Turnabout

[cheerful_deviant]

In July, municipal officials in Provincetown, Mass., held a community meeting to air numerous complaints by heterosexuals that they are targets of hate speech by the town's large gay and lesbian population. [Newsoftherweird.com ~07/30/06]

~~~~~~~~~~~

Some people can dish it out but they just can't take it.

 

[Tom Collins]

People have a right to say whatever they want, so long as they aren't inciting violence. At least that's what they keep claiming about people who trash talk everyone who isn't white and hetero. They need to wake up and realize that all they're getting is a taste of their own nasty medicine.

Doesn't taste very nice, does it, Precious?

No, my love...not nice at all.

 

[TheEarl]

In July, municipal officials in Provincetown, Mass., held a community meeting to air numerous complaints by heterosexuals that they are targets of hate speech by the town's large gay and lesbian population. [Newsoftherweird.com ~07/30/06]

~~~~~~~~~~~

Some people can dish it out but they just can't take it.

I can understand that. My sister lived for a while in an area of London where she was one of very few white faces and worked in a bar there. Some of the racist abuse she got from drunkards and louts was extraordinary, especially considering that it wouldn't be tolerated the other way around.

This is a pet peeve of mine. Just because a group has been discriminated against, it doesn't make it okay for them to reciprocate. The only way that there'll ever be true equality is by acting like people are equal, instead of giving special circumstances and allowing certain behaviours to one group because they're a minority.

The Earl

 

[Liar]

In July, municipal officials in Provincetown, Mass., held a community meeting to air numerous complaints by heterosexuals that they are targets of hate speech by the town's large gay and lesbian population. [Newsoftherweird.com ~07/30/06]

~~~~~~~~~~~

Some people can dish it out but they just can't take it.

Did is say they dish it out?

 

[cloudy]

When we were in Provincetown, I found it a remarkably tolerant place - of everybody. Hets were WAY outnumbered, but no one ever said anything to me.

Oh, wait....I was there with Mat, Min, Vella & Lucky.

 

[Tom Collins]

I'm not saying it's right for the gay community to be heaping verbal abuse on the hets. Simply that the hets are finally seeing what it's like when they make snide remarks that are intended to be over heard and that sort of thing.

 

[Belegon]

People have a right to say whatever they want, so long as they aren't inciting violence. At least that's what they keep claiming about people who trash talk everyone who isn't white and hetero. They need to wake up and realize that all they're getting is a taste of their own nasty medicine.

Doesn't taste very nice, does it, Precious?

No, my love...not nice at all.

..and what about those who don't work in the pharmacy and have to taste the medicine anyway?

I am a heterosexual middle-class, middle aged, middle-sized white male in a conservative industry. With blue eyes. In other words, sometimes I feel like people think I am the source of all the world's ills.

Discrimination is wrong. Period.

I used to be a store manager for a major athletic footwear retailer. I had the "race card" played on me DAILY. DAILY! If I told someone "no" it was because I was a racist. Even if all I said was we were out of size 10 1/2.

Hate breeds hate.

 

[nyte_byrd]

The problem with this sort of thing is that no matter who is "dishing it out" they always seem to hit a fair portion of the folks who weren't against them in the first place. Think of it as the old school lunchroom food fight: you're sitting minding your business and get hit in the face with someone else's soggy taters. It wasn't your fight to begin with, but now you're among the ones being attacked, so they've made a new enemy of you as well.
When I was a kid it was all about race riots. My friends were a virtual rainbow of colors and creeds and we all managed to get along perfectly fine. But I remember one summer when the whites couldn't go to their black friends' houses and vice versa, because the radicals were attacking "visitors from another color" on their streets. It was totally sad and worthless, and none of us were in on it.

It's a stupid-assed thing to fight about anyway (hetero vs. gay)... as long as everybody's having sex with who they want to and nobody's stealing your partner (unless you want them to.. hehe), then why cause problems from either side? We all need a good-old 60's love-in!

 

[SeaCat]

The problem with this sort of thing is that no matter who is "dishing it out" they always seem to hit a fair portion of the folks who weren't against them in the first place. Think of it as the old school lunchroom food fight: you're sitting minding your business and get hit in the face with someone else's soggy taters. It wasn't your fight to begin with, but now you're among the ones being attacked, so they've made a new enemy of you as well.
When I was a kid it was all about race riots. My friends were a virtual rainbow of colors and creeds and we all managed to get along perfectly fine. But I remember one summer when the whites couldn't go to their black friends' houses and vice versa, because the radicals were attacking "visitors from another color" on their streets. It was totally sad and worthless, and none of us were in on it.

It's a stupid-assed thing to fight about anyway (hetero vs. gay)... as long as everybody's having sex with who they want to and nobody's stealing your partner (unless you want them to.. hehe), then why cause problems from either side? We all need a good-old 60's love-in!

Good God someone is making sense.

I used to go to ProvinceTown a lot. Several times a year. I went with my wife and at first we had fun. Towards the end though we were constantly verbally attaced. Me for being with her and keeping her from experiencing the women there, and her for keeping me straight. It got to the point where for the last couple of years we lived on Cape we didn't go up to P-Town. We just didn't want to deal with the Bovine Excrement.

Cat

 

[Tom Collins]

..and what about those who don't work in the pharmacy and have to taste the medicine anyway?

I am a heterosexual middle-class, middle aged, middle-sized white male in a conservative industry. With blue eyes. In other words, sometimes I feel like people think I am the source of all the world's ills.

Discrimination is wrong. Period.

I used to be a store manager for a major athletic footwear retailer. I had the "race card" played on me DAILY. DAILY! If I told someone "no" it was because I was a racist. Even if all I said was we were out of size 10 1/2.

Hate breeds hate.

Bel, I know what it's like to be discriminated against from so many angles you wouldn't believe me if I told you, and sometimes from more than one at a given instant. I've been discriminated against at the same time that they were pulling the race card out and waving it in my face. I'm the last person who's going to believe that it's right for anyone to do it. I'm also the last person who's going to hate someone for a superficial reason. To be honest, there are very few groups of people that I can't tolerate, and it's always because of their own intolerance.

All I was saying in that post is that a goodly number of people who've treated other people badly for superfical reasons are finally discovering what it's like to walk a mile in another man's shoes. If you'll note the post directly above yours you'll see that.

 

[matriarch]

I've been to P-town twice, and on both occasions the place was overflowing with families of every variation you can think of, and I never heard any abuse as such, one way or the other.

What I did hear whilst on the pier, where visitors were arriving on the ferries, was groups of people talking about making a trip to the cape, for 'queer watching' and 'dyke watching', and laughing their heads off. It offended me.

Also, in the town centre, by the tower, there are lots of seats where quite obvious non-gay middle-aged men and women, in cowboy outfits and crimpelene dresses sat stoney faced, glaring at any and all gay/lesbian couples who dared to walk buy holding hands, arms around each other.

That said, I still loved it, loved the whole atmosphere, the overall tolerance of most of the families there towards each other, towards the gay families, the lesbian families, the straight families, the outrageous and adorable queens, the couples of all varieties. I'd go back at the blink of an eye.

 

[matriarch]

Good God someone is making sense.

I used to go to ProvinceTown a lot. Several times a year. I went with my wife and at first we had fun. Towards the end though we were constantly verbally attaced. Me for being with her and keeping her from experiencing the women there, and her for keeping me straight. It got to the point where for the last couple of years we lived on Cape we didn't go up to P-Town. We just didn't want to deal with the Bovine Excrement.

Cat

With all due respect, Cat.....that's exactly what happens on a daily basis to gay and lesbian couples. The insulting suggestion that a woman wouldn't be a dyke if she spent just one night with this or that guy......or the comments to the men, that they aren't real men, if they can't get a woman, and the contention that they are only with another guy because women aren't interested in them.

The whole point of the comment is that it makes a change for the 'side of the fence' usually dishing out the abuse to be on the receiving end, and know how it feels.

This is not directed at individuals, at anyone here. It's merely a comment on the state of the world.

Am I making sense??

 

[Belegon]

Bel, I know what it's like to be discriminated against from so many angles you wouldn't believe me if I told you, and sometimes from more than one at a given instant. I've been discriminated against at the same time that they were pulling the race card out and waving it in my face. I'm the last person who's going to believe that it's right for anyone to do it. I'm also the last person who's going to hate someone for a superficial reason. To be honest, there are very few groups of people that I can't tolerate, and it's always because of their own intolerance.

All I was saying in that post is that a goodly number of people who've treated other people badly for superfical reasons are finally discovering what it's like to walk a mile in another man's shoes. If you'll note the post directly above yours you'll see that.

TC, you know that I respect you. But you just can't group "The Hets" together and expect me to agree. The Hets, The Chinks, The Wetbacks, The Fags...jeez, we need any more bad names for 1950's NYC street gangs here?

The state of the world needs to change. That change starts with us. I won't even pretend to say that I think it is excusable. And I will come down on myself when I make bullshit statements. I'm not expecting anyone to be perfect. But I won't make excuses and say it is alright to be small-hearted and cruel because the "other people" started it.

 

[Tom Collins]

TC, you know that I respect you. But you just can't group "The Hets" together and expect me to agree. The Hets, The Chinks, The Wetbacks, The Fags...jeez, we need any more bad names for 1950's NYC street gangs here?

The state of the world needs to change. That change starts with us. I won't even pretend to say that I think it is excusable. And I will come down on myself when I make bullshit statements. I'm not expecting anyone to be perfect. But I won't make excuses and say it is alright to be small-hearted and cruel because the "other people" started it.

First off, I'd like to thank you for saying that you respect me. That really does mean something to me, and I assure you that I feel the same way about you. You're an intelligent and kindhearted person, and no one who would say otherwise knows you at all.

But...again...That's not what I said. I'm certain that I'm not expressing myself, my thoughts, correctly. Believe me; this happens to me all the time, that's why I believe it's me misspeaking rather than you misunderstanding.

I don’t believe that it’s acceptable behavior for anyone. I don’t think that it’s behavior that should be tolerated within any truly freethinking society, no matter who the target is. That being said, I know that there are some people who are incapable of understand someone else’s view point until they’ve actually stood in their place. There are, of course, those who simply will never see the other person’s perspective.

There are so many books and movies out about how someone hates or mistreats a specific type of person, or simply doesn’t understand them and so thinks less of them, and then they magically/mystically/scientifically/cosmetically become like that person. There are so many that the concept has become a cliché. Inevitably, at the end of the movie they’ve acquired a deep understanding of the other person’s point of view. What I was trying to express in those first posts is that such persons’ who are capable of altering perceptions, and therefore patterns of thinking, who are now experiencing this situation Provincetown are hopefully beginning to see the light.

I said, “They need to wake up and realize that all they're getting is a taste of their own nasty medicine.” The hope would be that they would stand up and say that it’s not right, not just where they’re concerned, but where anyone is concerned for any reason.

I think that if everyone in Provincetown who’s been experiencing this turn about would come together publicly, with a chosen spokes person, and say that they understand how the gay community feels and never intend to engage in such wretched behavior again, then the gay community would do likewise. I’m also willing to admit that I could be blowing smoke up my own ass with that last statement. After all, once the underdog gets on top of the pile he don’t usually want to step back down to the ground.

I’m not going to lie and say that I don’t see some humor in the situation. I’ve never claimed that I didn’t have a darkish sense of humor. I always loved those cartoon pics of the string of fish, each one larger than the last, all with their mouths open.

 

[Belegon]

I said, “They need to wake up and realize that all they're getting is a taste of their own nasty medicine.” The hope would be that they would stand up and say that it’s not right, not just where they’re concerned, but where anyone is concerned for any reason.

I think that if everyone in Provincetown who’s been experiencing this turn about would come together publicly, with a chosen spokes person, and say that they understand how the gay community feels and never intend to engage in such wretched behavior again, then the gay community would do likewise. I’m also willing to admit that I could be blowing smoke up my own ass with that last statement. After all, once the underdog gets on top of the pile he don’t usually want to step back down to the ground.

"never intend to engage in such behavior again" is my problem here.

I can promise you I don't engage in such behavior. And I despise being painted with that brush. Why should I be discriminated against and accept it? I won't accept when they discriminate against others...

What I'm saying is that I don't care how badly anyone has been treated. You can never respond in kind without losing the high moral ground. Period. It may feel satisfying, but it is wrong.

This is not to say I can't experience anger. I most certainly will get in someone's face about their attitude. Indeed, I am actually far more likely to engage in physical violence on this subject than many of the people in the community are. I never claimed to be a pacifist.

I'll kick somebodies ass for dissing my friends. I've done it. That said, you can pretty much say anything you want about me and I'll just let it roll right off my back. Call me a faggot and I'll thank you for the compliment. Tell me I'm "going to hell" for associating with, for example, Carson and I'll turn in front of those people saying it and lay a kiss on him that will curl his toes. And hope that I don't offend Carson in the process. As to the "preachers", I hope I offend them greatly.

But to make general statements about a group of people? To mutter and glare? to engage in "reverse racism"?

It's not "Medicine"...it's posion. It won't heal ANYBODY.

 

[Liar]

The whole point of the comment is that it makes a change for the 'side of the fence' usually dishing out the abuse to be on the receiving end, and know how it feels.

This is not directed at individuals, at anyone here. It's merely a comment on the state of the world.

Am I making sense??

Kind of. As long as people actually are on a side of the fence, and are not placed there by 'the other side' in order to have something to abuse.

And haven't each and every one of us been on the recieving end of passive-agressive dishing, one way or the other? Be it gay-bashing, race-bashing, sex-bashing, age-bashing, poor-bashing or just plain old what-have-you-bashing that is the life essence for every schoolyard bully and clique since the dawn of time, we all know more or less how it feels.

One could just as easily turn that around to say "it makes a change for the 'side of the fence' usually getting the abuse to be able to dish out the abuse, and know how it feels". Doesn't sound as positive a thing then.

My initial question remains: Were the ones now feeling targeted the same individuals who used to dish out, or decent people who got in the way on payback day?

And even if that is the case: So? If someone is being a dick, isn't it easier to target them for being dicks than for being [insert slur here]?

 

[TheEarl]

One could just as easily turn that around to say "it makes a change for the 'side of the fence' usually getting the abuse to be able to dish out the abuse, and know how it feels". Doesn't sound as positive a thing then.

Liar's hit it on the head there. It's not targetting an abusive group of people. To be honest, I'd be surprised if there were many homophobes in Provincetown, just the same as I'd be surprised if there were any white supremacists in Peckham.

It's not about "a change for the 'side of the fence' usually dishing out the abuse to be on the receiving end, and know how it feels," as Mat said. It's about the downtrodden group being allowed to be in the position of dishing it out and having fun being the bully for once. The victims are incidental.

The Earl

 

[cantdog]

Quite right, Earl... Liar really is a rockstar.

 

[SeaCat]

With all due respect, Cat.....that's exactly what happens on a daily basis to gay and lesbian couples. The insulting suggestion that a woman wouldn't be a dyke if she spent just one night with this or that guy......or the comments to the men, that they aren't real men, if they can't get a woman, and the contention that they are only with another guy because women aren't interested in them.

The whole point of the comment is that it makes a change for the 'side of the fence' usually dishing out the abuse to be on the receiving end, and know how it feels.

This is not directed at individuals, at anyone here. It's merely a comment on the state of the world.

Am I making sense??

Mat,

With all due respect, and believe me there is a great deal of that, I must disagree with one aspect of your argument. (Yes I do know that this isn't directed at any certain members here.)

You make the comment; "The whole point of the comment is that it makes a change for the 'side of the fence' usually dishing out the abuse to be on the receiving end, and know how it feels." This is true but it misses something, what about those of us who are caught in the scatter of shit from the attacks? What about those of us who aren't standing about on the pier talking about Dragging Queens, Queer Bashing or Lez Lagging? What about those of us who actually have made a stand against this type of thing even though we don't swing both ways? Do we too need to be punished along with the very vocal idiots?

I know you aren't one of these people who are doing the attacking, and I don't blame you for it. As I said I respect you, I respect you for your views and your willingness to stand up for them.

Cat