You can find your place, but never fit in.

There's lots of documentation that homosexuals have shorter life spans, and are more prone to suicide and depression, so it's not very loving of us to let them stay in that situation. - Ron Luce, director the of Texas-based ministry who brought 20,000 kids together in San Francisco this past weekend to protest treating gay people like human beings. So far, that's the best excuse I've heard yet for condoning discrimination, simply because it's true. What Mr. Luce doesn't seem to understand, however, is that it's because of people like him, and the environments of shame, hostility and hatred they create that make gay people more prone to substance abuse, depression and suicide, thus overall creating shorter life spans.

You can read a more in-depth reporting on the story here.

But on the other hand....

The New York Times reported this morning on the closing of the famous "gay playground" the Roxy Nightclub over the weekend. Which ordinarily I wouldn't care about, as very little makes me feel more alienatd from other gay people than going out to gay clubs does, but I wanted to point out this wonderful little quote at the bottom of the article about their practices of inviting people to their parties:

He went on: “This was the emergence of the Chelsea era, and the Chelsea Boy look. Everyone worked out really hard. And they all worked on the same body parts.”

Mr. Blair, who had owned gay health clubs, explained the coding system that he and his business partners devised for the Roxy’s loyalty cards and mailing lists. “We rated everybody on a scale from 1 to 4 based on how they looked,” he said. They kept the rankings in a database, so that for certain events they could direct their invitations to a specific mix of loyal customers and trophy guests.

“We gave out very few 1s — that’s the worst-looking, or for straight people,” he said. “Then, most people got 2s; if they’re pretty, they got a 3. Four is for people we have to let in free — either they’re really hot or they’re a friend of mine or somehow important in the club community.”

He explained that 3s were actually more desirable guests than 4s. “A 3 is a cutie that pays,” he said.

On second thought, perhaps Mr. Luce is on to something. Most of the time, I feel like we're all our own worst enemies.