Another Queer Jewish Buddhist

Better than Jesus on toast: Satan in your spaghetti!

From BBDO Dusseldorf comes the proof that in cuisine, presentation is indeed everything:

Sexy Gay Brazilian Men Vs. An Alien Female Predator

Okay, perhaps that's a little dramatic, but then, this ad, from MixBrasil, the lgbt film festival in Sao Paolo features a hot gay couple poolside, staring at a woman that is clearly not human. Now this could perhaps be seen as homosexual gynophobia projected out visually. But the campaign speaks to the sense many queer folk have of being seen as alien, other. Thus, the theme line: What is weird for you?

Obviously, to those of us who live very queer lives, suburban soccer moms can seem weird. It is all in who is doing the looking. And while that may be the point of the ad campaign, I am not sure how it works to get people to go to this film festival — or whether they are seeking an audience above and beyond the usual lgbt film fest crew. Perhaps some alients. Don't know. Or maybe Grace Jones, since I have to admit, the woman in this ad looks like Grace Jones to me, and I've always suspected she wasn't quite human. You can see the rest of this odd campaign at adsoftheworld.

Comrades: The Gay Chinese Film Festival in NYC this Weekend

One of the finest films on the subject of sexuality and oppression will be shown at the opening of the Chinese LGBT Film Festival, Friday at the LGBT Center in NYC. East Palace West Palace ranks up there with Genet's The Balcony as an examination of how sex, identity and power relationships are expressed not only in personal relationships but in polities. And it is an examination of how the state becomes a presence in the bedroom, and in the fantasies, of its citizens.

The story is simple: a policeman arrests and interogates a man who was cruising in one of Beijing's most notoriously busy public toilets. What happens is anything but simple and delivers an emotionally searing experience. The really amazing thing is that it got past the Chinese censors because they didn't understand how politically subversive the film is.

However, if you tend to like action films, East Palace West Palace is not for you. Like many foreign films, it moves slowly, developing a powerful emotional punch quietly. This is not the American was of film making, and for that reason, it didn't really find an audience when it had its theatrical release in NYC ten years ago.

This is a rare chance to see it again, in a room filled with Chinese gay men (be still my heart) who will no doubt be eager to talk about it afterwards with an intelligence and insight you won't have access to if you watch it at home on DVD alone.

I am only sorry to say that I am out of town this weekend, or I would be there myself to see the film again, and to enjoy the fantasy of finding a Chinese husband (you can apply here by emailing me anyway!).   

Plasticized Bodies, Advertising and the Illegal Trade in Organs

JWT in Shanghai is running some ads to convince the Chinese to donate organs, with a campaign for the Red Cross that shows organs with bodies inside

Am I on drugs or is there something really bizarre and disturbing about an organ donation campaign running in a country where prisoners have their organs removed (sometimes before execution) for sale?

The ad above, one of several, is supposed to be lungs though it looks like kidneys to me (does it remind you of the humans in pods in The Matrix?).  Others show livers and hearts. And it is true that is a shortage of organs for transplant. Only 50 to 60 kidneys are replaced a year in Hong Kong while the waiting list for transplants numbers around 500. But according to Human Rights Watch/Asia, about 2 to 3 thousand organs a year are cut from the bodies of executed Chinese prisoners. This is state sponsored theft (and desecration). I guess the ad campaign is encouraging private citizens to get a piece of the action, since transplant services are readily available to high ranking Party officials and cash-paying foreigners. Of course, there are those unfortunates who have their organs stolen. I seem to recall reading a science fiction novel about this in the 60s. Anyone recall what that might have been?

Here in New York City we have not avoided this controversy. Last year, 20/20 reported that the plasticized bodies in the extremely popular Bodies exhibit at the South Street Seaport were executed Chinese prisoners. The German doctor who invented the process that used to put these human bodies being put on display around the world, says he has stopped using bodies from China because some of them shows signs of torture. The exhibit in NYC now offers refunds after a lawsuit by the state attorney general.

I don’t know how much Chinese citizens know about the Bodies exhibit, but it certainly isn’t news on the street in Shanghai that there’s an illegal traffic in stolen organs. So what they must think when they see these ads? And what was the team at JWT thinking?

Oh yes, the images are striking, and you have to look at them. True. And that’s the first job of advertising — to get you to stop and pay attention. But this doesn’t go on to persuade me of anything other than being certain not to accept drinks from strangers in a Shanghai bar.

That's the advertising exec speaking. Now let's hear from the Jewish Buddhist. One of the many meditations taught by the Buddha was the charnel ground meditation — one was supposed to sit amidst the burned and decomposing bodies to meditate on the impermanence of one's own body. In the Buddha's time, there were places where the remains were left to decompose or be eaten by wild animals. Because there are no charnel grounds in New York City — or much anywhere anymore — Buddhist monks have been going to the Bodies exhibit to take on this meditation. Certainly seeing these bodies is a powerful experience of the fragility and impermanence of our physical nature.

However the Jew in me recoils at this practice — and at the exhibit. Just as a living person is the image of the Divine, so to the remains, which should have its integrity, at least until it naturally decomposes. This very reaction is interesting though. The Buddhist in me says this is about attachment to the body. So I'm going to have to sit with this. Perhaps I will use the JWT ads as a meditation mandala on this subject.

Homophobia & Advertising: Bob Garfield's Column

Ad Age columnist Bob Garfield sent an open letter in his column to the CEO of one of the top agency holding companies, accusing the network of homophobia in several campaigns. He wrote:

"Stop the dehumanizing stereotypes. Stop the jokey violence. There is no place in advertising for cruelty. Pull the campaign. Do it now."

Strong language. And I have to say, the Snickers campaign, which was roundly pilloried when it broke during the Super Bowl (a ritual of homo erotic masculinity that requires homophobic expression to distract us from the obvious), continues to be abhorrent. It glorifies homophobic violence, and Garfield says of the newest addition to the campaign that:

"your commercial is just a cartoonish recapitulation of {Matthew Shepard's] brutal murder"

Strong words. It is heartening to see heterosexual columnists take offense and speak up. Of course, to pin this on the CEO of the holding company seems a little too much. The CEO of the offending agencies? Sure. They are responsible. And bringing to the attention of the holding company isn't a bad thing. Pressure from the outside to an agency is one thing. Pressure from the holding company — that's serious.

Perhaps even more fascinating are the reader comments — there are lots. If you're interested in reading real opinions from people in the ad biz on the subject of homophobia in media, this is a goldmine of information.

But let's stop for a minute to analyze just what is going on in this new Snicker's spot. First we see a blond man with soft features speed walking down a suburban street. The camera cuts to a rear view and rests for a few precious TV seconds on his wiggling butt.

Next, a vehicle with Mr. T. crashes through a house and follows the walker while Mr. T harangues him for being a "disgrace to the man race." Visually we see the machine gun from the POV of the shooter (very video game, because of course this is targeted at insecure teen boys and young men who need to be reassured about their masculinity — after all, there is nothing more masculine than playing with a computer right?) pointed directly at aforesaid butt.

Uhhhh, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. But in this case? Not. Just more subconscious homosexual desire expressed in violence.

But this is where Garfield is dead on the money — the spot makes a violent response to inner desires that are unacceptable, acceptable. And that's unacceptable. One commenter points out that regardless of the agency, the clients bought off on this. So as much as I may love chocolate, Mars doesn't get any of my money. And I'm sure GLAAD will consider some action around this:

Yep, that's pretty damn bad. So while the holding company Mr. Garfield accuses does in fact treat its gay employees very well, this is seriously uncool. There are different opinions in the business classically about our influence.

One of my heroes, Bill Bernbach, one said:

"All of us who professionally use the mass media are the shapers of society. We can vulgarize that society. We can brutalize it. Or we can help lift it onto a higher level."

David Ogilvy, who believed that humor in advertising was a mistake, said:

"Advertising reflects the mores of society, but it does not influence them."

The truth lies somewhere in between. Nevertheless, I hold with Bernbach.

 

The Interrobang: Americans Are Torturing Prisoners At Gitmo?!?!

No, the interrobang is not a new style of violent interrogation akin to waterboarding. It is a punctuation mark created by a real Mad Man, advertising executive Martin K. Speckter in 1962. A combination of the question mark and exclamation point, it is used at the end of a sentence to convey astonishment, disbelief or to ask a rhetorical question.

The word itself comes from a combination of the printer’s jargon for the question mark “the interrogation point” and the exclamation point — the “bang.” Unfortunately, the use of an interrobang at the end of the question in the headline is appropriate, since the fact that we are torturing prisoners is astonishing, unbelievable, and unfortunately true as Jane Mayer's appalling book, “The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned Into a War on American Ideals,” proves beyond a doubt. Perhaps we will read a headline that ends with an interrobang someday that says "Bush Administration Officials Arrested For War Crimes!?"

Speckter's new punctuation mark never caught on, even though Specter used it in ads his agency created for accounts like The Wall Street Journal. Seems much more appropriate to use for a tabloid though.

It actually appeared on a typewriter (not however the Hermes model used by Douglas Adams that is currently up for auction) in the 60s. It was on a Remington that I’d like to add to my collection of Empires, Royals, Olivettis, Hammonds, Olivers, Smiths and Franklins. (Yes, I am afflicted with the collecting bug, and as a writer, typewriters speak to me.

And typographers include it with some fonts. It’s even available on many computers. On a Mac, four different versions can be found in the wingdings 2 font. Simply hit the ` ~ key, the ] } key, the 6 ^ key, or the - _ key and you'll be able to add this unusual punctuation to your documents.

I have to say, I don’t like the use of it in advertising. It’s kind of cheap, like the star burst, which is hated by creatives and loved by clients everywhere. In fact, a rather amusing ad was posted today to adsoftheworld by an agency in Columbia that addressed just this issue of the star burst. You can see it below — it adds to my collection of print ads that use a toilet as the location of the action.

However, I do think the interrobang works well in comic books, and one typographer has created a variation of the interrobang for the Fritz font that I like very much, seen at right. And I do think the more traditional(!) interrobang works well in a tabloid. Both are less formal venues. Which brings me to this venue: while the interrobang exists in some Unicode fonts, I can’t seem to be able to use it here except as a graphic. Too bad.

Then there is the symbol that appears almost entirely on the web: the copyright question mark. I have yet to determine its proper use though. Unlike copyleft, which offers up the usage of the material for non-profit use with proper attribution, I assume the copyright question mark is used when a web publisher uses material of uncertain copyright status, and wishes to make that known.

So what would a copyright interrobang mean?

Politics, Religion and Mass Hysteria: A True Masterpiece of Cinema, Ken Russell’s The Devils.

Religion has been used to generate mass hysteria for political ends for thousands of years now. But there have been few films that show the process so clearly. Ken Russell’s film, The Devils is the movie about EVERYTHING: the spirituality and lust in love; the madness and transcendence of sexual repression; using the threat of an imagined enemy to create state sponsored terror; justifying the use of torture to extract forced confession…. Watching this movie one can imagine the twisted and tortured mind of Roy Cohn while watching Vanessa Redgrave suffer the madness of desires that she demonizes and projects onto others. Not to mention the hypocrisy of Ted Haggard, Larry Craig and so on and so on.

This is a truly important movie. And it is simply criminal that it isn’t available on DVD. The VHS tape version is poor quality, and it has been cut. However there is a petition to Warner Home Video. And if you’ve seen this film and want to make sure others can, please sign the petition. If you’ve haven’t seen the film, read what others have to say about it, and then sign the petition.

It's raining men. Chinese men. Hallelujah.

Well, actually, the photos that follow this are rather disturbing — it's a series of photos the Boston's Globe's blog called The Big Picture published showing the Chinese Army doing anti-terrorism exercises in preparation for the Olympic Games. These pictures scare me. (Though the photos on the Segway are both hilarious and terrifying at the same time.)

Mind you, it is indeed raining Chinese men. Remember, the one child policy and the preference for male children has led to a wild imbalance in the male/female ratio in China. So there are literally millions of men who will not find a wife. That's a lot of frustrated men in the armed forces — which to me seems like  a recipe for worldwide military disaster.

Where is the international homosexual conspiracy to convert when you need it?

Now I have to admit it — I have in fact cavorted with a member of the Red Army. Well, the Red Army Ballet Troupe. One day walking down MacDougal Street in NYC I met the attractive eyes of Jin Xing, a choreographer, dancer and colonel in the Chinese Army's famous ballet corps (shown here at left pre-op). Later — after our own pas de deux — I learned that he had been in Japan earlier that year where he had a met a friend of mine there who it seemed no matter who I met when I lived in Tokyo, he had met the guy already. And it was still happening after I'd moved back to NYC! Well...in any case, Jin Xing went on to become rather famous as China's first MTF transexual. Personally, I think it was a pity. While many sex changes are for deep internal reasons, I believe this is not so different than what happens in Iran today, where gay men prefer to endure sex change operations (which is acceptable) rather than be identified as gay — and thus subject to death under Islamic law. I seem to have wandered far afield...

So getting back to the men on the field above, I suspect that very few of them would turn up at The Web Bar in New York should they find themselves magically transported here (or part of an invasion). But I have to say, that might well be a solution for many of China's population and social problems. And who knows, I might get a boyfriend out of it. Not.

The Divine Androgyne: Sex and Gender on the Gay Brain and the BBC

In many spiritual traditions, the inner union of male and female is one of the ways of knowing the Divine. Jung wrote about this union as a way towards psychological wholeness. For men this does not mean becoming feminized (which is a major fear in the gynophobic American culture) but integrating qualities we label masculine and feminine, such as logic and intuition.

As a gay man with an interest in both spirituality and Jungian psychology this subject has always interested me. In some cultures queer people are said to embody both male and female qualities in a way that brings them closer to the world of spirit. Of course, in our monotheistic culture, born of the Israelite religion that denied the Divine Feminine (Asherah/Shekhina)even while it was worshiped in the Temple, queer people are a threat — thus the spiritual world we are said to connect with is demonic.

In the world of brain science, Time magazine reported recently that Swedish scientists have concluded from brain scans of 90 gay and straight men and women  that “the size of the two symmetrical halves of the brains of gay men more closely resembled those of straight women than they did straight men.”

While I have no idea of the size of my brain I discovered yesterday that the BBC web site that, along with a number of other tests on their site they offer one called Your Sex I.D. It takes about 35 minutes to complete on line. And based on your responses they can tell you where your brain fits on the male/female continuum. Much to my surprise, I was exactly in the middle. Except I can’t say that I am enjoying the spiritual benefits of inner union. The test itself was fascinating though, and I’d be curious to see how large numbers of gay men do on it.

It is true that I find myself attracted to one of the Buddhist saints who is depicted as both male and female (though not at the same time!). Avalokiteshvara is depicted as a young man in India and Nepal — but as Buddhism moved east, in China and Japan he became a she, and is known as Kuan Yin or Kannon.

And of course, in Kabbalistic Judaism, Adam Kadmon, the original created human was an androgyne — based on the phrase in Bereshit translated as “male and female created [he] them.” Diagrams of this first human superimpose the sephirot over the body — sephirot that include Yesod, often connected to the male genitalia, and Malchut, connected to the female genitalia. However this is merely metaphoric externalization of what is really about an inner state.

Brain scientists have investigated how meditation affects communication between the left and right hemispheres.

A research team investigating the effects of meditation on the brain with the collaboration of the Dalai Llama, showed that meditators had a significant increase in activation in the left pre-frontal regions of their brain, associated with a reduction in the amount of anxiety they reported.

So why aren’t gay men more like the Buddha? I would argue that many gay men in fact are — from those who volunteer their time at places like God’s Love We Deliver to those who become church choir directors we bring our gifts of creativity and compassion to society in many ways. However as a minority that has been demonized, in a culture where a man who exhibits qualities that are ascribed to women is denigrated, there is no question that many of us take on the negatives of both genders — an aggressive bitchiness for example, used as a defense.

I pray for a world where all people, male - female - intersexed - trans - are not merely free to develop their gifts, but a world where those gifts are welcomed and nurtured. Keyn Yehi Ratzon. So may it be.

Size Queens And Patriots

On the 4th of July, the NY Times reported on the peculiar phenomenon of giant American flags at sporting events. On I95 there is a huge American flag that is tattered and brown that flies over a car dealership. It is so big the wind has to be pretty strong for it to wave. The Times quoted one manufacturer:

"'People go ape when they see it,' said Jim Alexander, a retired Coast Guard commander who runs Superflag, the company that basically invented the industry and once held the world record for the largest flag, which temporarily hung on the Hoover Dam. It was 255 by 505 feet"

Go ape. That is a telling phrase. Lose one's humanity. Behave like an animal. It's no surprise many of these flags are displayed at football games or NASCAR events.

Don't get me wrong. I love this country. But I continue to be appalled at people who put more importance on the symbols and little to no importance on the ideals (or for that matter the Constitution or Bill of Rights).

All this seemed even weirder when I was visiting my old friend John in Providence the weekend they held their Pride Celebration. Knitting Nation, a group founded by a RISD prof, Liz Collins, brought together dozens of knitters to create the country's largest rainbow flag. John and I wandered down to Waterplace Park to watch the people at their machines go at it like a looking-glass version of a New England Mill.

Each colored segment was unrolled on a knoll and sewn to the others as the segments kept coming out of the machines. As this went on, different people read letters, web postings, articles and memoirs of what this symbol meant to them. Love it or hate it. Listening to all those voices was fascinating.

Of course, I don't think Jim Alexander and the NASCAR patriots would take too kindly to knowing that a queer flag was bigger than his. Then again, perhaps this is their misdirected and sublimated size queen thinking. I just want to know who's making all the flag poles.