What constitutes gay?

So yesterday I was watching the movie “The Longest Yard” again…B-movie featuring Adam Sandler as a point-shaving quarterback who goes to jail and then takes a bunch of inmates and makes them into a football team to play the guards. Anyhow, that isn’t the point…while watching the movie, I remembered a debate my friends and I had, and I wanted to bring the question we debated to you: what constitutes gay?

The reason that this movie brought that back that conversation was that in this movie there are some men who are the ‘girls’ of the jail – dress up in women’s clothing, perform sexual acts on the other inmates etc – and there is a humorous scene where you see one of the inmates kisses another. Anyhow, during our conversation one of my friends said that anyone who engages in a homosexual act is gay. So, I asked, would this make those men in jail who get sexual acts performed upon them by other men gay?

Does a lone act of homosexuality mean you are gay? Yes? No? If not, then where is the line, if there is a line, drawn? 5? 10? And if yes, is the definition different for men and women? I know a number of girls who have made out with other girls, but no one calls them gay. Why? Is it because they are doing it to mess with the heads (no pun intended) of the surrounding males, stimulating the fantasy of being with two women at once, and thus, because they are doing to tease and not for pleasure, they are not gay? Or is it because society is more lax when it comes to women (if two men did that would the reaction be the same)?

Or is being gay a frame of mind? The dictionary says that being gay (homosexual) means “Of, relating to, or having a sexual orientation to persons of the same sex”. So, if we take that to be general definition, then what do you tell my friend is the sexual orientation of those prisoners that have sex, oral or anal, with other prisoners? Are they gay, or simply out of loneliness/desperation/desire, have resorted to same-sex experiences?

Just some random questions I thought I would boil down into a post…Any thoughts?

Cheers,
Taps

What decides?

The following post is somewhat verbose and not relevant to any current topic…I apologize ahead of time for any pointless ramblings that take place… 

While having some drinks this past Friday night with some buddies of mine, we got into a discussion not typical of your standard bar conversation. Now, although the conversation might have started due to the alcoholic ramblings of how relaxed we all were that night, glad to be there together, it evolved into an in depth discussion about life and each of our places in the world. While one of my friends was talking about how glad he was that he had met us all etc. etc. (you know the conversation…everyone who has consumed alcohol in excess has been a part of one), one of my friends (who turned out to be extremely deep and philosophical when plastered) asked, “What decided that we would all be here together, sitting in Hong Kong, drinking beers together? Who decided that we would all meet and become friends?” This led into a discussion about faith vs. fate and raised the ultimate question, the question that I now bring to you and ask you to comment on your thoughts: What decides?

What decides? Answering this question is like counting the number of chairs in a stadium one-by-one…no matter how hard you try, you will never get the same answer twice…the quest towards ultimate truth has often been derailed by this idea of what decides the things that happen on a daily basis. Some say we decide our own lives. Who decided that we would be born? Our parents did you may say. Who decided that our parents would meet and get married? Indians might say, “Their parents…” Non-Indians may say ”love” or “fate”. Do these concepts really exist? What decided that we would call them such things? That there would be opposites in the universe, black vs. white, tall vs. short, light vs. dark?

Was it a supernatural power, a higher being in some far off place called heaven? If so, what decided that he, she, it, whatever it is, would have supreme rule over life on this planet? Who is the the higher power’s boss that decides what the higher power does? 

In the end, each decision that is made is a decision subsequent to a previous decision that was made. But what makes that ultimate decision? Everything has a beginning…when was the first decision that was made?  A question that will not be answered in my lifetime, but a good one to talk about nonetheless. So next time you are at a bar, and have nothing to talk about it, ask the question: who decides? It makes for some great drunken banter, let me tell you..

Cheers,
Taps