The Community - what is to you?

[Nevarro]

OK so i want to shed some light on this topic.

I feel strongly about the need to have a gay community and it seems that a few people dont even understand what it is. :eek:

so this i ask of you all that do, post what our communtiy means to you.


to me its about it all - the parties, the people, the support networks, ACON, MARDI GRAS, PRIDE, Charity Drives, Education, Drug awareness, places to go to relate to others.
To me its so much more then meets the eye.

[burgjo]

very true Nevarro......the community is so much more then an asthetic thing. However the debates have been running hot more about re-establishing a ghetto culture like in the 70's where the community is isolated around oxford st or somewhere similar.

You are 100% right - community is not about a place! We can't expect to be accepted into general society but yet isolate to one area. The community needs to stand alongside...not alone.

[Cheetah77]

I also feel that we need a strong sense of community and I think that lack of a sense of a gay community is what has attributed to the death of Oxford St. We have become so vanilla and integrated into the community that there is no feeling of community left, just a sad homogenised street with very little gay flavour left at all.

When I first saw Clover's flash new rainbow flags on Oxford St I thought it was a great idea - I remember seeing them in the gay areas of LA and San Fran a few years ago and it gave me such a feeling of pride and it made me feel like I had found "my people" and I thought it was great that we could offer this to visitors to Sydney... sadly, I don't think it has done that at all given the current state of things.

I'm one of the loudest callers for equal gay rights in terms of having our relationships recognised and all the rest of it but we should retain some sense of what makes us gay. We have become too worried about what people think of us, but does that mean we should stop trying to move forward and recognising the need to keep that bond and sense of what makes us different?

Does this buy into the 'Gay ghetto' thing? I don't think so. I think you can inspire feelings of belonging and a sense of community without segregating ourselves completely.

[Tim D]

See I think that the "gay identity" is forged out of "being different".

So the more the same same we become with the rest of society, the less clear our identity becomes. And there's nothing wrong with that IMO.

[peeter]

The gay community is who I turn to when I'm feeling isolated within this hetro world.. a place to find support, solace and understanding. Some people find they can carry on in this world without a gay community but others like to associate with like minded fags..

[taylor-dayne]

everyone has their communities - and we should be no different. a huge chunk of our social scene has been stripped of its sexuality - i'll say it again, it's because of online hook up websites. a "wink" in a chatroom, a text message, or looking at profiles are no substitute for the real thing - they just aren't.

compare a "wink" online to a wink in a BAR - how daring is the real thing? how great is it? how thrilling is eye contact? or dancing? REAL CONVERSATION? why people are choosing something else is beyond me.

i love the gay community. i love being involved. i have stopped wanting us to unify like we were years ago - it's too frustrating to keep hoping that will happen, cos it won't. now i just make sure when i find my people i hang onto them. and i know the places i like and i go there, and i support them.

[danny corvini]

Thank you peeter and taylor-dayne for talking common sense. You'd think that having to live in gay old Sydney was the biggest punishment on earth reading many of the forum posts!