Editor,
I am writing this letter in response to a previous letter to the editor in Tuesday’s Daily Lobo, “Social norms repress men’s desire for sexual exploration.” That letter was one of the most ludicrous, maudlin and solipsistic opinion pieces I have ever had the displeasure of reading.
It was not journalism, but rather the uninformed egotistical palaver of an over-opinionated, undereducated imbecile. It is people like Don Schrader who give bisexual men a bad name. They parade their sexual identities around as some sort of ego badge, as if the world must accept and listen to everything they have to say about sexual freedom and sexuality in general because they’re bisexual and, consequently, they have insights into the sexual realm of the human psyche that only confound the straight world.
The author has no intrinsic reservoir of knowledge about the male mind and male sexuality simply because he is bisexual. On the contrary, he is foolish enough to believe that his sexual orientation says something about his personality, other than that he is shallow and egocentric. He thinks he can speak for most, if not all, of the men in the world simply because he is a man who views his bisexual experimentation as an incendiary form of personal expression. The fact that he chooses to indulge in bisexual acts does not make him a rebel or a revolutionary. In doing so and saying so (that he can speak for most men on the subject of bisexuality because he is a bisexual male), he is not only a buffoon, but he is also a cliché — a sad reflection of American cultural stereotypes of grandiose solipsism and empty excess. I have nothing against homosexuality or bisexuality. I think people should be able to freely express themselves sexually in any manner they see fit. However, it is pretentious, banal attitudes like the aforementioned author’s that have taken the spirituality and the sanctity out of the modern physical act of love, or coitus if you will.
There was not a stitch of productive journalistic insight in the entire “sexual exploration” piece. The author did not say anything sagacious, novel or even really controversial, but spoke about himself, and sexuality, in a manner that made the whole endeavor offensively pedantic, vapid and trite all in the same breath. There is no doubt that “social norms repress men’s desires for sexual exploration.” This is blatantly obvious just like the fact that social norms also repress women’s desires for sexual exploration. This is all public knowledge.
Letters to the editor should not be reckless, uninformed vanity projects. Schrader’s letter was shamefully irresponsible and woefully myopic. Honestly, no one (myself included) cares that he is bisexual, and no one believes that the fact that he is bisexual gives him the lofty journalistic license to speak as an authority on the majority of the male population’s sexual habits. In the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson, “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,” and Schrader’s conceit that somehow he has some unique window into the male mind that allows him to accurately conclude that most men have bisexual tendencies is the epitome of foolish consistencies. Shame on him, and shame on the editorial staff for printing this kind of pompous drivel.
Mikell McMurry
UNM student
