ralph schaffer - will you still need me when i’m 64?

Gay Liberation has covered a wide terrain, geographically and intellectually. We gay people have recognized our oppression, and in different ways we are dealing with it. We are also confronting our racism and our male chauvinism toward women and each other. 

We are coping with gender identities and gender chauvinism. At hundreds of Gay Liberation meetings in four cities I have quietly raised my voice to speak of the “youthism” of gay life—the chauvinism of people (young and old) against the older gay male. People listen and move on to the next topic.

Now I’m beginning to get a little pissed. I think it is about time Gay Liberation came to grips with its “youthism.” It is the most vicious and entrenched of our fuckups left over from our oppression. It is tragic because it leaves half our gay people lonely, alienated and unwanted.

Youthism is the unconscious belief that older people are inferior. We older gay men are looked upon as inferior in appearance, attractiveness, intelligence, and sexual prowess. Many of us have unwittingly accepted our alleged inferiority. Consequently, we cannot relate to other gay men our age—we must pursue the eternal eighteen-year-old Adonis.

Young people constantly use us. They use us to get a crash pad, to get money, food, jobs, contacts—and in return they condescend to let us do them.

All the aims and goals of Gay Liberation are for young gays. Nothing is for older gays—not even those who are hip and in the movement. The young take our contributions for granted, blithely accept the advantages (draft counseling, crash pads, etc.), drop a quarter in the bucket, smile, and wave good-bye. I’m not saying they should lay us in return. They should serve equally.

Who is an older person? Well, I remember two sweet young guys complaining to me at a Gay Liberation dance that some dirty old man was bothering them. The “dirty old man” was twenty-four years old! (And why is it that when an older man cruises, he’s dirty?)

We hear a lot about the gay spirit, a spirit of a special tender love. Where is it? How can you speak of such a thing when millions of gays over thirty are lonely, isolated, rejected, unloved and unwanted! In gay life we must learn to relate to each other as human beings.

I have nothing against the older man who digs younger guys, or vice-versa—yes, there are some younger guys who really dig older men—but when an older man is so fucked up that he can’t respond to a man his own age because he’s got his eye on every sixteen-year-old, he’s sick.

Why is he after the sixteen-year-old? Because he believes the physical beauty of youth is superior to the physical beauty of older men. Phooey. I’m in better shape at forty-two than many young fellows I’ve seen. The oppressed older man even believes he is not as beautiful as he once was. Nonsense. If our heads were not fucked up, we would see that not all older men are pot-bellied and bald. And so what if a guy does have a pot belly? A pot belly has its own kind of beauty, if you look for it. So do baldness and gray hair and wrinkles.

The older man has a beauty that is inaccessible to youth. His life story is written in his body, in his gestures, in his facial expressions. His body is the history of victories and defeats, moments of joy and moments of sorrow. We’ve had them all. Every man has a story to tell about life. He has visited places and travelled roads the young have not yet imagined.

The young cannot be blamed for not seeing this beauty. But older gay men have no excuse for overlooking the beauty and attractiveness of their peers.

The young person who concerns himself with the lousy fate of older gays is planning for his future. But, of course, young people don’t really believe they will someday be a hoary thirty-three years old! Believe me, it comes faster than you think.

I have quit Gay Liberation after being extremely active for a full year. In Gay Liberation I’ve known more gay people than in all my life. I have never been so lonely. What a tragic comment on Gay Liberation.

Gay Liberation is masturbation.