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“Why I Am Ashamed To Be On The Cover Of The Grid“

By Hamutal Dotan

LGBT/MEDIA The cover story of this week’s Grid—titled “Dawn of a New Gay“—continues to draw ire. Almost immediately after publication the piece was met with a growing firestorm on Twitter and in the article’s comment section; we had some pretty strong thoughts as well. Now, one of the subjects interviewed for and photographed in the piece is denouncing it as well. Elie writes:

I grew up in Dubai, U.A.E where homosexuality is punishable by death. I sought refuge in Canada, and have only recently, finally been granted permanent resident status. The fear of having to go back home should I not have been approved haunted me every single day that I lived here. The Grid’s article was a major slap in the face to those not as privileged as Aguirre-Livingston, and to many others in rural areas of this country and in countries around the world.

Read his full response to the article at TheGaily.ca.

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  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_DVWU6MEIBFLDA3BQUTHTN26MHM Sean

    Interesting that Elie's blurb that accompanies his picture appears to be missing the quotation marks of all the others…hmmmm…

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    From The Grid:

    'The weekend before the piece appeared, we shot the accompanying photos at a Royal Canadian Legion. Aguirre-Livingtson invited people he knew to come and be part of the Post-Mo shoot. He asked them via email to “Please read the details about the piece first…If you don’t feel this way, please feel free to decline.”'

    It would seem Elie didn't read the piece before succumbing to the seduction of the front page.

  • Calvin K

    hm if you bothered to continue reading you will see the “details” says nothing about how patronizing and pretentious the article turned out to be. 
    The “details” were valid. The article just ended up with much more unpleasantry than the “details”.

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    Ummmmmmmmm if you bothered to read, at all, you'd know he sent them the article itself and not a précis or some razzle-dazzle to trick them.

    The “details” were the details of his own experience, offered as examples of the liberated life he's led and not a template or mould every gay man his age was stamped through like so much Play-Doh.

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    From Elie's shame:

    “As a contributor to The Gaily, I was personally attracted to the notion that the article would start a dialogue on how  the ‘new gay identity’ would exist in a world that was pro-women and pro-trans, while being anti-racist and anti-classist.”

    As you can see he wanted the article to be something very specific – not unlike a lot of people who read it – full of rainbows and cheering for anyone who has ever been even slightly marginalized, yet he couldn't be bothered to actually read the thing before endorsing it.

  • HamutalDotan

    So you think that because he didn't read the piece prior to publication he has no right to speak about it after?

    Sorry, that's a logical fallacy. Whether or not Elie read the piece beforehand is immaterial to whether or not it accurately reflects his views or experience, and whether he could have done more due dilligence in advance is an entirely separate matter from whether this complaints about the substance of the piece have merit.

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    Not at all. Aguirre-Livingston presented the article, and the opportunity to be in the photo shoot, to his friends with the caveat that if they did not feel it properly represented their views, they could decline. Elie had the opportunity to read it but didn't, so distancing himself from it now does not imply any faux pas or strategy on the part of The Grid or A-L – the article didn't not suddenly change before hitting the press, and it wasn't presented to him in a misleading light. Elie screwed up, but he and the LGBTQ blogosphere are trying to frame his negligence as evidence of deception on the part of The Grid/A-L.

  • Calvin K

    Well now unless you have some insider information. The only source I have about the prearrangement for the photoshoot, and the source you quoted, is from The Grid's reply. 

    At no where does it say that each participant was given the entire, actual article before the shoot. Only the supposed details, which was a small paragraph. 

    And yes, that small paragraph is completely valid, if Aguirre-Livingston had stuck with it and spoke only for himself and his friends than it will be fine. He didn't, he ended up making blanket statements and got over his head as if he is speaking for everyone, talking about queer community and pride as if they were made for his white middle class ass only (oh it's passé because “I” don't need it anymore)

  • Calvin K

    The way Aguirre-Livingston described his article WAS inconsistent with the outcome. The premise was good, I would have endorsed it. 

    I don't think anyone is saying The Grid “con” these people for the photos. They are more concerned about The Grid publishing it at the first place. Elle is also very self-aware, in his article he at no time blamed anyone but himself for accepting the gig. He disagree with the article now, but no one is calling “deception” but you. 

    Yes he is back-pedaling, he even let people call him wuss. But your cynism is seeing conspiracies where there is none.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_XYF3QSKFNHJ6PSNNHJBRFTT7AM Joe

    Essentially you’re saying there are some topics a free press should never touch. I assume you realize we aren’t talking about nuclear launch codes here, just a bunch of urban gays arguing about each other.

  • http://twitter.com/jaimewoo Jaime Woo

    I've talked to some of the cover models and they've confirmed that they were given the brief synopsis, but did not see the article until it was published.

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    “The way Aguirre-Livingston described his article WAS inconsistent with the outcome.”

    He could have said it was about dinosaurs and unicorns and contained the cure to cancer; the article itself was given to them to read.

  • HamutalDotan

    Rek, what makes you say that? As he wrote below, Jaime spoke with several of the cover subjects, who all told him they were given a brief synopsis to look at but the not the full text of the article itself. Have you spoken with  others featured in the piece who were given the full article?

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    I'm reply to multiple posts here:

    (Quoting Aguire-Livingston) “Please read the details about the piece first…”

    I took this to mean he was offering them the article to read. 'Details' is not a synonym for synopsis or summary, it's actually the opposite.

    (The Grid) “Here’s how he described his piece:”

    And the paragraph which follows, I understood to be a preface he had appended to the article he was sending.

    As it has now come to light that A-L didn't send them anything but those 100-or-so words before asking them to sign on, I have to apologize for asserting otherwise – though I hope you can see why I was saying that. It still stands, however, that Elie and perhaps others raised their expectations: A-L's summary does not speak to the lesbian, activist or any other demographic's experience, and it even specifies that it is about homosexual men of a new generation's distinct desires.

    I still stand by everything else I've said in defence of the article, and I believe the hostile and self-righteous reaction to it, as seen here and elsewhere online, is completely misguided and only goes to demonstrate that the local omni-queer activist community (which feels it has the authority to speak for everyone who isn't straight) as no tolerance for individual experiences that do not match or defer to the harshest of the harsh elsewhere and in other times.

  • HamutalDotan

    A-L's summary does not speak to the lesbian, activist or any other
    demographic's experience, and it even specifies that it is about
    homosexual men of a new generation's distinct desires.

    A lot of the objections to the piece though, are coming from 20-something urban gay men – that is, the precise generation and demographic the article says it explictly is describing – who have been saying that it doesn't represent them at all. And while no attempt to capture a group will be unanimously endorsed, the overwhelming resistance to this piece indicates, I think, that it just failed in capturing that generation credibly.

    Setting aside the question about what this piece doesn't tackle (which is a choice fundamentally made by editors, not writers), insofar as it was framed not as a personal essay but an expression of a generational shift in the male gay community, its failture to capture the hearts or minds of those it purportedly represents is good evidence that it simply isn't hasn't done what it set out to do, namely give voice to that community.

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    A lot of these 20-something urban gay men also state they are recent transplants from small towns or foreign countries, and then go on to object to the lack of transsexual and lesbian interviewees, all of which are outside the purview of the article and author.

    Any framing was done by the editors, though the criticism has largely be levelled at Aguirre-Livingston.

    It is also apparent that much of the criticism has nothing to do with the meat of the article – young gay men of a certain age, in Toronto, free to be who the are, not raised as activists, are drifting away from the Village/Pride/etc – which tells me he has indeed captured in broad strokes what this community feels. It's everything else, real, imagined, and associated, that they object to.

  • HamutalDotan

    Not sure how the fact that some of the young gay men who object to the piece are recent transplants or from small towns  undermines anything? That is quintessentially Toronto, in fact – and any piece that tries to capture any generation of Torontonians within a certain community is likely going to have to consider the fact that half of us are from somewhere else.

    Definitely agree that the framing of the piece is a question primarily about the editors, not the writer, and that some of the criticism has therefore been misplaced. It isn't less valid for all that though.

  • tyrannosaurus_rek

    I'm done commenting on the article and everything related to it.

    This experience has taught me the local non-straight community has no time for opinions and experiences that conflict with their activist doctrine. That only underlines something I've known since I was a teenager, confirmed after I moved to Toronto, which is that there's very little for me and guys like me – we're out there, 30-somethings and older – in this community of self-congratulatory cheerleaders for whom every orgasm is political, stereotypes are ideals, and being 'born this way' issues you a membership card with terms and conditions and obligations you'd better live up to. No thank you, I'd rather just be myself.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Robert-Stemmler/644800361 Robert Stemmler

    Well, then, you learned the wrong thing. The lesson here is, if you want to write an article about your own experiences, use I instead of we; don't disparage others while you're doing it; don't cherry pick quotes from others to make your experience seem more common than it is; and most importantly, don't trust The Grid to position your personal essay in such a way that it's obvious that it's a personal essay.

    That last paragraph in your last post, though, indicates that your participation in this thread has been informed mostly through confirmation bias. You've come to believe a certain caricature of the community (one that is far from universal or accurate) and that caricature has informed your reading of both the article and the responses to it.

  • Calvin K

    I start to feel you are having the wrong impression of what most people's reactions are. 

    We are not saying AL shouldn't think and live the way he has. In fact we will probably congratulate him.

    We are saying please don't impose how AL think and live on the rest of us, please don't speak for me; which the article did. Through the article's framing, structure, phrasing, choice of words.

    “I'd rather just be myself.” – you said, and I agree. 

    Myself, no the “self” AL apparently think I should be by speaking for my generation.