TO THE EDITOR:
God bless Cameron Mitchell and Linda Chupkowski! If it weren't for them and their fascinating columns (April 20 and 23), I would never have known the many harsh realities of the gay lifestyle, such as the fact that there is homophobia and the strange phenomenon that many people who think they are straight, actually are not! Gosh, what will these dazzlingly original thinkers do next, invent the wheel?
It's been a long time since I've stared agape at something in The Daily Tar Heel, but these two pulled it off twice in a row. Chupkowski actually used the line, "Ever since I took Political Science 73 I realized I was bisexual," which makes about as much sense as taking Geology 11 and realizing you're a piece of basaltic rock. She also implies that being bisexual (or not "categorizing" herself ... a cop-out if I ever heard one) means she is no longer constrained by societal norms, seemingly unaware that she is now a stereotype so common these days it has its own derisive label: LUG (Lesbian Until Graduation).
Speaking of stereotypes, I'm personally getting tired of Mitchell's attention-getting schtick. How can he be so stunned that people react negatively when he holds his boyfriend's hand in public? What real homosexual is so naive? And why does he uses the word "breeders" to refer to straight people, even though that hasn't shocked anyone since 1994?
It may make these two feel better to think of homosexuality as a political or social issue rather than a simple matter of who one is attracted to, but it's not illuminating -- or interesting -- to write about it.
To put it bluntly, they're just not helping. How long will people blather about homosexuality without saying anything new? As these columnists demonstrate, as long as they can.
Jordan Carpenter
Sophomore
Undecided
