The 28 October 2004 issue of the Far Eastern Economic Review carried a special report on gays in Asia covering a sufficiently wide range of issues, albeit somewhat superficially, across the region from Australia to North Korea.
Unsurprisingly, the economic argument, i.e. the Pink Dollar/Pound (now a much rehashed argument), was cited as a main reason for the thawing of official (government) “tolerance” for homosexuals. Organisers of the annual Nation Party in Singapore (now in its fourth year) estimated that the party and related events pulled in about 2,500 foreign visitors and nearly $6 million (presumably Singaporean dollars). A Hong Kong event manager who spent three days in Singapore for the party spent S$1,200 on hotels, S$4,000 on food and beverage and another S$2,800 shopping for clothes and CDs during his three-day visit to Singapore!
The news-magazine then cited one recent study by Marcus Noland, a researcher at the Institute for International Economics in Washington, who found that countries that were more accepting of homosexuality fared better economically (read a brief argument here). Apparently, tolerance pays - “People who are comfortable with differences seem to be more comfortable with innovation.” American academic Richard Florida argued in his book, The Rise of the Creative Class, that a city’s openness to gay communities is an indicator of receptivity to new ideas and, thus, creativity.
Effectively, they’re arguing that gay rights will (eventually) come (to Asia) thanks to economic determinism (if at all). Karl Marx would have been proud.
That may be.
But what I found interesting were the contradictions of gay society that came through the article. Several interviewees, including the founders and organisers of a regular gay “networking” event in Hong Kong, did not want to be named.
An Indonesian couple who were committed and comfortable enough to live together and raise an adopted child still felt “intimated” by “social forces” to not mention their sexuality explicitly in any conversation. While the internet, travel, and exposure to “Western” cultures have emboldened many individuals in once “conservative” and socially “oppresive” Asian societies to “come out”, many apparenlty still feel pressured to conform by marrying individuals of the opposite sex and having children.
At the official level, while Singapore’s Government was happy to welcome the economic benefits of the gay economy, they’d rather not hear about our political and social inclinations. On the other hand, I was surprised to find that the authoritarian Government of China had repealed the law against sodomy in 1997 and ended official classification of homosexuality as a psychiatric disorder in 2001.
And these in an article discussing the awakening of gay society in Asia with increasingly louder demands for greater tolerance, freedom and rights! I find it somewhat paradoxical, though perhaps not surprising, that individuals who haven’t yet sorted themselves out where their own sexuality and identity are concerned would somehow expect society to do so!
I find myself becoming increasingly impatient and annoyed with self-professed gay individuals who would beat around the bush about their sexuality but yet expect to “reap the fruits” of their carnal intercourses. I mean, if you’re gay, you’re gay. There’s no need to be clandestinely looking around you whenever the word “gay” is uttered in your presence for fear of being recognised and “associated”. Or denigrate fellow homosexuals when you most certainly wouldn’t want to be similarly treated by heterosexuals (there’s far too much discrimination against “sissies”, “chubs”, and the like). Paradoxically, why are gay men increasingly glorifying and aspiring to be “straight acting” when they’re not about to bother fucking straight? Why do so many gay individuals insist on reinforcing established norms and practices when even these - conforming to steoreotypes for instance - are becoming anachronisms?
Many gay men I come across seem to have huge chips on their shoulder that is partially related their sexuality. Given that the homosexual “revolution” is closely correlated with the social “movement” of liberalism and individualism, I find it ironic that they should be so shackled by social norms and dynamics. If you’re not comfortable in your own skin, I don’t see how you can sensibly bare it to others.
But that’s the inherent contradictions of a nascent and “developing” gay society: still finding our way around, going through the sequential phases of a long “pre-determined” cycle. First, the schizophrenic existentialist crisis, then the confident and brash teenager before finally mellowing into a (hopefully) restrained but scarred queen drinking tea in an English garden wandering the hallowed corridors of the neighbourhood sauna.
Maybe I’m getting old. Maybe I’m becoming cynical and jaded. But people really should get a grip on themselves… and stop these annoying, and in my view, irrational behaviour!
Posted on October 27th, 2004 by jl
Filed under: Life's Gay | 4 Comments »
