Comments on Practice Makes Perfect

Oh my god, "generous lubrication." That's just hilarious. Ample wouldn't have been nearly as funny. Nor would adequate.

Generous, as in unselfish, giving. Here, baby, I have a gift for you. It goes with my cock, now bend over.

Oh STFU, Michelangelo Signorile. Homos who get bent over the word "homosexual" really bum me out when we got all kinds of bigger fish to fry. "Practicing homosexual" is awkward, but I'm not going to waste my time harassing my allies when I've got so many enemies, you know?

We sure do seem to be getting offended a lot. I realize there's a need for being offended, what with the other side trying so hard and all. But you know, I getting tired of being offended all the time.

Practicing Homosexual? Well, I am a homo and I do practice as often as possible. Nope, not offended.

Yeah...

This is at best a very mild offense. Sure, strictly speaking, "practicing" is rather ridiculous, and implies that homosexuality is a learned behavior. But compared to the hateful bile that we hear from the religious right, I can't get myself too worked up over this.

I can't wait till my boyfriend gets home so I can practice on him. With some generous lubrication. Because, you know, otherwise I might forget I'm gay.

Signorile really needs something better to do.

I too, abjure the odious phrase, "practicing homosexual," for practice negates perfection, and without perfection, there can be no fabulosity.

Some miss the point on this issue with the idiot's nomination. Look who is on the Senate committee that is going to be interviewing him! Hillary, Obama, Dodd... (think about this) The GOP is trying to get the Presidential hopefuls with some great sounds bites that will make the Dems look like they are favorable to gays and lesbians and hate Jesus. It is not about actually confirming this asshole, it is all about the sound bites for 2008.

Most men, het and gay, need more than a little practice.

And obviously, if more hets are going for anal sex then they're finally discovering what men have been lying for, crying for and dying for all these years - it simply can't be beat. Thanks Maxim Magazine!

In true Republican fashion, you just know that Holsinger (nice name BTW) is the biggest ass slut on the DL. Eww, I shouldn’t have written that.

Although, the phrase "practicing homosexual" does give new meaning about that joke about getting to Carnegie Hall.

that signorile quote made me choke on my cereal. so awesome. but yah i hate the 'H' word and a big fuck you to everyone above me for not understanding how important it is to get rid of that word. you may not see it as a priority, but i personally would rather work on getting the newspapers to quit using that word than to get more gay folks in the military.

It's time to drop the H-Bomb!

@and: I may be a complete hetro moron, but why is the "h-bomb" offensive? I always thought it was just a descriptive word. The "practising" bit is ridiculous, so I get that. I am not trying to be offensive, I just truly don't get why it would be wrong to say...and also never knew that it was offensive to anyone.

Original Monique: The America Blog post by John Aravosis appears to explain why.

While I get the negative connotations of the term, yeah, can't gays just "reclaim" the term, just like they reclaimed "queer", "fag", and yes, "gay"? Plus, without "homosexual", terms like "heterosexual" and "bisexual" just seem so lonely and incomplete.

Did you mean "marred" when you said "married"? Is that a Freudian slip?

for some reason my post didnt work, but yah, read the link that dan posted and the links inside it for a pretty good explanation. @13 but like, what if we don't want to reclaim it? why am i supposed to reclaim every word that i find offensive to make myself feel better? i dont want it you can have it if you want. in fact if you people want to keep calling yourself heterosexual and bisexual please feel free to continue, that's your own problem, but at least you get to decide for yourself.

I kinda like "homo," and acknowledge that it's reclaimed. Homosexual is sterile, but funny at times. I can't get upset about it. I'm trying and trying, but I just can't. (Those labeling me an angry dyke, take note.)

Back to homo: it's not inclusive. That's my biggest problem with it. While we're on the subject, do we have to say LGBTQIA...? I object primarily because there's no noun form as in, "I am an LGBT..."

Queer is just fine for me & mine, but for example, in a conversation with an older relative, she informed me, "I hate that word." I tried to explain reclamation to her, but she is, well, in her sixties, and pretty hetero. And when I explained what LGBTQIA... stood for, she was stymied.

We are complex, it's true. But let's get a good, simple, inclusive word with multiple parts of speech going that I can use at the PTA and the sex toy store alike. Whaddya say?

@15: What do you say on making terms like "heterosexual" and "bisexual" offensive and outdated too? Then we can get rid of the whole freakin' group, and not just leave bits and pieces lying around.

@2 Michelangelo Signorile has a point in wanting to get rid of that antiquated term, and you're just perpetuating the status quo by attempting to silence him. People will not learn unless you point it out to them that the word(s) that they are using hurts. I know I get a quirk in my stomach everytime someone says "homosexual" instead of "queer" or "gay" when referring to me . Normally, people/allies will not be offended if you point out to them in a nice and calming tone that the word isn't preferred anymore and that it offends you.

In turn, those allies can use those terms to their non-ally friends, and thus those people will quit using it.

@18: Normally, people/allies will not be offended if you point out to them in a nice and calming tone that the word isn't preferred anymore and that it offends you.

Very true. Maybe it's a result of straight privilege combined with good old intellectual laziness; if we don't feel we "have" to think about the language the same way that queers do, we just won't. And especially living outside of urban centers or other relatively progressive areas, you're talking about a lack of savvy rather than malevolence. I think you'll find that most people, especially those identifying as allies, are pretty receptive, though. Mention it once, and anyone whose company is worth keeping will likely understand.

Why are higher cigarette taxes "progressive"? Given that more working-class people smoke than rich people, I would have thought it, quite precisely, "regressive"...

Dan... quit posting and get back to having fun with your family, we can wait till you're back!
Enjoy!

@12 Original Monique, congratulations on apparently being the only other person in the entire freaking world who knows how to spell "practising". The rest of you, hang your heads! I can feel myself turning into A. Birch Steen here.

Fascinating titbit: my 1963 edition of Fowlers Modern English Usage gives 'homo' as an abbreviation for 'homosexual' as a noun, but elsewhere insists that the first syllable of 'homosexual' should rhyme with 'Tom'. Has anyone anywhere ever referred to anyone as a 'hommo' with a straight (so to speak) face?

Matthew, "practising" is wrong, or at least secondary, in the United States. "Practicing" is definitely NOT wrong, as you suggest. Similarly, the pronunciation you mention is British, not American. And you're misunderstanding it; just because the first syllable of "homosexual" rhymes with "Tom" in British English, that does not imply "hommo" -- an abbreviated usage which would never occur to a Brit. Poofter, maybe.

I agree to stop writing "practicing homosexual" as soon as the MSM and the Stranger's staff (are you reading this ECB?) stop using "wheelchair bound." I'm looking in the mirror, and guess what, no ropes or chains.

When I was in college, back in the late 80s, I would get in trouble if I used the term "gay" to everyone who liked those of their own gender. Because gay just applied to men, and was disempowering of women. Or womyn. I had to say "gays and lesbians." Then of course along came GLBT as an adjective.

I sort of thought the whole language war thing was long over. Guess not.

I think everyone is overstating the implications of "practicing homosexual." It's not a matter of equating it to a cult or a game, it's simply distinguishing between people who are gay and engage in sexual activity with members of their sex, and people who are gay but choose to be celebate or engage in differently-gendered sex they're not particularly interested in. Are there better terms for this? The distinction is becoming less relevant as it becomes more "okay" to be gay, but it still exists.

Also, law and medicine are also things one "practices", not just witchcraft or sports. Why assume a negative connotation of the word?

I thought "wheelchair bound" meant "headed towards one", as in "that idiot skateboarding on the edge of that roof is wheelchair bound".

Man, Homosexual is too many syllables anyway. I get tired halfway through it. I like Dan's "Mo", because I can just put my lips together and exhale without any of that fancy enunciating.

I've actually liked the word "homosexual". Etymoligically its as benign as "heterosexual". Just the logic of greek words strung together. Neutral really. Of course I understand that connotatively that word has been dragged through the mud, and I can understand if gay people wouldn't like being called it. Needless to say I don't call my gay friends that.

But imagine destigmatizing the word that our enemies still enjoy using? Some science articles defending the normalness of gayness use the h-word and I think they owe that. After all, science used it in the wrong way, now they can use it in the right way.

Homosexuality is beautiful and heaven's miracle and wonder. It enhances my heterosexuality and heterosexuality everywhere. We are brothers.

I don't get it. why is the word homosexual offensive? is heterosexual offensive (you use quite a lot!!!)?
it only means 'same sex partners', like heterosexual means you like sexual partners that aren't your same sex. is that offensive?
explain!

The issue with "practicing" is that you don't "practice" who you are. You don't call someone s "practicing" African-American or a "practicing" left handed person. Nor do you ever hear about "practicing" heterosexuals.

The better way to do it is to describe someone as sexually active... It works both ways - you could be a "sexually active" hetrosexual or a "sexually active" homosexual or lesbian. See? Easy. As Dan says, it's not a huge deal - but it is something. Because it assumes that the "practice" of homosexuality is sex - rather than say, love or affinity.

In other anal sex news - how about the article">http://www.shakesville.com/2007/07/stroke-your-mans-ego-give-up-teh-butt">article in Details about how anal sex is a badge of honor for straight guys. Charming.

I don't get it either. I'm sure straight people refer to themselves as "straight" more often than "heterosexual" as well, I personally prefer to say "bisexual" rather than "bi," I don't see anything wrong with using "homosexual" in a more professional field like journalism to describe the gay community. "Gay" just seems a bit more...casual?

It's just like saying "african american" instead of "black."
"Practicing" homosexual is just a kinda weird and poor choice of words. But I don't find it offensive, certainly.

I asked the public editor at the NYT about this, and here's the response I got from Andrew Rosenthal, the editor of the editorial page:

The point was to express Holsinger's views with as much precision as
possible. His claim, and that of his church, is that they have no objection
people being gay, as long as they don't have sex with others of the same
gender. This is doctrtne in many religions and we may think it's a
distinction utterly without a difference, but if we had said he objects to "homosexuals" or "gay men" then he could have said, "No, that's wrong factually."

And he never said in his paper that being gay is dangerous. He said
having anal sex is dangerous, specificallly for men who have it with other
men.

To the writer, yes, it's awkward and unsatisfactory, but in fact what
is at issue here is the activity, not the orientation. At least in the mind of
Dr. Holsinger. And yes, in this context, you'd have to say "practicing
heterosexual."

Perhaps it would be better to say, "Gay men who are sexually active,"
but then that's not even right. "We'd have to say, gay men who engage in
anal sex with other men."

The sad fact is that our language is not subtle enough for this sort of
nuance.

I think it's more than a little dumb to take the term "homosexual" as an ephithet, because uhm...Heterosexual would then have to be an insult also.
And I don't even get why people consider words like "oriental" insulting...They're fucking technical, people, get over it. It's what words mean, not how their said, that we're fighting over, anyway.
Someone for whom the term "homosexual" has a negative connotation, isn't going to suddenly feel like "Oh that's wonderful!" at their associations with the word "gay", because it still means men fucking other men in the ass to them, et al.

First, #34, "oriental" is now taken to be insulting because it means from the east. East of what? East of Europe, center of white people's civilization, of course. It suggests that people from Asia only have meaning in relation to Europeans and their descendants (although one must admit that Asia is west of North America).

OK, I know that PC objection, but I'm taking this opportunity to ask about LGBTQIA. What, pray tell, is the difference between a queer and a lesbian or gay man? I always thought I was hip, but I guess I've been living away from Seattle too long.

I never really got how "gay" came to mean men only, anyway. When my friend came out to me in the early 80s, she said she was gay (duh, like we didn't already know that--she was geared up for some hate, and we all just shrugged. Poor thing. What an anticlimax.). I'm against having to label everyone, but if we're going to, why can't it just be GBTIA?