You referenced a 2001 article in which a straight woman in Texas claims that “they” call themselves “fags” in Southern California.

http://www.texasobserver.org/224-political-intelligence/

I’m glad you put a stop to people calling men by female names or pronouns on this site, because, in my view, it denigrates both men and women.

It denigrates women because its roots are misogynistic and it reinforces the “inferiority” of women.

It denigrates men because it imposes a false-self on men and reinforces the idea that men cannot be whole if they love another man and therefore he must be demoted; “inferior” like a woman.

I think this is a misogynistic under-the-radar way of reinforcing the idea that gay men are defective. This, in my opinion, leads to psyche harm that contributes to self-destructive habits and actions in the part of gay men who don’t feel whole and worthy as they are.

Willow’s usage is plainly – plainly – deprecatory, linking “disgusting” with “so gay” and “faggot”.

And, from time to time, one does hear that word, “faggot” inside the community, more often than not it is with the same deprecatory usage. And, therefore, ugly.

So, it really, really doesn’t matter what Tammy Bruce said. We’d concur that the most frequent usage is deprecatory.

There are some people who do use it to pretend that it has been “reclaimed”. I have to say, those usages fall hard on the ear, still, for me. It’s like it’s forced. Like a little kid saying “dick” or “twat” for the first time.

I’ve never heard “faggot” used in a playful manner or as a term of endearment. Never. I can think of only a few instances where I’ve seen it used as a badge of solidarity (unwisely, I think, but …).

Talk about a “woe-is-me” kind of clique and their ideology, have you read more than just a few of the comments posted on this or any other gay discussion website??? My friend you won’t find a better example of the “us-against-them” corps anywhere else on the net.

As to Ms. Bruce, she always seems so negative and steeped in victimization, a common trait among her cadre of ideological conservatives.

When I was a child my mother warned me that she would beat the white off my backside if I ever used the n-word or if I ever entered a segregated business. That lesson stuck and I applied it with my own child, not merely on the issue of race but also with respect to gay people. I’m *certain* my daughter never used anti-anyone slurs. In fact, when I read the mounds of research on gay and lesbian parenting and found out that one of the more remarkable outcomes was that the children of gays are remarkably accepting of diversity, it certainly rang true for me as a parent. That was the *real* difference I could see in my own kid. She was/is always respectful in her language and behavior towards others. I don’t know why other parents can’t seem to produce that same kind of temperament in their own kids. All I know is that my mother took deliberate steps to produce it in me and my siblings and that we, in turn, were able to produce that kind of respect in our own kids. Yeah, we “managed” it. It works. I had to “manage” as a public school teacher. It works there, too.