After finishing the essay by Rich, the one thing that stood with me besides the fact that heterosexuality as an institution can be more oppressive than I even realized is the idea of the lesbian continuum. The idea that lesbianism would not be just limited to the notion of woman's sexual preference. I think the author brought up an excellent point in that simply calling it lesbianism was far too limiting in its scope. The continuum idea intrigued me and I began really trying to dissect what she meant by it. It boils down to being emotionally connected to an individual of another woman and it being identified as an intense connection even if only briefly for that experience.
I then thought if men would have the same thing. If it's the same as male bonding or if it needs to be deeper than that. For some males fishing would in and of itself be part of a homosexual continuum by definition of the lesbian continuum given by the author. However, I think those types of experiences will generally only scratch the surface unless real issues are brought up during those experiences. I think while most women can identify with what the author is talking about and understand it, I think heterosexual men would be far more resistant to the idea. It would be considered feminine or homosexual if you were to identify close experience or support with homosexual experiences even if there is no physical contact involved.
As a male I know it would be hard for me to call any sort of male bonding a homosexual experience, and that it belongs on its own continuum, and I also would consider myself more openminded than the average male. I think that it's interesting to see the shift of that women coming together can be seen as a lesbian experience and could be at least accepted by good percentage of women. Whereas if you try to put the same idea to guys but call it a homosexual or gay experience there would be strong resistance to it by an overwhelming majority in my opinion.
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