Monday, May 26, 2008

An Unlikely Comparison

As The Wife and I were in bed the other night, drifting off to sleep and talking about random things, we had a conversation that went something like this.

The Wife: Did you see that Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi are getting married?
G.B.H. Hornswoggler: You mean, now that gay marriage is legal in California?
TW: Yes.
(digression on the charms of Ms. DiRossi, with particular reference to the film Sirens, suppressed)
GBHH: So is Portia going to go straight afterwards, too?
TW: You mean like Anne Heche? Why would you think that? Just because Anne went back and forth doesn't mean it would happen again.
GBHH: I guess, but it seems like that's how it happens in Hollywood.
(and then somehow we got to this comparison, which only a mother would make)
TW: But if someone's never had a gay relationship, how would they know if they're really gay or not? Maybe they'd like it, but they don't know, since they never tried it.
GBHH: You mean that being gay is like eating vegetables? "How can you say you don't like it if you've never even tried it?"
TW: Right, yeah -- if you've never done it, you don't know if you like it or not.
GBHH: I guess that's fair, actually. Gay sex is the Brussels Sprouts of the adult world...

Seeing as this weekend was Wiscon, I thought that a strangely appropriate blog-topic right now. Though I guess I should also point out that I mostly don't like eating vegetables, even the ones I've never tried...

Update: I forgot the last part...

GBHH: I think I have to blog this.
TW: Don't mention me!
GBHH: What, I should say "so I was in bed with this woman whose name I can't divulge"? Would that be better?
TW: I guess not...

3 comments:

Cheryl said...

I'll take that as a valid comparison if you can point me at parts of the world where you can still be fired from your job, jailed, or even executed for liking Brussel Sprouts.

Robert Hutchinson said...

Cheryl: Really?

. . . really?

I guess it's not possible for any lighthearted conversation or joke to be about homosexuality, then. Because you'd have a hard time finding a less offensive context that the one provided in this post.

Cheryl said...

Oh, I'm not offended Robert. And I know Mr. Hornswoggler pretty well, so I'm sure he didn't intend to offend. But when I read his post it reminded me how lucky we are to live in a society in which we can treat homosexuality as something you can just try, the same way you would try a new vegetable. The whole political argument about whether homosexuality is a choice or not is deeply corrosive, and to have got beyond the point where we need to argue it is a Very Good Thing.

But it is still a good thing that isn't even available to people throughout the US, or throughout Europe. The Californian court decision that the original post is going to come under sustained attack over the next few months. So I guess I wanted to remind people how good it is that we can make lighthearted conversation about such things, and how important it is that we keep it that way.

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