So if Nightcharm is of the '70s generation, then I would expect that Nightcharm lived through, and was affected by, that key event in the polarization between the sex-positives and the politicos, the closing of the baths. That fight ended friendships: One pair of friends never spoke to each other again, until one of them died. Another friend still calls the author of ...And the Band Played On "Randy Shits" even today. And, by and large, it was the politicals who were caught up in the moral panic to close the baths.
I haven't seen Cruising. My gay Maoist friends of the time would have sent me to a re-education camp if I had seeen it when it came out. But times have changed since then. One of the notable things about the film for today's audience is that it is a document of a millieu that is now lost forever. In 1980 it was exploitation. Today it would be a wistful memory, to go along with the wistful memories inspired by Peter Berlin movies.
So sure there is a lot of oversimplification in "politically correct windbags." There's one heck of a lot of pain and loss and grief that shapes that oversimplification.
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Date: 2007-07-11 09:35 pm (UTC)I haven't seen Cruising. My gay Maoist friends of the time would have sent me to a re-education camp if I had seeen it when it came out. But times have changed since then. One of the notable things about the film for today's audience is that it is a document of a millieu that is now lost forever. In 1980 it was exploitation. Today it would be a wistful memory, to go along with the wistful memories inspired by Peter Berlin movies.
So sure there is a lot of oversimplification in "politically correct windbags." There's one heck of a lot of pain and loss and grief that shapes that oversimplification.