Gay Men’s Health and Inty: Social Change and the Life Course - PMC

Contents:

• TURNS OUT, BARBIELAND ISN'T AS GAY AS S QUEER FANS HAD HOPED
• A BRIEF HISTORY OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS
• GAY MEN’S HEALTH AND INTY: SOCIAL CHANGE AND THE LIFE COURSE
• 'PASSAG' DIRECTOR NOUNC 'DANGERO' NC-17 RATG ON A FILM PICTG A GAY LOVE STORY
• SECTN 2: KNOWG GAYS AND LBIANS, RELIG CONFLICTS, BELIEFS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALY
• THE SLOW EVOLUTN OF GAY CULTURE INDIA
• WHO ARE THE PEOPLE YOUR GAYBORHOOD? UNRSTANDG POPULATN CHANGE AND CULTURAL SHIFTS LGBTQ+ NEIGHBORHOODS

TURNS OUT, BARBIELAND ISN'T AS GAY AS S QUEER FANS HAD HOPED

Many also flagged the teased scene which Barbie, now the real world, exchang a longg look wh Ameri Ferrera’s Gloria character; though, the relatnship between the two turns out to be a tribute to motherhood and the tradnal, nuclear before the film’s release, Robbie all but squashed the mors that some or any of the Barbi and Kens would be gay, tellg the Brish LGBTQ magaze Attu: The dolls don’t “actually have sexual orientatns. Wh greater media attentn to gay and lbian civil rights the 1990s, trans and tersex voic began to ga space through works such as Kate Boernste’s “Genr Outlaw” (1994) and “My Genr Workbook” (1998), Ann Fsto-Sterlg’s “Myths of Genr” (1992) and Llie Feberg’s “Transgenr Warrrs” (1998), enhancg shifts women’s and genr studi to bee more clive of transgenr and nonbary inti. Keywords: gay men, health, homosexualy, life urse, inty, history, HIV/AIDS, PrEPIn an early fom on the emergence of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP; see Grant et al., 2010) for HIV preventn held at San Francis’s LGBT Center wnsed by the first thor, an argument epted the dience between a group of young men their twenti and a group of men their fifti.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

It th n gui scholars to rearch qutns, practic, and advocy strategi more clearly aligned wh the lived experience of gay men diverse cultural and historil ntexts, wh the aim to both unrstand and enhance gay men’s this article, we illtrate the utily of a life urse paradigm the study of gay men’s health and inty velopment and propose empiril work that embodi this paradigm.

GAY MEN’S HEALTH AND INTY: SOCIAL CHANGE AND THE LIFE COURSE

Health is th ncerned wh more than the absence of pathology body and md; is ncerned wh the state of dividual and social well-beg (World Health Organizatn, 1948) a larger ntext of stigma and strs for sexual mori (Meyer, 2003) Men’s Health and the Life Course: Key PrciplThe life urse paradigm do not simply gui to a foc on gay men at different pots their dividual velopment (e. A brief samplg of major historil events that have occurred over the past half-century ll our attentn to how the urse of gay men’s liv the US might radilly diverge across generatns—the Stonewall rts of 1969, the emergence of the AIDS epimic the 1980s, the disvery of highly active anti-retroviral therapy (HAART) to manage HIV 1996, the US Supreme Court’s cisn Lawrence v. Our goal was to velop hypoth about hort differenc that n be tted future rearch and th to stimulate more quiry that foregrounds the ncept of generatn-hort as a meangful social inty for gay men’s health and inty intifyg hort-fg events, we were terted both discrete happengs and the broar social ntext of how gay men have been “spoken about” (Fouult, 1982) cultural disurse at particular historil moments.

Fally, the equaly era (approximately 2003-prent) is characterized by the gradual but now wily held regnn of sexual mory inti and muni as legimate and worthy of equal treatment and protectn unr the law (Keleher & Smh, 2012) the historil eras, we intified four specific hort-fg events (CDEs)—events that marked likely turng pots the llective nscns of gay men, wh implitns for their experience of inty and health (see Table 1). The distct labels we have selected for each generatn reflect the domant disurse of male homosexualy durg cril perds of velopment: sickns, liberatn, AIDS, and 1Generatn-horts of gay men alive, 2017GeneratnApproximatebirth yearsAge at CDE1(Stonewall, 1969)Age at CDE2(AIDSdisvery, 1981)Age at CDE3(HAARTdisvery, 1995)Age at CDE4(Lawrence, 2003)Age 2017Context of velopment1Sickns1930s30s40s50s60s70s–80sHomosexualy strongly pathologized durg childhood and adolcence; early adulthood wh birth of gay and lbian movement; many closeted until later life and sufferg more psychologil distrs about sexualy2Liberatn1940s20s30s40s50s60s–70sExperienced puberty as gay and lbian movement was iatg but not wily visible; early adulthood wh creased visibily and formatn of strong muni urban centers; strongly impacted by AIDS wh loss of works and partners3AIDS-11950s–1960s10s (puberty)20s30s40s50s–60sExperienced puberty at height of visibily for gay and lbian movement; experienced early adulthood at height of AIDS, trma of substantial aths muny; midlife wh major health advanc and civil rights gas4AIDS-21970s–1980s010s10s20s30s–40sExperienced puberty at height of AIDS, ls personal loss than member of AIDS-1 but equatn of gay sex wh ath; benefted om Inter durg adolcence; early adulthood durg treatment advanc and greater equaly5Equaly1990s00<1010s20sExperienced puberty and emergg adulthood after treatment advanc for HIV tablished, civil rights victori, creasg equalyThe Sickns GeneratnFor most of the twentieth century, same-sex sire was classified as a sickns, reprentg a diagnosable mental illns the Diagnostic and Statistil Manual (DSM) of the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn (see Hammack et al., 2013).

Yet prr to the natnal visibily for the gay and lbian civil rights movement realized by the Stonewall rts of 1969 and the removal of homosexualy om the DSM 1973, the domant disurse about homosexualy was that homosexualy and of self nstuted a disease (Hammack et al., 2013; Herek, 2010) men who veloped durg this era likely viewed their sexual sir, practic, and inti through the prism of disease and abnormaly, eply ternalizg stigma (see Cohler, 2007; Hammack & Cohler, 2011; Loughery, 1998). We regnize that this label may be an unfortable one for men of this generatn, yet we employ precisely to pture the extent to which societal disurse and cultural attus so strongly equated homosexualy wh pathology at the time, likely leadg to formidable early psychologil men of the Sickns Generatn were born approximately the 1930s and experienced childhood, adolcence, and early adulthood wh the domant disurse of homosexualy as illns (see Table 1).

'PASSAG' DIRECTOR NOUNC 'DANGERO' NC-17 RATG ON A FILM PICTG A GAY LOVE STORY

Rearch that foc specifilly on the experienc of men of lor of this generatn is sential to unrstand the impact of “double stigma” they likely experienced at cril perds their of the Sickns Generatn alive today would have experienced several eras of gay and lbian history, livg long enough to wns the major social and polil gas of the most recent equaly era (2003-prent). Stonewall exposed gay and other same-sex attracted men throughout the US to the size and signifince of the larger sexual mory muny, although this exposure was likely more pronounced for men who rid or near major urban sizeable gay and lbian muni had already formed major US ci after World War II (D’E, 1983; Sadownick, 1996), they existed more clanste forms until the 1970s. Open exprsn of same-sex sire beme possible some muni, pecially big ci wh “gay ghettos” (Leve, 1979), along wh a social and polil culture wh a more unified gay muny that enuraged challenge of the stat quo (Armstrong, 2002) men who me of age the US durg this era (1969–1981) had opportuni, unparalleled before, to immerse themselv to gay and lbian muni urban settgs, likely creasg possibili for enhanced psychologil and social well-beg pared to prr generatns.

SECTN 2: KNOWG GAYS AND LBIANS, RELIG CONFLICTS, BELIEFS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALY

In one of the only studi of men of lor of this generatn, Woody (2014) found that Ain Amerin men reported feelgs of alienatn om the Ain Amerin muny, havg to nceal their same-sex sir, but also an aversn to labels of the largely whe LGB AIDS-1 GeneratnThe social and polil succs of the liberatn era were cshed by the emergence of the AIDS epimic 1981, which by the end of the 1980s had killed nearly 75, 000 gay men (Centers for Disease Control and Preventn, 2005). The AIDS era was characterized not jt by the vastatn of the disease self but also the acpanyg disurse of the antigay “relig right” and “moral majory” that went so far as to claim that AIDS was punishment for the “immoraly” of gay sex, creatg a major ntext of stigma for all same-sex attracted men and for people wh AIDS (Herek & Glunt, 1988) and leadg to gay men’s practic and bodi beg subjects of ntamatn durg this era. AIDS-related stigma beme pervasive, wh extraordary public anxiety about the disease, part bee of s associatn wh homosexualy (Herek & Glunt, 1988) the 1980s, the state of gay men’s health beme a “public health and psychologil emergency” (Batchelor, 1984), and gay men beme targets of prejudice and wispread cultural fear for their ntamatn (Batchelor, 1988; Herek & Glunt, 1988).

Though other generatns of men of lor might have shared this experience, this hort was the first for which the experienc were clearly AIDS-2 GeneratnWe distguish between gay men who were early adulthood at the hort-fg event of AIDS 1981 (members of the AIDS-1 Generatn) and men who were childhood or early adolcence at the time and th ls likely to have been sexually active and socially embedd wh the gay muny. Th there is evince of diversy among same-sex attracted men of lor their health and inty velopment, and tersectg inti create variable velopmental trajectori for all same-sex attracted men of Equaly GeneratnWh the emergence of highly effective treatments and preventn strategi for HIV/AIDS me a gradual shift the disurse about gay men om ntamated to worthy of equal treatment unr the law, and the AIDS epimic may have e to humanize gay men ways prevly unrealized.

THE SLOW EVOLUTN OF GAY CULTURE INDIA

In addn, wh the emergence of new highly effective HIV preventn optns such as PrEP, views about sex, sexual practic, and sexual health have likely e to more closely remble men who me of age the liberatn era, wh gay sex ls likely to be viewed as herently of the Equaly Generatn may also be more likely to hold multiple, ncurrent sexual inti or prefer not to intify wh a sexual inty label. Even the US, the majory of rearch on gay men has not taken to acunt the unique experienc of bisexual men and of men of lor or men livg far om urban centers, so the prent amework mt be open to men other natns and non-whe US gay men may not have experienced the same events wh the same timg and social ntext as the men the generatns proposed here. We hope that rearchers who study sexual and genr inty diversy other cultural settgs will adapt a life urse paradigm for e those sexualy rearchers, a life urse paradigm challeng the notn that gay men nstute a “speci” whose practic and norms n be charted wh lawful regulary by llg attentn to variabily (see Hammack et al., 2013; Sav-Williams, 2005).

This approach may be at odds wh the sexual subjectivi of younger horts of gay men, who not only did not experience the AIDS epimic but also do not view HIV as a lethal advot for gay men and their health, the life urse paradigm illtrat how health is not jt a matter of dividual functng and adaptatn; is closely lked to the polil and historil ntext of shared membership a generatn-hort.

WHO ARE THE PEOPLE YOUR GAYBORHOOD? UNRSTANDG POPULATN CHANGE AND CULTURAL SHIFTS LGBTQ+ NEIGHBORHOODS

“This article [Sectn 377] was very rarely ed India, but was a sword of Damocl hangg over our heads, and ntributed to the nonregnn of homosexuals India, ” explas Rajeev, a gay activist om the Naz Foundatn Tst, an anizatn that fought for the crimalizatn of homosexualy and was supported by many Bollywood wrers and actors as well as by Amartya Sen, Nobel Prize wner enomics, and by the famo Manvendra Sgh Gohil, the only royal prce to be openly gay. In this ve, although many gay neighborhoods were historilly anchored by a populatn of gay cis men (Chncey 2008; Podmore 2021), we nsir a “gay” neighborhood to be urban space wh some gree of tolerance clive of gay men, lbian women, trans+ dividuals, tersex dividuals, qutng dividuals, and var other sexual among like-md people, LGBTQ+ rints sought llective secury to addrs their feelgs of disenanchisement and safeguard agast opprsn manifted hostily and vlence (Lria and Knopp 1985).

Gay neighborhoods emerged over this perd as a safe haven for ee exprsn and a rpe for all manner of people ostracized or shunned by mastream society om prosecutn, judgement, and gay neighborhoods were seed the settlement and movement pattern of sexual mori begng the first half of the twentieth century, and the history of gay neighborhoods is well documented lerature (Chncey 2008; Ghaziani 2015a; Higgs 1999; Niedt 2021; Orne 2017). Origal and inic LGBTQ+ neighborhoods— large ci such as Berl (Schöneberg), Istanbul (Taksim Square), London (Ltle Compton Street), Los Angel (Wt Hollywood, which beme Ameri’s first gay cy), Mexi Cy (Zona Rosa), Miami (South Beach), New York (Greenwich Village and Chelsea), Paris (LeMarais), Sydney (Oxford Street), San Francis (the Castro), São Plo (Rua Frei Cane), Tokyo (Ni-chōme), Toronto (Church Street), and Washgton, DC (DuPont Circle)—tered maly to gay men (lbians often did not have a notable prence).