by Sachin Jain
Date and time: December 13, 2009. 4 to 7 pm.
Venue: The Hub, Bandra (West), Bombay.
Participants: 89 (Men 83, Women 7)
The men included 11 current couples (22 guys) in relationships who said they had completed: 10 months, 1 year (2), 2 years (2), 3 years (2), 4 years (2), 10 years, 11 years. The meet also included 12 men who said they were in relationships with men who were not present at the meeting, and were in Bombay, in other Indian cities or abroad.
The meeting started with a request to respect all kinds of relationships and to maintain a non-judgmental atmosphere. It was wonderful to have the meeting at The Hub, an awesome Bandra space run by the warm and generous Raheen. Appropriately-named venue indeed for a meeting with the objective to facilitate a discussion space about gay relationships and to garner insights and gain tools to help all of us negotiate various aspects like the contemplation, forging, maintenance demise and regeneration of relationships. The following aspects of the subject were touched:
1. “Essential Ingredients of a relationship”
“I would consider integrity of character to be very important. I respect truthfulness.”
2. “Attraction”
“How many people are looking for a relationship at the moment? On internet dating websites people say they want to be in a relationship and put nude photographs of themselves. Is sexual attraction a prerequisite to relationships?”
“For some, sexual compatibility is more important than other parameters. You are talking from a perspective that is more emotional than physical. For you it may be inappropriate but there are many for whom it is entirely appropriate. I met someone who only had a picture of his chest and six-pack abs, but we got to know each other as people and have a durable LTR.”
“In case of a girl and boy, prior to marriage they do not show each other pictures of her vagina or her breasts. The guy wouldn’t send pictures of his penis or dick. So I think relationships are higher than that. People put explicit photos because they are only looking for sex. If there is nothing else then how am I to know what your personality is like?”
“Even if you take a face-picture, at the end of the day it will come to sex, but gradually and eventually. That’s what relationships are about. If you are not willing to wait for 2-3 months then it’s you are not worth pursuing. Every relationship starts with physical attraction. You came to know the person emotionally after you date him.”
“People putting physical pictures are merely trying to put their best assets forward with the hope of attracting others.”
“Physical touch can prove to be the backbone of a relationship. For example, fathers don’t touch children while mums do. Hence children are more attached to mothers. So somewhere the touch is important in nurturing a relationship. Physical intimacy is about loving, intimate touch and not just sex”
“I have a slightly contrarian viewpoint. I have had two relationships which were fantastic. Both started out by me being good friends with them. There was a little romance but no major physical attraction. It took us six months to a year to become really close and by then it was an unspoken thing that we would be together. After seven years he got married and we had to stop. The romance without attraction path was similar in my second relationship.”
“Physical relationship is not only sexual, it is also about the way he looks, he walks, he smiles.”
“For us it was the attraction. Both of us thought the other was nice. We got together after talking on the phone and a couple of meetings. Emotional compatibility and sensibility are there. Attraction is there but it is not hard-core attraction.”
3. “Fizzle or sizzle”
“Does sex really have to be sizzling? If there is emotional bonding can you work around the sex or lack thereof?
“It comes down to compatibility, not only physical but also emotional. If there is no physical vibe, you can extend emotional bonding only so far. There has to be a starting point of attraction. Over time it naturally fizzles out. The sizzle may fizzle but the relationship lasts.”
4. “Top and Bottom”
“I did change my natural role because I loved him very much. I think it’s possible.”
“At the end of the day both you and your partner should be comfortable with who you intrinsically are. Trying to take on an identity that is alien won’t work. You won’t be happy or satisfied, and by extension neither will your partner.
“I think it’s a matter of adjustment, compatibility and love. From the age of 18 to my present age of 35 I have evolved a lot. Sometimes one even goes with what is available.”
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5. “Norms”
“Will the married man see you in public and acknowledge your presence? Do you have a future with him? I personally think it is wrong since there are wives and children involved. I personally wouldn’t recommend it.”
“Consider the institution of marriage – by sleeping with a married man you are going against it. That’s how society has done it. However it is technically wrong for both male partners. Why is the onus always on the gay guy to do the right ethical thing?”
“I don’t think sleeping with a heterosexually married man is very different from sleeping with a gay guy with a boyfriend.”
“We should not be judgmental. We are nobody to say it is right or wrong. A person has a right to decide how he or she wants to take his or her relationship forward.”
“There is nothing wrong in an open relationship as long as both partners are happy. If two guys are in an open relationship, we get all moralistic and say they are screwing around.”
“In an open gay relationship, at least everybody is on the same page. With women in heterosexual marriages, they are for the most part unaware of the dalliances. When she finds out, the hapless woman accepts it because she has to out of economic and social compulsions. What about the children? There was a recent case of a young man killing himself on discovering his father’s bisexuality.”
“Many gay men find themselves in a relationship with another gay man who because of family pressure is going to get married.”
“Yes that has happened to me. We continued to remain good friends in all aspects, except for the sexual. For a lot of time we met each other. Finally one day he offered it and I accepted. After we did the deed 2-3 times, he questioned if it is right. I said don’t ask me.”
“When my ex decided to get married I ended it on my own. I would not do anything to break the current relationship with whoever he is with.”
“There have been cases where things have worked out between single gay guys and married guys. For some open relationships are okay and others say they want them closed. It is similar for all people, married or not.”
“Since there are no established norms in the gay community we are trying to find our way.”
6. “Comparing with straight relationships”
“The norms are decided for straight relationships.”
“Are they? Isn’t adultery omnipresent in straight society?”
“In the straight world you don’t have so much sleeping around. Our world is primarily about sex.”
“If my husband was truly attracted to men, I would end the relationship.”
“There is an element of competitiveness and insecurity between two men. That starts building up and it never works out. There is not enough emotional oneness.”
“If a relationship does not work, there is something one person is not doing for the other. People should learn from a bad situation and just move on.”
7. “Marriage”
“I come from a country of legal gay marriage. The sanctity of marriage is important. Shouldn’t we control ourselves and our sexual urges and put our energies into one person and work on them?”
“Marriage is about living together, much more than sex. As long as both parties are okay with it, there is no difference between marriage and a relationship. People struggled and made sacrifices for gay rights, so that people could live freely the way they wanted to.”
“We are in a relationship and we don’t need a piece of paper. It is because of the love, the wanting to see him everyday, that the relationship survives.”
“Tomorrow while formulating gay marriage we should not copy the straight marriage model.”
8. “Challenges and overcoming them”
8a. Career and studies:
“Choices related to career path and studies are a challenge. My boyfriend went abroad to do an MBA It did not work out for us. If you don’t lie together and spend quality time together it becomes that much more difficult. The commitment needed is that much more to overcome the obstacles of distance.”
“If you genuinely love someone, won’t you be a part of the future plans of the guy? Would you not want to sacrifice something for his sake?”
“Trying to align career goals without demanding sacrifices is the hardest. Consider his needs for study and travel. How in the long term can it be worked out together?”
8b. Long-distance:
“If the relationship has a good foundation it can be conducted long-distance. Neither party should sacrifice their interests. The assumption of living together and setting up home together is difficult to actualize though in such a case.”
“The challenge was the distance and the time for each other.”
8c. Family:
“When we started, the first obstacle was the family. His family, and their rejection of their son’s sexuality. This was our initial stage of bonding and it didn’t help that this added pressure was there. He overcame it. If he hadn’t stood up to them we would have broken up because I am out and he is not.”
“The biggest hurdle is still my parents .I struggle with them. I hate lying about where I am going and what I am doing. I do it because he is all alone. All groceries need to be bought. Wherever I am lacking he is strong. Though he has better finances I have better savings than him, he has zero.”
“Family has a vital role to play. A gay relationship is not what is expected by the family from the child. To make it happen it takes guts to come out of the closet.”
“We don’t have bhaiyyas and bhabhis to intervene on our behalf. Nobody comes to take care and effectuate a patch-up. So many times you fight and think this is the end of it.”
“I got invited to his cousin’s sisters wedding which was a huge thing. The big problem is what he should call my mother. I called his mother Mrs.…., but she doesn’t like it because the only people who call her that are people trying to sell her insurance on the phone.”
8d. Time and Space:
“You have to understand there is his space, my space and our space.”
“My boyfriend spends more time with GB than with me.”
8e. Extroversion – Introversion:
“The challenge is that I am outspoken and he is silent. Communication was difficult. We worked on it and by the grace of good we have somewhere matched our communication wavelength. Family is still a problem.”
“I don’t have many friends and am more of a loner. He has too many friends. When we started out there were just too many people around us. I got less personal time. As time has passed, now most of his friends are much closer to me. They are a great support to us. But our two radically different distinct personalities are a challenge. Eventually we decided, “this is the time for friends, and this time is for us.”
“He finds my talking people for hours very irritating. Why are you talking this openly to someone?, he says”
8f. Age difference:
“My boyfriend was quite young so it was like raising a child. Our maturity levels are different. He would throw tantrums. You expect an equal maturity level to discuss something serious. You just hope that one day he will come around in a few years. Now a few years have passed, he has come around but I have also grown older in the meanwhile!
“I would want to go for fast food or a movie, my older boyfriend would want to go for a walk or stay at home. He would keep to himself, saying I am over this. However I am having these experiences for the first time and would like to live my share of life.”
“I am in a relationship with someone who is 18 years older to me. But he is triple booked with social engagements every evening. Staying at home is my preference. I am just giving a counter-perspective.”
“There is always insecurity in the older guy. 5 years down the line if the relationship breaks, the older guy is always insecure about what would happen to him.”
“We are a bear-cub relationship. He feels when we are older he says I will become more attractive.”
8g. Sex drives:
“Our respective sexual drives are different. Our interests are also different.”
“The age difference is 9 years so sexual drives are different. He wants it everyday. I say I have better things to do.”
8h. Finances:
“My major obstacles have been finances and expenses. Where do I draw the line about spending?”
“I’m in the diamond business and my boyfriend works in a bar. I am Indian, he is white. He is out, I am not out. So one some level you work at expense as a treat. I will take him to fancy places and he takes me to other places, but they are treats for each other. There are ego clashes but these can be worked on. He is very chivalrous; he holds the door for me. If you take a guy out and treat him like a lady, it works wonders. He is very romantic. It comes down to love.”
“My boyfriend has not been working for a year and a half. It has been so difficult for him to survive in another city. We meet for a fixed time. I don’t mind spending on getting him to Bombay.”
“If you have discrepancies in income you need to be pulling your own weight. It has to be a visible effort. What generally happens is that we make a lot of assumptions about what the other person is going to feel but we never really discuss it. We should talk about finance. We are all too shy about it and that causes a lot of problems. It is entirely possible that the struggler wants to stay in a five star hotel and the rich guy is happy with a guest house. Lifestyle and income level are not always predictable”
“It’s not about spending as much as I can, but as much as I got. This is what I can afford, this is all I have got and I am spending it on you.”
“One guy of the two always earns more. That cannot shake the relationship. It doesn’t matter.”
“Consider a typical housing situation. If you are living in his house, he is paying for the apartment. If you don’t have a conversation you feel obliged to do all the work around the house. May be you can pay rent, anything to make both feel that none is taking advantage of the other.”
“At the start be very frank. The level of understanding should be high.”
“I was established in my career and he was just beginning. Money never becomes a problem in our lives. This never happens since he is my spouse and we are doing things together. I asked which car he liked and then I bought mine. Whoever spends is not the question. When I don’t have money in my wallet he spends.”
8i. Insecurity:
“A by-product of possessiveness is insecurity. He understood that the lack of communication was a problem. We consulted a few psychiatric friends. Then we understood the reason: I was always possessive about anyone close to me. So he helped me to work on this problem and it got resolved. Each fight adds a stronger bond to the relationship.”
“More than the physical age, the emotional maturity is very critical. My boyfriend was much younger but emotionally mature and ready for a relationship. Insecurity could work both ways since my boyfriend sees me with so many young friends.”
“The insecurity and possessiveness happened but they were just a phase.”
8j. Food
“Vegetarian and non-vegetarian was an issue.”
8k. Control
“The first challenge was me myself. I had decided to get into a relationship on my terms only. Friends suggested I should change a little since I was a control freak. I wanted to be accepted for who I was. I would not go to a gym and fit into a mould. I would not stop being blunt. At 37, I felt I was over the hill. When I met my spouse I called him spouse and not boyfriend. The relationship evolved and every step was a new challenges. Cultural backgrounds apart from religion mattered too – he was affluent, extremely pampered, and didn’t understand budgets or switching off lights, capping the toothpaste, or hanging the towel instead of putting it on a chair. This involved major adjustments. He was coming into my house and I was not going into his.”
“Challenges will be there but we overcome them in a different manner. 90% credit goes to him because it was a lot of change for him but not for me.”
9. “Staying safe and involved”
“In the event of an unforeseen illness or diagnosis, first and foremost do not react with pity. Just take it cool. I would support and stand by him and take precautions. I would get myself tested and consider everything else. Living with HIV is now like living with diabetes. Living a life, looking ahead, surviving. HIV could involve multiple possibilities. The premise that HIV = cheating is very irresponsible and problematic. A situation could come about from a variety of reasons. One may not have gotten oneself tested and that may be stupid. But it is not the same thing as cheating.”
“This is a very individual zone. Your anguish should be with the dishonesty. The HIV does not come with the picture.”
“Most of us have a very poor knowledge of HIV and the window period.”
“Self-preservation is the key. Why don’t I sit with him not confronting, asking what he is feeling? Maybe I am feeling guilty; my ethics may not allow me to go ahead with the relationship. Why are we not considering the HIV diagnosis from the infected persons point of view?”
“The danger is for serial monogamists lulled into complacency. They have a committed monogamous relationship for, like, seven weeks, and then have unsafe sex, that is dangerous. Make an informed decision about unsafe sex. Rule out window period.”
“The real question is do I walk out if there is dishonesty, or a terminal illness? Will you stick by with someone who has cancer?”
10. “Expectations”
“The relationship is up to you. Whether you want a bonsai, or a real tree.”
“We have grown up internalizing straight norms. The reasons we feel ashamed is that we have internalized guilt. We have not seen successful relationships since our communities are nascent. Durable, long term relationships are still a rare sight. Meetings like this may change the frame of reference.”
I felt oh my god I am getting old. I want to find someone soon.
“You don’t know what to expect. You like talking to him. It’s not a perpetual party. You do not look your best all the time. You may be unshaved and overweight. We have grown up in a situation where the symmetry is very different. I wanted what I saw between my mom and dad and other elders in the family. But that may not always be realized.”
11. “Adoption”
“Marriage is a social institution. If there is no set of norms it is difficult for adoption. The absence of rules is not a blessing, it is a game. Every coin has two sides. In a gay relationship there are no stepping stones. There are rites of passages. After 4 years I don’t even know how to describe it, engaged, married, what.”
“If you are in a relationship set norms for yourself. If my father starts dating other women, and mother sees other men, what will happen to me? Similarly it would be bad for the adopted child if the couple breaks up”
“You should adopt a child to raise or adopt with the full responsibility on yourself. You cannot put a child where you want to cement a relationship. That is using the child.”
“I come from a broken home. My mother stayed in the marriage for so many years for the sake of the children. I would have rather she left.”
“Mother and father are both responsible. In a gay relationship only 1 will adopt. He who will adopt will be totally responsible for the child.”
“That’s why you have the law. The only reason for registering the marriage is to legally oblige both partners to take care of the child.”
“We have three daughters and they are our three friends. It is about bonding and not about papers.”
12. “In and Out”
“My biggest barrier is getting into a relationship. I want to approach 20 people but there is a barrier to it.”
“I would like to do it in a forum like speed dating.”
13. “Duration”
“I have been in a long-term relationship. However I do not put great weight on a relationship because it is long-term. People should aspire to have relationships that are loving, of whatever duration that they may be. There should not be a stigma to a relationship ending. There is a tension normally among guys – I have to find a boyfriend for the rest of my life. It is ok to have a long-term relationship many times over. Loading it with so many expectations removes all the fun from it. Why can’t we enjoy the here and now?”
“In my minds there were stepping stones. Feeling attraction, telling others, calling him `boyfriend’, `partner’, moving in, meeting parents, there were gradual stages I went through which definitely were distinct. I don’t agree there are no stepping stones.”
“I don’t think relationships come with expiry dates. We don’t take each other for granted but we are used to each other.”
“Tending to relationships is like taking are of a baby. For the 1st 8 years you have to be careful.”
14. “Intercultural Relationships”
“Has anyone been in a relationship with a boyfriend who is not Indian?”
“I have and I think it makes things so much simpler. We have finite expectations and understand the parallax between our respective cultures and respect it.”
“I have and I think there are a number of challenges. In my first relationship I was with an Indian guy and negotiation a common space in the home was something I never even thought about, it was so natural. With my non-Indian boyfriend, everything needed to be talked about and negotiated. Also, he would find it strange if I would talk about his siblings to others. Likewise I would find it strange when he would discuss our relationship with others.”
The meeting ended by thanking all the attendees and our hosts at The Hub, and tea and snacks were had by all.
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