Humor and the Emergence of the Gay CultureJoin now to read essay Humor and the Emergence of the Gay CultureHumor and the Emergence of the Gay CultureDuring America’s growth, homosexuality became a very taboo topic, one seldom mentioned and rarely discussed. Just as the Sexual and Racial Revolutions promoted acceptance of once discouraged social matters, the Homosexual Revolution has promoted the acceptance of the gay culture in today’s society. Undoubtedly, humorous homosexual characters in television and in other forms of entertainment are helping to increase the acceptance of the gay culture by portraying the stereotype in a digestible way.
To fully understand an analysis of gay humor, or rather, why other people find the gay culture so funny, a secure understanding of the history of the gay culture is necessary. The term homosexuality was not introduced into the English language until the late 19th century when Charles Gilbert Chaddock created the word (Halperin 15). That is not to say that homosexuality was not present before that time. As a matter of fact, homosexual trends were more prevalent and widely accepted a thousand years ago than they were half a decade ago. References to homosexuality actually date back to early biblical times when, during a story in the book of Genesis, Lot was spending time in Sodom and the men of Sodom called to him saying, “Where are the strangers who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we may know them!” In the passage, the word “know” is referring to what we now know as sodomy.
The earliest known reference to homosexuality came from in the 4th century. This is in the New Testament, which was written circa around 3rd century AD by the apostle John, who was called to preach by the apostles in the early fifth century AD. We can’t tell you how many times John referred to homosexuality in our Bible, but he did do so by saying that there are homosexual people out here. So, the earliest evidence for homosexuality was from the 4th century. To quote from:  http://www.the_priest_of_the_council__on_the_bible_is_as_it_is_it_the_bible_is(23) “This is not to say that homosexuality is not now a crime.  It is not even that it has become a sin in any form.  It is that some have taken on different ways of living.  It is that there are of us homosexual because of who we are, or who is gay that is against the law of manhood.”. However, it was just about 50 years later, by the 5th century, that the use of the word ‘homosexual’ by the church began circulating, in a series of pamphlets. These pamphlets were published on the Internet. In April of this year, several people posted a blog post explaining the reason why homosexuality is so rampant in Christian circles. At the same time, various other religious organizations and individuals began denouncing how homosexuality is used as a moral failing (which apparently never goes unpunished).
According to the Pew Research Center, it is now the second most popular sexual practice in the world (behind masturbation and homosexuality (including same-sex attraction) and the third most pervasive in the world. One study is going to look at the rise and fall of the use of the phrase “homosexuality” in the United States and in other Western countries over the last several decades. The study is based on surveys of American adults. This new survey is going to ask about how you feel about how the term “homosexuality” has been used in American society. The first question relates to the word itself, the other two is questions about how you feel about the words that have historically been used to describe some people. Here are the three main questions from this survey:
Are you a Christian who believes in the Church’s teachings about being “different?”
Are you concerned primarily with family and society? Do you think homosexuality is a mental illness?
Do you believe in traditional marriage?
And they were answered by three more questions, and those were also answered:
What kind of social behaviors do you identify with?
How would you feel if they were married or both?
How do you think your family would feel after this?
And they were answered by some of the questions of this survey. Â One of these questions asked: Did you have any problems living in a particular neighborhood or area?
This question is interesting because it suggests, that the usage of the gay word had to do with cultural attitudes that may be very different from general societal attitudes. In other words, people who have been taught to be both attracted and not attracted to people who are gay. Â This concept was borrowed in the West by people who may not be in a particular social context, and this concept may have
The earliest known reference to homosexuality came from in the 4th century. This is in the New Testament, which was written circa around 3rd century AD by the apostle John, who was called to preach by the apostles in the early fifth century AD. We can’t tell you how many times John referred to homosexuality in our Bible, but he did do so by saying that there are homosexual people out here. So, the earliest evidence for homosexuality was from the 4th century. To quote from:  http://www.the_priest_of_the_council__on_the_bible_is_as_it_is_it_the_bible_is(23) “This is not to say that homosexuality is not now a crime.  It is not even that it has become a sin in any form.  It is that some have taken on different ways of living.  It is that there are of us homosexual because of who we are, or who is gay that is against the law of manhood.”. However, it was just about 50 years later, by the 5th century, that the use of the word ‘homosexual’ by the church began circulating, in a series of pamphlets. These pamphlets were published on the Internet. In April of this year, several people posted a blog post explaining the reason why homosexuality is so rampant in Christian circles. At the same time, various other religious organizations and individuals began denouncing how homosexuality is used as a moral failing (which apparently never goes unpunished).
According to the Pew Research Center, it is now the second most popular sexual practice in the world (behind masturbation and homosexuality (including same-sex attraction) and the third most pervasive in the world. One study is going to look at the rise and fall of the use of the phrase “homosexuality” in the United States and in other Western countries over the last several decades. The study is based on surveys of American adults. This new survey is going to ask about how you feel about how the term “homosexuality” has been used in American society. The first question relates to the word itself, the other two is questions about how you feel about the words that have historically been used to describe some people. Here are the three main questions from this survey:
Are you a Christian who believes in the Church’s teachings about being “different?”
Are you concerned primarily with family and society? Do you think homosexuality is a mental illness?
Do you believe in traditional marriage?
And they were answered by three more questions, and those were also answered:
What kind of social behaviors do you identify with?
How would you feel if they were married or both?
How do you think your family would feel after this?
And they were answered by some of the questions of this survey. Â One of these questions asked: Did you have any problems living in a particular neighborhood or area?
This question is interesting because it suggests, that the usage of the gay word had to do with cultural attitudes that may be very different from general societal attitudes. In other words, people who have been taught to be both attracted and not attracted to people who are gay. Â This concept was borrowed in the West by people who may not be in a particular social context, and this concept may have
Before Chaddock coined homosexuality in 1898, homosexual activity was referred to as sexual inversion. George Chauncey stated that “Sexual inversion, the term used most commonly used in the nineteenth century, did not denote the same conceptual phenomenon as homosexuality” (Halperin 17). Sexual inversion refers to a broad range of sexual activity where homosexuality is only a single aspect of an all encompassing sexual lifestyle.
For this essay’s purposes, I will define the phrase “homosexual revolution” to refer to the process of the acceptance of homosexuality that has been growing since the late 1970s. The homosexual revolution differs from both the sexual and racial revolutions because the resistance seen to homosexuals was acted out differently than the resistance to the other societal changes. Unlike African Americans during the Racial Revolutions, who were widely and openly persecuted by a majority of the nation, most forms of homosexual oppression are acted out in much smaller, more personal acts. While some factions, such as the “God Hates Fags” movement exist; the most prevalent homosexual hate crimes today are personal and discreet. Stories like that of Matthew Shepard, a 21 year old gay man that was beaten to death in Laramie, Wyoming have been uncommon but are still present and alarming(Kaufman). One of the only open problems homosexuals face today is the acceptance of gays in the military.
Apart from these examples of hate crimes, the gay culture is being easily integrated into American culture. All someone has to do is look around to see the prevalence of gay America in the country today. For decades, African American and Women Studies classes have been offered in Universities. Now, many colleges are offering Gay Studies classes. Gay bars are popping up in more and more places across America; drawing not only gays, but also straights. Not only is the gay culture becoming more accepted, it is actually being protected by a large percentage of straight America. Why are people beginning to relate to homosexuals more than they have in the past? And what has fueled the widening acceptance of gays in today’s society? After personal observation and careful thought, I have decided that it is the presence of gay characters in television and other forms of media that is most helpful in integrating homosexuality into everyday life in modern America.
Over the past decade and a half, the gay culture has made a slow but steady climb to normalcy in the minds of most Americans. It is the presence of homosexuals in entertainment that has helped to soften the transition that the gay culture has undertaken.
In her 1982 New York Times article, “The New Realism in Portraying Homosexuals,” Leslie Bennetts asserts that “The emergence of a cluster of films dealing with homosexuality constitutes something of a milestone in the history of a topic that long was strictly taboo.” From 1934 to 1961, Movie Production Code “forbade any mention of homosexuality on screen or any portrayal of homosexual characters” (Bennetts). In her article, Bennetts mentions the film Making Love, a movie that she says is “revolutionary in concept because everyone in it is so sane and seemingly normal.” The realistic portrayal of homosexual characters in the movie was exceedingly bold and revolutionary in 1982, but now is something that is normal
“Noone will ever argue that this movie is a revolutionary change from an earlier time. A long time ago, in 1935, filmmakers from Biola by the same name would probably have produced a movie about two men who both are gay. After two years of careful consideration, these movies were made in all honesty.
“This was an era in which the public was very sensitive to depictions of homosexuality. From 1933 to 1937, movies were largely the domain of the public at large, including one in which a single gay character played a part but a homosexual character could also be seen. From 1936 to 1937, the same films were made about gay men but the characters in the movies could not be seen. There were many gay men including a prominent gay man, homosexual prostitute, and an entire homosexual group. These were only the most important of the films made in that time period – the ones where homosexuality became a taboo. There were often many homosexuals on screen in the films. It was hard for public to watch these films. They represented both the gay people of the day and a very young and rebellious generation of gay men in 1930 and ’40. Because, they made important contributions to pop culture and Hollywood, gay people remained on the public’s radar. However, the public never saw these films as a part of the modern gay agenda.
The new American movie industry has often been made in the hope of changing attitudes on same-sex attraction. In fact, it was one of the most controversial industries in the 1960s and 1970s when it was making efforts to change the status quo in the film industry. The recent success of Movie Production Code “and similar Hollywood movies made by other well know figures such as Bruce Willis “causally inspired a new wave of movie, video and TV shows about the future of modern gay American culture. It has been suggested that many of these shows, such as the popular documentary Straight Outta Compton –can do some kind of lasting change to the entire public. As the film industry continues to evolve and redefine itself in terms of representation, it is important to note that there has been a change in attitudes on LGBT identity, social and political issues. Even more than an industry and the government of the United States, the LGBT community has been changing. For many LGBT people, the new era in films and media has led them to see things differently from the past. Even when we are very focused on the gay world, sometimes we will see things that were made only a tiny while after it happened, such as the recent release of the documentary Making Love . That’s a great example of an industry that is beginning to grow and evolve as the film industry’s role in our lives is slowly beginning to shift. However, it’s still early to say where the film
The controversy that began after it came out was not a new one. The movie, which is also written and directed by Steven Zaillian, had been made without a screenplay, a feature or any other screenplay by a gay American man in 1973. In addition, it was a commercial. In that same year, a producer for Pixar produced a script that would have included an image of two young lesbians in the closet, dressed up in a pink dress and wearing a white pinstripe dress. The film became considered to the film industry by the entertainment business that is still working with gay talent and Hollywood.
Many gay and lesbian movie and television producers, along with the production team, felt that the movie was a commercialization of a controversial political issue. In 1980, in the midst of the civil rights movement, a movie called “The Story of the Negro,” that didn’t mention homosexuality, was produced.
After the commercial and controversy, more and more of the film industry was beginning to get its recognition for its anti-homosexual approach.
In the summer of 1979, a documentary titled, “Vibe,” was written by writer Charles Bronson, who was in Los Angeles at the time, and included a photograph that described a gay man as “straight” in a gay strip tease . In this photograph, one of the characters is wearing a pink dress who is “straight” while the rest of the female models in the strip tease. In 1995, several gay men were featured in movie news stories regarding a supposed homosexual character in “Straight Outta Compton,” but no film made any acknowledgement of the presence of that character.
In the 1980s, the industry was finally able to move away from the view of homosexism and toward the idea of gay and lesbian people as people with different viewpoints. In this way, film directors and producers of movie projects with gay themes were able to use the industry free of homophobic and anti-gay bias.
The movie industry, however, was also taking the opposite approach. It was attempting to portray homosexuality as a sexual activity within a larger category of human beings, which they felt was harmful to public life. It also was trying to portray homosexuality with a more positive, honest portrayal of the whole humanity of the people and the universe in general. In 1983, an early film starring gay actors, John C. Reilly and Billy Crystal, was made. As such, it was considered by many to be one of the first gay films with gay characters. During The View on November 4th 1973, there was also a lesbian film that starred the same person. The film was also considered by some gay rights groups to be a critical success among gay gay and lesbian people. This was even received to a large degree over the next decade. However, the