"What's got us so worked up about sex?"

This piece was originally published on SameSame.com.au, on the 18th of August 2016, available here.

--------

So many people are weird about sex, and push their hang-ups onto others. It seems like it’s getting harder to be a sexually liberated gay guy.

I’m a proud slut. Yet although I’ve personally embraced a life of gutter-trash promiscuity, it’s sometimes difficult to talk about it openly. There’s an ongoing storm of sex-negativity and slut shaming that frequently comes from other gay men.

Now, I’m not saying people should care about my sex stories. Nor am I accusing all gay men of being prissy prudes. It’s simply the fact that many gay men are weird about sex, and some tend to make a point of it.

It started with disgusted whispers from the corners of smokers rooms, directed at the guy who would dare talk about his bedside manner.

Then in recent years – particularly with the advent of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP, which I take daily), and the surveyed realisation that more gay men are having casual sex and open relationships – those murmurs exploded into screams, as every comments section filled with cries of “You sluts! Keep it in your pants!”

Commentators and public figures talk about how ‘promiscuous gays are ruining our shot at equality’, that ‘PrEP users are giving us a bad name’ – and my personal fave, ‘straight people won’t ever accept us if we keep up all this rooting’. Because the straights aren’t deviants like us homos, and only have their marriage beds in mind. Apparently.

It all begs the question: What’s got us so worked up about sex?

Well, the simple answer to that is: Why on earth wouldn’t we be?

We’re living in what some might call ‘the shadow of the AIDS crisis’. An entire generation of young gay men have grown up with horror stories from their forefathers, detailing a time – one that wasn’t so long ago – when first-world gay men contracted HIV and, without adequate treatments available, crumbled in staggering numbers. When our lives felt out of our control, and the tides of homophobia swelled.

This has understandably had a huge impact on the way gay men approach sex. Our elders are scarred, with many not wanting to see history repeat itself. This anguish particularly burdens the young ones, whose only frames of reference for sex – alongside our terrible sex-ed system – are sad tales of torment and pain.

Gay boys are taught from society that not only is their sexuality bad, but that under the right circumstances, their sex alone could be deadly.

Now, modern treatments are available that allow people living with HIV to have an outstanding quality of life, and we have in our possession the combined forces of PrEP and TasP (treatment-as-prevention), two key tools in our arsenal that all but annihilate the potential for transmission.

I’m not suggesting that our ‘sexual liberation’ is perfect. For some, sexual liberation means defending our right to promiscuity – and everything else associated with it. This was seen with the release of the poignant and jarring documentary Chemsex earlier this year, with defenders of sexual liberation and ‘the right to do drugs for pleasure’ decrying the documentary as sensationalist.

Now, I’m no stranger to a sniff of amyl mid-coitus. But our community is quietly crippling itself under the weight of gay men having issues with not just drug misuse, but drug abuse and addiction, all happening in our bedrooms.

In the UK, ice is known solely as a gay sex drug. In Australia, the drug is associated with poverty and violence – not recreational bedroom use. We lack the lens through which to see gay drug misuse as the growing drama that it is. We’re also a proud and defiant community, one that is hesitant to admit we might ever have problems.

When so many gay people will experience issues with drug abuse in their lifetime, the tales portrayed in Chemsex become sensationalist – to all but those who have experienced them. To abusers, it is a grittily honest depiction, and reflects a desperate need for healthcare and research.

Yet staunch defenders of sexual liberation remain thorns in the side of professionals. While harm reduction strategies have their place among those who are going to use drugs despite warnings, we’ve seen that proclamations of “It’s not that bad!” actively hinder concerned individuals from reaching for support. Although you may feel you’ve won the right to ‘party and play’, it might be time for the liberated folk to step back. Our sex lives will not end when we address these problems.

Realistically, all of this sex-negativity stems from one thing: fear. The paralysing anxiety that one might contract HIV. The horrors of isolation, discrimination and violence on the basis of ones own sexuality. The worry our sexual expression will be stolen from us. The nightmare that the LGBT community might never ascend from marginalised group to first-class citizenry.

All of this fear coils together like a terrified snake – and lashes out at the Sexually Liberated Gay Man who dares express his sexuality, or tries to tell a tale of a morning he spent in bed with a stranger.

When you’ve spent most of your adult life constructing elaborate armour to suit a sexual-identity-in-crisis, it might make sense to bash the man who doesn’t play your game. But the fact of the matter is, we have options now. Our sex is no longer unsafe, whether through condoms or without.

Our sexual liberation has gone through some tumultuous turbulence, with an insidious fear blossoming within the hearts of so many gay men.

I, too, once lived in fear – but the rules created long ago to aid our community have changed. Now I own my sexuality, and marvel at the strides we have taken – PrEP, TasP, and the growing freedom to love – as the wonders that they are.

It amazes me more people don’t see it that way. A life lived in fear is a life half-lived.

'The evangelical leader teaching celibacy to the same-sex attracted'

This piece was originally published on SameSame.com.au, on the 11th of August 2016, available here.

--------

When Wesley Hill, the gay celibate Christian theologian, was in his university years, the first person he came out to was a high-ranking member of the Church.

That’s what he told us in Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Doncaster, during a seminar titled ‘The Bible and Same Sex Attraction’. It was one of three seminars on a speaking tour he’d been flown to Melbourne to give, by Ridley College in Parkville and St. Hilary’s in Kew.

Years after his coming-out, Hill believes, and publicly proselytises on, the idea that gay men should remain single, that they should abstain and forever await God’s judgment. That’s his shtick that gets Christians interested. That’s his gospel, and it’s the good word he came to Melbourne to preach.

I’d attended his seminar, as a writer, a tentative agnostic – and a promiscuous and outlandish homosexual. The last article I published was titled ‘I Went To A Naked Gay Bar’. I was not his target audience.

Spend any time flipping through the Bible, and you’ll see it has some pretty dodge ideas on human relationships – particularly involving marriage. It’s utterly rife with incest (Genesis 1:1-2:3, 2:4-2:25), the violation of virgins by their soon-to-be husbands (Deuteronomy 22:28-29), and with trophy wives stolen from murdered families (Judges 21:7-23). Hell, at one point it even permits a union between a man and a pillar of salt (Genesis 19:25).

Yet none get a bad rap quite like the homosexual. So sayeth Paul from the Bible, one of Jesus’ fabled disciples, who apparently knew same-sex relations as violent and exploitative. Sure, if that’s your kink.

Wesley Hill is not an aggressive or threatening figure. If I had to pick his Grindr tribe, it’d be a mix between ‘twink’ and ‘geek’. His pleasant tone and unimposing demeanour – an attitude common amongst members of church groups, one I’d experienced on my way in – takes you by surprise.

He stood spewing religious diatribe, and despite years of theological research, often contradicted himself – he says that Paul felt homosexuality was wrong due to his patriarchal cultural upbringing, so we should view his words as flawed – yet also ‘Paul’s word is Jesus’ word’? It’s the way he does it, though.

Knowing that Hill had been surrounded by strong religiosity from a young age, it’s no wonder he eventually embraced religion over his sexuality. That he chose the path of an evangelical leader, one who mystifies the masses with his acceptance of his identity – but sexual submission to the Lord on High.

It also makes him palatable to church audiences, who, though they claim to love their gay friends dearly, can’t vibe with what they do in the sack.

What struck me about the sold-out crowd of seminar attendees, were the sheer number of families and elderly present. Their faces were those I might have seen at shopping centres, or spotted having barbecues with their children at nearby parks. I grew up with these people. I might have gone to school with them.

I wondered what drew them to Hill’s ideas – until a young woman nearby opened her phone, and instead of Beyoncé plastered on the cover, there was an image of Jesus Christ. These were beaming suburban churchgoers, drawn to a narrative on a controversial topic that might support their beliefs.

Indeed, Hill’s words aren’t violent, nor does he stand spouting hateful invective. He’s quite pleasant to listen to – almost titillating, really. It’s the subtext that is insidious.

To be a homosexual, in Hill’s eyes, is to present with symptoms of something that is apparently true for all humans: we’re all sinners. We’re all ‘fallen’, and Jesus struck away our sins so that we could sin again, and again, and again, and repent those sins, soon as committing them.

He says that that everybody sins, that we are all equally sinful – yet to be a homosexual is to live in that sin. We fail to ‘live in difference’ – to engage in partnerships with the opposite sex. And yet, like we must apparently deny pleasure through celibacy, heterosexuals must deny indulgence through commitment and the oh-so-heterosexual institution of marriage, which somehow renders us equal.

Hill can’t outright state that homosexuals are destined for lifelong torment, in constant repentance of their infinite sin. That would be too heavy.

Until he utters the following phrase: “Where the sin comes in is how we act with our bodies, and how we think in our minds”.

And later, that churned my stomach: “The due penalty for same-sex coupling is its own punishment.”

It’s at this point that I realised there were same-sex attracted people in the audience. Without a doubt. Maybe they’d come with an almost mocking curiosity, as I had. Or maybe they’d approached out of fear, out of doubt, out of toxic self-hatred.

They’d just been told that their very thoughts of same-sex attraction need to be cleansed, and their every mental utterance is blasphemous to the great and vengeful God. Told their relationships must remain platonic – and that all of this is punishment for their very existence.

Hill beckoned churches to care for their homosexual brethren – but encouraged them to push their same-sex attracted peers towards ‘celibate friendships’, in an effort to turn their heads towards Christ.

When all was said and done, the seminar ended, all he had managed to do was turn my head to the back wall in discomfort and concern.

And, in a way, fear.

Fear that those seated around me shared in these beliefs. Fear that these ideas were being affirmed. Fear that my nature – as a gay man who has embraced his sexuality and all of the whims and pleasures of the world – stands in opposition to their faith.

A faith unrelenting, that is often violent, and often toxic to the fragile minds of gays nearby – hidden within that audience of Stepford-smiling churchgoers, who need comfort, community, validation and care. Not Hill’s idea of biblical salvation.

'I went to a naked gay bar'

This article was originally published on SameSame.com.au, on the 4th of August 2016, available here.

--------

I should start by saying that I have no hang-ups about sex.

I’ve hit up my fair share of saunas and cruise clubs in my time. Yet gay culture can so often feel superficial and obsessed with the body beautiful. In the past I’ve struggled to appreciate my body, as someone who’s never taken a gym selfie since I’ve never been inside a gym.

So when I got invited to attend a nude gay bar – that is, a regular-old homo drinking hole, with the added bonus that everyone there is completely naked – I was decidedly nervous.

ADAM is a men-only night on Mondays and Tuesdays at Sircuit Bar in Melbourne, co-presented by DownAnDirty with the Victorian AIDS Council, and describes itself as their take on “the Fitzroy local pub”.

Happy hour starts at 6:30 when the beers are $2 a pot. The pool games are competitive and the banter is plentiful. They also partner with Wet On Wellington, a gay sauna around the corner, giving you $5 entry there when Adam shuts at midnight. Nightcap?

The catch is: You’ve gotta strip down on entry, and spend the rest of your night in nothing but your shoes.

They had their birthday last Tuesday night, and I was asked to go and check it out. My editor clearly thinks I’m a slut.

Now, I’ve been to several of the sexy gay soirees here in Melbourne. In most of these environments, the expectation is that you’re basically there to get your fuck on. These nights don’t particularly run off intellect and good conversation, so a lot of the more muscled and strong-jawed blokes generally rule the school.

Adam was apparently a socially nude alternative – but that didn’t stop my anxiousness. The lead-up was spent panicking about whether or not I was pretty enough (insert Kasey Chambers reference), or if the two beers I chugged to ease the nerves would give me a beer gut before I’d even left the house.

I arrived – and was met with dozens of naked bodies scattered about the bar. Even the bartenders were naked. The smoking room was veiled from public view by a huge black drape. Up in an elevated booth, a professional masseuse – also nude – was giving free rubdowns (although fair warning: the massage oil will make your ass a slip-and-slide. Wink, nudge, etc)

I paid my entry, and got given a bag for my clothes. Stripping down, I stepped out of my pants and into my shoes, and hopped to doing what I do best: drinking large amounts of liquor and ogling strangers at the bar.

Without ever having attended Adam, one might assume that the event would be a sex-fest; an orgy of brimming testosterone, with the “uglies” left on the sidelines while the “pretty boys” have their own fun. I came prepared for just another gay night, all sleaze and superficiality.

However, spend an hour boozing with the guys here, and you’ll quickly realise it’s purely a social night – with fewer clothes.

It was Fitzroy’s local pub with a nudist twist. Not long after registering that yes, those are a swarm of penises; you eventually forgot that you were even naked. The bodies – in all of their many shapes and sizes – faded into a blur, until all you were left with were faces and names. It was suddenly too easy to chat and make friends.

And before you shout “Sounds like another night for dumb gay sluts, if you ask me! I was raised to hate my sexuality.” – nobody tried to grope me. Although shout-out to the dude who whispered in my ear, “You’re lucky kidnapping’s illegal”.

If you did want to have sex, however, there was an upstairs cruising lounge. Suddenly remembering the naked body of a guy you were chatting with moments ago, is a little jarring – but fun.

Every person at Adam felt far more approachable, the conversations shared with complete strangers more involved and intriguing, without a touch of fabric on.

Did I feel… liberated? Was I suddenly sold on what they were selling? Had I, in the space of a few beers, become a full-blown nudist?

The “pretty boys” of the gay community have no power there: nobody cares about how your body looks, when every body in sight is in some way flawed, no matter how they’ve tried to gym those flaws away. Taking off my clothes had robbed me of my shallow ego.

Nudism is often seen as ‘alternative’ and out of the ordinary, but what the lads behind Adam are providing is surprisingly progressive. They’re catering to a void in a community slightly obsessed with the mirror. The organisers are even thinking of welcoming trans men into the fold, providing an inclusive space for all male bodies, and further challenging notions held by a group that so often oppresses itself.

I crept into a naked gay bar expecting to swat away hands and feel bad about myself. Instead I met some interesting new faces and felt good in my own skin.

I think they’ve made a nudist out of me.

'TV: All the feels as 'Looking' says farewell'

This review was originally published on SameSame.com.au, on the 28th of July 2016, available here.

--------

Warning: This review contains spoilers for Looking seasons one, two, and the movie-length finale. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

When I first heard about Looking two years ago, the show about a group of gay men living in San Francisco, a kind of bearded-hipster reimagining of the iconic Queer As Folk concept, I was a tad dubious. One might call me a Brady.

Everybody wants to see themselves represented in popular culture, and gays have been starkly underrepresented on television for years. I feared that I might not relate to the characters in front of me, and that this show would tell a story I didn’t recognise.

It turned out to be excellent television, delivered by masterfully tender director Andrew Haigh – responsible for one of my personal favourite gay cinematic vignettes, Weekend (2011) – and I was hooked from the first episode.

Two years later, and we have reached an end to a charming piece of queer television. Two seasons, concluding with a feature-length finale, to see Looking off.

In Looking: The Movie, we return to wrap up the stories of Patrick (Jonathan Groff), Agustín (Frankie J. Alvarez), Dom (Daddy… sorry, I mean Murray Bartlett), and the utterly ineffable Doris (Lauren Weedman).

In the first half of the film, we are shown again the locations that made the first two seasons so memorable. Not mere setting, but real reflections of San Francisco, and oftentimes evoking its bustling community. So much of it feels familiar; particularly the gay bars and clubs, and they carry me away with the spirit of the queer haunts in my own city.

Even the title, Looking, graphically emblazoned across our screens in neon lights, feels wink-nudge familiar: neon lights of gay bars, our nightlife, the dim historical underground of queer culture – embodied in a scene, a city, a deftly depicted word.

In the second half, our characters’ arcs come to an end. Dom, after separating from his lover and business partner by the end of season two, decides to put himself out there again. Agustín overcomes his own insecurities and fears of self-sabotage, and marries the love of his life. And Doris, beautiful, untamed Doris, settles into her own relationship with her partner, and admits that they’re thinking about having a baby – while always “living in sin”.

Yet the most satisfying story to come to a close is that of Patrick, the lens through which we have always viewed these characters.

Patrick starts out in the beginning of Season One inexperienced, and is almost frustratingly immature. He often displays a total lack of self-awareness, and is generally apprehensive about pursuing his own desires.

Whether those desires are a committed relationship with the now-taken, now-moving-on Kevin (Russell Tovey) – or his past Season One love, the subdued and stoic Richie (Raúl Castillo), who spent much of Season Two involved with the insufferably self-absorbed journalist Brady (Chris Perfetti), Patrick’s neuroticism taints their potential, leaving him in a tragically depressed bind.

There’s a scene near the end of the film, where Brady accuses Patrick of being a ‘bad gay’ – but Patrick barks back, saying that he should be able to live how he chooses, without feeling like he’s letting the team down. It’s a volatile redemption for an otherwise peaceful Patrick, one that exemplifies his transformation from fragile and uncertain, to confident and self-assured. Brady and Richie both exit, leaving him rattled in their wake.

Shortly after, we see a lone Patrick looking out at his friends, all wrapped in loving embraces on the gay bar-cum-wedding reception dance-floor, their stories at an end.

Then, in a testament to Andrew Haighs’ skill for poignant vignettes, Richie returns.

Reflected in the glass behind Patrick, he treads over – and they share a kiss. All the whilePerfume Genius’ ‘Hood’ plays in the background, a far-too-meaningful track, as two seasons’ of Patrick’s childlike fear of embracing Richie and his own happiness finally melts away – Boy, I wish I grew up the second / I first held you in my arms – and he is reunited with the man he loves. The one who nearly got away.

It was after the conclusion of Patrick’s narrative that I understood my earlier fears were misplaced: Our gay stories don’t always need to feel so concretely told. For all the dissatisfied harrumphs our “gay thought police” dish out – as Patrick describes them – these televised representations of our lives, while never encompassing us completely, present characters that we can connect with.

This wasn’t a story about “all of us”. This was about complicated humans navigating chapters of their lives, in a world that perhaps you and I grew up in. These were modern gay anecdotes narrated against the backdrop of gay culture; a formula that has been missing from the small screen for years. In an unfamiliar desert of heterosexual excess, this was an oasis of television navel-gazing made solely for us.

Looking is about seeking something greater than what you’ve seemingly settled with.

It’s about being bold, taking leaps, and reaching forward from the grip of your own self-doubt, to pursue something more – whether that’s love, a career ambition, or sheer self-acceptance under the lights of gay nightlife.

But it’s also about finding solace in your own situation, and realising that sometimes, an escape isn’t what you need.

Sometimes our own carved-out corner of the dance-floor is perfectly good enough, as we get busy changing, busy growing, and looking for our happiness.

'Why the AFL's Pride Game means so much'

This piece was originally published on SameSame.com.au, on the 23rd July 2016, available here.

--------

I grew up in a football household. What I mean by that is: my family are staunch, almost fanatical AFL football fans.

My entire family, on both my Mum and Dad’s side, are all Hawthorn supporters. Mum and Dad grew up on opposite sides of inner suburban Hawthorn in Melbourne, and I’ve always been a bit convinced that their union was partially driven by a shared love for the Hawks.

Our household walls are covered with posters from grand final winnings. We have a signed Hawthorn jersey hanging in our living room, framed under glass. Stay-at-home nights watching away games are punctuated by the hysterical screams of my footy-fan mother, as near misses and straight-up goals play out on the television.

We’d attend every home game along with our family. I’m Greek, so that’s around thirty-plus impassioned louts lining two straight rows. We were louder than the beer-swilling men in the members’ section, and could shove for space on the crowded post-game trains at Richmond Station better than anyone.

The vertigo from looking around a stadium at a game can only be overshadowed by the thrill when someone nearly kicks a goal, as the punters fire up, bite their nails and shout and scream – and the player lands it! The arena erupts with a giant howl that vibrates in your ears and makes your stomach flip with excitement.

Of the family present at these outings, I was one of the louder ones.

And then at some point, as I began to mature, something changed. I went to matches less and less.

At the time, I was trying to find my place in a world that, though I so often denied it, found me feminine by virtue of my homosexuality, and femininity in men an unspoken crime. I could either overcompensate through a charade of masculinity – or opt out entirely, and be seen as inherently less of a man.

I watched as football continued to assert itself as a man’s game: the shouting, swearing, and rough-and-tumble ferocity an intrinsic part of masculinity, one that was threatened by both gays and women. Not only that, but stories of homophobia fell out from within the game itself. How could I possibly adapt to that? I didn’t pass as a “bloke” – where did I fit in?

The simple fact was: I didn’t. And so I did away with my spectatorship, and receded into my queer adolescence, isolated with video games and crippling anxiety. No longer feeling like part of the cheer squad, I stopped going to games.

Now, years later, St. Kilda and Sydney major league football clubs will go head-to-head on August 13th at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne, for the very first Pride Game. The St Kilda players will wear rainbow-patterned numbers on their guernseys, with Sydney sportsmen donning rainbow socks. Even the goalposts will be gayed up. It’s an undeniably iconic moment in AFL history.

The event is inspired in no small part by the work of ex-footballer-turned-community leader Jason Ball who, as the first footballer at any level to come out of the closet, helped unite local Yarra Glen and Yarra Junction football teams in the inaugural Pride Cup match of 2014, which continues annually to this day.

When you’re a boy feeling unwelcomed by boy-things, it’s as if no matter how close you get to a goal, you’re always passing with points or straight-up hitting the posts.

When an unruly spectator at an AFL match screams “poofter” at a player on the field, it’s a stark reminder for a red-hot minute that you’re not welcome there. It’s a casual and subtle nudge that football has and always will be, a man’s sport for manly men. No poofters allowed.

But with the Pride Game inbound in August, the model is swiftly changing. We’re seeing more footballers than ever stand up against homophobia. Players I was almost resentful of, for being the deified cultural symbols of masculinity, are showing the country that they won’t stand for that which holds the gay community down.

Australian Rules Football has, for what feels like far too long, struggled to tackle the bodies of bigotry, both in sport and in the culture that it creates. But with the advent of Pride Game, it is taking an active stance against the behaviour and intolerance that is rife within not just the sporting community, but in society at large.

One of the institutions, the very hallmarks of our country, is celebrating diversity, and challenging the ingrained notion that gays aren’t welcome in sport. It’s embracing a community who for years felt they weren’t allowed to exist, whether out in the open or out on the field.

It’s extending a loving hand to a young Brandon Cook, and letting him know that, whether he’s gay or straight, he can come along and raise the roof at Etihad Stadium with the rest of them.

And that’s what we call “kicking goals”.

'Yes, Coming Out IS A Big Deal'

This piece was originally published on SameSame.com.au, on the 9th of July, 2016, available here.

--------

Fun fact: I have spent a LOT of time on YouTube over the past few days watching Aubrey Plaza interviews.

I wish I were kidding. There’s something about her cool yet confident and catlike presence, that I can’t decide if I want to be her, or be her best friend. If you would like a really awkward date to see Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates, you can reach me at…

Another fun fact: Aubrey Plaza recently came out as queer. Or, as some headlines read, ‘at the very least, bisexual’.

More specifically: Speaking with LGBT publication The Advocate, Plaza responded to a question about whether women came onto her, with an answer containing the phrase “I fall in love with girls and guys. I can’t help it.”

Of course, this doesn’t really classify as a definitive answer to the question of Plaza’s sexual orientation. She’s not labelling herself – and nor does she need to. There is no requirement for Plaza to boldly and openly state the dictionary definition of her sexuality.

She’s allowed to fall for girls and guys, and she’s allowed to just exist this way. No frills, and no strings attached.

And as I poured through online story comments looking for those all-too-common bites of negativity, I could find nothing. No hate speech, no rage. Maybe I’m finally following all the right publications.

And yet, one comment, repeated so many times in so many different forms, stuck out to me: “Who cares if she came out? Why is this news?”

It’s easy to interpret such a comment as the usual homophobic silencing tactic we’re all so very used to, when you’re told to shut up and stop talking and stop making me uncomfortable with all this NOISE about your LIVES and IDENTITIES, GAWD.

But a lot of these comments sounded more like: I can’t believe that it’s 2016, and a celebrity coming out still makes international news.

This phrase usually comes from the mouths of heterosexuals who, though they truly mean well, can’t really understand why a celebrity coming out is important.

Most of them are just depressed at the reality that, in this day and age, being gay is still considered a problem. They’re the good ones: the ones who ‘like’ our angry gay Facebook updates in solidarity, and retweet our insidious homosexual propaganda. They don’t come to the marches, but they’re glad you went.

Yet every now and again, one might say, “I just don’t know why you need your own nightclubs” – or, “So you’re gay. That means you love shopping, right?”

They’re only a bit ignorant; almost endearingly out of touch. All they really need is for a fabulous homosexual to take them to a gay bar, and have all the binge-drinking queers give them a little education.

So, it’s in the spirit of education that I’d like to make a statement. To any straight members of the audience who might be listening:

Yes, coming out IS a big deal.

It’s a big deal, when members of the LGBTQ community are still being beaten, bashed – and, quite recently, murdered by the dozens – for a celebrity like Aubrey Plaza to almost casually talk about her broad sexual identity.

It’s a big deal, when queers are underrepresented across all media platforms, and gay kisses on television see massive repulsed outcries from “family” groups and conservative pundits.

It’s a big deal, when young people still live with a nagging feeling of being shit fucking scared to come out of the closet; when youths, not unlike who I was before I came out, still pray in their beds at night to the Lord on High that they might wake up the following day a happy-go-lucky heterosexual.

It’s a big deal, when it normalises behaviour that, scientifically and historically, has always been “normal” – but has been culturally warped by a terrified conservative populace over a period of decades.

You know, as a positively rabid homosexual, I agree with the idea that “it shouldn’t be a big deal”. And it is sad that it’s still big news.

We could have come so far already, if people weren’t so terrified of difference, and so unable to break free from whatever deity cripples them with fear – whether that’s a religious deity, or the real-world demons of conservative traditionalism.

But while holding hands in the street is still a carefully-considered political statement, and not a thoughtless gesture of affection – when interlocking those delicate fingers with your same-sex partner still carries a very real risk of violence – I’d like to celebrate people who come out. Particularly celebrities in the public eye.

Because the more LGBTQ icons who say, “This is who I am. What about it?” – the more young people know it’s OK.

And the more role models we will have who will show those young people that, whether you fall in love with girls, or guys, or both – and you can’t help it – it’s all a little bit fine.

'Does fashion have an accessibility problem?'

This piece was originally published on FashionJournal.com.au on the 28th of June, 2016. Available here.

--------

Before I ever got involved, I found myself at odds with the fashion industry. It was a mystical wonderland that felt foreign to me. Ironic given that I’m a tall, thin gay man.

Accompanying my sister to my first ever fashion show, I felt strangely out of place. I was not well dressed, nor did I know any of the designers. The waiting crowds of dolled-up couture connoisseurs left me feeling like a trespasser.

I was Andy Sachs in The Devil Wears Prada. A film that, coincidentally, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year.

I wasn’t sure what you were all fussing about. The hype felt bizarre. You were all a gasping Emily, and I, an onion bagel-chomping newbie. 

But when the runway started, suddenly I too was gasping. I was swept up in the atmosphere. I developed a fascination with designers, an understanding of labels and an appreciation for an industry that I had previously been an outsider to. I suddenly knew where I wanted to be.

Even now, years later, as I find myself staggering through runway foyers and hiding backstage, I am filled with that same breathlessness every time a runway starts. I am right where I belong.

I know a lot of people who feel the same. Yet I also know many who, though they might lust for sweet threads and aspire to big brands, still feel like outsiders in a private space.

They’re just not fashun enough, with highbrow frow-dwelling bloggers never ceasing to intimidate. Their looks – their sheer presence – are given the deadly purse-of-the-lips by many an amateur Miranda Priestley.

Like it or lump it, the industry sometimes feels like a battleground. The young and aspiring can feel ousted by the bold and the beautiful. 

The question is: Does fashion have an accessibility problem? Do runways feel less like celebrations of art and more the velvet ropes of country clubs du jour, meant for a certain type of fash-lover?

Not too long ago, fashion was a restricted area; the runway shows only available to the elite of industry figures. There were no bloggers, no sneaky Insta snaps, and no YouTube clips broadcasting twenty minutes of blessed Chanel. Fashion events were exclusive and meant for the crème de la crème of the industry.

Now, fashion is moving towards a consumer model. Shows are becoming accessible to anyone. Runway brands can be purchased post-show, and anyone can buy tickets to shrink around their icons and get glimpses of their future OOTDs. The concept of the ‘insider’ is all but a gimmick.

None of fashions’ elite can agree if this is a good thing. Lagerfeld himself describes the lack of harmony on the topic as “a mess”. Heaps of Paris Fashion Week regulars are straight up rejecting the push, while brands like Burberry have completely gotten on board.

Yet the question still remains: how do we engage the kids? How can we make fashion more accessible to intrigued freshies? How do we diminish the snark of Emily (too) Blunt, and bring out post-transformation Andy Sachs?

One answer is: make fashion funny.

This clip by Matthew Frost for French magazine Jalouse is a divine example of how to satirise a fashion method while still showcasing a brand. Another clip of his starring Lizzy Caplan, simply titled Fashion Film, perfectly lampoons the arthouse fash-flick genre in a way that is funny and appealing.

Vogue produces regular online videos that approach fashion and culture in an entertaining way. Comedian Amy Schumer recently collaborated with Anna Wintour in a hilarious clip, which got audiences laughing with an editor they might otherwise be intimidated by.

(Wintour later went on to describe Schumer as a “very human person” during a speech at Cannes – which is an incredible statement coming from a real-life fashion cyborg. Actually though, ILY goddess Wintour).

Fashion can appeal to the switched-on politico. Sydney model/activist Ollie Henderson made waves at MBFWA in 2014 with the headline-grabbing launch of her label House Of Riot, a brand that continues to intrigue and inspire. It’s fashion that garners interest with politically active young people, giving them people power through clothing.

Whether through comedy or politics, these are whole new audiences given the means to explore and engage with fashion for the very first time.

Ultimately, in this exciting new time of consumer runways and outsiders looking in, should we be appealing to the deliciously scornful Emily, or the ever-curious Andy Sachs?

The masses are being granted access to a previously exclusive realm, and it’s high time we worked out how to bring them into the fray.