"When I put on the sash, was both a sign of the promis of God and the acknowledgement of gay people beg loved and accepted."
Contents:
- GAY MEN AND THEIR MOTHERS: IS THERE A SPECIAL CLOSENS?
- DEAR PARENT OF A GAY CHILD
- HOW ONE MOTHER’S LOVE FOR HER GAY SON STARTED A REVOLUTN
- PARENTS OF GAY CHILDREN AND THE ISSU THEY FACE
- MOMMI DEART: MOTHERS AND GAY SONS ON FILM
- PARENTG A GAY CHILD
- FOR A MOM, LEARNG TO ACCEPT A GAY SON WAS 'NONNEGOTIABLE'
GAY MEN AND THEIR MOTHERS: IS THERE A SPECIAL CLOSENS?
My mother, and my (gay) self. * mother of gay son *
This was found to be te for many of the mothers and sons I terviewed for the study scribed the book: Comg Out, Comg Home: Helpg Fai Adjt to a Gay or Lbian Child (). Neverthels, this closens uld have a downsi, at least temporarily, as many mothers ially blame themselv and the close relatnships for their sons' homosexualy.
DEAR PARENT OF A GAY CHILD
The photos om Gay Sons and Mothers exemplify the posive impact mothers n have the liv of queer men. * mother of gay son *
So, perhaps is not pletely surprisg that once they learned their sons were gay, some of the mothers I terviewed felt that they had done somethg to damage them. Even though rearch sce the 1950's has bunked , this theory persists people's mds and rears s ugly head for mothers when they ially learn their sons are gay.
Fortunately, for many mothers of gay son—wh time and tn, they learn that the ia that they had somehow ma their son gay is ad wrong This was te of the mothers my study who also me to see the benefs havg a gay son as will be scribed later this post.
HOW ONE MOTHER’S LOVE FOR HER GAY SON STARTED A REVOLUTN
Parents of gay children may go through an adjtment perd when they fd out their child is gay, but there is support for parents of gay children. * mother of gay son *
My rearch, clil and personal experienc suggt that there is ed a al lk between male homosexualy and a close maternal relatnship but flows the oppose directn than what was prevly thought. I thk personally [beg gay] ma me a more emotnal person, more sensive, more touch wh both the male and female sis of myself, but allowg me to even acknowledge that other si ma me closer to my mother. Once mothers this study got over their feelgs of guilt and got ed to the ia that their sons were gay, they were able to regnize the benefs of havg a gay son.
However, we get to hot water when we allow stereotyp to get the way of unrstandg the uniquens of dividuals and their circumstanc—so is important to remember that not all mothers and gay sons are close.
Sadly, some mothers simply nnot adjt to their sons' homosexualy, due to their guilt, relig ncerns, or abily to "let go" and accept the ways they live their liv. On social media, the group featur imag of gay men and their mothers behd them, highlightg the importance the women have their sons' liv. "After beg blamed for makg their sons gay the 70's, moms now get the regnn they serve for raisg betiful sons, " Miller out more about the group here.
PARENTS OF GAY CHILDREN AND THE ISSU THEY FACE
Philomena's heartbreakg story of a mother's search for her gay son puts md of some of our favore mother-gay son films. * mother of gay son *
As I relayed When Your Child Is Gay: What You Need To Know (Sterlg, 2016), I found out that my son was gay om a note wh our son's name entwed wh another boy's, surround by a heart. Acrdg to my -thor, psychiatrist Jonathan Tobk, "Gay children feel credibly vulnerable when g out to their parents, and tak time to work up the urage to do this. You may have grown up thkg that gay people f to a certa five mold, and your child acted “straight” through the years, only to seemgly sudnly reveal their same-sex attractn.
Others entst only their parents wh their secret until the timg is right to tell may feel happy, relieved, sad, sred, angry, nfed, or all of the above when you fd out your child is gay.
It was a wonrful experience to meet all the other fay members and hear their stori and learn om a parent n be very sry, pecially today’s tumultuo a parent to a gay child n often add an extra layer of worry and fear.
MOMMI DEART: MOTHERS AND GAY SONS ON FILM
When Connie Casey learned her adolcent son was gay, she blamed herself and sent him to nversn therapy for several years. But when Samuel, now 22, went away to llege, Connie says, she realized that " was time to take a look at everythg that I'd ever been tght to believe." * mother of gay son *
Whether you are gay, straight, bi, pan, asexual, or everythg parents, ntu to be our job to love and protect and support our children. They asked if they uld kiss her; they asked if she would talk to their parents; they told her that they uldn’t image their own mothers and fathers supportg them so publicly, or supportg them at woman’s name was Jeanne Manford, and she was marchg alongsi her twenty-one-year-old gay son, Morty. The anizatn they dreamed up that day, which started as a sgle support group Manhattan, was ially lled Parents of Gays; later, was renamed Parents FLAG, for Parents and Friends of Lbians and Gays; nowadays, is known only as PFLAG.
The same year Avril was born, Morty’s psychiatrist summoned Jeanne and Jul to his office and rmed them that their beloved goln boy and sole survivg son was the bt of her knowledge, Jeanne Manford had never known anyone who was gay. Polil anizg was virtually impossible—one early gay-rights group that attempted to officially rporate New York was told that s mere existence would vlate state sodomy laws—and posive cultural reprentatn was all but nonexistent; there were no openly gay or lbian policians, punds, relig lears, actors, athlet, or micians the mastream. Newspapers ed the words “homosexual” and “pervert” terchangeably, and the handful of gay people who appeared on televisn to discs their “life style” almost always had their fac hidn shadows or otherwise obscured.
PARENTG A GAY CHILD
In 1974, when “The Pat Colls Show” aired a segment on parents of gay children, the host troduced by sayg, “Even if he mted murr, I gus you’d say, ‘Well, he’s still my child, no matter what. ”You uld f most of the solar system to the chasm between how the average Amerin of the era would have reacted that hypothetil suatn and how Jeanne Manford rpond upon learng that Morty was gay. Later, after he went to llege at Columbia and me to terms wh beg gay, the steady, unfsy love of his fay seemed tepid pared wh his own creasg radilism.
The first time he attend a gay-rights prott, he wore sunglass and turned away om the news meras, but he soon beme, his sister Suzanne (now Suzanne Manford Swan) told me, “unaaid and unstoppable. ” An eighteen-year-old regular at the Stonewall Inn, Morty was there when a fight broke out between patrons and the police the summer of 1969, an event that talyzed the gay-rights movement.
The followg year, after jog the brand-new Gay Activists Alliance, he began anizg polil monstratns, then dropped out of llege to do so full time. Not long after, he was arrted for refg to move when police tried to shoo him off a stoop on Christopher Street, the heart of the Greenwich Village gay scene. (One of them, om the Tim, featured him beg ejected om a benef for John Ldsay, the mayor of New York Cy, after shoutg, “Jtice for homosexuals!
FOR A MOM, LEARNG TO ACCEPT A GAY SON WAS 'NONNEGOTIABLE'
The next time Morty wound up jail, Jeanne was woken up by an early-morng phone ll—not om him but om the arrtg officer, who, apparently expectg to Morty’s life, ma a show of askg Jeanne if she knew that her son was “a homosexual. The possibily that he would be attacked for beg gay “was always the back of my md, ” she said—until the day when was sudnly at the foreont. In the sprg of 1972, the New York Daily News ran an edorial, headled “Any Old Jobs for Homos?, ” that referred to “fairi, nanc, swish, fags, lezz” and mend the Supreme Court for cidg that a public universy uld rcd a job offer to a man who applied for a marriage license wh his male partner.
) That edorial cid wh the annual Inner Circle dner, a parody show hosted by New York Cy journalists, which that year was slated to clu a mockg sk about a gay-rights bill. “You would meet Jeanne Manford and you would never a ln years gus what she had her, ” Eric Marc, the thor of the 1992 book “Makg Gay History” and now the host of a podst by the same name, told me. Then she went on to exprs a sentiment never before aired a mastream publitn: “I am proud of my son, Morty Manford, and the hard work he has been dog urgg homosexuals to accept their feelgs.