In what’s turning out to be a big week for straight actors who play gay characters saying some dumb shit and getting roasted for it, ex-Spider-Man Andrew Garfield is currently copping a rinsing for some poorly chosen words in a recent interview.
Garfield, who is currently portraying Prior Walter in the seminal piece of queer theatre ‘Angels in America‘, was discussing the fact he had been watching a lot of ‘Ru Paul’s Drag Race‘ with a group of friends lately when he dropped this, somehow related doozy: “I am a gay man right now just without the physical act – that’s all”.
The internet, of course, has responded in the only way it knows how; blind, visceral outrage:
Whilst a lot of the takes out there are borderline hyperbole, when you look at the quote in its
broader context it does downgrade from “HE SAID FUCKING WHAT?” to a “Ohhh, that’s still heaps dumb though”. Still, there are a couple of important things to note on.
Firstly people CAN identify as gay without participating in sexual, homosexual acts. These people can be called bisexual, pansexual, aromantic or a whole bunch of other legit labels that fall under the gay umbrella. However it’s pretty clear to me Garfield isn’t implying he is anything other than straight, and I mean in a full-hetero, laughing-out-loud-at-an-episode-of-Entourage kind of way.
What his comments, which were obviously a failed attempt at humour, do unfortunately carry with them though is the appropriative attitudes a lot of cisgendered heterosexuals (usually men), unknowingly employ when they say these kind of things.
Being gay isn’t something that can happen to you because you binge-watched a show filled with fabulous drag queens, nor is it a choice one can simply pluck out of the air. Being gay or queer for a lot people actually means ongoing oppression, physical harm and wide-ranging discrimination.
So whilst Garfield’s comments are intended as a passing joke, they carry problematic and damaging ideas about homosexuality.
Dear heteros. Please think, read, learn, listen, before going out and saying dumb things that include the G-A-Y word. Please… I’m just so, so tired.
Image: Dan MacMedan /Getty.
