As "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" to an end, we sent Chris Heath to terview dozens of gay servicemen om the past and prent to fd out what life was really like as Ameri's ary stggled wh s last great inty crisis
Contents:
TELL: AN INTIMATE HISTORY OF GAY MEN THE MILARY
Stori by, for, and/or about Gay and Bi Young People. * mifty gay *
Gay Erotic Stori. As the only out young gay kid at my school, I took the advancement of my sexual experienc to my own hands and I did what we all do: I bought a fake ID and h the gay clubs.
* mifty gay *
While I knew wouldn’t be like a gay llege eroti I’d read on (gay non, really), I rather naively wasn’t expectg the fall out. I realize I fell to that old gay adage of placg my feelgs on a person who, for whatever reason, was never gog to vt them back me. Worst of all, though, the shame attached to the memori of those first tim marred how I would approach sex for years.It was listeng to Years & Years’ new song “Sanctify,” and seeg the band’s out gay sger Olly Alexanr talk about how the song was spired his sexual trysts wh straight men, that I realized that the feelgs are way more mon than people let on.
Sure, I know all about gay guys havg sex wh straight guys, but felt reassurg to see him scribe the “sat and sner role” he embodied durg those experienc, and to hear the uncertaty and melancholy weaved to the song.More than anythg though, was the repeated lyril mantra of “I won’t be ashamed.” Bee as queer people, we’re buried lifetime’s worth of shame so vivid and searg that oftentim ’s cripplg. At my school, the very place that I first observed queer cursy, I was sred to e out, fearg my own physil and emotnal wasn’t jt the school locker room where I heard homophobic remarks. Gay people are an abomatn and are gog to Hell if they don’t get right wh God.
” Years later he warned: “If you turn out gay, I’ll fuck you up. Image me, a young black gay Christian male, tryg to rencile my sexualy wh school, home, and church life. What happens to a black gay Christian who liv a hoehold that hat him; who really believed that he was gog to Hell.