There can be no question that we live in tumultuous times with a society seemingly on the cusp of widespread proliferation of the civil rights of the GLBT community.


Certainly the press and blogosphere is rife with daily news of the push and pull of issues such as gay marriage or civil unions. But fortunately this is not going to be one those diatribes. What has received far less attention it seems to this writer is a discourse about the inner lives of gay men or perhaps men in general and the fear and anxiety that pervades it.
We don’t like to talk about our fears, particularly in a city like New York where fear is smelt 10 blocks away, emanating through the garbage and the dog pee evaporating on a warm summer afternoon. Of course our fear manifests into a multitude of forms. There are our neuroses about our appearance, our bodies, friendships, careers and our relationships or more pertinently, the lack thereof. More importantly there exists a profound uncertainty about our place in society. In a culture that fetishizes success, power, invulnerability and all over fabulousness, where does the gay man fit in? Are we a tribe? Do we have something that we can call a collective culture? Do we even talk in depth about the common narratives of our lives beyond that which only concerns our own problems and insecurities?
Perhaps a problem that we face is the fact that as a minority, we exhibit such a high degree of heterogeneity, not only in terms of race, demographics and education but also the way in which we manifest our homosexuality. So beyond large unifying civil rights issues in which we face oppression from a common enemy, what else is relevant?


The process of growing up gay and coming out shapes us in ways that often lead us to treat others in our community with fear and disdain. We are men and to be a man who likes other men, one is necessarily forced to wade through a confusing morass in developing our sense of masculinity and identity and all the baggage that comes with that. It should be no surprise that this leads to highly adversarial outcomes. For instance, why is it that so many gay men treat what they deem feminine qualities or feminine acting men with such approbation more so that a large number of straight men? Why do so many gay men eschew or ignore the issues of women and race which echo the struggles and insecurities that we experience?
To put a lighter spin on what is no doubt a heavy and potentially intractable constellation of issues, one simply needs to look at the state of mens fashion. Or more accurately, the fashion that men -gay and straight – purchase and ultimately wear. To this observer, there are such a limited range of stories and characters that seem to exist on the catwalk and the sidewalk. It seems that fantasy, escapism and grandeur have become purely the providence of women and a small number of men who are deemed frivolous and invariably elicit ridicule. Women can be made to feel like warriors, or empresses or fantastical creatures, shamans, demons, ravens, nymphs and most pertinently, men. It not that men lack the ability to inhabit or share such accents but one can’t get the sense that something has been lost. The punk, the soldier, the businessman, the athlete and the dandy are all men seem to permit themselves to be. But yet there is such a richness to the history of dress that we need to begin to incorporate. We should not and cannot be afraid. And we most certainly need to divest ourselves from feeling ashamed or anxious about creating our own sense of masculinity and femininity and appreciate those who have the courage to dress for themselves and their imaginations. That must ultimately be a crucial aspect of a modern gay man. So we should pay attention to the avant-garde and the exquisite detailing and technical mastery that womenswear so often exhibits. It is not good enough for us to claim irrelevance or snobbery. The modern gay man sees beauty for what it is in all its various forms and he must unearth his imagination and cast off his inhibitions. To do so is a first step in truly releasing ourselves from the bounds of hetero-normativity and to allow ourselves to be just a little more fearless, to subsume and assimilate idioms and characters that ultimately resonate with us even if it they can be a little off center and even disturbing.
Images from the Comme des Garcons S/S 2010 show in Paris over the weekend.
Related posts:
- A Touch of Northern European Avant Garde Charm for Big Boot Maker Hot on the heels of his Eastpak and ongoing Fred Perry projects, Raf Simons has hooked up with 90’s nostalgia inducing Dr. Martens to...
- GREAT WHITE GAY | Broadway Beauty Pageant, the Video! Hello Homo-Neurotic! This is your new weekly Broadway Correspondent, Justin coming to you live from heatstroked Manhattan. Hopefully your offices are being generous with the...
- ‘A Single Man’ Poster In case you haven’t seen this already, here’s the new poster for Tom Ford’s new film, “A Single Man,” which opens in New York,...
- GREAT WHITE GAY | Jesse Vargas, The Man Behind the Musicals Helloooo Homo-Neurotic! Here we are, back for another Theatrical Tuesday with Great White Gay. So put on your opera glasses and let’s get started. But...
- Everything I Know About Being Gay I Learned From Watching TV in the 00’s Sometimes I forget that I was fortunate enough to have been able to come to terms with my sexuality at such an early age. I...
Tags: Attire, Comme des Garcons, Dandy, Fashion


No comments
Comments feed for this article
Trackback link: http://www.homo-neurotic.com/2009/10/06/fear-and-clothing-beauty-masculinity-the-avant-garde-and-the-modern-gay-man/trackback/