Bravo, WW! Beautifully written and superbly true. The one point I think you may not have touched on sufficiently is how much of the violent anti-gay behavior is perpetrated by men who may sense some homosexual tendencies in themselves, and are terrified by that realization. (Some such tendencies are probably present in many comfortably heterosexual men -- it doesn't mean they are obsessed by them, or act on them, or even pay much attention to them.) I think it's more than just the fear of being weak. But we can discuss that; you may have been saying it and I just didn't hear it. Aside from that, I think you've hit it perfectly.

I remember about 18 years ago visiting a friend of mine from college, who had come out in graduate school; we'd kept in touch over the years. Jim and I went out to dinner one night with his partner and four or five other men, all gay. Even though they all knew I was straight, I could feel myself being checked out. I had a very strong sense at that point of what it felt like to be a woman and be the subject of that kind of sexual scrutiny by men. I don't envy you women in the least.

Aloha,
Mark