My Qu-heroes

What is this process of Gay Iconic veneration? 

Looking back on the iconography of my earlier life, (Kenneth Williams, Quentin Crisp, Judy Garland, Barbara Streisand, Freddy Mercury, Will Young), I see how, with each figure, I managed to create an image-construct. Its value, for me, being that of knowing there was a story of a real person, like my own queer struggling self, who was capable of transcending adversity (or if not, was at least enduring its suffering in a truly fabulous way!) These Gay Icons gave me the courage to come out of my closet. They were individuals who dared to express their forbidden amazingness and desires shamelessly.

More recently however, I’ve had little spells of hero worship for gay men who are remembered for their role as visionaries, political activists and fighters for queer social justice. Here are my top 3…

Walt Whitman: 19th Century American poet who dared to openly publish poems about “the manly love of comrades” at a time when celebrating a reality which included sex would have him branded as an obscene writer throughout his lifetime. His poetry strongly influenced…

Edward Carpenter: Early 20th Century British writer and socialist poet who became a hero to the first generation of Labour politicians. At a time of Victorian homophobia (his contemporary Oscar Wilde was imprisoned for 2 years with hard labour for the crime of “gross indecency with sodomy”) he managed to live in an openly gay relationship and publish books allowing folk to discuss the possibility that sexual orientation was natural and biologically determined rather than being something to be morally condemned or criminalised. His books were read by…

Harry Hay: (1912-2002) American communist who was able to see the link between queer and black oppression and had the vision and courage to establish the first, pre-Stonewall gay rights movement called the Mattachine Society. Doing this meant risking his life, his job and his liberty. 

The Society became a victim of its own success, got a sudden influx of conservative members who saw Hay’s communism, at a time of McCarthy’s witch-hunt trials, as a liability, ousted him and established itself as an assimilationist lobby. 

Undaunted Hay then went on to argue for a different kind of liberation. For queers to ‘cast off the ugly frog-skin of hetero-conformity’ and for them to discover their queer purpose through the realisation of their true faerie nature in community at Faerie Gatherings.

I suppose I’ve been following Harry’s lead in this respect for the past 10 years or so. For me he’s not so much an Icon or Hero-to-worship. In fact the more I’ve learned about his egocentricity, intellectual bullying, and temper tantrums, the less I feel I would have liked him as a person!

He’s more of a flawed fore-father-figure…a guiding queer ancestor…a giant who stood on giant’s shoulders. 

His own shoulders now invite us all to step up and see the amazing view!

Is “Fitting In” Making You Sick?

The Brighton Faeries are officially marching in this year’s Pride Parade.

Yep- we booked ourselves a ‘walking float’ slot for up to 30 marching Faeries!

This is a controversial move because- as everyone knows- the Faeries are very elusive creatures. You might catch a glimpse of one and then, Pouff, gone, never to be seen again…

The Faerie ‘development of consciousness’ grew from the U.S. counterculture and gay civil rights movements of the late 60’s. Within 10 years of the Stonewall riots, a call went out to convene “gay brothers” to a Spiritual Conference of Radical Faeries. Those interested in ‘re-establishing a communication with Nature and the Great Mother and, in feeling the essential link between sex and the forces that hold the universe together’ were invited to come together (kinda literally) for a long weekend in early September 1979.

Since then Queer Folk from across the spectra of gender and sexuality have been hearing the call to convene in Nature and to celebrate the awesome naturalness of their sexual and gender queerness.

Faerie Gatherings are about queers co-creating foundational intentional community- nurturing and celebrating our ancient historical roles as medicine people, healers, prophets, shamans, witches and sorcerers. We encourage ourselves to engage with that endless and fathomless process of coming out as Queer, as animals, as humans AND as mysterious and powerful spirits that move through the life cycle of the cosmos…

The tradition of Faerie-ness has been counter to the cultural pressure from the mainstream to assimilate; to resist the lure of acceptance ‘as long as you can just stop being THAT WAY’. Faeries drill down into what it feels like (and what it means) to be ‘THAT WAY’. As Faeries we endeavour to be more ‘THAT WAY’ than ever we were before!

Faerie-ness resists ‘fitting in’. It proudly and queerly presents itself as a challenge to the status quo; as an opportunity to bring to consciousness those forces which endeavour to obliterate different-ness.

So, what are the Faeries doing in a Pride Parade with its corporate drive to have the queers put on a show, draw the crowds and bring millions in capital to boost the Brighton business economy. The irony of a non-political parade celebrating 50 years of queer civil rights activism would be funny if it weren’t so creepy.

Well, Faerie-ness has been a little known and barely recognised force empowering queers, over the years to refuse to fit into an inauthenticity-glorifying world.

If you’re reading this before the Parade, look out for us. We’ll simply be turning up in all our non-corporate weird uniqueness and representing that awkward voice asking: 'Is this all there is?’

If any of all this chimes with you then find the Faerie Camp @ Queer Spirit Summer Festival in Northamptonshire August 14-18 or just google Albion Faeries and see what its like to co-create spiritually nurturing community together at a Gathering.

Hope Along the Wind: A Film About the Sussex Man who Started Two Queer Revolutions in the USA!

Gay Socrates talks to Harry Hay's friend and carer Joey Cain about Hay, the man, and the movie made about his life, coming to the Brighton Fringe next month.

Harry Hay (1912-2002) was born in Worthing. As an adult he became a gay activist in the US and founded the first Gay Liberation movement (The Mattachine Society) in 1950. He then went on to co-found the Radical Faeries.

'Hope Along the Wind...' is a lovely movie which sets this unlikely story in its historic context and captures rare interview footage of this iconic character in his later years.

Joey Cain knew Harry in person and was one of the devoted band of 'Loving Companions' who tended to the care of Harry and his partner in their closing years. For the 100th anniversary of Harry’s birth in 2012, he curated a major exhibition about his life and times in San Francisco and co-organized a conference about Harry in New York City.

Joey is flying from his home in San Francisco to present a screening of this movie as part of the Brighton Fringe Festival next month. 

GS: Who was Harry Hay to you?

JC: Harry was a dear friend, political comrade and gay visionary the likes of which we probably won’t see again. Without his tenacity, deep thinking and integrity, the LGBT revolution, at least as far as the USA goes, would have been a much longer time coming. He traversed many worlds, as Gay people often do.

A Communist activist and great music lover who was a trained baritone, he read long and deep in history and anthropology to find the hidden history of our People.

GS: Why are you bringing Harry Hay's story to the Brighton Fringe?

JC: Harry was born in Worthing, his birth house still stands, and we thought it would be a lovely idea to “bring Harry back” to this part of England, where he started out. This whole area is so rich in Queer history what with Edward Carpenter being born in Brighton, Oscar Wilde writing “The Importance of being Ernest” practically around the corner from where Harry was born. And that’s just scratching the surface.

GS: Why do you think conceiving of the Radical Faeries was important to Harry?

JC: Harry always said that the Radical Fairies was the realization of the dream he had when he started The Mattachine Society in 1950. The essence lies in the 3 questions he posed to be answered by both groups: Who are we? Where do we come from? Why are we here? For Harry, the Fairies were about answering those questions and acting on the answers.

'Hope Along the Wind: The Life of Harry Hay' is showing at the Fabrica Gallery, Tuesday May 8 7.30pm 

Tickets: https://www.brightonfringe.org/whats-on/harry-hay-founder-of-the-radical-faeries-124999/

Radical Faeries: Why Are We Here?

There are times in the history of our humanity when, suddenly, unexpectedly, and dramatically, human consciousness shifts. When this happens, historians are usually curious about how these changes came about. Who did what to whom, and when?

The development of an LGBTQI+ liberation movement is one such event. We all know there was a time, back in the dark ages, when queerness didn’t even seem to have a consciousness of itself. And then there was a time when queers were vilified and persecuted- even killed and eugenicised. And then came the time when one queer said ‘No!”

There is a scientifically recognised phenomenon known as ‘morphic resonance’ (discovered by biologist Professor Rupert Sheldrake) whereby, a puzzle or dilemma solved by one living creature is immediately more likely, and more rapidly, to be solved by another, regardless of geographical proximity. Maybe it is by this little understood process that historic shifts of consciousness occur. However, in terms of queer liberation, there must have been that moment when, not only did one particular queer say “No! This is not acceptable” but then went on to say “And this is how we’ll go about changing it...”

It is quite possible that the name of that queer was Harry Hay. He was one of the founders of the first gay liberation movement organisations in the U.S.- the Mattachine Society. The story of how that small group brought hope and then ultimately tangible human rights equality to a growing number of nations across the world is told in a short, gripping movie biopic ‘Hope Along the Wind’ coming to the Brighton Fringe Festival in May.

Interestingly, Harry Hay’s involvement at the inception of the LGBTQI+ liberation movement was not the end of the story. After the movement’s historic successful legal challenge of a cottaging charge, the movement was flooded with ‘assimilationists’ (who believed ‘we’re just like straights apart from our sexualities’). He stepped away from the movement believing steadfastly that having sexualities was one of the few things that queers did have in common with the mainstream. He believed that queerness gave us a unique window through which we are able to view society and that we then favourably influence society through our own individual cultural engagements.

He threw himself into research constantly asking his famous three questions:  “Who are we?’ , ‘Where do we come from?’ and ‘Why are we here?’

Following his discovery of a resonance with the Native American identity of Berdache or ‘Two Spirit’, he began to see queers as a tribe of magical spiritual creatures with a unique role to play in the development of human consciousness. 

As Faeries, we locate our own unique purpose by celebrating our wild and mysterious natures together in community......

‘Hope Along the Wind: The Life of Harry Hay’ is showing at the Fabrica Gallery, 40 Duke Street, BN11AG 

TUESDAY May8 at 7.30pm. Tickets £8 & £6: 

https://www.brightonfringe.org/whats-on/harry-hay-founder-of-the-radical-faeries-124999/

Come along and say hello to the Brighton Faeries!

If You Like To Take It Up The A*se- Does That Make You A Sissy?

Last week I had sex with a guy in the sauna. Yay! And afterwards when we were cuddling and chatting in our little cubicle (it can happen sometimes- occasionally) we got on to the subject of how to respond to THAT QUESTION: ‘Are you a Top or a Bottom?’

It’s a question often furtively asked during the course of a bit of fumbling exploratory touch. It seems to be asked by guys in a rush to get to some kind of destination. They ‘aint looking for some mutually explored erotic adventure. It’s like they want to fast forward to some live-action, conventionally plugged-in, porn cum-shot.

I usually indicate that I’m enjoying the touch happening right now and that I’m capable of going with the flow of wherever it might take us. Which usually gets us back in the zone!

My sauna buddy seemed interested to talk about this topic, so I told him, for the record, that with regard to gender I personally identified as a bigendered. 

And, furthermore, having reflected on how my bigendered-ness impacts on my sexuality, I’ve come to the conclusion that the feminine pole of my gender is BISEXUAL! She’s into men who are into her femininity and she’s also into women who want to engage in sexual play with her. (Hmm- one of these days that fantasy of a dominant woman with a strap-on taking me to heaven will become a reality!). 

And then there’s the masculine end of my spectral identity, who is a sexually versatile gay guy. He enjoys f*cking, being f*cked, s*cking, being s*cked, d*minating and s*bmitting. It’s all f*cking great!

Then my sauna lover said ‘Well, I’ve done Queer Studies and they said there, that ‘Bigendered’ doesn’t exist because gender is all fluid-like’. He was young and not a little irritatingly- if not invalidatingly- correct. I suppose!

As a sissy child I was ruthlessly coerced into eradicating any element of femininity from my behaviour. I was a quick learner and a good little actor and so rapidly acquired a reasonably convincing straight-acting veneer of false-self. It’s taken years to recognise and challenge the shame that I was made to feel about my sissy self. Thankfully I am now able to honour and reclaim it as my precious birthright.

Why does this ugly gender expression repression happen? And why do so many men  continue to hide and despise their feminine nature. Is it because we live in a patriarchal, misogynist culture hating women and seeing men who resemble women as even worse?

Whatever it is, we do appear to be stuck with this gender binary thing and it does seem, for many, to touch on something deeply fundamental which shouldn’t be messed with! 

Maybe I’m just a freak of nature. Maybe most men are just men. In which case that’s just fine too!

Eight Faerie Books from the Brighton Faerie Library Feel Free to come down and have a browse!

The Faerie Iconoclasts Who Dared to Re-Imagine Queer

 

So what’s an Icon?

In a literal sense it is a painted image intended to induce a sense of the divine. Over the centuries Queer folk have suffered at the hands the Great Organised Religions' image-makers. Metaphorically, nothing divine has ever been invoked in the painting of our image. In fact quite the reverse!

However I have a personal gratitude to three great secular saints of The Church of Queer who each, in their own ways, have managed to repaint our tarnished image. They have helped us to dare to be our divine selves against all odds.

The great American writer Walt Whitman (1819- 1892), in the Calamus cycle of poems from his magnum opus ‘Leaves of Grass’, re-imagined the then unspeakable love of men-loving-men as the ‘Love of Comrades’; a love so powerful it would transform a warring world into a calm and peaceful global village.

These poems were largely considered to be obscene by Walt’s compatriots. Internationally, however, they excited a new generation of morally oppressed yet nascently radical queer folk. Among them was the Brighton born Edward Carpenter (1844-1929) who was dramatically transformed after reading them. So much so that he sailed to the US to meet, and then make love with, his heroic iconoclast.

He was encouraged in his own writing to re-paint the way in which queerness had been smeared. In his book ‘The Intermediate Sex’ he articulated, to a hostile and highly sexually oppressive Victorian society, the argument for a biological determinant for non-heterosexual sexuality. This was a society which criminalised as morally defective any physical expression of same-sex love. In 1895 Oscar Wilde was sentenced by our great British society to two years of hard labour in prison for daring to be himself!

When he was just a child the Worthing born Harry Hay (1912-2002) migrated with his parents to America. In the local library he managed to break his way into a locked cabinet containing a copy of ‘The Intermediate Sex’. Encouraged by the fact that there were at least some highly respected European writers who took a non-moralistic view of the expression of same-sex love, he developed his own ideas (via his involvement with the American communist party and a love affair with the actor who famously came to play the part of Grandpa Walton). In a post-Stonewall era when queers were increasingly clamouring for ‘we’re just the same as you are- but different’ social and legal acceptance, Harry was busy wondering what was the purpose of queers? Do we not have a unique window of perspective for the wider society and a special subject-subject love devoid of the materialistic and social status considerations implicit in most marriage contracts? Was our purpose not to be visionaries, healers and teachers? Did we not need spiritual sanctuary where our unarticulated sense of purpose and our innate sense of awe at the fabulousness of the natural world could be allowed to flourish unencumbered?

As Faeries we dare to be ourselves and we model the audacity of this radically spiritual act for our non-queer brethren.

Let us then give thanks to Saint Walt, Saint Edward and Saint Harry the Great Faerie Iconoclastic Icons!

A South Coast Faerie Hi[Story]

  Children! Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin…

Once upon a time many years ago in America, a little Faerie called Walter was born into a hostile world. It was a time of fools in old style hats and coats who half the time were soppy-stern, and half at one another's throats!

Walter was a nature-loving Faerie and his nature was to love. His world disapproved of his kind of love but to him it was quite natural.

He wrote poems about nature and was brave enough to write about the nature of his kind of love. No one had done this before.

He published his poems and his countrymen thought them crude and disgusting. 

However here in England one little Faerie, called Edward, [who had been born in Brighton then moved to Leeds], read the poems and they sang to his soul. He loved the poems so much he set sail to meet Walter to see and touch him in the flesh! He thought ‘if one Faerie can dare to put into words what it is like to love like a Faerie then so can I!’

Edward was very knowledgeable having studied at a very important university. He wrote a book about Faerie-love. He wanted to help people understand that to love like a Faerie was not something evil or corrupt but a very natural thing indeed. Faerie-lovers needed help to heal their broken wings and their woundedness from years of bullying and fear of imprisonment. 

At that time a very theatrical, flamboyant, Faerie called Oscar-who had also visited Walter- was discovered to have been indiscreetly loving like a Faerie and was sent to hard labour imprisonment which broke his soul.

By some miracle of Faerie-magic Edward was able to publish his book living [openlyish] with a number of Faerie-lovers in Leeds and managed to escape prosecution- just narrowly- by the authorities for what was seen by many at the time as an obscene publication.

A copy of his book found its way to a library back in America where a little Faerie called Harry [who had been born in Worthing] discovered it peeping out at him from a locked glass cabinet. As only a little Faerie could, he persuaded the lady librarian that she could lose her stern look by popping down the hair salon for a Marcel Wave perm whilst he looked after the library. As soon as she left he grabbed the secret key to the locked bookcase of forbidden books. She returned hours later to find little Harry engrossed in the book of Faerie-love. From this day forward Harry knew he was not the only Faerie and he determined to fight against the persecution of Faerie-lovers. He gathered a group of like-minded men. Some thought the best way to fight persecution would be to convince the law-makers that we were just like them only a bit different. Harry said ‘No! Faeries have a purpose! We are special! We need to cultivate our specialness and heal our woundedness in Sanctuary by exposing our vulnerabilities to each other in Heart Circle. In this way our kind of love can transform the world!’

Three years ago a little Faerie called Mushroom-who lives in Brighton- discovered and healed bruised and battered Faerie-wings through Heart Circle at Faerie Sanctuary feeling much gratitude to Harry, Edward Oscar and Walter.

Mushroom really does wish that there had been Faerie Hi[Stories] like this at nursery school. Who knows? 
Perhaps someday there will be!

Walt Whitman              1819-1892

Edward Carpenter        1844-1929

Oscar Wilde                  1854-1900

Harry Hay                     1912-2002

Faerie Mushroom         1960-