Gay on the brain is right! I remember growing up in the 40s and 50's. There were kids in our school and high-school who had traits that were inappropriate to their gender. We took them as the people they were, usually that they were more artistic, or in other ways more interesting, or more intelligent than the run of the mill kid with few interests.
At one point, in our group of friends in a new community I'd moved into, one of the (four of) us boys accused me of being a "queer." This came up one evening when we were out in the woods near our homes. This boy had just identified a group of stars, saying it was the "Little Dipper;" I corrected him saying that actually it was the "seven sisters," the Pleiades; something I knew because I was an amateur astronomer.
I was different in intellect than he was used to, because I had no effeminate physical traits; very much the opposite. His was an accusation out of jealousy of my superior knowledge, and anger at being contradicted in front of the others. I did the only thing I understood at that age of about 12; I grabbed him and threw him to the ground, and whipped his ass until he took it back. But lots of boys who are homosexual in nature would not or could not have handled it that way. He was really easily subdued, which suggests to me now that he was a homophobe embodied.
But out in the open, I never once heard anyone "called out," or any offensive terms used to their face, really, even any mention among us kids.
Then, as a parent, in my son's school years, in the 80's I heard kids call out other kids as "faggots" etc. It had become commonplace. I've seen it right here on this forum in a mild form, such as "that's gay" or "you're gay." (I know it's just in good fun, of course... ) To me this is an unaccountable obsession with other people's business.
So, the "coming out" has in some ways exacerbated the conflict that before was subdued, in abeyance, more considerate, or more compassionately observed ... than it is now.
At one point, in our group of friends in a new community I'd moved into, one of the (four of) us boys accused me of being a "queer." This came up one evening when we were out in the woods near our homes. This boy had just identified a group of stars, saying it was the "Little Dipper;" I corrected him saying that actually it was the "seven sisters," the Pleiades; something I knew because I was an amateur astronomer.
I was different in intellect than he was used to, because I had no effeminate physical traits; very much the opposite. His was an accusation out of jealousy of my superior knowledge, and anger at being contradicted in front of the others. I did the only thing I understood at that age of about 12; I grabbed him and threw him to the ground, and whipped his ass until he took it back. But lots of boys who are homosexual in nature would not or could not have handled it that way. He was really easily subdued, which suggests to me now that he was a homophobe embodied.
But out in the open, I never once heard anyone "called out," or any offensive terms used to their face, really, even any mention among us kids.
Then, as a parent, in my son's school years, in the 80's I heard kids call out other kids as "faggots" etc. It had become commonplace. I've seen it right here on this forum in a mild form, such as "that's gay" or "you're gay." (I know it's just in good fun, of course... ) To me this is an unaccountable obsession with other people's business.
So, the "coming out" has in some ways exacerbated the conflict that before was subdued, in abeyance, more considerate, or more compassionately observed ... than it is now.
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