The Gay Blade

One of my oldest friends, Paul, in Sydney, sent me an invite to his 50th. Luckily I was able to go. But 50! I can remember going to friends' 21sts, 30ths, 40ths but this is the first 50th I've been asked to. And my own 50th is a few years off yet, but I am looking forward to it. I guess the oldest gay friend I have is in his 70s, and the youngest in his teens: I enjoy having that range of people and views in life. But it made me think about how long we've known each other - it'll be about 30 years now. We met when we were both going to Auckland Uni, he was a couple of years ahead of me. He was flatting up the road from my family home, and I can't quite remember now how we met. All I know is he forms part of a core group of my dearest and oldest friends. When we meet up again it's always just so easy and warm and funny and joyful. He's a great guy. 30 years is along time to know someone, especially from our generation when so many of us died so young. We'...

I was talking with various friends the other night in the bar, and the topic of abuse and violence in gay relationships came up. I was amazed at how widespread it is. Some guys viewed it as an inevitable part of men being together, and not too damaging. Others were less sanguine about it. For me, violence in a relationship would equal the automatic end of it. It's over. Locks changed. Police called. It's just not acceptable for me. And then later this week I was talking with someone else and he told me of being in a violent realtionship when he was younger. I still just have this visceral reaction - you leave if he hits you - it's that simple. Easy to say I know, but I think that's how I'd react. But violence and abuse can take many forms, it doesn't just have to be physical. Emotional and mental violence, manipulation, guilt, insults and undermining can also be powerfully aggressive ways to attack the person you're with, the person you're supposed to l...

I was having "the talk" with a young gay man recently. Trying to make sure he looked after himself, explaining about how HIV works, how much it sucks to have it etc, and after a bit he said to me: "But you've had it for years and you're fine!" It was one of those moments, when you think "Arggghhh!" Yes, I am living well. Yes, compared to where I was 10 - 15 years ago, I feel like the Six Million Dollar Man. I never thought I'd be alive at this stage of my life, and neither did my Drs. In the mid 90s I nearly died. I was in and out of hospital with PCP and other nasty conditions. My body weight dropped down to 50 kgs and I'm in the mid 80s now, where I should be. I can remember one of the worst nights in hospital when they were trying to get my temperature down, and I had my hands in basins of ice water, a fan blowing chilled air over me. I was delirious. I couldn't get out of bed to shit. I couldn't move. I was weak, powerless, and ...

Young men often do not realise the dazzling power of their beauty, of a smile, or of a forearm carelessly draped on a thigh. Possessed of such unwitting power, I can’t help but admire it. I once had it. I didn’t know I had it though. I doubt they do either. I would love to fuck Robert Downey Jr. And Sean Penn. Or get them to fuck me. Getting spit-roasted is always fun. I’ve been thinking about the punk/disco wars in Auckland of the late 70s, early 80s a bit. It was a real mark of who you were, how you saw yourself, depending on what look you took, what music you listened to. I remember Ruff (RIP – burnt to death in a fire in London rescuing her Chanel suits -seriously) going to a concert in just a black garbage bag, torn fishnets and black stilettos, and lots of makeup. I wore makeup, eye shadow streaked on my cheek, and my hair was high and hard. There were fights outside Babes, one of the main discos, in Eliot St? I can’t remember. We sneered at Billy Idol for being a fake punk. We ...

I seem to have rediscovered dancing. It’s something I used to do so much, when I was young (er?) . I could spend hours on the floor, working up a sweat, just letting rip and having a great time with friends and strangers. But then, as I got older, I seemed to have less interest in it. I’d stand around the walls and watch other men dance. I’m not quite sure why that happened. But I seem to be back into it. And lets face it, dancing is a lot like sex with (some of) your clothes on, so while I have been having sex, it was puzzling me a little that I wasn’t dancing in the way I used to. Was I too old? Too unfit? Too ugly to hang out with the shirtless gods on the floor? I remember going to dances at Auckland Uni in 1979 when I was 18. We’d have a room at the top floor of the student union, where Shadows is now I think, and someone would bring in a stereo from home (seriously) and others would bring records, and we’d dance happily thinking it was just great. The unsophisticated fun...

here’s a an episode of The Simpsons when a Gay Pride parade goes by and the marchers chant “We’re here, we’re queer! Get used to it!” and Lisa shouts back “We are used to it! You do this every year!” The entire “Pride” concept is simply dated - it’s too last century, too 80s, too pre Law Reform. The choice of this name for the replacement committee for Hero really makes me wonder what they think they are doing. If the Hero brand is now poison, as it seems to be, then just what makes anyone think that “Pride” is going to be all fresh and new? “Pride” was never a big movement in Auckland in the past - there used to be those sad little “coming out” marches down Ponsonby Rd in the 90s - and really, could you find anywhere less offensive to gay pride than Ponsonby Rd? The Pride Centre - a debacle, and also a concept rooted in the politics of 30 years ago. Have you seen the logo ? It is simply embarrassing. It’s tired, cliched, yawningly unoriginal and dull. Which is most likely what this...

So we have a new government. Democracy in action, messy, imperfect, but it still beats all the alternatives (except for me being Dictator of the World!). We now have openly gay and lesbian MPs all across the Parliament, from the Greens to National. Not quite every party, but all the biggest ones. Even our Attorney-General, a National MP, is an out gay man. What I find both bizarre and wonderful is that no-one has commented on his sexuality. Have we perverts become so mainstream now that when a right-wing Government appoints an open homo to one of the most important positions in Parliament there is no response? And what does this signal? What does it mean for us? In some ways, it is the culmination of what “we” fought for – the right to be accepted for who we are as full and equal human beings, regardless of our sexuality. In other ways, it the opposite. Let me explain. There have basically been two streams to the movement for our rights over the last 100 years or so. The one w...