There are any number of reasons why it's a good idea for a young person to attend University. Josh’s primary reasons: getting laid, partying, and being irresponsible are essentially suitable ones. These are exactly the kinds of things a young person needs to do and get out of their system before the aftermaths for such things become too severe, as they inevitably do in later life. Certainly it can be said that a person's lifetime earnings are likely to increase based, statistically, on their level of education, making the pursuit of a profitable career a good reason to go to college.
Apart from all the tomfoolery, Josh enjoyed his humanities classes as sources of inspiration and information that allowed him an opportunity to view himself more definitively as an individual, but more importantly, to see himself in relation to his society and the many communities to which he belonged. Learning about art, science, history, music, psychology, all of it, was expansive, and it was an exceedingly beneficial motivation to go to college. Within the realm of that idea, expansion, going to college provided Josh an opportunity to meet and communicate with people who were different from him. For anyone at all, this is an exceptional purpose for attending college. It turned out to be quite life-changing for Josh.
The occurrence of meeting people unlike himself, caused Joshua to examine the pronoun, “they”. He learned to be very concerned about people who spoke in generalities regarding other people, nonchalantly using the term “they”. The myriad of the world's clichés and stereotypes could be embodied in that word “they”. Of African-Americans, it was said, “they” were all thugs. “They” were all angry. Of Hispanics, it was said, “they” were all illiterate. “They” were all lazy. Of women, it was said, “they’re” all over emotional. “They” talk too much. Of Jews, it was said, “they” are all greedy. Of Muslims, it was said “they” are all terrorists and extremists. Of gays, it was said that “they're” all sinners, who want to corrupt the souls of men. These sentiments all held their place among others, in a lengthy catalog, built by people in the thrall of fear and ignorance over hundreds, even thousands of years. Josh, like everyone else on earth, was exposed to these farcical categorizations, and they were presented to him as unassailable truths from god’s mouth to humanity’s ears.
He soon learned that the application of the word “they” was often an egregious mistake. The hardest working students Josh encountered at Eastern New Mexico University, while the nation wrung its hands over immigration, were the students from other countries, who had a serious, vested interest in elevating themselves through education, along with their families. He learned just how much African Americans had to prove simply to come up to equal status in American society, how hard that work was, and how hard they were willing to work at it. He met incredibly hard-working and scholarly Latinos. He met extremely generous Jews. He met Muslims, in whose hearts, the very notion of doing violence to another person was repugnant. He met women who proved that he himself was far more over-emotional than they were, and who looked at him frequently stunned by how much he could talk. He learned that gays did not choose to be gay, that they had no desire at all to harm society, and that their pain ran deep.
How easy it was, Josh came to marvel, to make an other of somebody. All one had to do was think of the other as a concept, rather than as a human being, and then one could flippantly use the word “they” to refer to an entire classification of people. If a person believed in the myth of “the other” that they were taught from childhood, they often exhibited real fear of communicating with people who represented that other class, and they would never learn. They would never grow. They would never understand. It was in having the courage to speak to somebody different, somebody from the other class, that Josh understood how amazingly common each of us is. It was by means of an open and honest exchange, built especially upon listening for understanding, in which Joshua came to greater awareness about the realities of his world and the people who lived in it.
Once, in a political science class Josh was taking, the teacher organized a debate about whether or not African Americans should receive reparations from the government for the crime of slavery. This was at a time when Apartheid was in full swing in South Africa, Louis Farrakhan was organizing his marches, and the Ghosts of Jim Crow, segregation, and the Civil War were more vehemently rattling their chains, like poltergeists, in darkened hallways of news rooms, classrooms, and legislatures everywhere.
A cloud of anger hovered over the room as the debate found itself well under weigh. In class, Josh argued that hiring quotas and affirmative action made the idea of reparations moot. His opponents in the debate argued, with an intensity that took Josh aback, about the atrocity that was slavery. They contended that such things as redlining and the establishment of ghettos in the inner city, which represented ongoing efforts to keep people of color in their place, necessitated the kind of compensation that could truly lift blacks up to equality in society.
There was no resolution to the debate, not only in that classroom in 1988, but to this very day, Dear Reader, to this very day. The fury had been so intense, Josh was actually terrified he was going to get his ass handed to him by a couple of African-American gentleman, who were linebackers on the football team, when no one was there to prevent it. To his great relief, this did not happen.
When that class session came to its happy conclusion, Josh was approached by a soft-spoken, yet clear-headed black woman named Deb Watson. She had hair shorn all around, no make-up and no need for it, large brown eyes that sparkled with warm insight, and she had a smile that said, “All are friends, until they’re not”. She was in her junior year, studying to be a civil rights attorney.
She smiled at Josh. “That was something huh?”
He was beside himself. “They think they think I'm a racist.”
“I think most people don't intend to be racist but don't know the ways that they are, and I think that includes you.”
What Josh wanted to hear was, “Of course you’re not a racist. You’re just a smart, wonderful human being who believes in being logical about everything.”
This was not what he was told, and Josh was stupefied. Without a lot of money to spare, Josh was making monthly contributions to Amnesty International, in the hope of bringing Apartheid to an end. He wept like a baby when he saw “Cry Freedom”. He recoiled at the notion that slavery ever existed, and human injustice bothered him to his core. How could he be racist?
She could see that he was crestfallen and feeling misunderstood. “I'm Debbie Watson, by the way”, she said extending a firm hand to him.
“Josh. Josh Megalos. Nice to meet you”, he said mildly. “Do you really think I'm a racist? I hate racism. I really do, a lot.”
“Oh, I get it. I sense that you have a good heart, but what you don't have are good facts. Most people don't have good facts, and it's not like the history books aren’t written by the winners, so finding those facts is not easy to do, and when people of my color present such facts, we get told we're uppity, were exaggerating, that slavery was 400 years ago, and why can’t we just get over it. The truth about racism in this country is not made available for public consumption, and even if it was, not many people in America would want to consume it in the first place. The facts stay in their convenient little hidey holes, away from the conscious minds of people like you. No offense.”
Josh felt a little dizzy. Here was ground of unfamiliar footing. “None taken”, he said trying to ensure he was being honest.
“You want some facts, Josh? They’re out there.” It was an invitation, yes, but the look on her face had, “I dare you” all over it. Josh was not one to walk away from a dare.
“Try me”, he responded warily.
She raised an eyebrow like Mr. Spock and gazed at him keenly for a moment, trying to size up whether or not his objectives were pure and he was serious.
“What are you doing tomorrow night?” Her face shone with observable self-assurance.
“No plans”, Josh replied.
“Let's grab a bite to eat, have some drinks, talk, and I will provide you with the information you need. After that, I want you to tell me where you think you stand. Are you down?”
“I am”, Josh responded with what he hoped seemed like sufficient conviction.
They decided to meet at 7 p.m. and go Dutch at the nicest restaurant in town, the Cattle Baron. They had a great salad bar, good drink specials, and it was a good place to sit, eat, and have a good long colloquy of any kind, which they were about to.
The conversation began at the bar. Josh drank some Heineken, and Deb had a glass of pinot noir. There was no foreplay in the discussion. She jumped right in.
“Tell me what you know about Thomas Jefferson.”
“Okay. He was a founding father. He wrote the Declaration of Independence. He was the third president of the United States of America. Now, I know he owned slaves, but he was also against slavery.”
“He not only owned slaves, Josh, he raped them. They had his children.”
Josh was impressed by how blunt his dinner companion that night was, nearly as tactless as he was. “I'd heard something about that, but didn't he have relationships with his slaves, not violent or abusive?”
The look on Deb’s face had “are you kidding?” written all over it. “What greater abuse can there be than to be somebody's property. Do you think any of the slaves he raped had an option to say no? By definition, a slave cannot offer consent. That makes it rape.”
Josh took a moment to digest this. Everything about the Declaration of Independence and Jeffersonian ideals in democracy was revered by Josh, but here, Deb pointed out irrefutable facts. Rape doesn't have to be the product of wrath or viciousness, as he was imagining at that instant. It could merely be the absence of consent. There was no denying that this is what must have happened when Jefferson impregnated his slaves. Josh had an urge to stop listening at this point. He knew, from then on, that certain myths about America we're about to be called into grave question, and the idea of certainty in the greatness of his nation, a faith not unlike a faith in any religion, was about to be shaken. He could well understand why many in his position would’ve stopped right there and walked away from this, choosing to live in denial about historical fact, but he had agreed with Deb that he was in this for the duration, and there wasn't anything about this conversation that he was going to shy away from, regardless of how uncomfortable he knew this was about to make him.
“And that's the way of the heroes you learned about in your history class, Joshua. You've learned about the heroes of the oppressor, and they don't want you to know about the heroes of the oppressed. That's why we have Black History Month, or Women's History Month. There are incredible black individuals and female individuals who have made America great, but you don't hear their stories, because it goes against the narrative they want you to believe in, and Thomas Jefferson, this great American hero, was a slave owner and a rapist. I'm not saying his influence on democracy was not a positive thing. I'm just challenging you to see the man as he really was, villain and hero all wrapped into one. In fact, it might be said of Jefferson that his ideas of race influenced slavery in one of the worst ways possible. Right along with the fake scientists propagating the notions of eugenics in Europe, classifying human beings by the shape of their skulls, the sizes of their nostrils, and various outward features, determining whether or not they were higher or lower on a scale of evolution and intellect, Jefferson jumps in, writing a letter to the French, proclaiming his belief that blacks were inferior, mentally and physically, to white people. So here is your influential founding father basically saying crap like this. What are people going to believe? They're going to believe what the authoritative white man has said, and that's going to be all the justification they want or need to propagate the subjugation and servitude of people of color. Despite the very freedoms that man wrote about in the Declaration of Independence, claiming that all men were created equal, here he is, now saying all men are not created equal. This basic contradiction has become part of the collective unconscious of the people of this country, and it influences attitudes about people of color to this very day, in ways they don't even realize.”
Josh found himself very much on the receiving end of this exchange, which he deemed absolutely appropriate. His disquiet was only just beginning, however. “I see your point”, he said. “I think you're right. Racism is in the unconscious, and many people don't even know. I remember a day when my brothers and I we're watching a basketball game on TV. My mom said, ‘I think black men are becoming more attractive. They're developing more white features’.”
Deb’s eyebrows rose in vivid dismay.
“I know. My response exactly’, Josh continued. “My brothers and I were stunned, and we tried for the next half hour to explain how what she said was racist. My mother, a product of the 50s, had a hard time seeing it, but it was there, and maybe because we're from a different generation, a generation that grew up after the 60s, we developed some different social sensibilities on the matter.”
“That's a good example, Josh, and here we are, after the 60s, after the Civil Rights Movement, and yes, your sensibilities and my sensibilities have changed from those of folks in the 40s and 50s, but the myths that inform racism still exist, unaddressed in the public dialogue, the result of which is that, even in your mind, even with your desire for a higher state of understanding, you still have racist tendencies within you, just as unbeknownst to you as the racism of your mother’s statement was unbeknownst to her.”
Consternation gripped Josh. “See, this is where I struggle, because I don't know the ways that I might be racist. I can't think of any. I really can't.”
“Let me ask you this. You’re walking down the street. Down the way, you see three black teenagers coming your way. Do you cross the street?’
“You want an honest answer?”
“That's what we're here for.”
“I guess I would.”
“And would it be the same way if those kids were white?”
“Maybe.”
“But less likely?”
“I guess. Yeah.”
“Why?”
“A biological imperative, perhaps? Just because of the difference? I don’t know.”
Again, Josh saw, “Are you kidding” on Debbie’s face. “Mmm hmm. Do you maybe fear that the black kids could be criminals?”
“I might. Yeah. But listen, it may not be racism from my end. It may just be a knowledge of the world I live in, Debbie. The dominant race in American prisons is African American. I think it’s something like four times as many blacks as whites. Blacks commit something like 20% more murders in America than whites. And when it comes to black kids, they represent about 16% of America’s youth population, and yet they commit about 50% of the crime. My numbers may not be exact, but I think they’re close, and these statistics come from the FBI. Now, knowing these things, is it racism making me cross the street, or is it reasonable precautions for safety?”
Josh was pleased, at least for a fraction of a moment, at the logic he’d infused into the dialogue.
“Are those statistics right? Yeah. Probably. And they have you believing that blacks, are, by nature, more violent and aggressive than whites, do they not?”
“I suppose they do, but it’s not because I’m a racist.”
Deb chuckled, taking a sip of her wine. “No. It’s because you’ve been made to be racist, and you don’t know it. Let me ask you, what makes someone turn to crime?”
Their table was available, and the couple were seated. After getting salads from the bar, and settling in to wait for the steaks they both ordered, Deb continued, not even skipping a beat. She was like a hunting dog, hot on the scent of a recently fallen pheasant.
“You know what causes people to become criminals in this country? Poverty, neglect, abuse, drugs and alcohol, a lack of educational opportunity, and basically being born into depressed circumstances. When you grow up in circumstances like these, you end up walking three paths. You might just be lucky enough, disciplined enough, and forceful enough to get out of the ghetto, into a college, and into a career, but it's such hard work coming from so low down, that is not the highest likelihood. What are the other options, the ones that are most likely? You find yourself staying in the ghetto, living off of social assistance, or you find yourself in the kind of fraught circumstances that make you tempted to commit crime.”
“Okay, Deb, but what about personal accountability? Sure, it's hard work to get out of circumstances like that, but it's not impossible. Becoming a criminal is a choice. No one is forced into that.”
“I don't entirely discount what you're saying”, Deb responded, never for a second losing her train of thought or losing her cool, “But you can't understand the circumstances they’re living in. It's not something you've had to face, and these circumstances are not accidental. The reason that many blacks live in conditions like these is because they were intended to by the oppressor. It was planned.”
Josh smirked as he gave himself a mouth full of macaroni salad and red beans. “You're not going to go into some crazy conspiracy theories are you?”
“No, Josh, I'm not a conspiracy nut. It just so happens that white people in power share common interests. They didn't all get together in some Star Chamber and come up with this plan, but because they shared these similar interests, they acted similarly. They made policies and laws similarly. That's what I mean by ‘there was a plan’.”
Incredulously, Josh said, “Okay. Tell me more about this plan.”
“Let me take you back to World War II. Blacks and whites, who were segregated throughout the conflict, by the way, returned home from the war, and they did not get equal rewards for their service. In the 1930s, there was the Federal Housing Administration, and this is where racism came into something as basic the need for human beings to be housed. On the surface, it seemed innocent enough. They were there to provide loans to average Americans so they could have the American dream, a home of their own. When veterans came home from the war, they were encouraged to buy new homes in nice neighborhoods and live the dream they fought so hard for. Suburban communities, in big cities all over the country, sprung up almost overnight. Nearly a million African American families we're basically told that they couldn't buy homes in these new communities, flat out. The FHA had basically published a statement in which they said the presence of black families in those neighborhoods would lower the property values of the other homes, so nobody wanted to sell to black families, and white families wouldn't have it if black families wanted to come in. According to a national appraisal system, established in the 30s, race was figured into the value of the home as much as the quality of the lawn, the stability of the foundation, and the size of the yard. These were codified standards for determining property value. This is where the term redlining comes from. Have you ever heard this term?”
Josh shook his head no.
“People in real estate, white people, assessed neighborhoods in which the communities were full of white folks, and they labeled them green, the highest rating, with the highest property values. They looked at neighborhoods that were becoming more multiracial or that were dominated by people of color, and those neighborhoods were colored red, given the lowest rating, with the lowest property value. The logical consequence of this, was that the suburbs became the nice places, full of nice white people, and the inner cities, those labeled yellow were designated declining neighborhoods, which meant that it was increasing in people of color, or those neighborhoods that were redlined were considered irredeemable. Those redlined neighborhoods, did they have the best schools? Could you get the best jobs in those neighborhoods? Could you start the best businesses in those neighborhoods? Of course not. So those neighborhoods became depressed neighborhoods. Those neighborhoods became the ghettos. Those ghettos are where poor people, mostly people of color came to live and still live to this day. Did it have anything to do with how hard a black person worked, or how educated they were, or how effectively they served in combat in the war? It did not. Black people had the same access to FHA Loans as white people, but because of what the FHA put in their policy, they did not have the same opportunity to buy homes in those neighborhoods. They were forced … let me repeat this, Josh … they were forced into these ghettos. People all over this country look at African Americans in the inner cities, and like you, they say these people can choose to rise out of that poverty. It's only a matter of hard work. Unfortunately, people who say that don't understand how this happened, and they have no concept, whatsoever, about how hard the work is to get out of it, especially when there's a history of having the cards stacked against them, like they have been since even before redlining began. Don't take my word for it, Josh. Come with me to the library, and I will show you some books on this subject.”
Josh was impressed with Debbie Watson. This girl was masterful in dialectics, clever as a fox, and she argued her points with the tenacity of a lobster. “No, Deb, I believe you. I know you to be hard-working student, and every time we have class discussions, your contributions are impeccable. I feel like it can trust you on that.”
Her eyes grew in intensity as they fixed even more firmly on Josh. “But don't. Come with me to the library, and see the books. Read the books. See the credible evidence that what I'm saying is true. Discussions like this mean nothing without evidence, and I insist upon it.”
Josh had committed to this discussion over dinner. Why not go further? In for a penny, in for a pound. This was about matters of extreme consequence. “Of course. That makes total sense.”
There was silence between them for a few moments. Their steaks arrived. As they dug in, she into her medium T bone, and he into his medium well rib eye, she continued. Her tone shifted slightly, softening somewhat.
“And then I have first-hand experience. My father grew up in the Southside of Chicago in the 50s. I don't need to tell you that it was a rough place to grow up. The school he went to had no air conditioning, and I don't know if you've ever experienced a summer in Chicago, but being in a school without air conditioning is dreadful. His school had text books that were written in the 20s. That was the most current information he had access to, and they didn't even have enough to go around for everybody. He took the L almost every day to a public library far outside of his neighborhood so he could read books about chemistry, which was his passion. He worked construction the moment he was able to, and he worked as many hours as he could, saving every penny so that he could go to college. He went to Howard University for his Bachelors, and after getting incredibly good grades, he was accepted at Rutgers in New Jersey, where he earned his master's degree. I can have him sit down and tell you, he had to work four times as hard just to achieve attention from his professors at Rutgers even remotely equal to that of his white peers while he was getting his education, and after he got a job at Flaubert Chemicals, he saw white people getting promotions right and left. For every three promotions he saw white people getting, who were hired long after he was, he might get one, but he was good at what he did, and he worked hard. He eventually made it into lower management by the early 70s. When he finally had the money, he fulfilled a lifelong dream of having a Porsche. And, Josh, this is where, perhaps, the most insidious racism lives. One day, he was driving his brand new pride and joy along Lakeshore Drive, with me sitting shotgun. I was ten or eleven. And he got pulled over. He was maybe going two miles per hour over the speed limit. The first thing out of that white cop’s mouth, when my father rolled down his window was, ‘Does this car belong to you?’ ‘Does this car belong to you?’ Josh, if it was your dad in that Porsche, a white man, would a police officer have ever thought to ask, ‘Does this car belong to you?’ Do you understand the implication here?”
Josh nodded, empathetic sadness aching in his heart for Deb and her father.
Deb wiped some A1 sauce from the corner of her lips with her napkin and returned her gaze to Josh. “The devil is always in the details, Josh, and these are daily occurrences for black men, women, and children all across this nation. Black people don't talk about it with other black people, because to complain about it would be like announcing that the sun came up that day, or that trees were green, or that cars have wheels. Black people don't talk about it with white people, because either they don't expect a white person to understand, they don't expect a white person to care, or they're being so nice, they don't want to burden white people with their troubles and tribulations. No, black people keep these daily abuses to themselves, where the anger and hurt festers and traumatizes in ways you can’t know.”
Josh stopped eating and became completely quiet, which was now most appropriate.
“It's when a nice person like you, who looks at the statistics and has come to believe that blacks are likely to be criminals, crosses the street.”
Terrible guilt traveled down Josh’s throat, like poison, into the pit of his stomach.
“You're right. It's not over racism, and you didn't do it out of hate or malice. You did it because you didn't know better. You were not in possession of all the facts. But that act of crossing the street has an impact on those young black teens. It reminds them that they have no place in this society. It traps them in the ghetto of their own minds, to such an extent that it unconsciously inhibits any belief that they actually can advance in this world. It's the day-to-day shit, Josh, that makes getting out of the ghetto as hard as it is, and it was designed to be this way.”
Josh was deeply agitated by what Deb had shared with him. He was saddened, he was angry, he was ashamed, and he felt an impulsive urgency about it all. He wanted to know now what he could do to help. “I don't know what to say, Deb. I am so sorry. I'm so sorry about the part I play in this, I am so sorry about the history here, and I'm angry that this perpetuates itself. I'm at a loss. What can I do? How can I be part of the solution, instead of the problem?
Deb smiled warmly at Josh, and in that smile, there was a respectful appreciation for the fact that this naïve young white boy had shown such willingness to be put through the shattering of his illusions. She recognized that there was hope for him, despite the fact that, in that moment, he looked like he was going to cry. Her tone became gentle, but she lost nothing of her firmness.
“I am glad you asked, Josh. First of all, you can learn about this, and you can educate people like yourself about this. When you do it, you have to understand that no matter what you've experienced, you cannot truly understand the black experience in this country. And I can see the temptation in you right now. You want to be a hero. Don't be like that. You are not Sylvia Barrett from "Up the Down Staircase" or Atticus Finch from "To Kill a Mockingbird". We don't need white saviors. The fight for equality is our fight, and one of the best ways you can help us is to support us in that fight, not to think you can fight that fight for us. You can advocate for putting more people of color into positions of power, and use your vote accordingly. You can help us make sure we have a platform and a pulpit from which to speak when we choose to. These are ways you can help us, but please remember, this is our fight.”
Dinner ended. Deb and Josh shook hands as they went their separate ways.
“Thank you, Debbie”, for setting me straight about a lot of things. I have a lot to learn, apparently.”
“That’s life isn’t it”, she said with a comfortable grin, “Endless opportunities to evolve.”
Josh, who could barely be bothered to do his homework for the actual classes he had been taking, did indeed make a trip to the library with Deb. Over time, he learned a lot more details about the slave trade, Jim Crow laws, Brown versus the Board of Education, the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, Medgar Evers, Freedom Riders, the horrifying lynching of blacks in the south, the history of the rise of the KKK, and so on. Beyond that, he got his nose into literature about the internment of the Japanese during World War II, the Sand Creek Massacre, the so-called “Indian Wars”, Bacon’s Rebellion, the Long Walk, the Trail of Tears, and other not-so-very proud moments of his nation’s history. The book that made the greatest impression on him, both for it's amazing objectivity and its impeccable research, was Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. He would recommend it to everyone he met, whether they were studying history or not. Everything Deb had told him that night at the Cattle Baron was borne out to be truth. They became good friends, and every time there was something that demanded protest, resistance, or civil action, she would be his go to for advice about how best to play a part.
He learned a lot from her. All he had to do was find the guts to be part of an open dialogue with someone who had been “othered”, and a world of personal development was made available to him. But for his time in college, he might never have had such an opportunity, and though he was shaken to the core by what he’d learned, he was made more compassionate because of it, and had nothing but gratitude in his heart about it. This had changed him irrecoverably, but there was still more to come.
When Josh was sixteen years old, he auditioned for his first play, outside of a school setting, "Romeo and Juliet", produced by The Vortex theatre. He was to play a bit part, Balthasar, Romeo’s sidekick, and the director was going to go with correct, period costuming. This meant that Josh was going to wear tights and have a bowl haircut. It meant that there was going to be a hairdresser, and that hairdresser was gay.
No, Dear Reader, to merely say that the hairdresser was gay is inadequate. He was as queer as queer could get. The Human Torch, yelling, “Flame on!” and rising to fight Doctor Doom was not nearly as flamey as Benjie McCulloch, the spirited and ostentatious stylist for that production of Romeo and Juliet. Josh, who had been taught that homosexuality was a grievous sin, his parents quoting from The Book of Leviticus and telling him stories of Sodom and Gomorrah, the origins of the word sodomy itself, made it clear that Josh was in no way to befriend any such person, that individuals like these, devoted themselves to sexual perversions, the molestation of children, incest, and the seduction of the innocent. Homosexuals fell into the “they” category, about which no one in Josh’s family knew anything, because they didn’t know any gay people, or rather, they didn’t know they knew any gay people. When Josh encountered Benjie McCullogh, it was his first time not only being knowingly present in the room with a homosexual, but being … touched by one. Others in the theatre, perhaps closeted gays themselves, or lunatic liberal sorts, tried to convince Josh that there was nothing wrong with being gay, but Josh wasn't having it. These were predators. These were people wired incorrectly in their minds.
When Eric was first teaching Josh his fifth grade, pornographic sex ed lessons, the subject of homosexuals came up. Eric pontificated thus on the subject of the gay man.
“You guys know what sodomy is right?”
Josh's mother and father hadn’t gone into great details about it, other than to say it was the sickest kind of perversion, a vile sex act, and it's why God destroyed a couple of cities. It pissed him off so much.
“Sure. Yeah. I know what sodomy is”, Josh answered with faux poise.
“It's butt fucking”, added Eric. “It's when one dude takes his cock and shoves it up another of dudes butt. Fucking disgusting!”
“That's what sodomy was?!” Josh thought. “Eeeeewwww!”
“Picture it” Eric went on. “Two dudes, two hairy fuckin’ dudes making out, maybe with beards. Like Velcro on Velcro. Then one gets down on his knees and sucks the other’s dick. And they go and suck each other's dicks, after they put them in each other's butt. Fuckin’ faggots. It's disgusting. My dad says they're all going to burn in hell.”
And so it would be, that young Josh, playing his bit-part in Romeo and Juliet, would have the hands of Benjie McCulloch, running through his hair every weekend for four weeks. Every time Benjie lisped, Josh felt wrath in the pit of his stomach. Every time Benjie spoke to him, regardless of how kindly he was, regardless of what they spoke about, Josh could barely stand it. Having Benjie's fingers touch his hair, repulsed Josh. He did his best to hide it, and Benjie, a gay man in his early 30s, who’d experienced this kind of thing before, knew that Josh was doing everything he could to bury his antipathy. Regardless, Benjie spoke benevolently to Josh, complimenting him on his preparation to perform in the fight scenes, his natural acting ability, and his hopes for future success. Somewhere, deep in the recesses of his unconscious, Josh was aware that Benjie was a very nice man, but this was overridden by the bigotry programmed in his operating system at the time, born of alarm and unawareness. He didn't discuss this revulsion with his friends in the theatre, because he knew they would tell him he was wrong, and he didn't discuss it with his family, because he knew they would pull him from not only this production, but any other theatrical production, in which he was likely to have a run-in with a fag.
And so, this intolerance would sit, a festering cancer in Josh's heart, for two more years, until the day he got to college and realized if he was going to continue doing theatre, he would have to find a way to cope with the reality of working with gays. It was that or quit doing theatre, and Josh loved it too much, at that time, to consider quitting. This realization did not make his anxiety go away, and one night, after another bacchanalian gathering at the Forest, Josh was being given a ride back to his dorm room, by Bud Volkmann and Ernest Scottsdale. Ernest was another chaotic churning volcano of queer fire, unabashed in his raunchy humor and his overt sexuality. Drunk from the evening in the Forest, this threw gasoline onto his innate flame. He put his hand on Josh's thigh. Joshua threw up in his mouth a little bit, but said nothing. He was still a noob to the group, and he wondered if this was yet another test he needed to pass to be accepted by the upperclassmen.
“You seem like a pretty open-minded guy, eh Josh”, Ernest practically sung, “Are you an open-minded guy?
Feeling bated, Josh tried to be noncommittal. “Open minded? I guess. It depends.”
Ernest put his arm around Josh's shoulder. “It depends? On what?”
How to be firm without being mean became the quandary. “There are some things, a person shouldn't be open-minded about”, Josh said quivering inwardly.
“Like what? I find”, Ernest continued as he inched his hand further up Josh's thigh, “that life, this beautiful quagmire we call life, is a glorious cornucopia of Epicurean delights. Don't you agree?”
Delight was the furthest thing from Josh's mind. Real fear had crept into him, and he was very literally shaking.
“What some people call delight”, he stammered out stupidly, “other people call sin. Nobody should be open-minded about Sin.”
Ernest guffawed loudly. It was the forced laugh of a villain from 60s Batman episodes.
“Oh, Ernest responded, grinning from ear-to-ear, you're one of those. I've met your kind before, and you're the most fun to play with. Afraid to walk up to the door, but when someone takes your hand and gets you to the door and then opens that door, it's people like you who have a surprising eagerness to wander all the way through.”
Bud looked and saw Ernest, hand around Josh’s shoulder, pulling Josh closer into him, whispering into his ear, his hand caressing Josh's thigh. He stopped the car.
“Ernie”, he commanded, like Dirty Harry, “if you don't cut that shit out right now, and leave Josh alone, you can take your drunk ass home on foot. Do you understand me? In case you haven't figured it out, he isn't buying what you're selling. Not everybody buys what you sell. Show some respect.”
Ernie was cowed by the stronger of the personalities. He had to back down, but to save face, he did so with snake-like sarcasm. “I'm sorry. I was just having a little fun. Didn't mean to offend. Sorry to scare the little Christian white boy. Didn't mean no harm.”
Ernest quickly removed his arm from around Josh and his hand from Josh's thigh. Josh felt the same kind of relief one feels after avoiding a car crash. There was a huge swell of adrenaline flowing through him, like somebody had given full electric charges through jumper cables clamped to his nipples, suddenly abated by a power outage. Pressure eased instantly, he caught his breath, and he was euphoric at the notion the he was to survive. The rest of the ride home happened in silence. Bud dropped Ernie off first. Josh’s dorm would have been the obvious first choice, based on time and distance, but Bud wanted Ernie out of the truck.
As Ernie got out, he waved wildly. “Toodaloo, Boys. It’s been a scream. Josh, when you change your mind, I'll be your brother from behind.”
Bud hit the accelerator swiftly, and to Josh's great ease, they were a good distance from Ernie in mere moments. Bud couldn’t get away fast enough, and Josh was awash with gratitude.
“Thanks, Bud.”
Bud nodded.
“Look, I don't mean to seem uptight” Josh offered, “but I'm not gay. If I'm going to be completely honest here, gay people kind of freak me out.”
Josh was a victim of what he been taught in the realm of pigeonholes. Bud Volkmann, driving his white Ford pickup, with a gun rack, a member of the NRA, and a Republican, couldn't possibly be gay. After what just happened with Ernie, surely Josh could speak freely on the matter.
“Would it surprise you to know that I'm gay too, Josh.”
And here it was, a perfect example of how the illusion of “the other” is broken down. It is the magic moment when one steps beyond the typecasts and stares, face to face, into the eyes of another human being, the same in every way that matters, but different in the ways that are the most thought-provoking. This revelation dazed Josh. Where was Bud’s lisp? Where was his outrageous effeminate behavior? Where was the peculiar love for The Wizard of Oz and musical theatre? Nowhere to be found with Bud Volkmann.
“Yeah, would it surprise you to know”, Bud continued, “That gays come in all different varieties just like heterosexuals do?
“I'm sorry”, Josh conceded coyly, “I didn't mean to…”
“… Don't worry about it. Have you met many gay people, talked with them about being gay?”
Josh shook his head no.
“Well, there it is. It's a simple matter of misunderstanding. Don't think for a moment that all gay men are like Ernie. In fact, most gays are offended by people like Ernie. Ernie is a fucking creep. He even creeps me out. I'm gay, and he couldn't pay me enough money to fuck him. He's a creep. Even other people I know, who think he's good-looking, wouldn't fuck him. He's a creep. Creeps come in all varieties too, Josh. There are gay ones, and there are straight ones. Straight men do to women what Ernie tried to do to you tonight. Does that make all straight men creeps? Of course not. What Ernie did tonight, does that make all gay men creeps?”
“No”, answered Josh.
They pulled up to Lincoln Hall. It was late, Josh was drunk, tired, ready for bed, and after the adrenaline from his experience with Ernie wore off, more than a little in need of being alone in his private room with dim light, comic books, and Tangerine Dream to sedate him.
“The conversation about being gay is more than the kind of conversation someone has on a single truck ride home, Josh, but please consider this. A gay man and a straight man are no different, other than in the objects of their affections. Just like a woman would with a predatory man, stand your ground with a predatory creep like Ernie. If you're respectful, it won't be an affront to anyone who's gay, only to someone who's an asshole.”
Josh nodded. There was a lot going on in his head at that moment. It was the first time he’d confronted the idea that what he’d been taught about homosexuals was entirely wrong.
“Good night, Josh. See you later.”
“Good night, Bud. Thanks for your help with Ernie, and thanks for giving me something to think about.”
Bud smiled warmly. “Thanks for being someone who will think about it.”
That summer, Josh came home to Albuquerque, and after a short time of college, exposure to different people of different values, with different viewpoints, Josh was inspired to make great changes in himself. One night, Josh got some old friends together for beer and board games at his mother's house, where he was staying. He hadn't seen these friends in at least a year, and he wanted to catch up. There that night were Kevin Connor, Raymond Mensch, Tony Silverman, and Michael D’Arcangelo.
One may not have believed that a company such as Mad Magazine, the many issues of which Josh grew up on, would offer an enormous gift to mankind such as a board game, but indeed they did, and it was enjoyed that night by Josh & Company. As the evening wore on, the group shifted from the simple playing of a game to banter about happenings from over the last year or so. Both Raymond and Michael were in their sophomore years at Manzano, and they told great tales about the goings-on in the theatre Department, the plays that they had performed in, and the hijinks that they had embarked upon. Tony spoke about his first year as a major of art history at the University of New Mexico, and he illuminated everyone with discussions about what he was learning about Art Nouveau, at the time, emphasizing a particular curiosity and fascination with Gustav Klimt. Kevin, the academic heavyweight of the group, had gone to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was studying electrical engineering. He refrained from a good deal of discussion about what he was learning, because much of it would have been a terrible bore to the lay people, and he seemed acquiescently more interested in hearing about the adventures of others in the group. As the hour grew late, Michael, Raymond, and Tony Departed. Kevin lingered.
“Do you mind if I stick around for a few minutes? There’s something I want to share with you.”
“Not at all”, bounced Josh. “You know me. I'm a night owl. It's only midnight. I have been known to get stupid until five in the morning.”
Kevin smiled. “Good. I'm glad you have the time.”
Josh sensed the seriousness in Kevin's demeanor, and unconsciously created the head space to give time and opportunity to his friend, not quite sure what it was he wanted to talk about.
“More beer?”
“Please.”
The two adjourned to the back porch on the second story balcony of Josh's childhood home. From there, in the Northeast Heights, there was a great view of the city. Its lights sparkled jubilantly on the horizon. That hot July day had given way to a perfectly cool summer night, with a breeze that kissed their faces like mothers do the minor cuts and scrapes of their children. Kevin knocked back half of a Budweiser before speaking. There was a satisfying, composed moment between them, a simple pleasure only the most congenial of friends can truly appreciate. Then Kevin spoke.
“Do you remember that time, in the school cafeteria, the first time you ever laid eyes on Janet Krauss?”
“How could I forget? My dong was punching holes through the ceiling of the cafeteria on sight”, quipped Josh in standard form.
Kevin laughed. He always loved Josh's humorous fascination with his own genitals and his gift for hyperbole regarding the same.
“Well, Kevin confided, while you were busy staring at her firm, proud cheerleader buttocks, my eyes were glued to her boyfriend. Remember Jerome Taylor? Running back for the football team. He had a body that was built for speed, in more ways than one. I cannot tell you how many socks I soiled thinking of him.”
This was not what Josh thought Kevin was going to talk about. Kevin had a Polynesian girlfriend named Miranda all through High School. They were one of the few couples who got together and stayed together for the duration. They were loving toward one another, and even people like Josh envied them for their connection, which seemed amorous and amiable at all times. No way could Kevin be gay.
Could he?
As if reading Josh’s mind, Kevin continued, “I know what you're thinking, and to my great shame, I really broke her heart. In those moments, like the ones in the cafeteria, staring at Jerome Taylor's ass, while you were turgid over Janet Krauss, I knew what I was, but in knowing what I was, I dreaded what I was. I hated what I was, and I was so gripped with fear about it, I hid myself away in the darkest corners of my own psyche, and I lied to myself about everything. The lies I told myself about myself became the inadvertent lies I told to everyone else, and the worst of those lies were the ones I told to Miranda.”
At Best, in high school, Josh and Kevin had been participants in cursory dialogues in the cafeteria: the making of the Tobies, the telling of dirty jokes, complaints about teachers they hated, foods they liked, and the best ways to gross out girls at the lunch table. At no point, had the two of them ever shared a conversation, of any significant depth, like they were having right then. Kevin was opening his entire being to Josh, and Josh not lacking and empathy, turned off the mechanism in his ego that impelled him to talk about himself, and he listened, really listened, to a man who had something important to say.
“To this day, she doesn't know why I ended the relationship. All she knows is that, very suddenly, with no warning at all, it was over. I haven't spoken with her since it ended. I don't know what I would say to her. I don't know if this is something you'll understand, Josh, having a secret about something so intrinsic to your own identity. Who one is attracted to, who one loves; these are things that are alive at the core of our being. Hiding things about this hurts in ways you can't possibly imagine.”
To be a friend to Josh was to indulge him when he wanted to speak about those things that interested him, about the philosophies he found fascinating, about politics he found engaging, about poetry he found illuminating, and naturally, about himself. Those closest to him accepted this as one of his personal foibles, and they were wise enough to know how to realize the extent of Josh's love for them when Josh closed his mouth and gave his fullest attention to them. There was no greater a sign of Josh's affection and respect for someone else then his engaged silence, and in this moment, with Kevin, hearing what he was hearing, knowing where Kevin was going with his line of discourse, Josh was hushed. Kevin could feel Josh's concern. Josh could feel his concern. Ears were open and mouth was shut.
“When you told me that story about that guy Ernie and the other guy, Bud, this wasn't the same Josh Megalos who talked about how fucked-up faggots were, who had horror in his heart after doing that play you did at the Vortex. I heard you tonight, and I realized you were confused about gay people. Well trust me, no one is more confused about gay people than gay people. I think as early as 6th grade, while the heterosexual boys we're learning to ogle the girls, I was looking at the boys. I was thinking naughty thoughts about the boys. I was masturbating, thinking of the boys. And you have to know, being raised Mormon like I was, masturbation is a sin to begin with, but masturbating thinking of other boys, you just can't know. You just can't know the shame that I lived with in my heart and my soul. You just can't know about the many times I thought about killing myself. Here I was in a predicament. Do I continue to jack off thinking of boys, which is a sin, sure to send me to hell, or do I commit suicide to prevent myself from masturbating and thinking about the boys and go to hell. There's no happy ending there, Josh. It's just a lot of sin, and a lot of Shame, and a lot of psychological trauma.”
“I'm sorry”, Josh blurted out. “I'm so sorry. You were sitting right next to me in that cafeteria all the time, and I'm calling you a faggot to your face, without knowing, without fucking knowing. I'm so sorry.”
“There's no need to apologize, Josh. We're both victims in this story. I'm the victim of people's panic and obliviousness about what's different, and you're a victim, like I am, of the teachings of those people. But you have nothing to apologize for, because here you are, listening to me, without judging me. I could never have told you this before, but you've changed, and I can tell you now. It means so much to me to know somebody I can tell these things to without fear of prejudice, without fear of being hated.”
Josh was deeply touched by the extraordinary faith now being bestowed upon him. “It means the world to me, Kevin, that you trust me enough to tell me about these terrible things that happened to you. It means the world to me to be your friend.”
“Before you get too apologetic, let me tell you how well you rise above my family. Here you are, a man who no longer believes in the church and its dogma, embracing me in love, regardless of the path I'm on. I wish the same could be said of my family. I haven't heard from them in a year. I came out to them. I held my heart out in my hand before them. I asked them, I begged them to understand. They cast me out. That's all. They cast me out.”
It's unfortunate”, Josh replied sympathetically, “that people have a Bible in their hand and still can't understand the basic teachings of Christ. ‘Judge not lest ye be judged’. ‘Let he who is without sin cast the first stone’. I don't get it. It's a pretty simple teaching. I don't get why people don't get it.”
The two of them sat in enlightening quiet for a few moments, each of them taking small sips of their beers, listening to the sounds of ambulances in the far-off distance, enjoying the breeze upon their faces and the hushed night air, united in a quiet, more meaningful friendship.
“It's hard, Josh. It's hard. My little brother, the one I protected from bullies, who I always tried to buy the best birthday presents for, whose first girlfriend was introduced to him by me, he told me I was destined for hell, and he wanted nothing to do with me. My father called me an abomination. My mother just cried, waving her hand for me to leave the house. So I left. I haven't been back. I don't think I will ever be back. What is it Christ said about wiping the dirt from one sandals? It's not such an easy thing to do. It’s brutal.”
Josh rose from the table, and he leaned into his friend to embrace him. “I cannot comprehend what you are going through. I truly cannot, and I'm so sorry, so very sorry about what you've experienced. I am sorry about every time I ever said the word fag, about every time I ever assumed that being gay meant you were some kind of sicko. I'm so sorry about my judgement, about my hypocrisy, about my lack of compassion. I want you to know that you are not alone in this, not alone at all.”
Kevin beamed. Clearly, he was struggling to come to terms with the fact that he had lost his family. Clearly, being gay was not a choice. It was not about one day saying, “Hey, I've had such trouble with the ladies, maybe I should fuck some boys”. It wasn't about pedophilia or being a predator. It wasn't about any of the things Josh had been told being gay was. It was about being something different than what the Abrahamic faiths said was normal, about being dissimilar, in any way at all, from those who decided what was normal and what wasn't. Josh thought about it, at length. Who would choose to be gay? Who would choose to be somebody who could never express love publicly without ridicule? Who would choose to love people they couldn't marry? Who would choose to live a lifestyle that invited brutality? Who would choose a path that would make them an outcast from their own family? The gay man was not “the other” anymore in Joshua's mind or in his heart. As Deb Watson Had taught him to be an ally to people of color, Kevin Connor had taught Josh to be an ally to those who identified as LGBTQ.
In Josh’s fondness for the underdog, he began an earnest quest to learn more about the problems with history, as written by the winners. He was beginning to realize that the narrative of dominant culture in America was a myth, concocted by those who stood to gain by separating groups into different competitive tribes, turning people against one another, manipulating people into elevating leaders who acted against their own self-interest, and who actively engaged in perpetuating an unequal society. He became determined to be an adversary to such people. To this end, he began his first forays into activism.
Debbie Watson introduced him to Howard Zinn and his book A People's History of the United States. Josh digested it like a thirsty man, 40 days in the desert, drank water from an oasis. He was illuminated, inspired, and humbled. During this time at Eastern New Mexico University what once had been Josh’s first priority of partying, pranks, alcohol, and his many expressions of juvenile playfulness, never lost their importance, but this now took second place to a new role he was coming to identify, that of the Rebel with a Cause.
Like a good many young people, discovering a desire for justice, unfortunately, Josh would overdo it. He would need to be taught how to fight the good fight sans ineffectual douchebaggery.