Faggots, punks, and prostut: the evolvg language of gay men

Contents:

• THREAD: FLAMBOYANT GAYS VS THE AVERAGE HOMOSEXUAL MALE.
• TAYE DIGGS: 'I HAVE A FLAMG GAY MAN INSI OF ME'
• FLAMG GAY
• JAMAI'S ANTI-GAY 'MURR MIC' CARRI VLENT MSAGE

THREAD: FLAMBOYANT GAYS VS THE AVERAGE HOMOSEXUAL MALE.

A type of homosexual that is easily tected by a person wh ltle to morate "gay-dar".

Someone who is so gay that even gay people say he is too gay for them. Stop beg flamg homosexualPerson A: Has he ever choked on you? Person A: goddamn you flamg homosexualGet the Flamg homosexual mug.

Joe Jackson’s 1982 h Real Men was the first time I had heard gays referred to as faggots. I was jt out of the closet and my first gay relatnship London. Jackson’s lyrics about how only our iends and other gays uld ll faggots was enuragg, g as did om a straight man sgg a song jt before AIDS h.

TAYE DIGGS: 'I HAVE A FLAMG GAY MAN INSI OF ME'

Faggot, often-nsired a slur, has been reclaimed many tim over by gay men, cludg a new play by Declan Greene, The Homosexuals, or “Faggots”, currently showg at the Malthoe Melbourne. The play looks at gay male relatnships and their polics, and is apt as middle-class gay men and lbians stggle wh acceptance all over aga the face of their ll for marriage equaly. And merry-old-England there was abe: one night when leavg gay club Heaven, a bunch of lads lled and our female iends “pooh jabbers”.

But words ed by others to fe gay people n say a great al more about them than . Let’s beg wh the most mon term, “gay”, which baby-boomer homosexuals appropriated for their liberatnist e the late 1960s and early 1970s. “In the past one asked if a woman was "gay, ” much as today one might ask if she “swgs, ”“ wrote Whe.

FLAMG GAY

"Homosexual” (or “homosexualist”) has siar 19th-century origs and was origally ed 1869 by a Hungarian doctor, Karoly Maria Benkert. In eighteenth-century London was first a term for prostute then for homosexual.

In 1920s New York, scribed an effemate homosexual who sought social/sexual relatns wh “normal men”, acrdg to Gee Chncey while a “flamg faggot” was an extremely obv, flamboyant gay man. This tenncy for the words for prostute to be later ed for homosexual dat om 18th-century England when they often shared mon social spac, argu gay historian Rictor Norton.

Bee of the sardonic nature of gayns, all of the above would have to be clud also the vobulary of gay men and queers.

JAMAI'S ANTI-GAY 'MURR MIC' CARRI VLENT MSAGE

Historilly-specific, nnot the style of gay men mid-1970 to mid-1980s (motache, short hair, fad, baggy Levis and pocket and/or neck handkerchief) as exemplified by the lead sger of the Bronski Beat at the time of their h sgle, Smalltown Boy. “Nance” and “nancy boy” as well as “Nelly” and “nelli” were terms ed by both gays and straights also nnotg effemacy or youthfulns.

The terms I’ve illtrated were ed by the majory to exclu prostut and homosexuals om “pole” society. While the terms were ed to mark their difference, this did not prevent mal om that same pole society om g the good servic of prostut and homosexuals when sued them.

That young, gay men are now startg to reclaim the words is signifint. Twenty-one years ago, AIDS, which was then the domant ncern for gay men and culture, ceased to be a ath sentence and stead beme a manageable disease.

Young men who have grown up sce then uld feel that other aspects of gay life n now be explored wh greater eedom. If this is so, would suggt a strengtheng of gay culture and muny bee people n only start explorg their past, warts and all, when they feel safe.