Gaybriel Discusses Everything Gay And Latino: Bedroom Politics…Who’s On Top?

In Latin America homosexuals are still considered the unfortunate other. Even progressive homochummy Latinos are sometimes clueless as to how to deal with their gay friends. An issue that sometimes reflects this country’s prevailing attitudes towards Latinos in general. We’re living in an era where Latinos, like gays, are demonized to the point where it is considered righteous, even patriotic, to bash, degrade, and even kill Latinos and immigrants. To gay people, this inquisition sounds all too familiar. For your edification in all things homo, gaythority Bosrican is gonna dig deep into the thresh-holes of gaytino subject matter. We’ll see if your rectum is truly straight.

For some Latino men who have sex with men, being an “active” or penetrative sexual partner has a very different connotation than being a “passive” or receptive partner. To use the current gaymenclature, “tops” may or may not identify as “gay”, whereas “bottoms” always are. In Mexico, for example, the label of maricón, joto, or puto is usually reserved for the “bottom” half of the gay male equation, whereas men who “top” can consider themselves, and can be considered by their peers to be straight. The act of penetrating, then, becomes the defining characteristic on whether to identify or not with a sexual orientation. To complicate matters, Latin American homosexual identity is burdened by, among other things, the three C’s: colonialism, catholicism, and class structure, which all hinge on hierarchy, power, and punishment. Further, this active/passive formulation somehow omits, in its phallocentrism, the variety of sexual acts (or lack thereof) contained in homosexual relations.

While pondering Salma Hayek’s non-secular fun bags in a story we wrote a while ago, I was reminded of my first, em, exposure to the actress many years ago. In her first feature film, called El Callejón de los Milagros, Salma Hayek plays one of the main characters in a four-part story that interweaves four characters who live in the same apartment complex. The first character we meet, Rutilio, a fiftysomething bar owner trapped in a loveless marriage, gets involved in a homosexual relationship with a much younger store clerk. Rutilio’s masculinity is never questioned, perhaps because his identity and honor as a man hinges on the fact that he is the one who “fucks”, and not the one who gets “fucked”:

In Latin America the verb chingar, more than its Anglo counterpart “to fuck”, has connotations of violence more similar to the word “rape”. That is, “to chingar” is to to take or penetrate another by force. The other, then, becomes the raped, entered, subjugated, ripped, and violated. The “fucked one”, wrote Octavio Paz in a collection of essays published in the early 50’s, is:

The passive, the inert and open, as opposed to he who fucks, who is active, aggressive, and closed. The one who fucks is the “macho”, he who opens. The one who gets fucked, the female, is pure passivity, disarmed before the exterior world. The relationship between them is violent, determined by the cynical power of the first against the impotence of the other.

Interesting choice of words, wouldn’t you say? This sexual wrestling match presents sex as a struggle between the strong and the weak, which historically has corresponded to the constructs of masculinity and femininity. How does this translate, therefore, in the definition of same-sex relations where there currently exists an almost fastidious need to label oneself as “top” or “bottom”, particularly in Latino same-sex couples? Is there necessarily a passive role in homosexual relations? And if so, can one embrace passivity or “bottoming” without the usual attributions of degradation and defeat? As I mentioned, in many Latin American cultures men who “top” are sometimes tolerated and unquestioned in their sexuality as long as they are penetrating and not penetrated. As Julian Pitt-Rivers argued in The Fate of Shechem, or the Politics of Sex, penetration is the overriding metaphor for honor, which is why women needed to be virgins before marriage, lest they lose their “honor”. As a corollary to this, men would irrevocably lose their honor if they were sexually penetrated. Gay what?

As Matthew Johnson wrote in the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered and Queer Encyclopedia: “The political ideology of gay and lesbian liberation has traditionally required a particular and consistent constellation of sex/gender role and sexual object-choice in order to cultivate gay and lesbian sexual identities.” On top of that (pun!), many Latino men have the added stigma of catholicism and sexism to deal with in their formulations of queer identities. That one position is associated with a powerful male gender role and the other with a weak female gender role is the same abject blueprint that’s been used against women for hundreds of years. So, yes, even gay men are influenced by sexism and misogyny.

Allow me to expand your mind for a minute with these case studies:

1) A burly, hot bodybuilder guy from Puerto Rico meets a yuppie, white stockbroker type in the financial district and they decide to go for a fuck. Whom do you think will fuck who?
2) A fashion evangelist “Tim Gunn” type meets a roudy fashion designer “Marc Jacobs” type. Who do you think should be on top?
3) Queen Latifah and Jodie Foster. Who’s is who’s mommy?

Kinda confusing, and hot, maybe? The problem is that cultural images or concepts of homosexuality have no space for equality and reciprocity in sexual relations. In other words, contemporary gay sexual relationships are defined as give or take, but not give and take. And yes, it does smell of sexism and traditional gender roles. To wit, just take a quick glimpse through Craigslist’s magnificent online ads, where you will find priceless gems such as:

Horny Latino with hard dick seeking a guy that needs to be fucked real bad. You host and I cum to fuck you in any position we can imagine. I am d/d free and you should be the same and also prefer non smokers but just be a bottom or be willing to get rammed hard right now.

Mr. Horny Latino is looking for some good times, inasmuch as his prospective conquest is “just a bottom”. However, he also acknowledges that labels mean shit by adding the salvo that if not a bottom, at least be “willing to get rammed hard right now.” Hot. But wait, there’s even more cuteness to be found on Craigslist:

Hi! Looking for masculine and Latino top for hot conversations and perhaps more. I’m 100% bottom with a guy and very discreet. You must be a total top. I don’t smoke, do drugs, and only drink socially. I’m a bit chubby but not obese, light skin, and a nice ass. Do you like it?

Yes, we do. Nice Ass guy just wants to find love. As long as it comes in a “top” configuration. Also, we want to hug him. And maybe slap him.

Sexism and homophobia are the two pillars from which the top/bottom gay power structure rises, and they have no business being in our bedrooms. As fucked up as it may seem, in Latin America being a male is valued more than being a female. And in male same-sex relations there is usually a tacit gender role assignment to one partner or the other. Obviously I am not talking about everybody, but this does seem to be the norm rather than the exception. The concept of “power bottoms”, or men who eagerly and with utmost glee enjoy getting fucked and are not a bit ashamed by it (yay!), helped level the playing field, but this is something that has not been embraced by the majority of the Latino gay culture. If you think that being butch precludes taking it up the ass, think again amigo. Gay Latino men should know better than to employ sexism in the development of their identities when we have so much to thank the women’s movement in their battle against sexual and gender discrimination.

Here’s the deal: Sexual acts do not and cannot define who one is. This may come as a surprise to some but there are some homosexual men who do not engage in anal sex. Ever. Also, there are also heterosexual men who like to be anally penetrated by women with strap-on dildos. Does that make them gay, weak, defeated, or emasculated? No. That just makes them interesting, adventurous, and evolved. [Ed. Note: And hot!] Gaytinos need to embrace variety in sexual expression and shun the homophobia that dictates repressed and repressive sexual behavior and forms of expression. If Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna did it in “Y Tu Mama También“, so can you.