Tuesday, June 30, 2009
When I got the e-mail saying I was placed with Gay Community News for an internship, I was thrilled.
I researched the Dublin gay scene — a small but growing community that is, for the most part, widely accepted by the traditionally Catholic city.
The first night I moved into our apartment, a friend of one of my roommates took us to The Dragon, a gay club. After an hour, I started to notice that a good number of the bar’s patrons looked as if they didn’t want us there.
The friend who took us to the bar later found out “the gays” were upset because “so many straight girls” were there that night.
This “straight girl” stigma followed me to work.
When I walked in on my first day, I probably should have guessed that my Midwestern charm screamed “I CAN TOLERATE YOU.”
From what I’ve noticed, the majority of straight people here tolerate the LGBT community, but many have yet to accept that homosexuality doesn’t challenge their own way of life.
Any time you go into a pub, it doesn’t take long for you to hear someone mimicking the stereotypical “gay voice,” flapping their hands in the stereotypical “gay way.”
When you leave the city, it gets worse. A friend was on a work trip to various small Irish towns. In one of those towns, he told me a little boy walked up to him and asked him if he was “a fag.”
“Yes, uh, I am,” he had replied.
What followed, in the most technical way possible, was the boy asking my friend if he wanted to have anal sex with him. The boy then ran off laughing with his friends.
On June 26 Dermot Ahern, The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, published a civil partnership bill to show his commitment to equality, which was soon followed with a public statement to calm the straight people of Ireland.
He said the bill was not and would never be a step toward gay marriage. He said that the bill extended all the rights to the LGBT community that the Irish constitution would allow. He said they shouldn’t ask for more.
As Ahern spoke over the radio, my coworkers could only stare at the floor, and then at each other.
One of them wanted to adopt a child with his long-time partner. Dream nixed.
Another hoped to extend medical insurance to her girlfriend. Denied.
And another just wanted to get married to the person she loved. Not happening.
Two days later was Dublin’s annual Pride Parade, the second largest parade in Dublin, which drew 12,000 LGBT people from around the country.
Many of those 12,000 people probably had plans for what they would do if, finally, they were treated as equal citizens under the law.
A very real division exists here. Although I’m sure progress will be made, I really have no idea what the next step will be for the Irish LGBT community.
I am, after all, the American straight intern.
— — Edited by Ross Stewart
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