THEGAYUK

Category: Comment

  • OPINION | The Rise And Rise of the GBF

    Another year another Hack comes forward talking about the virtue of having a gay best friend and why they are essential. I’ve done the check list to make sure all the clichés are covered so you don’t have to do read it.

    • In touch with his feminine side
    • Identifying female attribute to male (Queen, flouncing ET all)
    • “soul mate”
    • List of things that we share in common
    • Allusion to gay best friend being better than a partner.

    Of course all the girls want a Stanford character in their life’s so they can play at being Carrie. The gay best friend figure is seen as someone there to provide unconditional support, impeccable fashion advice, hugs and sympathy that a straight friend are magically unable to offer. They are camp and hilarious always ready to provide some kind of double entendre. They will joke about sex but essentially they are sexless.

    This isn’t a TV show.

    My best friend is Nina, female and we’ve been friends for the past 15 years. We used to work together while going through uni. We’ve both gone into different careers. She is a solicitor I’m a therapist she has a term for me, it’s “best Friend”. The fact that I am gay is totally irrelevant.

    As she will no doubt attest to having lived with me, I am not in touch with my feminine side and my fashion advice is anything but impeccable. We have similar interests, movies, music books etc. but don’t all best friends? After all why would you be friends with someone that you have nothing in common?

    We have supported each other through so much over the years; to list it here would be the most depressing checklist ever. The respect and support is mutual. As is the judgement that comes from your best friend when you are in the wrong, is always conveyed in no uncertain terms. We laugh together and cry together, we have seen marriages and relationships of our mutual friends fall apart while we are still standing strong.

    If I marry my partner, she will be the best Woman. I’m still a groom and she is still a woman. We have joked that on the wedding day I will make her wear a wedding dress for the photos. Mainly just to mess with people’s minds. We also have the same warped sense of humour.

    We’ve fallen out of bars together, seen each other through bad relationships, embraced new fads that have come along and now quite happily exchange recipe tips over a brew. We’ve changed and evolved together and provide each other with a mutually supportive relationship. We both have partners that we are quite happy with and there is nothing lacking in our lives.

    So is it time to retire the “GBF” title?. Last year Tesco had a gay best friend doll on sale as a novelty gift that was swiftly withdrawn. Why? Maybe the times has changed, a friendship should be based on commonality and loyalty rather that sexuality. Every so often another one of these articles will appear praising the attributes of the gay best friend and talking about how essential they are to the authors lifestyle. But ask yourself this, are they describing a caricature from a bad movie or a real flesh and blood person. By using the term “Gay Best Friend” , they are prioritising the sexuality and losing the essence of the person and the relationship. Its not homophobic just a narrow-minded and outdated way of thinking.
    I am not her gay best friend, she is not my straight best friend. We’re best friends

     

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, it’s management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • OPINION: Rylan has every right to play down Tom Daley’s coming out

    OPINION: Rylan has every right to play down Tom Daley’s coming out

    This week, former X-Factor contestant Rylan Clark openly criticised the public reaction to Tom Daley’s coming out, saying: “It is still hard to come out… but what about people like Alan Carr, Gok Wan, Graham Norton and me – people who are on TV who have never hidden their sexuality? What do we get? We don’t get recognition.”

    Oh Rylan, I thought, you’ll do anything for a headline. After all, in the formulaic industry of reality TV, Rylan’s whole purpose on the X-Factor was to get headlines. He was the comic relief; the weirdo with no talent; the guy who entertained us with his delusions of grandeur… Rylan garnered tabloid headlines, promoted the show and kept people watching. That was his job.

    And yet, while Rylan was supposed to be flavour of the week, for some reason, he seems to have endured beyond his natural shelf life. In turn, our fascination with this fact has kept him in the public eye. So what is it that has kept Rylan Clark in the limelight? And does the fact that he is a camp, talentless caricature invalidate his right to speak about matters that don’t involve the X-Factor or Celebrity Big Brother?

    Ok, so let’s get the unpleasantness out of the way. Yes, Rylan is exhaustingly narcissistic, shamelessly desperate for attention, and has, as yet, failed to exhibit any discernible skills or talents which justify his level of fame. Indeed, he said himself: “I wanted to be famous. I didn’t care what for.” And you sort of have to respect his honesty. But as was insightfully observed in the Guardian, Rylan Clark isn’t just the questionable token comedy act. His campness might be loud and glitzy, but it hasn’t managed to conceal the fact that he has a quick wit and intelligence to go with it.

    This is exactly why, when I heard Rylan criticise the response to Tom Daley’s coming out, that I paused and found myself thinking, doesn’t he have a point? Of course, it’s great news that Tom Daley feels comfortably sharing his sexuality with the world. He’s a popular role model; kind, considerate and friendly, scandal-free (so far) and in touch with many people, especially younger ones. But the cynic in me also questions whether there would be nearly so much fuss if he looked less like Tom Daley, Olympic athlete and gay icon, and more like… well, Rylan Clark.

    But despite Rylan’s valid point, headlines are subtly loaded against him; even within the gay media. I saw one which read: Rylan wants same attention as Tom Daley for being gay. But what he actually said is that he didn’t get that kind of attention, so why should Tom Daley? It’s a subtle difference, but it’s an important one; the first suggests jealousy, the second nods to a desire for a different kind of equality. The fact that Rylan is ridiculed (even indirectly) for speaking his mind, should tell us that even within the gay community, we are not always happy for people like Rylan to perform outside their predetermined roles.

    The narrow-minded stereotypes we are fed by the mainstream media about how gay people are supposed to look and act is so pervasive that even the gay community itself cannot shake it. And the reason nobody dishes out congratulations to the Gok Wans, the Alan Carrs and the Rylan Clarks out there is because they fit perfectly with the flamboyant, bitchy gay trope. It’s precisely because they’re open with their sexuality that they will never receive the same kind of adulation for it as somebody less flamboyant, less ‘typically gay’, like Tom Daley. And that’s not right. It also hints that, after years of speculation about his sexuality, the world isn’t really that bothered by Daley’s coming out. Although they might be saying ‘well done’, I’m starting to think that what they really mean is ‘I told you so’.

    It is tempting to suggest that Rylan’s remarks about Tom Daley are nothing more than a jealous cry for attention, but that would be too easy. Perhaps, from the self-proclaimed fame monster, there is an element of truth to this, but it’s hardly enough of a reason to invalidate his opinion entirely, even if it is just with subversive, undermining headlines.

    But when Rylan says: “I’m just upset that in 2013 someone coming out is still such big news.” he’s right. I can’t count the number of times I’ve read: ‘brave Tom comes out’ and frankly it makes me wince. Perhaps it was brave for him to come out, but to define it by its bravery rather alone suggests that there is something shameful in it, and there isn’t.

    Nonetheless, congratulations Tom Daley, we’re very pleased for you. But give Rylan his dues too; if not for being gay (after all, who cares?) then for having the guts to say what he thinks without sugar-coating it. He might be a fame-hungry media whore, but at least he’s a fame-hungry media whore with a pair of balls and, I’m starting to suspect, a brain to go with them.

    @WillHillier

     Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, it’s management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • Happy New Year from THEGAYUK

    We just want to thank you all for being part of THEGAYUK this year – and look forward to growing further with you in 2014.

    It’s been an amazing journey – and we’re so excited to take TGUK in 2014!

    Lots of love

    Jake + Graham and the entire TGUK Team

  • COLUMN | Sunny With A Chance of Cloud

    I was looking out of my kitchen window the other day and watching the sky. It was a sunny day but with banks of clouding blowing past. I don’t become sentimental or wax lyrical very often but I was taken with how beautiful the clouds were with a range of shapes and colours and an ever-changing view. I’m all for the beauty of a clear blue sky but wouldn’t it be a bit boring to not have the clouds too?

    I progressed even further with my sentimentally and began to think about my friends and how they’re much the same: frequently cloudy. I don’t think that I know anyone whom I call flawless and perfect. If I did, then I probably wouldn’t stay in touch with them for long. I’d be severely tried by their lack of blemishes, whether emotional or physical. What on earth would we have to talk about if everything was fantastic and life hadn’t thrown a few punches, leaving subsequent bruises? The media created automatons that we watch and read about are so dull that we desperately wait to have some dirt on them unearthed so that we can gloat. I don’t just like people in spite of their quirks, anomalies and faults; I frequently like them because of them.

    Wouldn’t it be a boring world if we all had sculpted torsos and unblemished skin? The cult of hard bodied youth has its merits but, personally, I’m more intrigued by a bit of imperfection. My eyes will scan over a perfume advertisement model’s bronzed flesh with a barely recognised acknowledgment. Show me a perma-tanned youthful pop singer with airbrushed skin and I’ll show you a thousand others. However, show me a slightly battered and craggy older man and I’ll be much more likely to feel a tug of attraction and curiosity. In a Photoshopped world it’s good to reality check.

    Wouldn’t it be good if we could be less influenced by what we see and weren’t so likely to translate it into what we want to be? It’s a very hard state to achieve. Who doesn’t want to a bit thinner/more bulky/less or more hairy and older/younger/better looking etc. etc.?

    As New Year’s Eve approaches, if you must make resolutions (they’re a bit passé aren’t they, though, really?), then make them about being what you want to be and not what you think you the world wants you to be. Your flaws are so often what makes you fantastic and I for one, love you for them.

  • COLUMN | Very Superstitious

    People talk about spirituality and faith and I’m always left puzzled. Talk to me about organised religion and my eyes glaze over as I reach for my Richard Dawkins books. Lecture me on Eastern mysticism and I shudder and look away. If you want to tell me about astrology, cosmic ordering or the time your deceased neighbour communicated with you from the spirit world then I’m anything but fascinated.

    I escaped my religious upbringing as soon as I was able and I avoid anything with chanting or incense. I suspect that my chakras are more than out of alignment but are actually non-existent. A woman at a party once told me that a dead woman called Marjory was wanting to talk to me and I politely told her to go away and take Marjory with her.

    If I think about it, though, I do have a religion of sorts: superstition. I can’t pass a single magpie without saluting it. If I see a shiny penny on the floor then I have to pick it up and I touch wooden things with alarming regularity. This can prove very awkward. Saluting a magpie during a driving lesson will guarantee that a frantic instructor will shout at you in alarm and grab for the dual controls as you allow the car to veer across lanes of traffic. Ducking down whilst on a date to snatch a coin from the street whilst drunkenly shouting: “A lucky penny!” will almost certainly ensure that date number two will not be forthcoming. Grabbing a penny from a colleague’s desk will get you odd looks too. Reaching for tree trunks in the street to touch wood will perhaps risk arrest, if done too conspicuously.

    My superstition is as sound as anything and no less valid. It’s based on centuries of tradition. I know it’s not true and that it’s a mad way to run my life but what’s not to like about not opening an umbrella indoors or keeping new shoes off the table? It’s hardly a hardship.

    For me, it’s more a way of keeping anxiety at bay, like a very mild strain of O.C.D. I see a black cat and I feel instantly calmer. It has a flip side too, of course. Seeing one magpie can leave me lurching with angst. Its mild angst though and it passes. The major bonus for me is that my religion has no dietary restrictions, no observances and no tricky festivals to navigate. It also doesn’t disapprove of me being gay.

    Maybe I’ll start a festival though. If anyone wants to come round to mine dressed as a magpie whilst bearing wood then I’ll gladly let you pick up all the pennies you like from my carpet. Tempted?

  • COLUMN | A Message From The Bunker

    As an atheist, vegetarian, teetotal, chocolate hating, childless man with very little family and a job which requires me to work over Christmas often, I don’t really see a lot in it for me to enjoy. I ‘came out’ as a festive hater a few years back and have suffered all the usual labels of Grinch and Scrooge and the tedious Bah Humbug comments.

    Over the course of several years, I gradually sloughed off the habits expected of me. I just didn’t enjoy them and despite what everyone seems to say, none of it is compulsory. Stopping sending cards celebrating something I don’t celebrate, not attending the tense family meal, avoiding the dreary works’ do: all of these actions felt increasingly liberating. I also discovered that amongst my friends there were a huge number of secret Christmas haters.

    Maybe you love it (and good luck to you if you do) but for those who feel like I do, here are my top five tips for avoiding the Yuletide hassle.

    1) Avoid Social Media: Unless you want to see endless ‘selfies’ of sweaty people in too much make-up at works’ parties, photos of uncomfortable looking people at dinner tables, over-dressed trees and endless Instagrammed food pictures, then stay clear. You’ll also avoid the smug updates and the plethora of posts where people complain about how much they have to do.

    2) Avoid the shops: They’ll be packed with amateurs. People who don’t enter a shop from one month to the next descend on the high streets in December and they just don’t understand the etiquette and tend to get underfoot. Shop rage can soon ensue. Plus: all those delightful little things you want to buy are all wedged in a back stockroom to make way for nasty little novelty gifts.

    3) Invest in good headphones: You’ll need these if you have to make a foray into a shop to buy food or more importantly some kind of substance such as nicotine or alcohol to get you through. Unless you really do love Aled Jones and Shakin’ Stevens then your own music is essential to keep you sane whilst you stagger round the booze aisle.

    4) Utilise technology: Unless you want bombarding with tacky perfume ads, images of plastic families eating mountains of food and various mythical weird Utopian delights dreamt up by advertisers then you need to avoid live television. Skipping adverts is what the DVD recorder/box type thing and internet were made for

    5) If it gets too much hide: There’s still a few bunkers left from the last war. Maybe hiding in one of these might help you avoid the yuletide horrors. I have a perfectly lovely one where I’ve draped a few Liberty fabrics and have a delightful Chaise Longue. If you fancy joining me: I have enough dried food to get me through till January. I also have a collection of music that doesn’t include anything by Slade and a pile of books. Just don’t mention the C word to me.

    If you are religious and Christmas is your festival then I really hope you enjoy it. As for the rest of you: whatever it is you think you might be celebrating, I hope you enjoy it too.

  • COMMENT | Religion And Sexuality

    We have made some great leaps over the last few years in the name of Diversity. Accepting the belief systems of the individuals and communities, which make up the company within which we live in order to present and perform as a united public.

    We endeavour to behave by a generally accepted rule of what is right and wrong towards people in the name of humanity and to the virtue of the individual regardless of their cultural status. To this merit; Society, in the broadest terms, aims to aid in the progression of law and ethics in order to establish a fairer less segregated union by acknowledging what is “Different” to the considered “Norm”, and then accepting that it is these very diversities which are the mainstream of Society and not the minority. We are, none of us, the same as any other.

    With this slightly hippified version of life and all its wonderful nuances in mind, I set about exploring, in a somewhat naive way, what it actually means to ‘Accept’ within the parameters of the anticipated Ideal of a community. And the community I decided to explore? Well, I couldn’t have given myself a larger more diverse group if I had tried; I choose Religion, what with the festive season approaching and all and not just one but all of them; no stone unturned, and why? Because the religious community is one built on love, and togetherness and belonging and acceptance without rule, isn’t it? Well yes, of course, only with some slight deviations along the way

    It may be relevant to point out that I am not personally religious. I come from a religious family, I have studied the major texts of several religions and I have friends from across the religious community but when it comes to ticking that little box on the diversity monitoring form, I sit quite happily in the “no religion” category. I do however; have the upmost respect for the beliefs of the individual and their personal right to live freely by their own judgements.

    So anyway, here I am; curiosity to boot, with my slightly ‘Peace and Love’ attitude in tow and I start contacting people to ask them about Love, and if I stopped there then everything would be just fine. In fact, lets try that shall we…

    Hello,

    I would like to ask you about Love

    Bye then

    Answers below please…

    I imagine we would be hard pushed to find anyone that would not agree that the love of one individual to another, or of several individuals, is anything but a good thing. Unless of course you’re reading this after you’ve had another blazing row about who left the milk out all night, because when we look at this rationally, it couldn’t have been me because I don’t make the porridge and if it wasn’t me, and it wasn’t you, then we have far bigger things to worry about than some slightly luke warm milk.

    But Love is something which resonates without exception; we all know it in some shape or form, we all need it, in others; we’re all afraid of it in ways that make us shy away from our own hearts in order to protect ourselves from the joys and hurts we may not even know yet. Love is hard and Love is beautiful and Love is ours; whoever and whatever you may be. So that question of Love is a question that is universal, for apart from anything else, how could we, anyone, presume to take precedents enough over it to deny someone of it? What great audacity gives us that right?

    So when I went to the Priests and the Rabbi’s and the Vicars and the Imam’s and the congregations that make up their communities, with this question of Sexuality and Identity, I was only left disheartened by the lack of Love that appeared both in its acceptance and understanding, and I was furthermore saddened by the hostility and disregard of the individual and their right to live freely, because of it.

    And then I got angry. And I have pondered over how better to put this than: grr, but the ridiculousness of it, the hypocrisy, the stupidity that places such effect and importance on something so…so natural as to love; the pomposity of it, it just makes me grrr and then, following that, begin along the lines of some angry feminist rant.

    Without wanting to go on too much of a nit-picking ramble around different religious texts, I will make reference to just one, here, as it is rather at the cornerstone of our beliefs of the heterosexual union.
    The same Hebrew Word, as used in Genesis to describe the love between Adam and Eve is used to describe the love between Ruth and Naomi in The Book of Ruth. Furthermore this vow, made from one woman to another, is often used in marriage ceremonies to illustrate the nature of the covenant of the union. And well, isn’t that ironic? This idealised heterosexual union of love is blessed by, and based on, a homosexual union. Just saying…

    To say I struggled to engage people in this conversation, would be putting it lightly. It seems that everyone has an opinion but nobody wants to talk about it but I was lucky enough to speak and meet with some wonderful people who were able to share their stories with me and leave me, surprisingly actually, feeling much better about the whole damn thing in the end.

    It is a story of struggle. Of fighting through adversity. Of strength and, at the end of all of that; love (though one would really hope that came somewhere closer to the beginning).

    I spoke with people who had been completely vilified and run out of their communities, people who had been forced to try and “change” or hide themselves, people who had been completely abandoned, abused and neglected, people who were left scared and ashamed and alone and fearful of ever trying to integrate with a community again. And why? because they had fallen in love. And there is no way of explaining that because no belief, surely, results in the belief of the mistreatment of another person.

    But what I find most astonishing at the end of all of this is that Faith and the Love of Faith holds strong. When everything around you in the name of religion is against you, somehow it is your faith and your God that gives you the strength to continue.

    And I gotta say this didn’t make a lot of sense to me, how could you hold on to Faith when it is that very thing that has turned its back on you?

    But then someone said to me “its all struggle; Jesus struggled, Ruth struggled, Mary struggled…they all fought against someone for the right to be free in themselves; they all struggled, but they never had to fight God; he loved them always, whatever struggle life had given them, he loved them always and he loves me” and I think that is a message for anyone to keep in their hearts that it is your strength and your belief and your faith in something, whatever that may be, that keeps you going and that Love, whatever shape, whatever form it may come in, will never die.

    So having navigated my way through some verbal abuse and some outrageous ignorance and some damn right rudeness, I settled on something rather wonderful; a universal truth of love: you are never alone. For every one struggling there is someone who cares, for everywhere you are not welcome there is a place you always are, for every person that doesn’t understand there is someone that does and when you finally find that you can walk through a door into a room full of strangers and belong, and be loved, there is beauty in that struggle too, and that’s the message; that no matter what, you are loved.

     

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, its management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • OPINION | A Ban on Gay-to-Straight Conversion Therapy Can’t Come Soon Enough

    A new bill put forward by Swansea West MP Geraint Davies looks to ban gay-to-straight conversion therapy in the United Kingdom (UK).

    See the BBC Newsbeat article – My ‘horrendous’ gay conversion in the UK article.

    Gay-to-Straight Conversion Therapy Irresponsible & Damaging
    The practise is not only irresponsible, but potentially damaging to those who are subjected to gay-to-straight conversion therapy. Many people struggle with being gay and coming to terms with it can be an uphill struggle.

    Being gay is not a choice, it is not an illness, and therefore is not something you can change or cure. The sooner someone can come to terms with that the better it is for them, only when then align themselves with who they actually are will they find true happiness in life.

    By giving someone even the slightest hope that they can change what is innately them is not only wrong, but wholly irresponsible. There are many people who have tried to change their sexuality with no success, using all sorts of therapies and rituals. The failure of such gay-to-straight conversion therapies and rituals only cause further issues and anxieties for the person concerned.

    People Need Support in Coming to Terms With Who They Are
    Any counselling or therapy should concentrate on helping people come to terms with who they are and support them in understanding that being gay is natural for some people and can’t be changed. Unfortunately a lot of people do not get help with this and go through many internal struggles over many years, fighting a battle which they won’t win.

    If gay-to-straight conversion therapy worked would we not have heard more about all the successes? From my own experience of coming to terms with being gay I now know the fight I had against my innate sexuality was never going to be one that I was going to win, all it was a lot of struggle and heartache, I wished I just accepted it a lot earlier.

    With psychologists confirming that gay-to-straight conversion therapy is potentially dangerous and harmful, and that there are therapists out their attempting gay-to-straight conversion therapy a ban on this can’t come soon enough. Promoting acceptance of who you are is the only way forward for the health and wellbeing of those concerned.

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, it’s management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

     

  • COMMENT | Accepting Yourself As Gay – The Internal Boxing Match

    The thoughts start to enter your head that you are attracted to the same sex… the internal boxing match begins.

    Round one, wham! You are hit by a thought that that indicates to you that you are gay; you either ignore it, dismiss it (It’s just a phase!), or retaliate in some way by fighting back with a counter argument of some kind (As you angrily say to yourself “I’m not gay”). Round two, some more thoughts come into your head that indicates you are attracted to the same sex; again you ignore it, dismiss it, or fight back in your own way. This cycle sound familiar? Well, this is one boxing match you are not going to win! The winner will always be your innate sexuality.

    Being gay is not a choice…. you do have a choice whether you accept who you are though. The fact is if you are gay then it will always be with you until the day you die, cheery stuff I know. We have all heard stories of people trying to change their sexuality through rituals and processes either of their own accord or by the external influence of others, and we know how successful they have been proved to be! There is also many people out there who have lived the heterosexual lifestyle of getting married and having children only to come out of the closet in their 30’s,40’s, 50’s… Do you really think these people would put themselves and their families through all the heartache associated with coming out in that situation if they could find some other way?

    The decision you have to make (your choice) is at which point in your life are you going to accept yourself for who you are. Self-acceptance is not about telling anyone else, it is about accepting yourself for who you are. You can spend your life pretending to be someone else by having a heterosexual relationship for example, only to deal with it much later in life, just remember that the ‘internal boxing match’ continues, your thoughts around your innate sexuality versus your own thinking around who you believe you should be.

    As you land the punches against what is innately you, your experience of life is going to be affected in a negative way. Just remember we are feeling our thinking in the moment, so your experience of your sexuality will be determined by your thinking about it, positive or negative. When you are battling against your innate sexuality you are creating a negative experience for yourself through your thinking, and this negative thinking goes onto affect your feelings and emotions in a negative way. Anxiety, worry, frustration, guilt and possibly anger are some of the feelings, and emotions that accompany the negative thinking around your sexuality, right?

    As I mentioned earlier, being gay is not a choice, so there is nothing you can do about it, fighting back against who you are leads to a negative experience of life which you have control over. When you realise that your negative thinking around your innate sexuality is causing your negative feelings and emotions, it must be worth accepting yourself for who you are, perhaps it’s time to hang up your boxing gloves, call time out on the boxing match between what is innately you, and the way you believe you should be.
    Be Proud – Be Who You Are

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, its management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • COLUMN | The Church of the poisoned mind

    As a teenager I dallied with the idea of religion. That was until I realised that I was actually what religion often calls an inveterate sinner and decided to give it up.

    My dad was agnostic, tending more towards atheism and my mum had been raised a Roman Catholic. My brother and I were christened and all that business and my mum took us to church regularly as small children. I remember it as being a crushing bore. My mum would intermittently pass us dusty boiled sweets or Polo Mints from the recesses of her handbag, to placate us as we stood up and down repeatedly, listening to the strange and spooky incantations in the local Catholic Church. I hated it and would often try to smuggle a book in to pass the time and distract me from the anxiety it invoked.

    For a small child a Catholic church can be a sinister place. The masses of blankly staring statues, the smoky incense, dim light, candles and the mumbling, all combined to give me the jitters and to be honest still does. The huge crucifix with the depiction of a man with a collection of oozing wounds gave me nightmares. I shudder now on the rare occasions I have to enter a church. I still recall that strange mix of boredom, cold and terror instilled into me and I break out into a sweat. I can also understand that scene in “The Omen” where Damien goes off on one. I feel his pain. I also get funny urges to shout absurd made up swear words in very quiet places. No one wants to hear me shout “F**k-bumble” or “W**k-toffee” whilst they’re praying so I avoid that risk.

    Luckily my mum became tired of the ritual of church attendance and the joy of accompanying two bored children to church soon palled and she gave it up for many years. I got to age 12 and decided I’d rethink the whole church issue. My maternal Grandfather was an amusing spiv of a man who was all Brill Cream, bandy gait and cheeky charm. He entertained me and I liked his carefree manner and his love of fruit machines and Embassy Number Ones. I decided to try going to church a few times with him. Oddly, I enjoyed it. The service was a bore and the bobbing up and down was hard on the knees but I got to spend time with my funny Granddad who would be wearing his best suit and we always went in the bar at the Catholic Social Club after and let me have a Shandy. It seemed a fair pay off for having to go in the spooky place.

    I quickly become quite entranced by it all and found I quite liked the ritual and the pomp. There was gold, perfumes and shiny things and a man in a dress standing at the front; ideal fodder for a teenage gay boy’s imagination. I decided to have my first communion and get confirmed, all in one go.

    To become a good Catholic you have to go to classes. I went once a week to the presbytery and sat in the priest’s office for an hour of instruction after school. No, before you ask, he didn’t try a thing. He was in his eighties, a funny little walnut of a man who smelt of old age and fusty cassocks. I was given a little red book called the Catechism that felt like it was a manual to tell me how bad I was. That’s where it all went a bit wrong.

    I was 13 and there I was with a little book telling me how full of dirty nasty sin I was and the voice of the wizened little priest to back this up. The book had such delightful entries as the one telling you that homosexuality was a sin crying out to heaven for vengeance. That didn’t make me feel very warm inside. My teenage love for Nick Hayward from Haircut 100 was the beginning of the road to becoming as evil as Myra Hindley, according to the priest. It wasn’t just a sin to do the bum thing. It was also a sin to think about sex and to masturbate. I was 13. Masturbation is the prerogative of the teenage boy. I could no more stop myself thinking about sex as I could give up food or air. I made a few valiant attempts to give up “the sin of self abuse” but it made me crabby and deranged and never lasted. As Woody Allen once said, “Don’t knock masturbation. It’s sex with someone you love.”

    Apparently I also had to obey and respect my parents. That one was even harder. I sat through the classes getting more and more anxious and mixed up. It was an odd feeling to be told you’re fundamentally wrong and bad. I wouldn’t recommend it.

    I went for my first (and last) confession. It was a bit of a farce. Anonymity wasn’t achieved, as I was the only one in the church. It was also a wet autumn evening and the flickering candles did little to dispel my nerves as I sat behind the grotty little grill. The priest asked me what sins I’d committed and I made up a few minor things, omitting to mention the time I got caught shoplifting in W.H. Smiths and the bouts of long and steamy dirty thoughts about Peter Duncan off Blue Peter with my hand down my trousers.

    The confirmation service was the biggest bore ever, worse than any maths lesson at school. The church was packed with proud parents and was hot and uncomfortable. The Bishop led the lengthy service and did a sermon about how evil Boy George was. He’s badly dressed at times and he can be a bit irritating but I’m not sure about evil. He also added in a topical element by telling us what a sinner Mick Jagger was too. This raised a few puzzled looks from an audience of teenagers in the early 80s who weren’t quite sure who he was.

    My granddad seemed proud, which was a consolation. In retrospect, it’s not really worth months of sitting in a little room being told you’re evil, just to try and make someone proud. The head f**king isn’t a great thing and I feel very angry when I look back and think of myself as a vulnerable child being given such psychologically damaging misinformation. My granddad died not long after that and the appeal of the church going faded and I gave it up.

    My dad converted to Catholicism when he was dying and in an odd twist, at the time, I was dating a man who was a devout Catholic and had once entered a seminary and almost completed his training to be a priest: strange times indeed. My dad’s funeral was an excruciating experience and if you’re a non-Catholic you maybe won’t know that there’s no speed or economy to a Catholic Church service. The funeral lasted over two hours, including the reception into church and the cremation. It wasn’t good to prolong it and required medical sedation, thanks to my understanding G.P. and a sedative prescription that barely contained my grief.

    I don’t intend to ever enter a church again or sit through a service as long as I live unless it’s to marvel at the architecture or the church is now a pub. I won’t attend church weddings or christenings and if I need to go to a funeral then the little bit at the crematorium is fine. I don’t think that’s disrespectful at all, just respecting myself.

    Although my experience of the church isn’t good, other people’s can be fantastic and I don’t disrespect anyone who has a strong religious faith if that’s what gets them through the night. I also acknowledge that religion isn’t all about condemnation and disapproval and I applaud certain aspects of religious faith and works of the church. This is just my experience.

    Maybe my views will change as I get older and I’m self knowing enough to realise that maybe the threat of terminal illness or old age might send me running back in a search for comfort and meaning. I hope not. If there’s one thing the Catholic Church never gave me, it’s comfort or meaning.

  • OPINION: Why We Should Focus on Real Issues, Not Gossip and Bandwagons

    Something has been building up inside me recently and it came to a head this week. The moment that Tom Daley made the revelation that he is in a relationship with another man I could foresee that the press and gossips would go into overdrive.

    That’s exactly what has happened and it doesn’t half bug me.

    Tom Daley coming out has been splashed over the front pages of trash rag tabloids this week and was even breaking news on the BBC and Sky news channels. I don’t see why as it is not actually news. It’s simply gossip. Now of course I applaud Tom for having the courage to come out in his own time and on his own terms. Although sad that he had to reveal his relationship status at all, there’s no doubt that his words will help other young people who are thinking about coming out. But again I come back to the reason why it is headline news. With so much other stuff going on in the world that should be featured on the news, why was a 19 year old lad revealing he is in a relationship with another man the headline story?

    The sad fact is that gossip sells. It sells papers to those who are taken in by tabloid trash and it also keeps people watching television shows. Personally, I couldn’t care less about who Tom Daley is dating. I’m more concerned about the victims of the typhoon in the Philippines, the people injured in the Glasgow helicopter crash, the many homeless people facing cold, lonely nights in the lead up to Christmas, and important global issues such as climate change.

    In the wake of Tom Daley’s ‘news’ I was asked to take part in a BBC radio discussion about it. Whenever something gay is in the news the BBC roll me out to talk about it. I agreed because I thought it would be a great opportunity to tell thousands of people that it is not a newsworthy story and we should be more concerned about other things. Also taking part in the discussion was a Baptist minister who agreed that it is not newsworthy. However, his reason for that view is because he believes a relationship should be between one man and one woman. I began to switch off when he started talking about the Bible and why we should all follow its teachings. Normally I’d challenge such opinions but on this occasion decided to ignore the bigot and focus on my message. Luckily I managed to convey that Tom Daley’s relationship status should not be on the news, but I felt that perhaps it was falling on some deaf ears.

    As I put my face in the palms of my hands we were then fed the revelation that Tom is apparently dating someone who is twenty years older than himself. This is something else I could not care less about and it baffles me why anyone else would be interested. The shock, some genuine and some feigned, is absurd and I do not know what all the fuss is about. I’m in a relationship with someone who is twenty five years older than me. All I can say is don’t judge and don’t knock it until you have tried. This is such a non-story and I wish that people cared as much about genuine news as they do about this tittle tattle.

    Something else that has bugged me in recent weeks is the James Arthur bashing. Everyone seems to be jumping on that bandwagon, but it’s something I refuse to be a part of. While I don’t condone James calling someone a “f**king queer”, I do accept that we all make mistakes. I don’t believe that James Arthur is a homophobe. A gobby fool, maybe, but he’s no homophobe. I just think that he did not think about what he was saying; he engaged his mouth before his brain. What has followed since then has been nothing short of a witch hunt. Comments in the media and on sites such as Twitter and Facebook have been ridiculous. As far as I am concerned James Arthur has apologised and that should be accepted.

    It’s sad when people jump on bandwagons, sometimes without actually analysing all of the facts. It’s all too easy to do, but there are bigger things that we should be concerned about.

    Instead of being taken in by gossip and jumping on bandwagons because it’s the in thing to do, we should be highlighting real news and causes. The totally abhorrent situation in Russia is something we must continue to highlight and it needs to be shown in the media more. Instead of writing about Tom Daley they should be bringing attention to the human rights struggles going on in the world at the moment.

    An example is when Madonna took to the stage in a Scout’s uniform to protest against gay people being banned from being in the Scouts, the media twisted the story to make it about Madonna looking ridiculous instead of highlighting the reason why she dressed like that. It’s something that I find incredibly frustrating and it needs to change.

    How are we going to make real progress and bring about huge social changes if we continue to be taken in by gossip and bandwagons? It’s clear that the media need to change, but actually, we as a society need to as well.

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