Letter: Open letter to gay men

Jacques Fourie of Ballito writes:

I find it shocking that we as gay men – and our counterparts in the LGBTQ community – ever bothered fighting for equal rights when we take for granted daily the rights we have been awarded.

Blood, sweat and tears. Some may not know the struggle we have, or how hard we’ve fought to get where we have, and yet men still treat sex as a simple act of enjoyment.

Something similar to a snack, or a treat bought at a store for a penny. Love I’ve known a few times: heartbreak is no stranger to me. I’ve seen the good in some, and the worst in others.

But as a gay man I have never been more embarrassed by the sheer lust which drives many gay men. Consensual sex is your right.

That being said, a large number of us fail to account for the feelings of our partner/s – whether a fling or long-term relationship, even marriage. Investment is an unfamiliar word to the majority of us, because we take for granted what being able to love means.

Perhaps our rights, which some lost their lives for, should never have been given to us.

Perhaps this would have made us cherish what it means to be able to love, even still today where it is unacceptable in some countries to do so. I find it an embarrassment that we sell our bodies for a fleeting moment with another, while some of us may never know what it means to simply be able to hold another man’s hand, and say out loud to him ‘I love you’, without fear of persecution.

Our fear today, is to say those exact words.

Not because of being at risk of persecution, but rather the fear of rejection.

We’ve placed too much importance on our bodies, instead of our hearts and minds, ideals and values.

Instead, we continue down a path of self-destruction thinking we deserve less than we do, because of how our past relationships have changed us.

I feel embarrassed today, to be ‘allowed’ to be an openly gay man, because being just that has put me, and others, at risk of being judged by our own people.

Being judged for caring, being too skinny, too fat, too happy, too sad, too much of this or that.

We fought for equal rights, and yet today we are our own worst enemies.

While a rare few cherish the gifts we’ve been given, too many of us take for granted the blood that was shed to bring us where we could have been today.

I am embarrassed not to be gay.

I am embarrassed instead, at the sheer lack of our morals, values and ethics.

We are men, and yet we act like trash.