When I was a little coming out chicken the only gay media around was ‘Gay Times’. Back then in the early 70s this was a rather worthy publication. Back then there were lots of injustices, it wasn’t fair, it needed to change and so it was important to share information and maintain solidarity. GT helped us to do this.
Then came my first encounter with ‘Attitude’ magazine. It was sitting there bold as brass in my local newsagent’s- albeit on the top shelf but none the less out-and-proud and unapologetic. Those first issues were full of- well- attitude and humour. Not ashamed to be frivolous and to celebrate camp gay stuff. It seemed like the gay media had reached a level of self-assuredness. Sadly in my dotage I’m now less inclined to read gay beauty magazines. I follow Baz Luhrmann’s advice as stated in his immemorable ‘Everybody’s free [to wear sunscreen]’ diatribe ‘Do not read beauty magazines-they will only make you feel ugly’.
So how do I get my information about LGBT related matters now?
I suppose it is via my LGBT friends and of course GScene magazine [tee-hee]. I’ve certainly stopped trusting the conventional mass media. For me it has become totally toxic. It seems to just pedal misinformation and induces fear and mistrust.
The media of the new millennium are email, blogs, facebook, texting and tweeting. These media have allowed us to spread our social networks further afield and to cut out these poisonous mass media middlemen.
I now take time to develop friendships via the Edward Carpenter Community and the Faeries. These friends are the best sources of information for what is happening to them, their friends and to the planet.
Through my blog I’ve met a good few virtual friends. Rory is a deeply spiritual Taoist who lives with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome in the North East of Scotland [blog http://lucid-exposition.blogspot.com/]. Keith is a highly intelligent writer who battles with episodic unipolar depression in Hollywood [blog http://brokenwholeblog.blogspot.com/].
I met Spanish-speaking Marco whilst on holiday in Toronto. He now lives in Mexico and we keep in touch- by emailing in each other’s language. He struggles with the closeted-ness induced by the homophobia of South American Catholicism.
In the past 30 years or so in the UK we have moved away from a focus on civil rights and rectifying social injustice. We have enjoyed a dalliance with assimilation and are increasingly accepted into mainstream society provided we shut up and fit in. Sadly fitting in involves becoming part of an empty, shallow, consumerist, cosmetically obsessed, sex focused, death denying, planet poisoning, war-torn system with our intimate relationships tied to civil partnerships, property and wealth.
Let’s break free of our ties to this oppressing system. Let’s connect to each other on a deeper loving level and generate our own information and organisation. We just need to make a bit of effort and not expect to be spoon fed with information that is anything other than toxic waste to our unique natures as queer folk.
