Nice people thread part 3- Nice as pie

vivatifosi

PasturesNew wrote: »

How many "men prefer blondes" - yet marry brunettes?

Brilliant!

My husband for one.

But then I married someone who looks like Gary Barlow when I really fancy George Clooney, Robert Downey Jr and Jose Mourinho.

vivatifosi

silvercar wrote: »

For youngsters of today, in most circles, being gay is a non issue....

....Reading back what I've written I feel so old.

I feel the same silvercar. Being gay these days is rightly a non-issue among younger people but we as a country have come massively far on this issue in a relatively short period of time. Homosexuality in England was made legal not long after I was born, but in Scotland the law didn't change until 1980. Initially the age of homosexual consent was 21, but this has come down in stages to 18 and then 16. It is hard to believe - looking back - that the age of consent for homosexual people has only been the same as for heterosexual people and true equality in that sense has existed for about the same amount of time as we've had access to the web. It is no wonder that there are such big generational differences in attitude towards being gay, but long may the attitudinal changes roll on.

LydiaJ

vivatifosi wrote: »

Being gay these days is rightly a non-issue among younger people ...

I'm not sure that's entirely true. Among well educated liberal-minded young adults, maybe, but not among the vast numbers of teenage boys who use "gay" to mean "stupid" in their everyday language.

Fortunately my son liked and respected our gay next-door-neighbour at our old house, so I've been able to explain to him that using "gay" to mean "stupid" is implying that the neighbour is stupid, and he's agreed that that's not fair and not nice. I'm hoping he'll carry that attitude with him into secondary school, but I'm aware that he'll be swimming against the tide if he does.

ETA I agree with silvercar that for some people it's a lot more fluid than for others. The gay neighbour originally thought of himself as straight and got married - he chose to be gay after experiencing a particularly nasty marriage break-up. I have a happily married friend at work who casually refers in conversation to things that happened "when I was in my bisexual phase", and I'm still in touch with a friend from uni who chose to stay happily partnered with her former husband when s/he (the husband) came out as transgendered and had surgery. But I myself have always been straight and can't imagine ever being anything else. We're not all the same.

SingleSue

It's the same here Lydia, so much so that I remarked upon it a few weeks back to my boys that it is my generation that is ok with people being gay but the new generation (the now teenagers), see it as derogatory to call someone gay, that it is therefore, not right to be gay.

It sure confuses my boys as they have been brought up to be accepting of different sexuality (just as I was even though my father actually thought differently), so they are getting it is ok to be gay from me but that it is not ok to be gay from their friends!

lostinrates

Actually, I think there is too much pressure on young people to consider their own sexuality, whatever it is, these days. I think a lot of new intolerance is a reaction to too much discussion of sex where sex doesn't need to be an issue, confusing that ''lots'' with tolerance and openess, they are different things.

vivatifosi

LydiaJ wrote: »

I'm not sure that's entirely true. Among well educated liberal-minded young adults, maybe, but not among the vast numbers of teenage boys who use "gay" to mean "stupid" in their everyday language.

Fair point. Chris Moyles has a lot to answer for. I know more teenage girls than boys. I wonder if there is a gender difference in terms of tolerance.

tomterm8

All this seems a little like what they do in school (hand you a form, and then you play darts to make important life decisions about what you want to be in a decades time, without really knowing the consequences of your decisions). Many people genuinely don't know what they want from life, and it would be a pity if people couldn't change their mind. On this and many other matters.

vivatifosi

Changing the subject to F1 did anyone see quali this morning (if you didn't and don't know the result don't read on)....


Vettel was absolutely peerless. I sense we are going to return to something like the Schumacher era when there is one totally dominant driver. Webber wasn't even close in the same equipment. Short of some kind of catastrophic car failure or heaven forbid injury I can't see this season being close at all. Now tell me, how good was Red Bull's young driver development programme who picked up on this guy who didn't follow the normal route to the sport. That's how special he is. Last year I didn't want him to win the championship because I didn't think it was his turn yet, but now he's in his element and this I think will be his era.

GDB2222

I take it that Vettel plays for Ferrari, then?

vivatifosi

Ah my heart will always be with the tifosi GDB, but that doesn't mean I can't appreciate good driving when I see it. I'd love to see Vettel in a red car rather than a red bull one.