Separate But Equal?

The idea of gender wars dawned on me as I sat last weekend to watch one of the movies that was part of Reel Affirmations, the LGBT film festival in DC. A man took the podium to briefly introduce the movie. He said something to the effect of, “Enjoy the show, gentlemen.”

Here’s the problem. There was at least one woman in attendance, and she was sitting in my row. I looked over and she just laughed it off. It was easy to see that because the movie was male-dominated, the speaker assumed the audience was all gay men.

I could give the speaker grief, but who can blame him? Socially, LGBT men and women segregate themselves. It’s like we take great pains to create our distinct spaces and never the twain shall meet.

Reel Affirmations always supports this. How many times have we men looked through the festival guide and immediately skipped over films starring women? One year, I suggested a lesbian-themed movie to a friend while we were sitting in the audience waiting for another movie to start. He responded with a “Yuck!” and seemingly ignored the lesbian behind him who could have beaten him up with one hand tied behind her back. But many women are guilty, too. If it ain’t The L Word, they ain’t going!

To some degree, separation makes sense. I largely think of bars. After all, men and women want very different things. And yes, perhaps there are quirks and facets of gay male life that lesbians aren’t frankly interested in, and vice versa. I understand issues of interests and preferences

But that doesn’t explain why you’d be hard pressed to go to restaurants, movies, museums, almost anywhere, and see a group of gay men and women together. Most gay men I know – and I’m including myself – have few if any lesbian friends. And the same goes for gay women.

This shows that there is pervasive gender segregation in the LGBT community. My volunteer work, including the mixers my group sponsors, is really the only time I see everyone fraternizing. And even then, there’s not full integration. Often, many of the volunteer groups I join to help out a particular cause are 90-95% men. One time, I helped out at the Mautner Project just for a change in scenery.

Frankly, many gay men and women don’t care about this. But in my mind, separation can breed animosity, distrust and misunderstanding. Considering that we’re a persecuted minority, is it healthy for the genders to so willfully separate and refuse to integrate? Don’t we need to be, or at least feel, more united?

My theory is that a lot of us don’t start the gay journey determined to cut ourselves off from the other gender(s). But as we venture out to bars, clubs, and parties to create a social network, we tend to stick to a familiar path. If our social life foundation starts in a gender-exclusive environment, it probably doesn’t branch out too far from that. A lot of gay men, for example are just satisfied with other men and the requisite fag hags. If you mention lesbians, you get eye rolls or ugly faces.

I’m going to challenge myself to be more inclusive in my social circle. Just watching and thoroughly enjoying the new liberal star Rachel Maddow on MSNBC, I became an instant fan and found myself thinking, “I’d like to be friends with someone like that.”

But I also have to overcome attitudes. Just look how I started this column with the idea of “gender war.” I guess I assume gay men and women will be perpetually at odds.