Pop-Politics- you're gay or you're not.
Oct. 19th, 2007 10:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
astoryandasongAfter I posted the link to the PopPolitics article, adellyna commented to say that she disagreed strongly, and with pep. After second reading (and a third, and oh god, a fourth), I got a bit pissed off.
That people would find Pete Wentz exploitative doesn't surprise me. I don't, y'now, agree with that, because I think he hasn't crossed that line yet. I certainly don't feel exploited because I bought a clan hoodie or anything. More power to him, I say, go for what you want. And make people wear your strange bat tattoo on their clothes if you can!
What really fucking pissed me off hardcore was the casual way in which the writer dismissed the queerness of FOB as something commercial, a veneer, a show. Like- not gay = completely straight and obviously just out for cash. What about queerness? What about bisexuality? Where's the fucking spectrum, Mr Author Man?
Now, I am bisexual. I love boys, and I love girls. Sometimes more and sometimes less. It never fails to irritate me when bisexual characters (like, say Alice on the L Word) are implicated to be merely travelling on the spectrum. Like bisexuality is the gateway to being fully something else. I think it is perfectly possible to enjoy kissing the same sex, to enjoy close relationships with them that yeah, maybe go farther than your usual friendship, but stop short of sex. In other words, I think it's pretty possible to be 'gay from the waist up'. I think Pete Wentz is pretty fucking queer, personally.
As for the author wishing for some more of them fightin' words and actions from Wentz, I can't lie- I'd love to hear Pete say 'I'm all for gay marriage!' or something like that. But for me, I wish they'd been around when I was fifteen and thinking about girls. I wish that someone had had the gall to write a song like G.I.N.A.S.F.S and get the guy he refers to in his blog as his 'husband' to sing it. I mean sure, there was KD Lang or Melissa Etheridge or some shit but I was a West Coast Scottish Catholic Punk (yes, oh god, it deserves capital letters like whoa) and there was just no-one who had ever really thought to say something like that to me.
So yeah, the article just kind of stank of all sorts of privelege and shit that I am just not even going to touch, and pretty much ignored any bi/queer experience. Gay isn't a synonym for shitty, and queer/bisexual is not (should not be) a synonym for 'too scared to come out as gay'.
In other news, I got fitted for new bras.
adellyna commented to say that she disagreed strongly, and with pep. After second reading (and a third, and oh god, a fourth), I got a bit pissed off.That people would find Pete Wentz exploitative doesn't surprise me. I don't, y'now, agree with that, because I think he hasn't crossed that line yet. I certainly don't feel exploited because I bought a clan hoodie or anything. More power to him, I say, go for what you want. And make people wear your strange bat tattoo on their clothes if you can!
What really fucking pissed me off hardcore was the casual way in which the writer dismissed the queerness of FOB as something commercial, a veneer, a show. Like- not gay = completely straight and obviously just out for cash. What about queerness? What about bisexuality? Where's the fucking spectrum, Mr Author Man?
Now, I am bisexual. I love boys, and I love girls. Sometimes more and sometimes less. It never fails to irritate me when bisexual characters (like, say Alice on the L Word) are implicated to be merely travelling on the spectrum. Like bisexuality is the gateway to being fully something else. I think it is perfectly possible to enjoy kissing the same sex, to enjoy close relationships with them that yeah, maybe go farther than your usual friendship, but stop short of sex. In other words, I think it's pretty possible to be 'gay from the waist up'. I think Pete Wentz is pretty fucking queer, personally.
As for the author wishing for some more of them fightin' words and actions from Wentz, I can't lie- I'd love to hear Pete say 'I'm all for gay marriage!' or something like that. But for me, I wish they'd been around when I was fifteen and thinking about girls. I wish that someone had had the gall to write a song like G.I.N.A.S.F.S and get the guy he refers to in his blog as his 'husband' to sing it. I mean sure, there was KD Lang or Melissa Etheridge or some shit but I was a West Coast Scottish Catholic Punk (yes, oh god, it deserves capital letters like whoa) and there was just no-one who had ever really thought to say something like that to me.
So yeah, the article just kind of stank of all sorts of privelege and shit that I am just not even going to touch, and pretty much ignored any bi/queer experience. Gay isn't a synonym for shitty, and queer/bisexual is not (should not be) a synonym for 'too scared to come out as gay'.
In other news, I got fitted for new bras.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-19 10:23 pm (UTC)I do, however, agree that whoever this author is, they're choosing to see only the marketing angle of FOB's uh...leanings. And this is nothing new, musicians blurring the line and going against any set gender or sexual orientation stereotype. David fucking BOWIE, anyone? Ok ok, he may have actually been more than "gay from the waist up" but my point is this is nothing new and the author's acting like it's some new phenomenon of this younger generation, who are OBVIOUSLY more confident and comfortable with themselves than he is. Le sigh.
It's interesting you said you wished someone like FOB was around when you were 15. I remember nothing but fucking pop princesses and boy bands being all the rage at the time, and I hated it. Absolutely nauseating.
Finally, I don't want to be cheap and comment on the bra-fitting but...yours are memorable to say the least, and I must comment. Straight, bi or gay, nobody can deny that titties are a beautiful thing, as a former roommate of mine used to say. She was almost as well endowed as you. :) Sorry if that delved into weirdo territory.