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    AC Benus
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Stories posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 

The Great Mirror of Same-Sex Love - Prose - 99. Everett Cooper “Don’t tell me, because I don’t want my mind changed"

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“Don’t tell me, because I don’t want my mind changed.”

 

Quote from a former farm boy on straights+ preferring to choose hate. The following testimony comes from a person born in 1957 and raised in an extremist, fundamentalist family.

 

When I was somewhere between thirteen and fifteen [circa 1970-72], we were at my grandma’s, and there was a report about Gay men in a park somewhere in California. The family got all up in arms, saying “Kill the perverts,” and that kind of stuff. […]

[M]y mother has said on more than one occasion she would rather one of her kids die than tell her they were Gay. […] There are people at work I’ve come out to, but with some of the people in my family, I wouldn’t be surprised if they would pick up a gun and shoot me. So I’m just playing it by ear. My dad would get real deadpan and order me out of the house; or, he could just beat me to a bloody pulp. […] He has in recent years.

 

I have some frustration and anger about the friction between my religious upbringing and coming to grips with my orientation – about being forced to be stuck in a lie; about the unfairness I’ve experienced in disentangling myself from my most recent marriage [to a woman]; about being thirty-five and just now coming out. And by god [sic], I’m so sick of other people dictating. […]

When my second wife and I started going through the process of divorce [circa 1991], we told close friends and our pastor and his wife that I was Gay. At no time did anybody say, “Wow, this is interesting. Tell me about it.” They just put up walls. I have a real deep sorrow that people don’t want to know. It’s not a matter of “Oh, I didn’t know that – that's neat to know.” It’s “Don’t tell me, because I don’t want my mind changed. I’m comfortable being antagonistic and prejudiced against you.” It makes me very sad that a lot of people think we’re all a bunch of perverts [read, H-words] running around. And not only do they think that, but they choose to think that – they choose not to know the other side of it. I would like somehow to become politically forceful in changing that perception. […]

Now that I’ve stopped worrying about what if and why not, I look at the beauty of the [two-and-a-half year] relationship I had with the guy in Colorado Springs. I think in some ways, same-sex partners are far more capable of being real in a relationship, because they understand more closely where each other is coming from. The physical love and spiritual communion I have had with other men have been far superior to what I have observed in heterosexuals.

—Everett Cooper,

oral interview, 1992

 

 

 

 

 


The italics bracketing the word choose are per the original.

_

as noted
  • Love 2
Stories posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 
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This one reminded me of when I was working a second, evening, job at a store in a mall, and the woman I was closing the store for the night with said something like, " Wow, those gays are so selfish.  They want to do everything their own way."  My response was something like, "Oh, you have talked to every gay guy in the world and asked each one why they chose to be something most people would reject, hate, and turn their back upon?"

If I had been thinking more quickly, I would have added, "And the sex with someone of the same gender is so much more satisfying to every guy that they would be gay if they tried it?"  But I have had years to think since that incident -- over twenty years -- and even with what I said in the first paragraph, she got a surprised look on her face and shut up, looking like her thoughts might have been -- "I never thought about it that way."

Thank you for discovering these, @AC Benus.

  • Love 2
On 7/21/2023 at 10:16 AM, ReaderPaul said:

This one reminded me of when I was working a second, evening, job at a store in a mall, and the woman I was closing the store for the night with said something like, " Wow, those gays are so selfish.  They want to do everything their own way."  My response was something like, "Oh, you have talked to every gay guy in the world and asked each one why they chose to be something most people would reject, hate, and turn their back upon?"

If I had been thinking more quickly, I would have added, "And the sex with someone of the same gender is so much more satisfying to every guy that they would be gay if they tried it?"  But I have had years to think since that incident -- over twenty years -- and even with what I said in the first paragraph, she got a surprised look on her face and shut up, looking like her thoughts might have been -- "I never thought about it that way."

Thank you for discovering these, @AC Benus.

I'm interested in knowing what, at the time she said it, you took her "Gays are so selfish" to mean? Is it that she was saying all the "good men" were taken by other "good men", leaving only turds for gals like her?

But in any event, she was wrong to assume you were straight. But then again, it gives us an insight into the homophobic prejudices they feel so comfortable in sharing amongst their "own kind."   

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1 hour ago, AC Benus said:

     I'm interested in knowing what, at the time she said it, you took her "Gays are so selfish" to mean?  Is it that she was saying all the "good men" were taken by other "good men", leaving only turds for gals like her?
     But in any event, she was wrong to assume you were straight.  But then again, it gives us an insight into the homophobic prejudices they feel so comfortable in sharing amongst their "own kind."   

Well, @AC Benus, when she said that, along with something like (not exact wording) "They just want their own pleasure" -- I was married to a woman and we had a son in high school.  (For that matter, I am still married to her; son is in mid-thirties now.)  So she had no reason to think I was NOT straight.  But I'd had sex with guys before I was married, and know how good that can be.  I am bisexual, and know sex with either sex is enjoyable and fun.  But she and I very rarely have sex now; she complains my penis is too large and too long.  It is a lot worse since she hit menopause and is not as "stretchy" down there.

When women complain about the physical aspects of sex, it is much easier for a guy to look at other guys as desirable if you are not getting anywhere near enough at home.  Especially if the guy already knows how good same sex activities can be.

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