My Yearly Dose of Homophobia
As posted (mostly word for word) at the TCMB.
Missy and I had two gift certificates to View, so we went out for a nice Sunday evening dinner. Ate on the patio, enjoyed our meal, and decided that a post-dinner walk around Lake Calhoun was in order.
The weather was lovely (okay, maybe a tad hot), and surprisingly it wasn't terribly crowded. I'd thought for sure with the long weekend that people would be out and about, but I suppose the hot scoping action takes place during the afternoon and not so much at 7:00 in the evening.
We're coming around the south side of the lake, right where you cut over to Lake Harriet. I'm enjoying my surroundings, enjoying my girlfriend's company as we walk hand-in-hand, and generally thinking about how great life is. Think soft focus and clouds and birds tweeting and cheesy music. The whole 9 yards.
And then I hear "Y'ALL CUT THAT SHIT OUT!"
*record scratch*
I turned my head towards the road. A big black guy driving a light blue Chrysler Crossfire is looking right at us. He yelled again, "EH, Y'ALL CUT THAT SHIT OUT!"
Dude was so disturbed by the sight of two women holding hands that he slowed down his car (and traffic behind him) and screamed at us.
I flipped him off and yelled out a half-hearted "fuck you" and we kept on walking.
My girlfriend was pretty unaffected by it. But I was surprised to find that it bothered me quite a bit. I know, I know, I can't judge everyone by the actions of one person. In the grand scheme of things, my life is relatively unaffected by this particular incident. We weren't in any danger. We weren't compelled to modify our behavior. It didn't ruin my evening by any means. But it was a nasty reminder that for as progressive and welcoming as one might think the Twin Cities is, it's not always that way.
It's almost the same as how visiting pretty much any other metropolitan area and seeing much more diverse populations reminds me how white it is here. You get in your comfortable spot and you forget.
I somewhat regret that I didn't take more action. I don't know what I would have done, but I had visions of approaching his car and (getting his license plate number so I could blog it and) asking him why he felt a need to do that.
Maybe I'm more disturbed that someone is so filled with hate that they go beyond thinking the nasty thought and feel the need to share it. I often think that people ought to know by now to keep their mouths shut about certain things, but keeping that sort of racism/sexism/homophobia/etc hidden is worse.
Anyway. I've now had my fill of bigotry for a while. Thanks, random dude at Lake Calhoun, for being That Guy.
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It did briefly cross my mind (as someone also pointed out at MB) that maybe his objection was not to lesbians, but to interracial couples.
Either way... Pfffft.
Yes, either way boo...
Off topic, your RSS feed never updates for me. *pout*
That's because I broke it and haven't fixed it yet. But you haven't missed much.
I truly believe that sexual orientation is the one area in this country where it's thought to be OK to make fun of it or to voice your objection. I mean, think about it. Would a movie making fun of Blacks/Hispanics/Asians, etc. make it to number 1 like Blades of Glory? Yes, both men were straight in the movie but it was 90 minutes of gay jokes. I believe that Chuck and Larry also made it to #1. It's OK to laugh at gay people 'cause no one of power stands up and says it's not OK. And it will stay that way, sadly, for some time.
*ssholes are everywhere.