From the Ridiculous to the Sublime

[bbm_stitchbuffyfan]

Maybe that is why we love Jack & Ennis so much. They have not just broken the stereotype but broke our hearts.

Definitely, but of course, their mannerisms and personalities and undying love for one another also comes into play... Okay, this is kind of off-topic but I really, really miss Jack and Ennis right now.  "I can hardly stand it..."

We had a conversation about why Jack and Ennis were sad that went about the way your conversation did.

Wait, you mean your three-year-old knows about Brokeback Mountain? That's strangely adorable (and adorably strange). In depth, or what? Describe...

[ednbarby]

Wait, you mean your three-year-old knows about Brokeback Mountain? That's strangely adorable (and adorably strange). In depth, or what? Describe...

I have a four-year-old who knows about it, too.  But y'all know those stories by now. 

[serious crayons]

Okay, this is kind of off-topic but I really, really miss Jack and Ennis right now.  "I can hardly stand it..."

I miss them, too -- and I just turned off the DVD five minutes ago!
 

[ednbarby]

I miss them, too -- and I just turned off the DVD five minutes ago!

I feel your pain, guys.  Sigh.  If loving them is wrong, I don't wanna be right.

[Jeff Wrangler]

I miss them, too -- and I just turned off the DVD five minutes ago!
 

I sympathize, but for me, Ennis and Jack, like my late mother and my late boyfriend, are with me always in my heart. All I have to do is think of them and they are with me. And I'm not jokin'. 

[ednbarby]

How sweet!  My Will knows Jack's and Ennis' names, too.  He's seen Brandon's montage on my home computer several times and asked who each was.  (He asks like this:  "What is that man's name?")  He's said that Jack is sad driving away from seeing Ennis after the divorce because "he can't be in the other man's family."  Thank goodness he's just naturally sensitive.  I don't know what I'd do if he were one of those kids with a mean streak, you know?  And I swear, even at three and four, you can tell if they're open to all the possibilities or if they're afraid of anything that seems the least little bit different.  If you have one of the latter on your hands, you've got your work cut out for you.  Looks like we both got lucky. 

[Kelda]

How sweet!  My Will knows Jack's and Ennis' names, too.  He's seen Brandon's montage on my home computer several times and asked who each was.  (He asks like this:  "What is that man's name?")  He's said that Jack is sad driving away from seeing Ennis after the divorce because "he can't be in the other man's family."  Thank goodness he's just naturally sensitive.  I don't know what I'd do if he were one of those kids with a mean streak, you know?  And I swear, even at three and four, you can tell if they're open to all the possibilities or if they're afraid of anything that seems the least little bit different.  If you have one of the latter on your hands, you've got your work cut out for you.  Looks like we both got lucky. 

No not LUCKY. Great parents. There is not one parent so far on this board that doesn't have a child who is not sensitive to the plights of Jack and Ennis.

What great parents you all are, Barb, Sheyne,Vic, Anke, Chris, to name just a few.. (apologies to those obvious ones I've missed!)

[serious crayons]

Well, as a word of warning about possible challenges to come, I'm going to take a huge gulp and jump in here and say that my 11-year-old son is not nearly as sensitive about Brokeback Mountain as your 3-year-old, Mel, or your 4-year-old, Barb. My son is too young to watch it, but if I put the DVD on the TV in the living room I'm pretty sure I would not have to shoo him away. And he has asked on several occasions, in a kind of squeamish tone, how straight actors could possibly kiss each other. I have explained as best I could and assured him it's not that big a deal one way or the other. He doesn't say anything worse than that, but clearly the subject makes him uncomfortable.

I have discussed my own views throughout both my sons' lives, and they know better than to say anything offensive, at least around me. A few years ago, when my younger son (now 10) was maybe seven or eight, I overheard an older kid tell him, in a horrified way, "We were in the park the other day and these gay guys showed up." And my son nonchallantly said, "So?" I was proud of him, especially because the other kid had that older-kid higher status, and I told my son later that was exactly the right answer.

But, contrary to popular belief, homophobia is not necessarily taught at home. Nor is the subject broached in school classrooms (compare this to racism, a topic covered progressively from kindergarten on). I think my older son's discomfort with Brokeback is a combination of peer pressure and developmental changes -- a couple of his 12-year-old friends have started getting girlfriends, and my son is still figuring out about sex and how this or that works and is so much on the cusp of all this stuff that an episode of The Office, as I squirmingly discovered last night, can be quite the learning experience. I'm sure he has heard jokes at school and I know he has heard them on TV -- you couldn't live in America for the past six months and not hear dozens of them -- and I guess it's natural for him to still be figuring out where his own views fit into all of this.

For a parent, it's kind of a landmine. My son is extremely bright and culturally aware but also extremely, um, independent-minded (to put it mildly). I have to find a way to share my values without coming on so strong that he rejects them out of sheer rebelliousness. So my approach is to tread lightly, not make too big a deal of things, but be clear about what I believe the right answers are.

And hopefully, as he gets older and wiser, he will agree with me.

[ednbarby]

That's a tough age for a boy just in general.  God, it's tough for a girl, too.  I wouldn't go back to those days myself for all the white tea in China.

I wonder, Katherine - do you think your son would have a different view of this movie at 11 had he been exposed to it at 4?  It sounds like you've raised them to be as open-minded and accepting as possible, but yet I wonder if having seen this movie when they were that young would have affected your parenting significantly even so?  You know what I mean?  I know I certainly planned to make sure my son would grow up to be the type of kid who at age 10 would say "So?" just like yours did (and Bravo to him - you're right - that is the *perfect* answer, and it shows how little he cares about what others think about his opinions that he wasn't afraid to say it to the older kid and in that context).  But I think I would have waited to approach it with him when it came up had I not seen this movie and he'd not seen the montage, you know?  And that may not have been until he was quite a bit older.

I have another friend whose son is 16.  She always described him as extremely sensitive and liberal-minded.  She saw Brokeback and loved it, bought the DVD, and the second he saw it sitting on top of the TV, he goes, "You bought the 'gay cowboy movie'?!"  She was so horrified, she said, "Absolutely.  And just for calling it that, you're going to be watching it with me on Movie Night."  He did.  And he loved it.  She says he was still a tad uncomfortable about the first tent scene, but he stayed with it, cried at the end, and now has watched it another two times, one with his girlfriend, the other alone.

Again, this brings me to my contention that mandatory viewing in high schools would be a very good idea.  (And wouldn't the Fundies just *love* that???  They'd sooner hand out condoms personally, I'd reckon.  )

[serious crayons]

They'd sooner hand out condoms personally, I'd reckon.  )

Are you kidding? They'd sooner hand out hypodermic needles and the phone numbers of good heroin dealers.

I would love to have my sons to watch the movie, if they were teenagers. At this age, it's a bit much -- the heterosexual scenes included. Besides, I'd be leery of having my strategy backfire. They are rebellious kids, and often get uncomfortable talking to me about sexual things in any case (unless they're SO curious about something they have no choice). (And frankly, sometimes I'm a bit uncomfortable myself -- in The Office episode last night, about sexual harassment, I tried to explain some of the shocking lines, but when the term "MILF" came up and they asked what that meant I, um, shrugged).

As for your other question, I would say that having kids be as exposed to the subject at your son's age might help. When mine were younger, my policy was to not necessarily broach the issue out of the blue, but if it came up I tried to make a point of treating it in a sort of casual, normal way. When I talked about men and women falling in love or whatever, for instance, I would try to remember to add that sometimes men fell in love with men and women with women. Though, true, now that I'm hyperaware of this topic over the past few months, I'm probably a bit more assertive about making those points than I used to be.

But the older my kids get, the more I realize that a lot of times I just have to be upfront about my own values and hope for the best. My kids are precociously rebellious (my older son has been going on 15 since he was about 4), but I think that policy really applies to all kids. You really can't control how their attitudes turn out, but you can control how you express your own, and I guess if all goes well the former will be influenced by the latter.