I want to talk more about gatekeeping. In the last post, I started with pop culture and then quickly went deep. It’s all related, but I want to try to keep this post light. We’ll see how well I adhere to that.
I started the last post talking about someone gatekeeping coffee. “If you can’t drink coffee black, then you’re not a real fan.” The woman who said it was not joking, though she said it in a jovial tone. And I have to think, why does it matter how someone else enjoys their coffee? And who made hre the arbiter of what made a true coffee fan?
Seriously. How did it affect her enjoyment of coffee if someone gasp liked to put cream and sugar in their coffee?
As a queer freak, I am by default ‘not how things are done’. Throw in Asian, agender, areligious, and a bunch of other minority qualifiers, and I should just be banned from polite society. Seriously. Why the hell does it matter to someone if someone else likes pineapple on their pizza or not? Or anchovies? Or that I don’t like pepperoni and vastly prefer sausage? Pepperoni is way too salty for me. Much like bacon, which I also don’t like. I also think Spam is fine, though it would not be my first choice of meat.
Other things I’ve taken flak for because I did not like them: The Beatles, The Big Lebowski, Pulp Fiction, The Titanic, The Rolling Stones. Things I don’t like, but never talk about: Star Wars, Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad, Se7en, The Simpsons.
I will be transparent and say I have only seen one episode of Game of Thrones (The Red Wedding) and one episode of Breaking Bad (the penultimate one), but I loathed both of the shows with all my heart. I don’t think I would have liked either of them even if I had started from the start because I don’t care for ultra-violent media.
Here’s the reason why. Well, one reason. My brain can’t differentiate between fake violence and real violence. Even though I know it’s not real, I still react as if it is. There are scenes I’ve seen in movies that have stayed with me for decades and still upset me when I think about them now.
Anyway. Powers doesn’t like The Beatles. Someone in the comments said that he didn’t trust anyone’s taste in music who did not like The Beatles. I think the commenter was joking, but I’ve heard many versions of that comment said in all seriousness about all kinds of things.
Let me say this quite plainly: Nothing is for everyone. I can’t believe that needs to be said, but apparently, it does. There is literally not a single thing that everyone likes. That would be impossible with how many people there are in the world.
As I said yesterday, too many people take it personally when you don’t like something they like. Or like something they don’t, though usually that’s not usually as upsetting to them. The latter is more a case of them jeering or mocking you for liking something they don’t, but, man, do people get heated when you don’t like what they do.
The most radical example I have is the movie Pulp Fiction. I have told this story many times, but it still sticks out in my mind. I was dating a guy who told me this was his favorite movie. This was several years after it came out. I had seen the trailer and knew that I would not like it. At the time it was released, I mean. It was going to be shown at the local midnight theater. He wanted me to see it, and he said he was sure I would like it.
Now, if you know me at all, you probably know where this is going. I know myself very well and am usually on point about what I will and won’t like. When I’m not, it’s most often the case of me not liking something I thought I would like (such as Brokeback Mountain). I liked the movie, but not nearly as much as I thought I would–and I have many problems with it. Including that it had no problem showing naked sexy bits of the women, but not the men, even thoug hthe men were purportedly the main characters–and their love for each other was supposed to be the focal point. But the sex between them was…problematic to say the least (the way it was shot, I mean).
Anyway! There is only one movie I can say that I was very pleasantly surprised that I liked because I thought I would hate it–The Royal Tenenbaums. I know what I don’t like very well (what I like, not so much), and if I don’t like something from the start, there’s a 99% chance that I will not like it. That’s me. But, I was deeply in lust, and I was willing to see the movie for his sake. Even though I knew I would hate it.
I tried to keep an open mind, but my heart sank with the opening cutscene. it was so jittery and all over the place, and it was clearly up its own ass with how impressed it was with itself. Look. I’m being burtally honest about how I viewed this movie. I fucking hated it from the start. I tohught it was pretentious, way too hyper-violent, soulless, and as I said, firmly wedged in its own ass. It only got worse, and by the end, I thought it was one of the worst movies I had ever seen. Not in terms of technique, but in terms of everything else.
My then-boyfriend asked me what I thought of it. Stupid me, I thought he wanted to know my actual opinion. He did not. He wanted me to say how amazing it was and how it was the best movie I had ever seen in my life. Even if I had known that, would I have lied to him? No. I could not say I enjoyed the movie because I found it appalling and loathsome. I probably could have found some way to make it a bit more palatable for him to hear, though.
Would I have wanted that? At the time, maybe. Now? No. We were most definitely not suited for each other (except in bed), and it was best that we broke up. Oh, I didn’t say what happened.
After the movie, my then-boyfriend asked me eagerly what I thought of the movie. I took the next fifteen minutes to tell him what I thought of the movie. I wasn’t mean or harsh about it, but I was honest. After I was done, he sat there for several seconds with a stunned look on his face. When he spoke again, he said, “I can’t be with someone with that viewpoint.”
And that’s how he broke up with me.
What did I learn from that? Never to give my actual opinion to a date again. I’m only half-kidding, by the way. I became more careful about ti because it was such a shock to me. It was a hard lesson to learn, but I have never forgotten it.