Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
TOTW 07/07: Was Mr. Twist homophobic?
serious crayons:
But aren't we just using a modern term to ask the question, "Did Mr. Twist dislike homosexual people?" Because certainly THAT state existed in his lifetime. I think that's the underlying issue, however we choose to word it (and I changed "gay" to "homosexual" to avoid any confusion that way).
Or, if you prefer, considering the fact that disliking homosexual people was probably the norm in that time and place, one could ask "Did Mr. Twist seem to accept (or at least tolerate) Jack's and Ennis' sexual orientation?"
To which I would say the answer is, yes.
Scott6373:
Having had a father much like the stud duck, I realised, as he lay in his casket, that he did the best he could with the knowledge and education he had been given. That didn't mean I had to agree or condone the way he treated me, but it did mean that I had to not judge his understanding (or lack thereof).
serious crayons:
--- Quote from: Scott on September 13, 2007, 03:12:30 pm ---That didn't mean I had to agree or condone the way he treated me, but it did mean that I had to not judge his understanding (or lack thereof).
--- End quote ---
OK ... :-\
Scott, I guess I don't understand what you're driving at. Are you saying we shouldn't "judge" Mr. Twist? Well, I suppose you could describe it that way.
But OMT is fictional. What we're really doing is analyzing fiction, which I don't see as analogous to your feelings about your father.
It's less about deciding on the morality of his behavior, or judging, than it is about understanding his character and why he said what he said and what it meant for the story.
Scott6373:
--- Quote from: ineedcrayons on September 13, 2007, 03:30:36 pm ---
But OMT is fictional. What we're really doing is analyzing fiction, which I don't see as analogous to your feelings about your father.
It's less about deciding on the morality of his behavior, or judging, than it is about understanding his character and why he said what he said and what it meant for the story.
--- End quote ---
You're missing the point. My father and Mr Twist were of the same generation, cut from the same cloth. I didn't consider my father homophic, just as I don't consider OMT homophobic, because labelling someone that presumes that they have knowledge of what they are "afraid" of. I can call them ignorant, inflexible, but not homophobic.
serious crayons:
--- Quote from: Scott on September 13, 2007, 03:38:47 pm ---You're missing the point. My father and Mr Twist were of the same generation, cut from the same cloth. I didn't consider my father homophic, just as I don't consider OMT homophobic, because labelling someone that presumes that they have knowledge of what they are "afraid" of. I can call them ignorant, inflexible, but not homophobic.
--- End quote ---
Well, you're missing mine. The question is merely, did Mr. Twist have anything against homosexuality?
I don't know anything about your father. But Mr. Del Mar, who was also cut from similar cloth, did have something against it. If you don't like applying the term "homophobic" anachronistically, we can just say that Mr. Del Mar hated homosexuality so much that he would expose his sons to the corpse of a homosexual man who'd been tortured to death, evidently to deter them from making the same choices. And it's not inconceivable that he would have actually participated in the murder himself.
Mr. Twist does not appear to have felt that kind of hatred toward homosexual men. In fact, he doesn't give any sign of hating them at all.
That's all we're talking about.
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