Think Before You Speak

I have been known to say whatever comes to my mind whenever I want to say it. I think of myself as a much younger, male, gay, Sophia from The Golden Girls, who had a stroke and lost that part of the brain that censors speech. Sometimes I say it for a joke, and sometimes I say it for shock value. Sometimes I hurt people's feelings because I speak before I think, and that's a work in progress to fix; I try counting to three, but I get to about one-and-three-quarters and BAM out it comes.

But, and this is a big but, though not as big as a Christina Aguilera butt--see what I mean?--I am not a public figure, so when I say something obtuse, obscene, slightly funny, highly hilarious, or, yes, rude, it rarely makes the papers, and only makes the blogs if I post it myself.

So, it got me to thinking, why don't people in public positions think before they speak?

Exhibit A, at least for these last few months, would have to be Mitt Romney. I mean, he went to London and insulted an entire country. He regularly insults anyone who doesn't qualify as rich, and then says the most illogical things about opening windows on airplanes.

A breath, please, Mittsy, and maybe you wouldn't be the King of Gaffes this election season.

Still, not to be outdone would be one Ann Romney, pretentious "let them eat cake" wife of Mitt. First, she basically told all of us who question her husband to shut up, by telling us that “you people" aren't going to see Mitts taxes. Then she asked us to stop picking on her husband because running for president is hard--like being president is a cake walk--and then, and this astounds me, she told us that, while she believes Mittsy is the best man to fix the economy, she's worried about his "mental well-being" if elected.

Excuse me? Did you just say that your husband is the best man for the job, but that he's also kinda emotionally and stuff? Yeah, Ann, that's the guy I want with one finger on the button.

But that's politics, and they all say things without speaking, or as Obama said, of Mittsy, we "shoot first and aim later."

This brings me to Rupert Everett.

Years ago I rented a movie called Dance With A Stranger and I fell in lust with the dazzling Everett. I scoured the video store shelves--this was the century before NetFlix and OnDemand and computers and stuff--for anything with Rupert. That's where I found Rupert playing gay in Another Country, and that's when I learned that Rupert was gay in real life.

And my lust deepened. I liked that he was open and honest about who he was; it made me realize that coming out is and always will be the best thing a gay man or woman can do for themselves. But then Rupert, off-screen, without a script, began speaking, or shooting first....

He said gay actors should never come out of the closet because they'll never get work, even though, after coming out in 1987, Everett has almost never stopped working. Sure, maybe his career didn't explode--even after playing gay opposite Julia and Madonna--but maybe that's nothing to with his being openly gay. Maybe that's something to do with his talent, his ego, and his choices. He turned down a role in A Room With A View that made Daniel Day-Lewis a household name--at least in my house.

So, being gay doesn’t affect your career; I mean, maybe it would have in 1987, or even in the 90s, but definitely not these days. Case in point: husband-in-my-head, Matt Bomer, who is openly gay--he's got a partner of several years and three children-and yet has a very successful cable show and even played a male stripper, in a woman’s club, in the movies. he doesn’t seem to be suffering in his career because he's gay.

But Rupert doesn't stop. Lately he's been saying things about gay parents and same-sex marriage. He said, before he clarified, retracted and then re-clarified, that he doesn't think a child should have two same-sex parents, that they are better off with Mom and Dad.

And he doesn't like the idea of gays getting married, either, because, it’s a straight thing.

Well, Rupert, the light of my crush has been thoroughly extinguished, thanks to your inability to think before you speak, and your recent need for Botox by the barrel.

Rupert said: 

"For me, being gay was about wanting to do the opposite of the straight world, so I think that's where my problems in this particular area come from. For me, personally, the last thing I would like in the entire world would be to go through cocktailing my sperm with my boyfriend and finding some grim couple in Ohio who are gluten-free and who you pay $75,000 to have your baby. To me it feels absolutely hideous. But that's me, just me. I'm not having a go at gay couples who do. I think if Elton and David want to have babies, that's wonderful. I think we should all do what we want. Isn't there a middle way, where you can just say, 'Not for me, but it doesn't matter'? But no, everything's sort of turned into al-Qaida. I'm sure I'm going to be nail-bombed. David Furnish is probably going to send Patrick Cox with a bomb and blow up the theatre."

No, Rupert, he won't, because you're allowed to think what you want, just exactly like straight people, You're allowed to choose to cocktail your sperm, or not, like straight people. You're allowed to be a parent, or not, want a child, or not. That's what gay people want: equality. And you can, as a gay man, as part of a couple, or as a single man, choose, not to have children. No one’s saying you can’t, they’re simply saying you have the right to choose to be a parent, or not.

Not children--for all of us--and not marriage....Everett on marriage: 

"Why do queens want to go and get married in churches? Obviously this crusty old pathetic, Anglican church – the most joke-ish church of all jokey churches – of course they don't want to have queens getting married. It's kind of understandable that they don't; they're crusty old calcified freaks. But why do we want to get married in churches? I don't understand that, myself, personally. I loathe heterosexual weddings; I would never go to a wedding in my life. I loathe the flowers, I loathe the fucking wedding dress, the little bridal tiara. It's grotesque. It's just hideous. The wedding cake, the party, the champagne, the inevitable divorce two years later. It's just a waste of time in the heterosexual world, and in the homosexual world I find it personally beyond tragic that we want to ape this institution that is so clearly a disaster."

First off, not all marriages end in disaster, and if you want to stop the 50% that do, then let’s talk about divorce.  It’s not tragic to declare your love and commitment to one person; it’s love.

And, while I wouldn’t count myself among them, some gay folks want to get married in a church because they have a faith they want represented in their ceremony; they have a belief that, in God's eyes, the Goddess' eyes, that we are all equal and have the same rights to be married. Or not.

You don't want to get married, Rupert, because you think it's a little too straight, then don’t get married. You have that right. And, married or not, if you choose to have children, or not, again, that's your right. But don’t denigrate the institution of marriage for anyone that wants it, and don't downplay the role of gay men or women as parents.

Being a parent is about loving and nurturing a child, and anyone who wants to do that, who has the capability to do that, should be able to do that.

Being married is about making a long-term commitment to another person, and if you choose not to make that commitment, then don't make it. But don't put down those of us who'd like to be able say, "This is my husband, Carlos."