Monday, August 13, 2012
Being A Better Man
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Parenting: Fair warning - I'm going to break away from the
usual videogames and TV talk tonight in order to tackle something much more
serious, and more personal. I'm not sure if I should put some sort of trigger
warning here for those of you who look out for that sort of thing, but just be
aware that this blog post might be not for everyone.
*
So, THIS LETTER has been making the rounds on the Internet
over the last week or so. If you haven't seen it, it's a handwritten note from
a father to his son, effectively disowning him for being gay. It's a pretty
terrible thing to see, and ever since I read it, I've been thinking about
something that happened to me in my own past... not quite the same thing, but
along similar lines.
I must have been about six or so, and I was living in
California at the time. My father called me into the living room and said he
wanted to talk to me about something.
If I close my eyes, I can recall many small details about
that exact moment. The way the furniture was arranged, the sunny day outside
the window, my toys scattered around and under the legs of the dinner table
where I had been playing. My dad was sitting on a chair, and I was on the floor
in front of him.
This talk we were about to have was a short one, but I've
never, ever forgotten it. I have absolutely no idea what made him want to have
this talk on this day, but he wasted no time in getting to the point.
“If you turn out to be gay, I will kill you. I will blow
your head off with a shotgun.”
That was the entire conversation.
Was I in trouble? What did I do? I didn't say anything at
the time, but I remember breaking out into a sweat and nodding my head, then
immediately wondering if I should be shaking it instead of nodding. Whatever
response I was supposed to give, I ended up just wandering back over to my toys
and staying out of sight.
I don't think the subject ever came up after that day and we never had this talk again, but I lived in constant fear of “being gay” for quite some time after wards, despite the fact that I knew I wasn't. In fact, as far as I could tell, I had never given my parents any reason to think that I might be. Even so, I was utterly frightened that I would one day wake up, discover that I was gay, and then... what?
I'm not sure, really.
Was I convinced that my father would actually murder me with
his gun?
It's hard to say. Part of me wants to think that it was just
talk, but the very fact that he took the time and set me down to inform me of this
extreme viewpoint gives me pause, not to mention that my father actually did
have a shotgun at this time. It was an older double-barreled model that he kept
in the garage near a box of shells, stored out in plain sight. I would touch it
sometimes… I was always a little surprised at how cold the metal stayed, and
how long the gun was.
And heavy. It was quite heavy, at least to my six-year-old
arms.
As I look back on it now, though, I don't think it was
really the threat of death that bothered me the most… I think what disturbed me
more was the underlying message. The same core message that’s illustrated in
the letter I mentioned at the beginning of this post -- the idea that a son
could do something or be something so distasteful that a father would cut all
ties one way or another, and be done with him.
Would that happen to me? Would I have to constantly mind my P's and Q's for fear of no longer having anyone to count on? Would I mistakenly fuck up one day, and then find myself all on my own? Knowing that this bond could be severed so casually rocked my world, and put my
entire life into a different perspective.
*
It's been more than thirty years since I had that talk with
my dad, and I'm now a father myself. I've got two boys, and every single day I
remind myself that I want to be a better father to them than mine was to me. It
may be a cliché for someone to say "I'm going to do the opposite of what
my parents did", but in my case, that's what I strive to do, and it leads
me in the right direction.
When my wife and I talk to our kids, we make a point to tell
them over and over that no matter who they are or what they do, we will always
support and accept them. When we talk about their future and the possibility of
them getting married, we always say "when you find the right partner"
instead of "wife", just in case. When we are out with GLBT friends,
we take time to talk about them with our kids in a positive way, accepting the
differences and showing that they are wonderful people we are glad to have in
our lives, and that there's nothing wrong with them in the least.
It's utterly heartbreaking to me to see that there are still
men in the world who dare to call themselves fathers while drawing these
arbitrary lines between themselves and their children, commanding that they not be
crossed. I know firsthand the damage these lines can cause, just as I'm sure the man who posted that letter does as well. It's a terrible, terrible thing to
do to someone, and knowing that your parent is capable of disowning you, hating you, or even worse creates a kind of loneliness inside you that doesn't ever get filled.
If you're a parent or someone
who would like to be a parent someday, I hope that sharing this story means something, and that you choose a better path than my dad did. His selfish,
conditional “love” was just another kind of hate, and there's already plenty of
hate in the world to go around as it is.
If you really, truly love your kids, then be there for them,
support them, and let them know how much they mean to you, even if they turn
out a little different than you expect.
*
Posts
Brad, I 100% agree with you. I think it is great that you post this on your blog. It is sad that intolerance like this, the note but also the talk you had with your dad, is stil such a big and present factor in this world.
People first had to accept women as equal, then black people, and now gays. I guess human evolution is a fucking slow process.
I personally think my dad is, well, an asshole, but when I hear these kind of stories, I am actually glad he left me/the family when I was 8 years old. He never said these kinds of things though. I still have contact with him, though we can't really talk to eachother on the same level.
Your post raised a question with me: are you still in touch/contact with your dad? And if not, is that hard for you or not a big problem? I just wonder...
Ah well, whatever the case, I think it is good that you show where you stand, and even better that you stand on the tolerant and friendly and positive side...
Viva nice people!
Holy hell, somehow, seeing a letter like that handwritten makes it even more - horrible. I live a sheltered life, I can not even imagine such hate towards your own child. I hope it's a generational thing and our children will grow up more tolerant than our parents.