The Fotten Secret Language of Gay Men - Atlas Obscura

Contents:

• THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN
• CO WORDS FOR “GAY” IN CLASSIC FILMS
• JUDAS PRIT’S GAY PHEMISMS AND NILE’S METAPHOR FOR HOMOPHOBIC PERSECUTN DISCSED ON HELL BENT FOR METAL
• WHAT ARE SOME PHEMISMS FOR GAY?
• FROM CLOSET TALK TO PC TERMOLOGY : GAY SPEECH AND THE POLICS OF VISIBILY
• GAY DICTNARY SPANISH
• WHY I N’T E PHEMISMS FOR ANTI-GAY CHRISTIANS

THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN

In the late ‘60s, as gay liberatn groups were fightg for regnn and equaly, Polari h mastream Brish pop-culture the form of Julian and Sandy, two flamboyant, not-officially-but-pretty-obvly gay characters on a BBC rad show lled Round the Horne.

If you hear any of the followg words or phras ed to scribe a male character a movie ma before 1970, odds are good that they’re tryg to tell you about a homosexual, a real boardg-school afternooner, someone who eats his dner a rtrant, a fellow who walks down the shady si of the street. ’ njurg up an image of what is affectnately known as face-fuckg, talk of ‘mcl all ntorted’ and ‘tickg like a time bomb, the fe is nng short’, addn to startg the song wh a snake reference the le ‘adly om the viper peerg om s il’, there’s rpect and admiratn show to Halford om the hosts jt how far he phed his luck whout everyone ttong on to the fact that he might’ve been sgg about a different type of snake entirely, some 14 years before he publicly me out as gay.

CO WORDS FOR “GAY” IN CLASSIC FILMS

Whilst to Tom and Matt would have seemed so easy to pick up on all the queer ntent wh their songs, others were genuely surprised (and some a lot worse) when Halford told the world he was gay, and this uld’ve given some of those people some thgs to thk about when revisg some of the band’s lyrics.

The guys both talk on how the song speaks to them on experienc that they’ve both had, such as tryg to ‘pray the gay away’ when they were younger, people tryg to tell them that their very existence is blasphemo and dangero, and for Matt specifilly, gettg to a place of givg up relign and lookg for, and fdg, solace, guidance and acceptance elsewhere. It’s certaly time for a drk to cheer ourselv up, and the new treats offered up by the Hate Crew Gay Bar jebox this week e the form of Heroe by Atralian alt-metallers Thornhill, the but album om digeno solo black metal project Blackbraid, and the sixth LP om Swedish ath metal supergroup Bloodbath, Survival of the Sickt.

JUDAS PRIT’S GAY PHEMISMS AND NILE’S METAPHOR FOR HOMOPHOBIC PERSECUTN DISCSED ON HELL BENT FOR METAL

Milant tout tant que ludique, ce langage se vt également le défensr d’un certa style vie, cherchant à exprimer, manière la pl visible, poliquement rrecte et effice qui so, la richse s portements et s cultur du mon gay.

WHAT ARE SOME PHEMISMS FOR GAY?

2Funny and provotive as may seem, this msage posted on Kks & Queens, a gay Swedish webse, not only reveals a visibily and culture that the Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgenr muny was long pelled to hh, but also nfirms the existence of a lexin not que like standard English.

FROM CLOSET TALK TO PC TERMOLOGY : GAY SPEECH AND THE POLICS OF VISIBILY

From the darker ag when homosexualy was at s bt a s and/or a perversn until the prent environment of rabow flags and gay pris, gayspeak has been ed to transgrs social norms, articulate particular needs and emotns, as well as renstct, or re-terpret, realy. When to elaborate polilly rrect fns of the « queer » universe, pk talk displays an extraordary plexy of sexual orientatns and subcultur, a possible means to pensate for lguistic ficiency and to claim a gay space on the social spectm. Most male homosexuals therefore kept their sexual orientatns very much the closet unls amidst their k when they lled each other female nam—« Miss Kten », « Cha Mary », « Primrose Mary », and « Dip-Candle Mary »3—, a practice still faiar among ntemporary gay men.

Until World War Two, rearch on what was then labeled the « language of homosexualy » foced on genr versn, wh homosexualy beg regard as a pathology characterized as sexual viance or perversn: whereas heterosexual language equated wh the appropriate genr, homosexual language displayed equent aquaci between the physil genr and the lguistic genr of the speaker.

GAY DICTNARY SPANISH

In the reprsive and secury-ncerned Cold War environment4, to talk about themselv, most gays and lbians relied upon phemisms such as « iends of Dorothy(‘s) », (after The Wizard of Oz, 1939, a classic mil popular wh gay dienc), « whoopsi », « (s)he’s is a ltle... Dpe the achievements of gay rights, the stigma attached to a « love that dare not [always] speak s name », to quote Osr Wil, ocsnally lgers the way some gays e « them » to refer to their partners and « refully word speech to hi explic genr referenc »16. For many Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgenr—or LGBT17—people today, pk talk works as a hive force agast discrimatn, although they also adm that gay exprsns have actually shifted om the physil nfement of the 18th century molly ho to a lguistic nfement.

5Sce 1993 [, ] the Amerin Universy Washgton DC has been home to annual nferenc on Lavenr Language and Lguistics, wh Lavenr19 Language beg fed as the way « lbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgenred persons and queers e language everyday life »20. Leap mentned two other « betiful exampl »: whereas gay speech « pcher » intifi the sexually active dividual and « tcher » the receptive person, « If we say pcher or we say tcher, an ordary nversatn, I thk ’s unlikely that [straight people] would read anythg else to .

Whereas some lbians tend to speak at a lower pch than straight women—and their range of pch is lser than that of straight women29—the typil high pched disurse and adorned talks of some gay men, not necsarily of the effemate type, is another equent give-away.

WHY I N’T E PHEMISMS FOR ANTI-GAY CHRISTIANS

Food metaphors are not unmon, such as seafood (gay sailors) and related sailor queens (men whose primary tert is sailors), tuna (young gay sailors), jam (younger men), angel food (gay men the air force), rice queens (men attracted to Asians), ernment spected meat (a gay man the armed forc) to be found meat racks (gay male cisg areas). Apts of the Scene (the gay club circu) attend whe parti, where Amy-Johns (after Amazons), lipstick lbians35 (stylishly drsed a tradnally feme way), and chapstick lbians (who do not wear make-up and are very much to sports)36 meet wh leather dyk, tomboys, and lemons (lbians).