Some oppression bullet points:
- Prom in mid 80's - couldn't ask anyone so I didn't go
- Corollary...too scared to ask out my high school crush - the closet of fear
- Just as I discovered my sexuality, we were told that having sex causes gay-related cancer (later it was called GRID then AIDS)
- Can't go to most Islamic nations (and some Christian nations) for fear of imprisonment
- My mother hated gay people and repeatedly told me I was dragging my life through the gutter
- Got fag-bashed a couple of times
- Having to endure annoying anti-gay rants from so-called holy men.
- In Oklahoma, straight porn was allowed but gay porn was illegal, so I had to buy muscle mags...this was pre-internet
- At my company, gay people are tolerated but not accepted...salary impacted
- Had to wait twelve years to get married and enjoy the tax breaks
- Still hear taunts in my head from early years "fucking fag" ringing in my ears
- Ongoing fear that society will do an about face and put us in camps
These things on their own don't seem like much, but these and hundreds of other subtle slights of society add up to a really crappy second class status. Things are way better in California now, but Oklahoma may not be so OK.
Couldn't agree more...
Here's just a few from me
. in a long-term relationship, we had to go through legal contortions with financial accounts--joint tenancy with right of survivorship and medical power of attorney for decision-making authority when 'family' and 'next-of-kin' was the basis of the direction of medical care if one of us partners could not direct medical care for the other and even be allowed access in a hospital by family who didn't approve of our relationship. I still have a will that disinherits by name every member of my family because of what some members of my family threatened to pull, should I die and specify my partner as my heir.
. the term 'sodomy'. Although the Supreme Court struck down the Texas sodomy law in Lawrence vs. Texas in 2003 and invalidated sodomy laws in 13 other states, this religious term continues to be used as a legal charge, when what is meant is forced anal penetration (anal rape).
What still pisses me off is that I can still be called any of a number of names (especially after I leave the room), when every woman who gives oral sex to a man is, in point of fact, a cocksucker and, in the eyes of some religions, a sodomite when she engages in consensual anal sex with a male partner. Most women I know admit and cheerfully to being cocksuckers.
. and the other names that people sling: butt pirate, faggot, cum slut, fairy, poofta, shirt lifter, chutney ferret (those fuckin' Brits...), tail gunner, nelly, etc. About the worst term I've ever heard gays use derogatorily for straight folks is 'breeders'.
Is it better now? Well, people still talk about 'gay marriage' rather than marriage equality or just plain marriage. There are still asshole Christian pastors who advocate the death penalty for homosexuals, say that it's too bad more people weren't killed in Orlando, and then there's Islam and even Hinduism and some Buddhists that feel that homosexuality is a perversion of their male/female spiritual models. At least two of the 'Great Western Religions' threaten hellfire and damnation for it. Ah yes, sins against nature (gimme a break!) are unforgivable sins against the holy spirit according to RC doctrine, and my relationship is disordered and contrary to reason and nature.
Kim Davis, Ted Cruz, Hambone Huckabee, Mike Pence, Pat McCrory, John Roberts, Samuel Alito, and Clarence Thomas are still around, and the newly-dead Antonin Scalia is still a reminder that there are poisonous toads out there filled with homophobic hate-venom. I'll betcha John Roberts' and Clarence Thomas' wives are cocksuckers...if their husbands have anything to do with it.
Here ends the Rant.