Let's Talk About...

I realize this post is really disjointed and unorganized, more so then usual for me, but this has been very hard for me to write.

I want to talk about rape.

I want to talk about why we think it's okay to joke about something that's so... I can't even find the right word. Oppressive? It just doesn't seem to cut it.

I want to talk about the perception that it's always this incredibly violent activity that leaves bruises and scarring, that means a week long hospital visit.

But how? How can I talk about this?

Of course, just open my mouth right? Or rather let my fingers do the talking for me in the context that this is a blog.

But I can't. I can't because I can't find the words to do so. Maybe because of my own perceptions and misconceptions of what rape is, I have a problem admitting that I was.

I can't tell you how troubling it was for me to just write that now, the knot that curled up in my stomach when I said it made me want to hurl.

I have been a sexually active man for 10 years now, but I probably shouldn't have been. I was young, and I was naive, and someone really took advantage of those things when I was 17. Someone that I never should have known in the first place.

It wasn't violent, there was no physical force involved. But in the situation I was in, I felt like if I hadn't gone down on him, that I was going to get left on the side of some random country road, without a way to get home.

He even told me that the reason he took me out there was because he wanted to be my first. This guy that I didn't know.

Why did I get in his car in the first place? Because I didn't want the first gay person I had ever met to think poorly of me, I didn't want him to think I was young and stupid. I wanted to be mature and worldly.

I'm so angry, to this day I am angry. Angry that I put myself in that situation, angry that i got in his car. Angry that I met some 36 year old man off the internet for coffee. Angry that I did this to myself. Angry that this asshole thought it was okay to relive his youth, by taking away part of mine.

When I got home I threw up for about an hour, I took a bath so hot that I could barely get in, and I cried for the rest of day, and I actually slept in my closet that night.

I'm angry that I convinced myself that what had happened was all my idea, and thought it was cool that I had had sex. I am angry that I started havng sex with a hell of a lot of inappropriate people after that.

I'm angry that I didn't talk about it, I'm angry that I couldn't find anyone to talk about it. I'm angry that there was no one there to actually listen to me. I am angry that there was no one to protect me ever. I'm angry that it turned me into a person who constantly sought out people to protect me.

I am angry that I still let it turn me into a mess whenever I think about it. I'm angry that I can't just forget that it happened.

I am filled with anger, and I live with this every day. I rarely ever talk about what had happened, because I don't like the look I get when people know.

I started this blog because I wanted to start my healing process. I've been living in a fog for too long, and it's time I find my way out of it. I want to be a successful person, and I believe that part of being successful I need to let a lot of stuff go about my past.

I am not a very nice person, a part of that is because I'm angry all the time. So I'm trying letting it go. It might not go all at once, but I need to let it out, so I can be me.

I am forgiving myself for what happened, because I know it wasn't my fault. I need to forgive myself so I can move one and grow up. I'm emotionally stunted and I need to get past that. I am forgiving the people that should have protected me from this, because it wasn't their fault either. And I am forgiving the man that did this, because there must be something very troubling in his own past, if he felt the need to put me in the situation that he did.

So no, rape, it's not funny. To the people it affects, it affects them for the rest of their life. It's not to be joked about, it's not to be laughed at.

I will never forget what happened to me, but I choose not to hold the anger in anymore

The Effectiveness of Facebook Awareness Campaigns

Wear purple, change your picture to a cartoon, change it to a poppy, to a ribbon of whatever colour. Change your status to your bra colour.

There's all these little things that started on social networking sites, all of them are meant to create awareness to whatever cause they're doing it to far. So the question is? Are they effective? Are they actually making an impact? Well that's really hard to say, and incredibly hard to measure. How does one actually measure the impact that any awareness campaign makes?

There's ways, surveys, talking to people on the topics they are raising awareness for. I mean we're talking about human behaviour here, so doing typical qualitative methods would get me the information I'm asking about, however, since I don't have the time, energy, or an ethics board backing up any such research, I'm not going to waste my time doing these things. I'm just going to tell you what I think, what I've observed. Since this is a blog after all and not an academic journal.

I'm of two minds on this.

First of all, I think that awareness is an incredibly important tool in any campaign. You can not motivate people to take action for your fight unless you make them aware that it's going on. If people are ignorant on the issues you need to educate them. Also, awareness campaigns are also there for a reminder, to keep them thinking about the ideas.

For instance, I think we can all agree that child abuse is bad. We all know this, we all agree with this. But how many of us actually think about this? How many of us actually support local charities that help children that were targets of abuse? How many of us do work to end child abuse?

I know I have a few friends out there that identify themselves as child advocates, I have a couple of friends that work or have worked in the field to protect children. But not all of us do that, not all of us are champions to end child abuse. Would it be more effective if we all were? Sure, but everyone has their own fights, their own baggage and their own causes.

Personally, I don't do much to end child abuse. I don't donate to charities that protect and help victims of it, or volunteer my time. I really don't have the means to do either, but even if I did, to be honest my resources would go else where. It's not that I don't care, I will happily and willing participate in an awareness campaign, wear a ribbon or a button that might make people think or ask questions. Or have a discussion with people about it. This is what I can do, and more then happily do.

So it's on that belief that I took part in the "Change Your Picture to a childhood cartoon meme." I found the campaign to be fun and silly way to remind us of our own childhood, but to actually start dialogue on the issue as well. I've enjoyed seeing the pictures of cartoons from my childhood, reminding me of shows I used to watch but have long forgotten. Commenting on the pictures that people post, for example I had a friend who posted a picture of Pepperann, and I told her that she was much too cool for 7th grade.

I have participated in several discussion about child abuse as well on friends walls and in private messages. I have seen friends post that instead of using the time to search for pictures of their favourite childhood cartoon, were going to instead use the time to search for organizations in their area that helped to end child abuse, and posted the links.

Would this have happened if someone didn't start this campaign?

On the other side, we must ask ourselves. Is social media an effective tool fo awareness campaigns, a friend of mine brought up an interesting point.

"... awareness should help inspire action, but I just don't believe that each person who changes their profile picture and/or changes their status - however briefly - are aggressively offering action. Honestly, facebook makes "caring" so easy, a simple copy/paste, that I worry the awareness is lost in medium. Actually processing the information and deciding it's worth pursuing change in this issue is entirely different from copy/pasting and hoping someone else will do it."

Kevin V. - A facebook friend

I believe he really has a point there, it's easy to make a change to one's status or picture. We cut and paste the information, and give it little thought. Personally, I do give each thing I do a lot of thought, but does everyone?

Has everyone participated in the same dialogue that I have, have they actually talked about the issues and thought about what abuse really does, how it effects people, and what they can actually do to make change. Does the caring go beyond the picture change/status update? Is there any sort of critical analysis of why we're posting what we do? Do we question why if we agree or if it would be effective?

An example of this is a recent campaign I saw, it claimed to be another breast cancer awareness thing. One of the one's that men weren't allowed in on. We're going to keep it secret and have some fun, and show the power of women. Well I have some major issues with these campaigns.

First of all, breast cancer, although effects women a lot more then men, can still effect men. Not including them in an awareness campaign is not only silly, but detrimental to their cause. We, as cisgendered men, may have a lot less of a chance to develop breast cancer; but we have sisters, mothers, aunts, and friends who have a lot higher chance then we do.

Now I understand that women also need a space to speak about their own bodies with other women. I get and respect the need for women only spaces. So when the bra campaign happened, I thought it was cute. It made the attention of the media. Although, I thought it was ineffective, because from what I witnessed no one really talked about the issue. The fun was in the secret.

Then there was the purse thing, and to be honest this one irritated me. Because it was another women's only thing for breast cancer but it was also hypersexualized. Now, I'm not sex negative by any means, but again, there was no real discussion about breast cancer. But it was harmless, so I said one thing about my irritation about it, but left it at that.

Then there was the marital status one. I am so thankful that this one didn't make it far and I actually only saw one friend post it. If you are unaware of what I'm speaking of, here's a copy of the e-mail that was sent around.

My friends are playing this game. One of them has proposed that us, GIRLS, did something special in Facebook to help gain consiousness of Breast Cancer. Its so easy that I'd like you to join us to make it spread! Last year it was about writing the colour of the bra you were wearing in your FB status... and it left men wondering for days why did the girls have colours (aparently random) in our status. This year it has to do with our love relationships, in other words, for the moment you are going through with your relationships. What do you drink?

tequila: I'm a single woman
rum: I'm a touch and go woman
champagne: I'm an engaged woman
redbull: I'm a woman in a relationship
beer: I'm a married woman
vodka: I'm the "other one"
sprite: I'm a woman that can't find the right man
whisky: I'm a single woman but with friends that won't stop partying
liquor: I'm a woman that wishes she was single.
gin: I'm a woman that wants to get married

Now all you need to do is write down the answer for your situation in your FB status (don't reply this email, just put it in your status). Also, cut and paste this message and send it to all your girl-friends as a message. The Bra game reached the news. Lets make this one make it too and see how powerful women are

There are so many things wrong with this, it's sexist and homophobic, and glorifies alcohol use in a society where substance abuse is a problem. So here we are raising awareness for breast cancer, once again men aren't included, because raising their awareness isn't important.

To raise awareness in a manner such as this, it's absurd. This doesn't show how powerful women are, in fact, I think it shows the exact opposite. By using such a method to raise awareness you are stepping on not only the toes of women, for I feel this is very objectifying to women, but you're alienating queer women (I'm a woman who can't find the right man), as well as alienating women who are recovering from alcoholism or are very affected by it in other ways in their life.

I'm really glad that this one didn't catch on like the bra one did, at least not in the circles I socialize with. Because it gives me faith that people are actually thinking about what they're posting, and not just posting without a thought. Which I suppose was my concern in the first place, but my social circles aren't everyones. I know people that saw a lot of this, I know people who had never heard of it.

Actually, the woman that I saw post this is someone that I really respect and an incredibly intelligent, politically active woman, and when we talked about it she admitted that she really didn't give it much thought, and just posted it because it was easy. I won't name her because well, that's not nice, because I just went and criticized this whole thing and in turn, I don't want that to reflect badly on her. And she's really made of awesome, and kind of proves my point about the not thinkng thing.

So I think both sides are equally valid, in this discussion.

So in conclusion, I personally think that facebook awareness campaigns, although not as effective as campaigns in other places, are still valid. They can start discussions, get people thinking, and show the world that they care. However, I feel that we, as a community, concerned citizens, or whatever, need to be careful and actually think about what we're doing, and not just doing it blindly because everyone else is.

Arms of an Angel

So if you've read my previous posts, you'll know that I was out in high school. I sort of eluded to some of the horrible experience I've had in high school, but I think it's important to remember and talk about the positive stuff as well.


So grade 11, I was 17 years old, I was out, I was fabulous, and I actually had a pretty good group of friends. All the girls loved me, the guys were mostly indifferent to me, which was fine, because I was also pretty indifferent to them as well. Well my high school had this leadership program from grade 11 students, that kids from all over the city would come to take.

Well in our grade 11 year, there were a few of my friends taking this course and we ended up adding a couple of extra people to our group that year. And one was J.


J was absolutely and utterly beautiful. He was like 6'3", somewhere around 190lbs, considering how much muscle he had on him, big hands and feet (and we all like to pretend what that insinuates), blonde shaggy hair and the most beautiful hazel eyes.

Needless to say, I was head over heels from the moment I met him, as was every girl in my group.


So at this point, I was out, it was no secret that i was gay, and was one of the reasons a lot of the guys in my group didn't pay much attention to me, and to be honest I was really alright with that, none of them were all that attractive. But with J, well he did pay attention to me. He said, hi, he talked to me, he actually acknowledged me. Which just deepened my crush on him. But he was straight, and it would never happen. I accepted that fact, but a boy's allowed to fantasize.

A few months into him hanging with us, he came with our group to the last school dance of the year. Now I used to love school dances, and i went to every one. I loved to get my groove on, and totally hammed it up with my girls. Usually making a production of our dances.

So at the dances, all the guys usually didn't show up, so more often then not, it was me and the girls on the dance floor, and the boys stood off to the side until the slow songs. Well the first slow song of the night hit, and J came up to me, and asked me to dance. I gave him a weird look like he had three heads, and told him no. I thought he was just taking the piss out of me. Like it was some big joke that he was going to embarass me if I danced with him, or if I said yes, he'd yell out something like, "Well I'm not a fag so DEAL!"


He kept trying to ask me to, but I kept telling him no, it's not going to happen. And made myself busy with one of my girls. He finally gave up halfway through the dance, which made me breathe a sigh of relief.

Last dance of the night, I'm dancing with my best friend H, it was Boys 2 Men's "On Bended Knee. When J comes up to me and taps me on the shoulder and asks if he could cut in. I said sure, it was the last dance of the night, and I kind of wanted to run out for a smoke, and wait for everyone out there. So I back up so he could dance with H, but to my surprise, he grabs me around the waist with such force that the only way I could keep my balance was to wrap my
arms around him. He held me tight making sure that I didn't fall.

I looked him in the eyes, and all I could get out was, "Why?"


"All night, you've been dancing with girls, you've never got to dance with anyone you like. I know you have a crush on me, and I'm flattered, but I'm not gay. But I don't mind giving you a dance."

The tears started to well him in my eyes, at this time I had never been kissed, never had a boyfriend, and this is the closest I've ever gotten to physical intimacy with someone I actually wanted, "But... all the guys here they're going to just assum..." I started to say, but he cut across me.


"Dude, I couldn't give a shit what the morons in this school think of me. So shut up and enjoy the dance." He joked, giving me a warm smile.

The tears started coming in full force, so I buried my head in his shoulder, and he just held me and danced with me while I cried.

Not a Bear

I am just below average in height for a Canadian male short.
I am fat.
I am gay.
I am hairy.

So because of those things, I am automatically put into a group of gay men. I am told that I am a part of the bear community.

If it looks like a duck, but it doesn't talk like a duck. is it still a duck?

Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't want to be a part of the bear community, or that their's anything wrong with the bear community. It's that I don't feel like a bear.

But why is that? Almost anyone in the gay community will tell you that the bear community is one of the friendliest subcultures of our large and diverse community. But whenever I go to an event, I feel awkward and out of place.

Well, we need to take a look at what the bear community is.

So what is a bear? We all know the physical traits right? Hairy and heavy set. They model themselves after a cliched working class man, in fact a lot of the bear culture came out of the idolization of the lumberjack. Jeans, flannel shirts, the isolation from civilization with a bunch of other men. The idea of being removed from society with a bunch of other masculine men? Not a surprise that it became the fantasy of a lot of gay men in the early years of the gay community.
But there's also a heavy importance placed on hypermasculinity, and thus, there's some shunning in the community of any man who isn't this ideal of masculine. Now mind you, there's many bears out there that might not be mentally this ideal of masculinity, but they entire community presents it physically, and I've witnessed some putting down of any man who doesn't meet this expectation.

So why don't I fit?

Well, I have never subscribed to the gender dichotomy, I don't feel that I'm either masculine or feminine, I do have traits of both, and I am not ashamed and refuse to change myself because of someone else's opinion. I will not conform myself to fit into a community. Either accept me as I am, or I'll move on. Which probably explains why I don't really fit in anywhere.

But that's not really all, and I will admit, that the cliched lumberjack, and a lot of the men in the bear community, I find really attractive. But this body, this fat and hairy body that I am in, I don't feel like it's mine. It's hard to fit into and subscribe to a community that is pretty heavily based on body image and size, even when your body fits, if you feel like you're in the wrong body.

So I am a fat, hairy man, with a neatly trimmed beard, and I am not a bear. So please people, stop telling me that I'm something that I'm not.

Just Who Is Skittles Anyway?

Skittles is a brand of fruit-flavored candies, currently produced and marketed by the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company, a division of Mars, Inc.. They have hard sugar shells which carry the letter S. The inside is mainly sugar and hydrogenated vegetable oil along with fruit juice, citric acid and natural and artificial flavours.

- Wikipedia

Well there's a very literal definition, but I'm sure we all know the Skittles Motto, "Taste the Rainbow." Well as a gay teen, sorry, let me rephrase that, as the gayest gay teen to have ever have gayed this far east of San Francisco, with a penchant for Rainbow Brite T-Shirts, glitter, and the very candy mentioned above, it didn't take me very long to earn the nickname Skittles.

Although the term was a failed attempt by some dumb jock in my school in using it as a pejorative I quickly fell in love with the name, and quickly adopted the alias. It was loud, it was obvious, and it was pretty in your face. Three things that I prided myself in being.

Growing up, I was never really allowed to be myself, I had an abusive father and a step father, and my way of rebelling, once I had discovered their disdain for my sexual preferences, was to make sure they couldn't make me hide this part of me, make sure that they could not make me feel shame for who I was. I was who I was, and I used that to spite them.

Maybe not the healthiest avenue to take, I can freely admit that now, but I am not going to pretend that I wasn't trying to make them feel the shame they tried to make me feel every day of my life, by making sure that everyone and their priest knew that I was a homo.

My alias though, quickly consumed me. I went from being, "A quiet kid with glasses, curly hair, and an Orange Plaid Shirt" to a raging flaming queen. The quotation being from a woman who led a gay youth group in my hometown of Guelph.

I started becoming a statistic. I was partying, way too had. Drinking away the depression I had from being kicked out of my house and not being able to have much of a relationship with my mother, because of her emotionally abusive second husband. I was sleeping with pretty much anything with a penis, in attempt to fill some void of a daddy complex that I had. Seeing as how I never really had a good male role model.

Skittles was vapid, shallow, hedonistic, and narcissitic. In fact, if I met the person I was a decade ago, I'd probably want to slap myself silly.

I'm not going to go through everything that happened to me as Skittles. Those stories will come out as I reminisce in future blog posts. Although, that's not all I will talk about. No, this blog is a place for me to rant and rave about those things that mean a lot to me. To discuss the socialization of queer men and where I fit in with that, or don't as the case may be. To talk about sexuality in a frank and honest way.

You see, Skittles is no more, I'd like to say that the alias went away over night. But the truth is, is that he didn't. Without making it sound like I have Dissociative identity disorder, more commonly and incorrectly referred to as Multiple Personality Disorder, part of Skittles is still alive in me, but I'm no longer that vapid and shallow gay teen.

Instead, I'm somewhere in gay limbo, trying to find a place I fit. Feeling a lot like I'm in highschool again, with the cliques and judgements.

Skittles may have left the building, but to be honest, it doesn't feel like I ever left high school with the way that gay men tend to socialize.

You may be writing this off as the rantings of a bitter, fat, gay man, trying to recapture the days when he was young and sexy. And sure, you know what, let's be honest, there is a part of me that wishes I still had the sex appeal I did back then. Partly because I'd better know how to exploit it now for my own personal gain, ha! Kidding. But seriously, I miss being attractive by mainstream gay standards, it allowed me to have a level of ignorance that I no longer have. And let me tell you, ignorance really is bliss.

So a third of you are thinking, this guy is a pathetic whiner, another third is thinking of trying to find words to tell me I don't need to be skinny to be beautiful without being condescending and the last third of stopped reading and moved on to another blog by now because my writing is so disjointed and the grammar is probably atrocious, but I'm too tired to really care about catering to the last third

As for the first two, you're both right But hey, this is my blog and I'll say what I want to. If you want to argue, dialogue, discuss anything with me, you're welcome to comment. If you want to lurk that's okay to. I welcome you all to my inner dialogues, and I hope you don't need to run away screaming.