We tried to define relations between minorities in the frame of the situation in our countries. Some interesting conclusions appeared during our discussion.
First we tried to define antagonisms between gay men and women. Many misunderstandings also exists between lesbians and gays, especially when we observe relations in open gay/lesbian bar’s, club’s or even chat-rooms. Existing stereotypes e.g. ‘butch’ lesbians are aggressive or ‘femi’ gays thinks only about cosmetics and nice clothes, causes that there’s really little communication between ‘butch dykes’ and ‘camp’ or ‘sisi fags’ even though they often visit the same clubs. Also inside gay or lesbian groups unclear antagonisms exists e.g. ‘macho’ gays ‘do not like’ drag queens. In lesbian groups the ‘image’ dictates the state of relation, some ‘femme looking’ lesbians are treated by ‘pure lesbians’ as bisexual, which means ‘not pure and real lesbians’.
The really big problem is friction and misunderstandings between generations. The majority of visitors of the gay / les clubs are young people, mostly aged between 18 and 30 years. They can feel free there, they are threatened mostly friendly, they can dance, enjoy and also create the club atmosphere the way they want. It’s really hard to find ‘aged’ gay or les, who feel comfortable in regular young-people disco (e.g. because the ‘ruled’ music), which can not offer them anything they like and need. That’s why ‘old’ gay men and women are not ‘mixing’ with the young, especially in new clubs or bars.
Another problem concerns transgender or transsexual people, who are often excluded because of their ‘unclear’ sex or gender statement. ‘Proper’ gay and les people treat them as ‘bender’.
In effect, crossdressing or transvestites often have no really friendly place to
go.
A separate issue is the relation between homosexual and bisexual people, which means again that ‘clear gays’ do not accept bisexuals in their environment. The situation is even worse, concerning married gays or lesbians, especially those, who have children or who came–out later and also those, who, after homosexual relations, decided to be heterosexually married. Often they are, almost 100% excluded from their former environments and relationships.
A second really serious problem of discrimination is the exclusion of disabled as well as HIV-positive people from gay/les clubs (no special adjustments) or even in the chat-rooms. This is the effect of low education about disabled or HIV-positive people problems and needs.
Finally there are racial/ ethnics/ national and religious antagonisms existing in almost every country that concern also sexual
minorities. The lower social statement of Turkish or Roma gay people effects the relations inside gay society which can be as intolerant as the rest of the society. As well as the social status, the financial/ economical or family status can play a
role. There are ‘better’ and ‘worse’ gay/ les clubs, where the door selection decides if someone looks smart enough to enter the club.
Also the ‘place of living’ can decide about the position inside gay/ les environment and mostly gay people, that come from the countryside have big problems to be accepted in the new, mostly urban or ‘big-city’, society.
Even though gay men and women are discriminated by the rest of society (gay men and lesbian women are the biggest discriminated minority e.g. in Poland) they are able to discriminate their non-homosexual friends or gay-friendly people. It’s sometimes easy to observe this in gay/ lesbian clubs, lesbians and gays isolating themselves from hetero’s or bi–oriented people.
The totally inverse situation can exist sometimes within bi-lesbian women relationships, especially when a bi-woman is older than a young les.
Sometimes the psychological pressure (or force) is very strong, e.g. the bisexual women even trying to push the lesbian into a heterosexual relationship (‘just to try how is it’).
Concluding these large problems we have to put the question:
‘Where does discrimination start and what is the reason of both-side antagonisms and
hates?’