The Cure

While digging through old blogs as part of my reflection for the one I will be posting shortly, I came accross this old one from a few years back and thought I'd re-post it:
(It's old, so my style is definately a bit different.)
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X-Men is a series of movies that every Homosexual ought to see. The homosexual overtones are amazingly clear...though certainly not intentional. Im sure we all know the basic premise of the series. Mutants...men and women with extraordinary powers and abilities, and they are faced with the choice to use them for either good or evil. Prof X and his clan are the good guys, while Magneto and company are the bad. The government, in the final movie of the series, creates a "cure" for mutants. A shot that strips the mutant of their abilities.

The first few movies delt with things like young people coming to terms with the fact that they were mutants. "Coming out" to their parents as mutants. The parents reaction was similar to the reactions of so many people in our lives as gay folk. "This is what youve chosen." "Have you tried NOT being a mutant?" "Let's not jump to conclusions, maybe your going through a phase." Some were banished from their families, and friends. In this final film, the mutant community is outraged that the government has found a "cure", because they dont need a "cure" there is nothing wrong with them! They are mutants. Its not a disease, its who they are.

I know my family views homosexuality as a mix of these things. My mother I think views it as a choice first and foremost, a choice that is spurred by this "disease". So many in seminary would speak of homosexuality as a "cross" that had to be borne. And prayed to one day find a cure. Gay seminarians denied their homosexuality, believing it was a shameful thing that they had been smitten with. Although the producers of XMen certainly were not maki ng a movie about gay rights, they were making a movie about rights, about prejudice, about tolerance, and about a society who is sometimes quite ignorant.

The athourities pointed to the evil mutants as an example of why the mutant cure was so important. Much like society points to certain things to demonstrate the homosexual stereotype, that we sometimes build ourselves.
The movie left me thinking. If a "cure" for homosexuality was discovered would I want it? I certainly would have to say 110 percent NO. The challange for the mutants was to figure out how to healthily blend their mutant-ness into their everyday lives. It was certainly a part of who they were but the entirety of who they were. I think its the same for all of us (gays). I think I am at a point in my life where my being gay is no longer the summation of who I am. Its a part of it, just like being portuguese, catholic, a gemeni, etc etc. All the things that contribute to making us who we are. If you think about it, a str8 man doesnt spend his life integrating his heterosexuality into his being...well he does...its called puberty. I think that when a gay man "comes out" he goes through puberty again. Its unique in our community because we come out at all different ages.

The screaming thing that the movie demonstrates is that ignorance exists towards all people who are in some way "different" for lack of a better word. In history so many have experienced bigotry; women, various ethnic groups, gays, in the ficticious future - mutants, lol. But look at the lesson taught to us by these other members of society. In the 60s a black man and a white man had to drink from different water fountains, yet today we dont even think twice about ethnic differences. Its not even a part of our thought process. And XMen ends the same way, with a mutant holding a government office. The same will happen with the gay community. The more being gay becomes a PART of who we are instead of something that we find the need to identify.

I think this is why the XMen were such heros to kids in their early teens. Those are years that are formative, where all of us, gay or str8, experience feelings like we are different, and no one understands us. Even the young mind of a 13 year old can identify what makes the XMen heros...the fact that they are different and have these gifts is not something that they are ashamed of...but rather something that they have integrated and made a part of them. They realized that their powers are "gifts" not crosses.

I have said before, and I say again. If there were a "cure" for homosexuality, Id tell them to stick it. Being gay is a gift, just like every single other aspect of what makes us who we are is a gift. Gay or straight. They are gifts because they are tiny details that God saw fit to make a part of us. You may be French, I am portuguese, both are Gods special gifts to us as individuals. Being gay or straight is no different...or being a mutant...so why would one want to change it? God's creation is exactly as He wants it - it always is.