When I was 12, I joined the school talent contest. One of our school teachers decided to put on a 6th grade dance routine. She recruited boys and girls and then choreographed their dances. I excitedly joined because I love to dance! All my friends were in the dance too. I was so excited. Little by little, the boys started dropping out……until I was the last boy in the dance. I went to Mrs. Shady and told her I was going to drop out. She nearly cried and told me not to leave and that I had talent and that she was proud of me for staying even though the other boys left. I decided to stay.

So she decides to give me a solo dance. I was scared but I agreed to do it. There I was in a crowd of girls. She had us line up in 5 lines and each line would step down from the bleachers and do their dance. I was in the last line. I was in the middle of 4 girls…..2 girls, me, then 2 more girls. After we did our dance I stepped out and did my solo to “Superfreak” of all songs. As I was out there strutting my stuff some of the boys in the front of the audience were calling me faggot, in English and Spanish. Some of the boys tried spitting on me as well. Even though I wanted to run off that stage, I stuck it out and did the dance all the way through. Once the number ended I ran and hid behind a curtain and cried. I was so embarrassed. All my family was there. I was so humiliated that they saw those boys being mean to me. I was so ashamed.

Then one of my best friends, her name was Carolyn Rodriguez, she found me behind the curtain and asked me why I was crying. I told her I was embarrassed because the boys were being mean to me. She hugged me and told me that the crowd was cheering me. She persuaded me to come out and I walked out to the stage with her. When the crowd saw me they gave me a standing ovation. They cheered so loudly, for minutes. The teacher came over and hugged me and had me do a bow to which the crowd thundered with applause and praise. That was the one of the most humiliating and the most proud days of my life.

Just the other day my mother and I talked about this experience for the first time, this happened over 20 years ago... When my mother and I talked about that dance, we both got a piece of the puzzle we'd never had before. Our reactions to it. As disappointing as it is for her to have a gay son (she's religious), I know she loves me. She explained that she went crazy on the boys after I had ran away and that parents, teachers and even the principal were trying to calm her down and were acting as if she was the one with the problem. She told the parents that they should be ashamed to allow their sons to treat me the way they did, especially since I had more guts than they did to stay in the dance. She called them all on it. It made me proud to know that even in all her disappointment in my “sinful” nature, that she saw me first and foremost that day as her child who needed to be protected.

I explained to her what happened once we got back to class. Back then I didn't know it, but looking back now I realize that my 6th grade teacher was gay. Some of the boys who spat at me and called me names were in my class. I remember walking into class and just putting my head down between my arms and just crying. One of the little girls came over and hugged me and tried to make me feel better. The teacher literally flipped out on the class. He was so angry at the way some of them treated me. And he defended me like a mother cat defends her kittens against the attacks of a dog. He put the fear of God in those boys he was so angry. I did get appologies from the boys and even a couple of them cried they were so scared about my teachers reaction.


This leads me to point out the most serious flaw in societies approach to us as gay people. People claim it is the sex act that they are concerned about. Somehow the sex act is threatening marriage and the family. Somehow the sex act jeopardizes society itself. Every institution is subject to ruin because of it...at least that's how some people act about it. The sex act is threatening our very souls. Yet it isn’t the sex act that people use as a gauge in persecuting us. When I was 12, I had never had sex, yet people tried spitting on me and called me names. Many parents saw nothing wrong with that, certainly not wrong enough to admit that their children were wrong when my mother defended me. As someone who has made it through many horrors in my childhood, I am here always to fight for my rights and those of my brothers and sisters. There are many straight people in this army as well. I'm sure there are a lot of people out there that never thought we'd fight back. We do, and we always will.

This lyric from Pink's song 18 wheeler is my theme song in this life:

"You can push me out the window, I'll just get back up. You can run over me with your 18 wheeler truck and I won't give up. You can make me like a slave, I'll go underground. You can run over me with your 18 wheeler bus, you can't keep me down."

Peace,
Supa

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[This message was edited Thu Jan 8 11:29:57 PST 2004 by SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy]

Wrong Forum!

AMAZING!

2the9s said:

Is it? I thought about putting this in politics and religion but then had second thoughts...

you brat!

SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy said:

I know. I saw!

SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy said:

So there's a spare thread going in the Politics forum! Can I have it?

Wow. Thanks for sharing that with us. Always amazed!!!

kids are cruel.

little shits.

You just gave me chills, sweetie...

I think you should copy and paste this and send it to a magazine for publishing...seriously.

(Oh, and know I love you )

coqui said:

yeah, and some never outgrow it. sad.

madartista said:

hmmm... how should i take that?

cruelty and blunt honesty are two different things.


but enough threadjacking. back to Supa's story...

coqui said:

there will be no misunderstandings here. I believe Mady was just pointing out the true fact that some people never do grow out of that kind of behavior. I'm positive it was not directed at you.

Oh, I know how you bitches can scratch!

I love that my gay and lesbian friends helped to pave the way for the younger gay and lesbian people.

I also adore the way Supa is aggressively gay.

SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy said:

Correct assessment. I should have been more clear. Sorry for the confusion, coqui.

Supa, thats Supa. A lot of women feel like that ya know.
We won't give up and we won't give in



Appelkisses is right, it's good enough to get published

What a moving story. What's saddest, though, is that we can appreciate this sort of thing if the story involves children, but somehow the very basic precepts of human respect get lost as we get older and our worldviews supposedly become more "sophisticated."

We could learn alot from watching kids.
[This message was edited Thu Jan 8 12:39:40 PST 2004 by Lammastide]

Supa, this really touched me.

You are a beautiful person.

Thanks for sharing this.

Lammastide said:

And teaching them to treat each other with respect and not support things like calling names and spitting. Not one of those parents reacted as their own children tried spittng on me. Thankfully I dodged the lugies but I am just amazed that the parents, teachers and even the principal took issue with my mother rather than address the horrid kids who were bullying me. To give you a sense of my stature, I was 65 pounds going into highschool. Certainly not big enough to defend myself physically in any situation.

You know, I can absolutely understand how "Columbines" happen. I was so mistreated that I would have loved to kill some of those people that tortured me. But that's not in me. I always turned to music as my escape, this is the reason Prince and his music is so important to me. When I was out in the world facing these kinds of horrors, I had my own world I could escape to all by myself in my room. Play my favorite artists songs and dance dance dance. That kept me alive when all I wanted to do was die...

SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy said:

Thankyou for sharing your moving story Supa. You overcame obstacles that might have defeated another, it's a testament to your admirable strength of character.


.....
[This message was edited Thu Jan 8 13:09:27 PST 2004 by Lleena]

I can't say I am sorry that it happened to you. Many similar experiences have I had. As a child I had severe exema. Most interestingly I don't even have a scar on my skin to show for it. I experienced a lot of cruelty behind it. It made me the strong centered compassionate person I am. I have always known that beauty and its trappings are fleeting and full of falsehood. I am in the beauty industry and LOVE being girl through and through but I in no way define myself by it. It is just great fun. I never have seen people as others do as a result of my experiences. It COULD have triggered many a bad thing within me but instead it brought out just the character traits God wanted. I am Thankful for that.

I have had the honor of interacting with you in person. I believe that through adversity you became the strong, able, solid person you are today. Those boys may have had similar lessons and missed them. There cruelty may have raised them up and they are great people today. I can't know. What I do know is you are well grounded and most beautiful of heart and soul.

madartista said:

No biggie. Im used to that assessment being thrown my way.

I wouldnt be mad at ya even if it was directed at me!

I'm a nice guy!

Muse2NOPharaoh said:

What an interesting way of looking at this.

Lammastide said:

I quite agree with her actually. It's kind of like purification by the fire. Instead of suppressing my heart and my love, those experience only sharpened them like weapons. The kind of weapons that are needed in this world.

Lammastide said:

That is interesting, and I understand where it comes from. I am sorry that we experience pain to become who we are. I know it makes us stronger, but I don't believe that was truly how the Creator wanted us to find ourselves.

As a kid, I had many similar experiences. I was never into sports, but loved theater, choir and books (not JUST comics, folks). For this, I was often called "faggot" and things of this nature. Now, steroetypically, many of my interest are deemed by soceity to be "gay", which is nonsense of course, but people in this soceity seem to think you're less of a man if you don't like Football and all that crap.

Maybe this is why I've always gotten along so well with gays, and other such "misfits" (as branded by soceity, not me). I know a bit about the persecution that a gay person feels (even though there is no way that I will ever know it 100%. I did turn out to like girls after all, much to the relief of my nutty parents, so I can never fully know how badly many have been treated, but I do know something about it). I've tasted persecution, and I don't like the flavour one bit.

I think that may be what attracted many people to Prince in the beginning. he was a straight man who wore eyeliner and high heels. he rejected labels and societal expectations, and made people feel accepted regardless of their race, color, religion, gender or sexual preference. He may not be entirely like that now, but I will always respect the man for taking this stance.

Thank you, Supa, for sharing this story. Just know that you have another straight man in your "army".


_____
[This message was edited Thu Jan 8 13:28:49 PST 2004 by JediMaster]

madartista said:

To that truth I agree. However, in a world of good and evil I do believe he loved us enough to give us exactly what we need to get through. Most certainly he didn't want for many things we both choose and were done to us but I am thankful for the tools and lessons that have brought me through and the choices I have made. I doubt I would be the person I am had adversity not taught me so much. I will except adversity as a teacher. I see the end result is a life I can stand. I have seen as well were those that did not choose to learn from the adversity in their lives a unfavorable result.

AWESOME story, Supa. Thanks for sharing