Features
This week 25 years ago: Homosexuals Share Experiences
By Jane Degenhardt
April 14, 2016
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A student and faculty member spoke about their personal experiences as homosexuals at Hamilton Wednesday night in Dwight Lounge. Their presentations and the discussion that followed comprised the third and final part of the series “Same Sex Love and Society.”
Mark Thompson, Psychological Counselor/Coordinator of Training and Programming and a representative for the Committee to Extend Human Rights [CEHR], which sponsored the series, introduced the speakers Wednesday night and recapped the previous two events.
Thompson said that the committee had hoped to solicit speakers representing the Hamilton staff and administration, as well as the student body and faculty, but that many homosexual employees of the College feared their appearance would lead to negative repercussions.
Pam Allen, Visiting Assistant Professor of German, spoke first, commenting on her disapproval of “tags,” which separate and exclude people. She said the stigma attached to homosexuality in society could be undermined if all people focused on their common humanity.
“In talking about humanity, I think it’s important to celebrate difference,” she added. “Not just tolerate it, but celebrate it heartily.”
Allen went in to speak about some of the myths society promotes about homosexual people. “Many well-intentioned people [mistakenly] think gayness is a result of a troubled childhood or something in the genes that went haywire,” she observed.
She said sometimes homosexuality is a “choice”—based on political convictions, physical pleasure, or emotional feelings—and sometimes it is not a choice. Allen maintained that, above all, “Gays are not sad about their gayness.”
Next, Allen focused on the difficulty a gay person faces in first acknowledging his or her own gayness and the “invisibility” that threatens to swallow up his or her identity. Reflecting on her own experience, Allen remarked that “coming out” had been relatively easy for her and that she had never suffered any overt prejudice.
She said she had spent a large portion of her life having a “non-sexual” orientation, then a five-year period during which she was heterosexually oriented, and most recently a second five-year period in which she has been homosexually oriented.
“Invisibility,” Allen said, could either be self-imposed, or inflicted by society on a gay person. The type that is inflicted by society is usually not “intentional or malicious,” but rather a result of the infamous “heterosexual assumption”—the assumption that everyone is heterosexual and that all normal people are married or want to be.
This heterosexual assumption often manifests itself subtly in society, for example in language or casual written communication.
Chris Banks ’91 began his presentation by stating that one out of 10 people are gay or lesbian, yet only one or two homosexuals have “come out” at Hamilton. “Where are the other 159?” he asked.
Banks, who is the president of the Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Alliance [GLBSA], directed his speech mostly towards encouraging other homosexual students to make their sexual orientation public. Remaining “in the closet,” he said, does harm to both the gay individuals and the rest of the community. He asked, “If we don’t respect ourselves, how can we expect others to respect us?”
Indicating that the community at large must also change to make Hamilton a more comfortable place for homosexuals, Banks said there was a need for people to change their way of thinking. “When you think of your world, know it’s not the end-all and be-all,” he suggested. “There are other perspectives to take into account.”
Both Banks and Allen agreed that one of the first steps toward a more accepting Hamilton community was for homosexuals to assert themselves more freely and openly. “If we all come out, people won’t think we’re all bizarre,” said Banks. He maintained that he had never been “harassed” because he always made his homosexuality seem normal, thus “taking the power away” from potential oppressors.
Bank’s experience as a homosexual differs from that of Allen in that he has never known a time when he was “straight.” His initial feeling that homosexuality was natural and comfortable has enabled him to speak confidently in the public eye, openly challenging those who spread ignorance, including Dr. Ruth Westheimer. Banks said he corrected Dr. Ruth on the air for saying that homosexuality could be “cured” when he was a first-year student.
But his position in the community as an informer and authority on all homosexual issues has been tiring. Banks wishes there were more homosexuals willing to stand up with him. He sympathized with their hesitancy, saying, “To come out, particularly in a place where there are very few gay people out, is absolute hell,” but said that “coming out” was necessary. “We have to make it a central issue before it can become a non-issue,” he remarked.
The discussion that followed addressed many concerns and at times became heated. One of the issues brought up was the debate over Hamilton’s discrimination disclaimer, which says that the College does not discriminate on the basis of race, sex, or religion, but does not mention sexual orientation.
Other issues that were discussed include “coming out” to one’s family, the curriculum, the prospects of a stronger support system for homosexuals, and the observation that attitudes voiced in the privacy of residence halls may not comply with those voiced in the classroom.
A recent display of possible homophobia, which entailed posters advertising a band with the slogan, “We’re not queer,” was also referred to throughout the discussions.