It Just Occurred To Me...

In my workaholism-induced stupor I stumbled awake, and then through my usual morning routine: checking my mail, updating my blog, making my way through my usual infotainment sites (fortunately it's Saturday) when I eventually get to Joe.My.God. As usual, there are some good posts there: a ramble up the West Side of Manhattan with pix (wish it was me), a couple of hot guys (ditto), a little politics, a sprinkling of bigotry, a lesbian rabbi - the whole schmear. The comments, of course, are half the fun, so I left a couple - lighthearted, informative (I hope)... I always try to play nice when I'm at Joe.My.God.

Most startling, though, was a post about Nutella that, at the time I found it, had an eye-popping 90 comments on it. With great trepidation I opened the comments section. I found myself thinking I'd rather have opened an actual jar of Nutella than this can of worms. What I did get, though, was a lightning bolt.

I've always found something irksome about Joe, but could never quite put my finger on it. Oh, I like him well enough, and it is interesting to have a ramble through someone else's point-of-view, especially when it's a) so different from your own, and b) so well-expressed. Plus, any bear who references Monica Geller is okay in my book. That's when it occurred to me what it is I find irksome about Joe.

If he likes something, he's unable to understand why others don't love it as much as he does, and the same goes for something he dislikes. It's a point made by Matt Sanchez on his blog (which seems to have been removed), but I never twigged to it until now, probably because Sanchez has next to no credibility. I guess there's something needy in my personality that makes me want to be liked to such an extent that I always try to understand the viewpoint of others, especially if said others are nice to me.

I think intolerance is a standard reaction to intolerance, and as much of that as gay men face, leather men and drag queens (in other words, our sexual and gender outlaws) likely face more. I understand why we ghetto-ize, even when I don't do it myself. (Like I even could.) A blog is a wonderful thing for bringing together people of similar affinities. I've never read far back into the misty past of Joe.My.God, but I suspect if I did I'd find that these tendencies of his - to be intractable, narrow-minded, etc. - were probably more marked one, two, or three thousand posts ago. Either that or he's always been an opinionated blowhard, and he always will be - not that I have any problem with a blowhard. ; )

Writing about Joe is a two-headed monster. It's good, in that anytime I post about him I get comments (and email) up the wazoo, most of it good or at least neutral. It's bad, in that, if I say anything critical (even constructively) I'm likely to be set upon and bottomed by hordes of angry bears who are pissed off that I've said anything worse than woof about the man who, for them, is less Joe than he is My God.

For the record, I like Nutella. It's marmite and vegemite I can't abide. Still, if I knew a friend who liked them was coming over, they'd find them in my fridge. Similarly, rather than merely reacting to some quality of a stranger's that I dislike, I do try to understand him if at all possible. I can only hope that Vancouver's gay men understand this about me, and continue in their concerted efforts to leave me alone, or at least be nice if they disagree.

Remember, the nicer you are, the harder I'll work to understand your point of view.