Note to the UPEI Rainbow Society
Dec. 20th, 2002 11:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldHi!
I'm Randy McDonald. Over the fall semester I irregularly attended meetings of the UPEI Rainbow Society. I'm sending this note to let you know that I won't be attending these meetings in the foreseeable future, and because I feel I owe you the courtesy of telling you why I won't be attending.
I'm afraid that the UPEI Rainbow Society, as currently constituted, is concerned with a relatively restrictive concept of GLBT culture. Some of the activities proposed would have, at best, indifferent appeal to the wider community on campus--many people, including myself, see _Queer as Folk_ as nothing more than a soap opera with unconventional relationships and a lot of nudity, for example, while even in a large GLBT community like Toronto's drag is a minority taste. It's not difficult to imagine that for people insecure in any GLBT identity, the Rainbow Society's apparently close association with media and activities that don't necessarily appeal to them--and which don't have to appeal to them, yet which would seem by virtue of their uniqueness to be the only activities with which the Rainbow Society is associated--could turn them off from participation. For people like myself, who would be fairly secure but simply uninterested, it can be a turn-off.
This is part of a larger group problem, namely, the lack of a coherent direction and of attractive opportunities. I began attending meetings because I was interested in sharing experiences and networking; instead, I found amorphous meetings lacking any interesting activity altogether apart from casual conversations from which I felt excluded. A hard core of a half-dozen or so people who know each other and their lives in detail is good in theory; all groups need a core to organize around. Without knowing any of the core's members in any detail, however, I felt like I couldn't get in.
One final note: At the third meeting I attended in October, there was a casual conversation between group members about how bis were just confused gays on the way to coming out. It was casual, and I wasn't offended by it. I was, however, disconcerted by it, not least because I identify myself as bi with good reason. I'm not doing this to retain any shreds of heterosexual leguitimacy, or because I'm afraid of being gay, or anything of the like: I'm identifying myself as bi because I'm attracted to girls along with guys and I want to be as accurate as I can. Sensitivity towards people who don't fit a relatively simple bifurcation of humanity between straights and gays would be appreciated. It could help retain members.
My best wishes,
Randy
I'm Randy McDonald. Over the fall semester I irregularly attended meetings of the UPEI Rainbow Society. I'm sending this note to let you know that I won't be attending these meetings in the foreseeable future, and because I feel I owe you the courtesy of telling you why I won't be attending.
I'm afraid that the UPEI Rainbow Society, as currently constituted, is concerned with a relatively restrictive concept of GLBT culture. Some of the activities proposed would have, at best, indifferent appeal to the wider community on campus--many people, including myself, see _Queer as Folk_ as nothing more than a soap opera with unconventional relationships and a lot of nudity, for example, while even in a large GLBT community like Toronto's drag is a minority taste. It's not difficult to imagine that for people insecure in any GLBT identity, the Rainbow Society's apparently close association with media and activities that don't necessarily appeal to them--and which don't have to appeal to them, yet which would seem by virtue of their uniqueness to be the only activities with which the Rainbow Society is associated--could turn them off from participation. For people like myself, who would be fairly secure but simply uninterested, it can be a turn-off.
This is part of a larger group problem, namely, the lack of a coherent direction and of attractive opportunities. I began attending meetings because I was interested in sharing experiences and networking; instead, I found amorphous meetings lacking any interesting activity altogether apart from casual conversations from which I felt excluded. A hard core of a half-dozen or so people who know each other and their lives in detail is good in theory; all groups need a core to organize around. Without knowing any of the core's members in any detail, however, I felt like I couldn't get in.
One final note: At the third meeting I attended in October, there was a casual conversation between group members about how bis were just confused gays on the way to coming out. It was casual, and I wasn't offended by it. I was, however, disconcerted by it, not least because I identify myself as bi with good reason. I'm not doing this to retain any shreds of heterosexual leguitimacy, or because I'm afraid of being gay, or anything of the like: I'm identifying myself as bi because I'm attracted to girls along with guys and I want to be as accurate as I can. Sensitivity towards people who don't fit a relatively simple bifurcation of humanity between straights and gays would be appreciated. It could help retain members.
My best wishes,
Randy
