Bill Weintraub

Re: Ennobling or Ennervating?

2-24-2003

"We must be the change we wish to see in the world."
--Mahatma Gandhi

"God grant me the courage not to give up what I think is right even though I think it is hopeless."
--Admiral Chester W. Nimitz

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
--Martin Luther King, Jr.

Don F

Re: Ennobling or Ennervating?

3-1-2003

I think we all share the sense of frustration and even anger in Luke's words here. He states the truth:

"As a result the struggle against lifting up the logical, genital-centered conformity between men is met by a seemingly self hating gay culture and a straight culture that remains willfully oblivious to the desires and needs of most men for more than a handshake friendship."

Yes, "more than a handshake friendship" is a desire many men need but are reluctant to face because the stigma of gay stereotypes is ANTI-masculine to most people's perceptions. Guys do not want to give up or subordinate their natural maleness in the desire for closeness, but would welcome the companship of equals.

The commonality of shared experience brings men into each other's company naturally. We see it in the comraderie of sports, military life, college dorm roommates, even curious teens who validate their own male sexuality seeing a trusted bud j/o thereby confirming maleness to each other.

Today's gay "culture" oftens violates that common identity by feminizing homosex in a ridiculous parody of M/F relations, potentially depriving men of their true nature and effectively blocking any consideration of the true M/M bond.

Men who want to celebrate their masculinity together are inhibited by the angst of stereotype, disease, and the grossness of analism. Thus, instinct is denied and the need for comraderie and closeness is co-opted to mean degradation of male essence through feminization.

I once asked a straight married buddy why he would call me and want to visit, knowing we would end up naked in the bedroom. His simple, yet telling response: "I need a companion....."

Powerful words from one guy to another I think, essentially revealing a natural male desire for more intimacy than a handshake.

Buddies everwhere need that honesty and liberation.

Don F