's general attitude toward gay people....

[MrM]

Thank God for Ashi's eidetic memory of his High School period during that time.

I'd forgotten half the S#!t that went on. Like I said, 1995 was all work for me.

 

I did have Compuserve as my ISP, however, as i recall. I would wait for 5 minutes for a picture to load over dial-up of some guys getting it on. I lived a dual existence in my mind. I 'sinned' by finding said guys on the World Wide Web (the long-winded 'friendly' name for the Internutz back then) and then go to Confession at my local Catholic Church to confess my pornography addiction. Like 5 pictures of guys doing things I'd love to have done is an 'addiction'? I ask you!

 

I think I spent most of my time gaming during that time. Yeah...Doom was a favorite as was Doom II. Heretic was good. I think Quake had come out by that time, but I never really got into that. I had the first first person shooter Star Wars game Dark Forces. Star Wars has always been my comfort place... (see what happens as you get past 40? Your mind wanders!)

 

But I digress, despite all my closting, I still managed to catch glimpses of real gay life. I know that one of the most affecting things I watched during that time was 'As The Band Played On'. I suggest this program or the book to anyone interested in LGBT History during the period between 1985 - 1995. It was a BIG part of the gay experience back then. One of the reasons why I found excuses to stay in the closet was my fear of gettng AIDS. The Elton John song "Last Song" brings me to sobs to this day and I consider it the theme song of that era. Here is a video of that song Sir Elton did live in 1994:

 

Even in 1995, a diagnosis of HIV carried a good chance of death if not caught soon enough. Before the breakthroughs in 1991-1993 in treating HIV, getting HIV WAS a definite terminal diagnosis. I am still haunted today by two men whom I befriended in college in the early 90s who had progressed to AIDS. They were rail thin. As thin as Nazi Concentration Camp victims. They were covered with Karposi Sarcoma, the rare skin cancer that was the telltale outward sign of uncontrolled AIDS. Both men would die shortly after I would graduate from College. As late as '93 advanced AIDS was always terminal. These men had no hope of survival. Their ghosts live with me to this day...

 

Anyways...that really was a big part of the Gay experience for me then that isn't as big a deal now. In my mind it SHOULD be, but with today's medical advances my Millenial Sweethearts don't have the same fear that I had when I was 'twinkalicious'.

 

I wish I had the clarity of memory that Ashi still has of the time. If you'd asked me about 1988, I might be able to give a better account. Those precious years in High School make the most lasting impressions upon a young mind. Later, in the twenties, at least for me...things start to blur a lot.

 

1988 was a time for Gay rebellion. Its the time when boys wore makeup and the 'goth/scene' movements really started to take off. A gay boy could hide behind the Goth mask which would always confuse the issue for homophobes. There were plenty of straight and many bi Goths to muddy the waters. In actuality, the 'straight' or 'bi' boys were almost always gay. But...it was a shame that they had to dress like 'deviants' just so they could express their natural feelings. I was semi-scene/mod/new romantic in my dress back then. I lost interest in self expression in the 90's. I just buried myself in my college and career work and 'disappeared' socially.

[Former Member]

I was working for an Apple-authorized Macintosh retailer (ie not owned by Apple) during that time period.

 

Between 1995 and 1997, Apple licensed the rights to build Macintosh clones, the most popular was Power Computing. That was pre-iMac (1998).

 

All news reports of the time concerning Apple apparently were required to use the phrase, "beleaguered Apple Computers." (Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997.)

 

Macintosh users were enjoying the network game series, Marathon by pre-MS Bungie (Marathon, 1994; Marathon 2: Durandal, 1995; Marathon Infinity, 1996). Computers were networked using either Appletalk (all Macs) or Ethernet (the pro PowerMac and PowerBook computers). This was very uncommon for games of the era.

 

 

Rosanne, the TV series, was one of the highest rated shows at the time. It was an early show to feature LGBTs as regular characters (in both senses). Fred Willard joined Martin Mull on the show in 1995. Rosanne would soon 'jump the shark.'

 

 

Greg Louganis' New York Times Best Seller (5 weeks at Number One) book, Breaking the Surface was published in 1996. The movie, It's My Party, was also released in 1996 – it seems to have been set in LA.