Gay Men and Tattoos: Rual and Meang

Contents:

• GAY (HOMOSEXUAL) AND GAY (HAPPY)
• A GAY THERAPIST DISCS GAY MEN AND TATTOOS: RUAL AND MEANG
• GAY ANGELS
• FEATURED QUIZZ & STORI

GAY (HOMOSEXUAL) AND GAY (HAPPY)

Tom Robson a Brish mician and sger, one of the first, if not the very first pop artist who did not disguise or hi his homosexualy om the general public.

Until then homosexual actors, micians, athlet or anyone the public eye had two choic life: to keep their homosexualy a secret, pecially om the media, or adopt the mannerisms and a of drs which were very mp but at the same time (ironilly) never admtg their sexual preferenc publicly. Tom Robson released a very succsful song entled (Sg if you're) Glad to be Gay, was the mid-70s, and I was still at a Catholic primary school when I remember que distctly hearg gay beg ed for the first time to unteract the BrEng rogatory terms such as: poofter, poof, queer, not normal, fairy and queen that were rife at the time.

A GAY THERAPIST DISCS GAY MEN AND TATTOOS: RUAL AND MEANG

Glad to be Gay. The song was origally wrten by Tom Robson for a London gay pri.

An out gay sger, he subsequently formed the. "Glad to Be Gay" is built around four vers cricizg Brish society's attus towards gay people.

GAY ANGELS

In the first verse, criciz the Brish police for raidg gay pubs for no reason at all, once homosexualy had been crimalized sce the 1967 Sexual Offenc Act.

In the send verse, pots to the hypocrisy of Gay News beg prosecuted for obsceny stead of porn magaz like magaz Playboy or the tabloid The Sun which publish photographs of topls girls on Page 3. It also criciz the way homosexual people are portrayed other parts of the prs, pecially nservative newspapers News of the World and Sunday Exprs.

FEATURED QUIZZ & STORI

On the third verse, pots out the extreme nsequenc of homophobia, such as vlence agast LGBT people. For me, a young child livg London at the time, the term gay (meang homosexual and not "happy") was ed much more equently by the media and the general public after the release of "Glad to be Gay". It also helped that Tom Robson looked straight and was not the least mp, he did not f the stereotypil ia of how homosexuals looked and behaved.

(This mol is not necsarily gay, but gay men n imbue their tattoos wh great meang. In my private practice as a psychotherapist who specializ workg wh gay men, was a surprise to me when several years to my practice I noticed a pattern that gay men like to talk about how the tattoos they have hold special, even profound meang for them. I gus straight people and lbians also have meangful tattoos, but sce my practice foc on gay men’s needs, I hear about tattoos that ntext.