“I do not have a problem with guys who sound gay. I actually like the gay voice. I mean… I like like it. I think gay voices are sexy. (I could binge watch an entire season of Project Runway with my eyes closed and still enjoy it.) I could blame my preference for gay voices on lousy gaydar—”gay accents help me spot other gay men!”—but my gaydar is excellent. The real reason gay voices and other overt manifestations of gayness appeal to me, I think, is because they’re so paradoxically masculine. The only openly gay kid at my Catholic high school in the early 1980s would roller skate into school every morning wearing satin short-shorts and a mesh tank top. He wasn’t afraid of the homophobic jocks at St. Greg’s. The jocks were afraid of him. I wanted to be him,” – Dan Savage.
I had a similar role model back in high school. He was a few years ahead of me, and his name was Johnny. At some point, Johnny started wearing make-up to my all-boys school, along with a pretty impressive pseudo-afro with his curly mope of hair. Eye-liner, lipstick, mascara, the whole nine gay yards.
He was constrained to some extent, since we all wore uniforms – cap, jacket, school tie, gray pants, black shoes. Then halfway through my time, the school went co-ed, and they introduced a school uniform for girls. Sure enough, the next day Johnny showed up in a charcoal skirt, with his hair like something out of, well, Hair. He used to catch the same public bus as I did on the way to school and I remember being in awe of his courage. But he carried it off with ease. And, as with Dan, the other boys – in a rowdy rugby-worshiping place – never took the bait. There was a steely self-confidence, an aura of aplomb, that simply disarmed those who might have wanted to bully him. Yes, they were a little bit afraid of his giant, pendulous balls.
Johnny died of AIDS in his twenties. He lives forever in my heart.
The Dish 