(50th post)

This weekend: Duncan, Part One: or, the boy wit ha bird in his heart comes to St. Ann's Warehouse. Click here to order tickets. I'm terrified.

Since our show closed at the theater, a renter has come in to take over the space and strike our set. From western ct. state u. -- frat boy queens basically -- and basically yesterday at work was me and rico and scotty chatting about boys, guessing who was gay, calling dibs.

which brings me to what i really want to talk about -- the term "straight acting." I recently recorded on the facebook that i thought this term was the devil. an interesting prospect: it sets up several embedded value statements. none of this should be news to you. not only does the term imply that there is a "gay" way to act and a "straight" way to act, it also sets up an implied hierarchy of gays -- why is it so preferred to act straight? it makes my skin crawl (i think you need to forgive my poor sentence structure here; i'm not in the mood to write yet i do have an urgent need to talk about this). Scotty showed me a picture of a boy he's going on a date with that he met from manhunt (another set of embedded problems there...next post). not only was this person "gorgeous" -- aka beefy, hairless, white, giant pecs -- but he "sounded straight on the phone." i was probably going to puke. this, ladies and gentlemen, is the royalty that we have crowned. likely repressive, likely living in steadfast adherence to social pressures, likely unhappy. do i need to mention to you that there is no way to act? that there is no appropriate manner to behave? that social codes are only validated by the people who carry them out and maintain their power.

after posting this on facebook, i got a message from a former boss of mine (also on facebook...next post) saying that i'm not straight acting, but "straight appearing." i assume he meant this as a compliment -- just as fags everywhere are supposed to be honored by the association with "heterosexual behavior" -- but he actually completely missed the point. of course i understand that certain behaviors tend to go in step with sexual orientation but to perpetuate these assumptions are actually counterproductive. even if we dont mind when men wear nailpolish -- if everytime a man wears nailpolish we assume he's gay, we haven't gotten anywhere. let all men wear nailpolish and let it be nothing but a vehicle for personal expression. personal expression that in no way is code for sexuality.

jesus. sorry. i'll post something pithy in a bit.