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assignment 9

I have struggled with and have felt like an outsider most all of my life. As a gay Hispanic male I struggled with self acceptance and looked everywhere outside of myself to fill the voids I have felt. Society has dictated through the media that all homosexuals are flamboyant, have high pitched voices with a lisp, and are overly feminine. I did not understand that being gay was not set by these characteristics, that in fact it went beyond these stereotypes. Yet once I was able to become more self accepting and made gay friends, I found myself still struggling because for some gay men, I just was not gay enough. Adding to the complexity of finding my way, was my Puerto Rican and Spanish ethnicity. I am the oldest of my four siblings and it is goes unspoken that the eldest son of a single mom family takes on that father figure role. I grew up in my culture speaking Spanish fluently, yet never fit in with the gay Hispanics. Apparently because my skin is fairer and I do not have an accent, I was not thought of as a Spanish person by anyone. My family moved to Pennsylvania into a very white country town where we were one of 5 ethnically different, non white families. It was a complete shock and as Collin’s mentions the oppression I felt, I began to feel was better if I just blended. Eventually they would call me “whitey” and it carried with me far into adulthood even within the gay Hispanic community, as a way of keeping me on the outside of my own culture and heritage. And it even today when I go to my local Dominican family-owned bodega I am on the outside looking in. There will be a line, where the people in front of me will have full Spanish conversations with the owner, and when it comes my turn to checkout, the owner goes back to speaking English, even after I start the conversation in Spanish. No matter that I have told him over and over that I am Spanish he will always respond to me in English. I suppose as Patricia Collins writes in her essay, that I have used this to my advantage even though I did not realize it. It has given me different perspectives of the differences in Hispanic and gay culture, allowing me to become more accepting and more aware of myself.