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06 June 2005

Coming out. [More:]

The average age for the coming out of gay folks has dropped from 22 to 15, according to this article.

Fifteen!

Have things changed that much since I was 15? Even with the roiling debate over gay marriage, being gay is more acceptable now -- right? I assume the acceptability of coming-out for teenagers varies greatly with geography, the urban divide, etc.

Would it have been okay when you were 15? (Regardless of your orientation. Pretend, if you have to.)
It would have been okay with my family for sure. School might have been a bit rocky, especially if I was dykey lookin', but I don't think I would have feared for my physical safety. (I'm 31, by the way.)
posted by Specklet 06 June | 15:17
At 30, I'd say (regarding when I was a 15 year old): it really depends on what academic level you were (god, that sounds bad). We had a few openly gay folks (not many), and they got on just fine, but there wasn't a whole lot of crossover between the honors class kids and the non-honors kids (gym and art being the usual exceptions). In the honors classes, you never really heard homophobic or racist comments, whereas you heard quite a bit in the non-honors classes. So, as long as you were primarily in honors classes, and you were prepared to put up with jerkiness for maybe one class a day, it wouldn't have been a huge deal. If you were particularly sensitive about being made fun of, even for the few minutes at the start or end of a class, or if you were in primarily non-honors classes, then it would be a big deal.
posted by bugbread 06 June | 15:29
they're so lucky--it's so much more visible now, and makes it less weird, and with the internet, no gay teen needs to feel alone the way people my age and older did. Of course, there's still tons of trouble, whether you're out or not--everyone different gets shit.

The only openly gay character on tv when i was a teen was Jody in Soap, and he ended up being a sexless single parent.

it really depends on the school and neighborhood tho--the gay-straight alliances are not being formed in lower and working class schools--it's all suburban and middle-class and higher areas.

posted by amberglow 06 June | 15:32
actually, since I didn't manage to have any dates or girlfriends in high school, my parents actually asked me if I was gay at one point. They seemed relieved when I said no*. When I graudated, I still hadn't had any girls, and I remember sitting there in my cap and gown quite miffed that all those Risky Business teen flicks had lied to me.

*mom was quite heartened when a gay couple moved into the house around the block and spiffed it all up. They were a great improvement over the previous residents: a white-trash single mom with two obese sons, (one a rather overeager eagle scout,the other less weird but prone to dressing in camo gear, but so was I at the time) her skinny biker boyfreind and a doberman that used to chase the shit out me on my paper route. We're still not allowed to mention my gay cousin Giuseppe in the Old Country, since it upsets Grandpa.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 15:32
i'm 40, and while people knew, i wouldn't have dreamed of actually talking about it, or taking a same-sex date to the prom or anything...it was inconceivable, and i had it much better than people 10 and 20 years older. I remember i was in college, or just out of college, and there was a big news story out of a chicago suburb--a boy had brought a boy to the prom!!!! We were so proud! (i was out having sex by 14, but didn't come out to family til 19)
posted by amberglow 06 June | 15:35
since I didn't manage to have any dates or girlfriends in high school, my parents actually asked me if I was gay at one point. They seemed relieved when I said no.


I dunno how many times I've heard that same thing from different people. Myself being one of them. Apparently I was also pegged as possibly gay by a few friends for not having a girlfriend and liking the Cocteau Twins. (Apparently one or the other was not strong enough, but the combination was)
posted by bugbread 06 June | 15:38
Apparently I was also pegged as possibly gay by a few friends for not having a girlfriend and liking the Cocteau Twins.

Well, the Cocteau Twins would've made me suspicious, too (I kid). But you've seen enough pictures of me and read enough music threads to know I'm a flaming heterosexual, but mom was clueless: but her teenage son wasn't queer, just a loser.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 15:42
There was a rumor at school that I was dyke when I was 15. The usual shun and freeze took place, where my former friends now turned tier backs on me but it didn't bother me much, I found some other outcast pals to hang with instead. I could never have come out to my parents at that age, I wasn't dating yet and it was a bit iffy until I turned 16. I might have been able to come out at 16, though that is still quite young.
posted by dabitch 06 June | 15:42
.....and liking the Cocteau Twins.


Oh dear, so that's why that dang rumor started. FInally mystery is solved!

(actually it's far more mundane than that, a girlfreind aasked to see my "art" so I showed her a few scetches and paintings and of course, they were all female nudes as that's what I had the oppertunity to draw in my nightclasses. Ta-dah, I'm a dyke. Idiots.)
posted by dabitch 06 June | 15:44
it really depends on what academic level you were (god, that sounds bad).

Well, I usually hung with the dunderheads in high school, and while there was some prejudice against gay men expressed*, there were always a few tough, butch girls in our crowd, who in retrospect, were probably lesbians, and we didn't care too much.

* we were almost all huge Judas Priest fans, too. Go figure.

posted by jonmc 06 June | 15:50
What i really don't get is that "fag" is the current very popular multi-purpose word for everyone. And i wonder about the connection to a much more visible gay presence in the media, and in some schools and neighborhoods.

(oh, i'd like to think that all the people my age are now the ones programming/producing tv--Will & Grace, and Showtime, and Ellen, etc) : >
posted by amberglow 06 June | 15:53
What i really don't get is that "fag" is the current very popular multi-purpose word for everyone.


Well, that comes and goes. It bothers the hell out of me, too, but we used it quite extensively when I was an elementary school kid (well, we used "that's so gay", not "that's so faggy", but close enough). I don't know how much it reflects actual opinion about gays.
posted by bugbread 06 June | 15:56
i'm amazed at how dated the celluloid closet look, even though it's not that old.

people love to think a battle's over because they heard about it somewhere.

i'm still amazed at the slang use of gay
*not straight or gay enough for to anyone's satisfaction*
posted by ethylene 06 June | 15:57
i'm still amazed at the slang use of gay

well, the word "gay" sounds kind of foofy, and this is probably related to it's original meaning of "happy." Which gives the word all kinds of la-la-la connotations. So maybe it's outlived it's usefulness as a descriptor of homosexuals. "Queer," always sounded better to me, more solid, masculine, even a little menacing.

But I realize that since I'm not a member of the club, as they say. it's really none of my business.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 16:01
When I was 15 a kid committed suicide because his friends found out he was gay.

Now that I've moved away from the redneck town I grew up in, every time I go home I hear that another one of my male friends has come out of the closet, and was screwing most of my other male friends throughout high school. It's a bit of a shock, really.

(of course, one of my best friends came out to everyone at school when he was 16, and to his parents at 18, so what do I know?)
posted by muddgirl 06 June | 16:07
jon: as amusing as your overexplaininess is
not for my benefit, please
posted by ethylene 06 June | 16:10
I'm twenty-five. If I were a lesbian, my family wouldn't have cared, though my mother was always thrilled that I wasn't very interested in sex in high school--more time for school. It might have been a thing at my school since I went to a girls school, but no one would have been rude. That is, I think it might have been odd because it would have introduced sex into a space that was essentially sex-free, not because anyone would have been homophobic enough to pick on a lesbian.
posted by dame 06 June | 16:12
*dresses a deer, awaits the comforting clusters and embrace of jews and gay masses again*
posted by ethylene 06 June | 16:15
not for my benefit, please

no, for my benefit. I get to express an idea I've had in my head.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 16:18
I went to a girls school...a space that was essentially sex-free

Ruin all my perverted fantasies, why don'tcha. way to go dame.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 16:19
yes, but your explanation of your martial status gave me giggles as much as q's mark up trick
posted by ethylene 06 June | 16:20
how we're diverting from gaychat, shush!
posted by ethylene 06 June | 16:22
aside: friends of mine who when to all girl schools loved not having to worry about their looks over their studies. now tell us about the showers after gym class
*goggles in wait*
posted by ethylene 06 June | 16:29
I could have come out to my family with few or no consquences. I didn't have any friends to speak of so that's a moot point.

I'm still not totally out. My mum knows because it came up in conversation (she thought I was asexual). If anyone asks me or orientation comes up in conversation, I'm upfront about it. But at this point, being married to a man, I don't see that it's necessary to announce it.
posted by deborah 06 June | 16:35
*rarely sees reason to label oneself except when that's the point*
posted by ethylene 06 June | 16:37
Unfortnately for you, we didn't shower after gym. And even if we had, our locker room had individual showers attached to individual changing stalls. On the other hand, my best friend and I used to take showers together in college and after. We also got propositioned for foursomes with stunning regularity. Does that help?
posted by dame 06 June | 16:46
keep going please, this best friend, what's she look like? and what scent was the soap...
posted by jonmc 06 June | 16:48
was hoping for the boys room actually, you know they have towel snapping hijinks--
posted by ethylene 06 June | 17:09
Unfortnately for you, we didn't shower after gym. And even if we had, our locker room had individual showers attached to individual changing stalls. On the other hand, my best friend and I used to take showers together in college and after. We also got propositioned for foursomes with stunning regularity. Does that help?
posted by dame 06 June | 17:09
Unfortnately for you, we didn't shower after gym. And even if we had, our locker room had individual showers attached to individual changing stalls. On the other hand, my best friend and I used to take showers together in college and after. We also got propositioned for foursomes with stunning regularity. Does that help?
posted by dame 06 June | 17:12
shatter my illusions dame you
now compare your penii
posted by ethylene 06 June | 17:13
Dood, that's a mess. I don't know what the heack happened there. Sorry.
posted by dame 06 June | 17:14
s'okay
i'm still attempting to be eminently skippable
posted by ethylene 06 June | 17:20
I didn't come out to myself until I was 15. This was in 1981. I came from Cincinnati. That same year in that city, a young woman was kidnapped and raped by "deprogrammers" hired by her parents to make her stop being a lesbian. A few years later, that same city raised a furor over the Mapplethorpe exhibit. I had moved away by then, and come out in college (first as gay, then as bi). Kids in that day and place didn't know any openly gay people, and certainly no one would come out.
posted by matildaben 06 June | 17:36
everyone different gets shit.
Got news for you, amberglow - everyone gets shit for something, or they did when I was growing up. I used to be teased and some kids were not allowed to play with me because I came from a "broken home", so I don't think it really matters who or what you are, there are going to be people who will put you down, if only so they can feel better than someone.

I don't mean to belittle the struggle that gays have gone through (and still are) to get acceptance, but it is not as if the rest of us breeze through life with nary a care, which seems to be the intimation often in this type of discussion.
posted by dg 06 June | 18:20
It's not news--it would be frontpage headline news if that "everyone" you speak of had as high a suicide rate tho. Maybe there are some real differences in the shit some receive as opposed to "everyone"?
posted by amberglow 06 June | 18:29
dg, the only person here who "intimated" that the issue is my-struggles-were-greater-than-your-struggle... is you, nu?

posted by mudpuppie 06 June | 18:30
At age 15, I was living in Maine. I certainly would have told my folks. But I wouldn't have told anyone else. As a vocal child of New Left parents, I got into enough fights already.

Being gay would have given the townies the incentive they needed to organize a successful ass-kicking.
posted by Mayor Curley 06 June | 18:43
yet me navigating around town in holiday traffic with perfect driver ettiquette while blasting old Muffs has empowered some visiting colored haired children to feel less ostractized by this crappy hick town
posted by ethylene 06 June | 18:48
trying to refrain from pixies: "there were rumors--"
posted by ethylene 06 June | 18:50
That same year in that city, a young woman was kidnapped and raped by "deprogrammers"


OMFG!@ Yeah, that'll help. That's so unbelievably brutal, insane and stupid... Holy crap. Even for "back then".

(Yeah, I know worse has happened, even recently, and maybe even daily in prisons, even out of prisons... but still. Guh!)



And regarding struggles and taking shit and the comparison thereof: The shit people take for being "alternatively sexed" seems to generally be much worse than most shit-taking. Sexual identity is extremely fundamental to self-image, self-worth and societal interaction. More than anything else, sex defines who we are. It's the first thing anyone wants to know about you, and almost always the prime factor and last word in interpersonal relationships - though, that's changing as more people can function "post sexually" or "pan sexually". The motives of sex and sexuality are the most powerful and fundamental of all.

I don't think it would be entirely unreasonable to say that sexual prejudice is more difficult and more problematic than even racial prejudice, and certainly much more than financial, political, religious, and cultural prejudices. Especially since it tends to be more brutal and more invisible than any other. It crosses over into all areas of life: Borders, skin colors, lifestyles, economic caste, cultural origins, religion, politics.

Especially since there's probably even more diversity in sexuality then in races, cultures, or any of the above. It's not just straight/gay/bi. It's not even just straight/gay/bi/transgendered. Or even straight/gay/bi/transgendered/top/bottom/both, though that's at least beginning to hint at the true spectrum of sexual diversity.
posted by loquacious 06 June | 19:02
Or even straight/gay/bi/transgendered/top/bottom/both, though that's at least beginning to hint at the true spectrum of sexual diversity.

And those who have sex and those who don't ot those society has deemed sexualized and those who aren't. That's a huge gap, in my experience.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 19:09
dg, the only person here who "intimated" that the issue is my-struggles-were-greater-than-your-struggle... is you, nu?
I wasn't meaning to intimate that at all - my comment didn't really come out the way I planned.

Amberglow, there are no doubt differences in the amount and the intensity of the shit that those who are openly gay cope with (and, more particularly, coped with 10, 15, 20 years ago etc). Please don't think that I am belittling what you have gone through or what other gay men have gone through at all. I guess I was just feeling a little sorry for myself, thinking about all the times I got the crap beaten out of me by kids 5 years younger than me and not being able to lay a finger on them, because of the knowledge (learned the hard way) that their much larger brothers would inflict a much more serious beating if I so much as raised an arm in front of me to defended myself.

Perhaps you do know what it is like to have someone pummel your face repeatedly without being able to defend yourself. Perhaps you do know what it is like to have to clean dirt and blood of yourself and your clothes before you got home, because your mother would have to try and do something about it and, no matter what she did, it only made it worse. It would not surprise me if you have dealt with far worse. Just remember that others have had it tough at times, too. Just because I am not gay, doesn't mean life is all roses. The beatings that I received as a kid were not because I was different or because kids didn't like me - they were administered by kids who did it just because they could. The fact that I had no father around and no big brother to back me up made me a target for exactly the same type of arsehole that targets gays.
posted by dg 06 June | 19:16
I'd like to find a link to post about the Cincinnati news story, but I'm afraid that if I did a google search for "Cincinnati deprogrammers lesbian" I would get some weird results. Any of you librarians care to take a whack at Lexis-Nexis for me? Unfortunately I cannot remember the woman's name, although it would probably come back to me if reminded. This was about 1981-1983.
posted by matildaben 06 June | 19:19
The fact that I had no father around and no big brother to back me up made me a target for exactly the same type of arsehole that targets gays.

Some people are just bullies, it's true and we've all encountered our share and I loathe them as much as anyone, but it's an added annoyance when they have the backup of societal prejudices for their bullying, I'd imagine.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 19:22
Actually, jonmc, I feel that it is worse for someone to act as a bully just because they can than because of prejudice. I can understand, without condoning in any way, someone acting out their prejudice, but cannot for the life of me understand why someone would act this way for no reason.

I guess I am just not wired the way these people are, so it is not possible for me to accept the thought process that goes "Look, someone who I can torture without consequence, so I will".


Sorry, didn't mean to derail the thread. Shutting up now.
posted by dg 06 June | 19:34
but cannot for the life of me understand why someone would act this way for no reason.

Just pure meanness, and we've probably all breifly tuned into that station when we've taken out our everyday frustrations on somebody who just happens to be there. And deplorable as it is, you'll usually be rebuked and disapproved of by society for it. But if your target is a member of a group that is despised by some, then your cruelty will be ignored or even praised.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 19:38
*takes the opportunity to move the thread back on-track*

Well, I guess that society has moved forward at least to the point where cruelty against any particular subset of society is not condoned (in most places, anyway). But still, I know a coupe of people (not friends, aquaintances), who used to like nothing better than to go out on a Firday night and antagonise individual drunks (this is three brothers that I am speaking of) until they took a swing at one of them, then use that as justification for beating them to a pulp. If they happened to get it into their heads that that person may have been less than perfectly masculine, they took additional satisfaction in administering a few kicks to the groin while the person was lying on the ground. In times gone by, this behaviour would have been seen as just "boys will be boys" in many places. Nowadays, this is not the case (and I believe they have given up their Friday night fun after one of them ended up in the hospital after someone was not as incapacitated as they thought he was), because the world has become more tolerant of difference and, while most still do not embrace those differences, they are (often grudgingly) accepted or, at worst, ignored.

Not much as far as progress goes, but at least now those who do not confirm to the "standards" of society can live their lives in peace, as long as they keep their heads down.
posted by dg 06 June | 20:15
dg: Yeah. I know what that's like. Even worse, I'd go 'home' and get more of the same from my stepdad. I had teachers that were brutal as well, and also permitted and actively overlooked severe in-class brutality from classmates. I know quite well what it's like to be repeatedly brutalized and to have nowhere to hide from it.

To state "Being brutalized or oppressed for one's sexuality is especially and uniquely heinous" doesn't diminish or rationalize "Being brutalized and/or oppressed in general is heinous".

I would stand by the argument that sexual oppression and brutality stands in a class by itself. Sexuality and the expression of it is fundamental - even quantum to the human experience. We are sexual beings first and foremost. Ask anyone to describe themselves sight unseen and voice unheard and the first answer (or question) is usually - nearly invariably - male or female (or rarely, "other"). Not black, not white, not aethist or devout orthodox Catholic. The second question/answer - in an open, honest and trusting conversation with self-accepting and self-aware individuals - is almost always sexual orientation.
posted by loquacious 06 June | 20:34
To state "Being brutalized or oppressed for one's sexuality is especially and uniquely heinous" doesn't diminish or rationalize "Being brutalized and/or oppressed in general is heinous".

Well, when someone getting brutalized for some amorphous or unspecified reason sees someone getting brutalized for a specific reason getting sympathy and support, their gut reaction is "hey, what about me?!"

I'm not saying it's a logical or constructive reaction, but it's certainly understandable.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 20:36
Matildaben, found an article about Stephanie Riethmiller, the woman from Cincy.


posted by mudpuppie 06 June | 20:53
jonmc: Yeah, it's understandable. I think there's even a name or phrase for the scenario.
posted by loquacious 06 June | 21:03
Mudp: yeah, that's the story I was thinking of. I had no idea she was only 19 at the time. "They focused on Thiemann's footwear (boots), her car (a pickp truck), and dog (Doberman pinscher) as evidence of her overbearing style."
posted by matildaben 06 June | 21:35
I don't think it would be entirely unreasonable to say that sexual prejudice is more difficult and more problematic than even racial prejudice,

That may be going a bit far, loquacious. People know (or think they know) what your race is just by looking at you. You cannot possibly hide it. Now, obviously being gay is tough, and I can imagine that being in the closet would suck ass, but I think something you can hide is still better than something you can't.
posted by dame 06 June | 22:25
Well, when someone getting brutalized for some amorphous or unspecified reason sees someone getting brutalized for a specific reason getting sympathy and support, their gut reaction is "hey, what about me?!"

I should add that the cultural and political right has been making electoral hay with this reactional pattern for decades. The left needs to find a politically efficacious way of dealing it. Or they could try to change humanity's emotional makeup, but I bet my idea is more workable.
posted by jonmc 06 June | 22:36
ok, someone grab a non white person
i simply cannot be the non white flag person right now
posted by ethylene 06 June | 22:42
That may be going a bit far, loquacious. People know (or think they know) what your race is just by looking at you.


It may be too far. It might not be. It's a really subjective topic - literally like asking who feels more pain when shot in the leg.

I'm thinking more from the perspective of the oppressed, and how heavily psychologically loaded sexuality is, and how integral it is to being human.

While there are at least some inherent racial traits for most races, it seems like the majority of "racial traits" aren't genetic or racial, but cultural - and culture is learned and taught.

Granted, there is perhaps learned a homosexual "culture" of sorts, but homosexuality (or pansexuality/pangenderism) itself certainly isn't learned, no more than race is.

Now, obviously being gay is tough, and I can imagine that being in the closet would suck ass, but I think something you can hide is still better than something you can't.


To turn that argument around, at least you could see and know people of your fellow race, and commune with them. Generally and historically, any given race has had a public peer group of one sort or another - except maybe in the most removed and isolated cases. Even African slaves in America had a public peer group, and even Jews deep in the hell of Auschwitz had public peer groups - however faint such a consolation prize in the face of such oppression and terror may be. (And let's not forget where the pink triangle comes from - Nazi concentration camps.)

For the pansexual/pangendered, every taken risk of trying to find someone similar, to disclose your orientation, commune (or love) someone of your compatible sexuality or orientation, simply trying to find a single peer or even just trying to find a sympethetic ear brought unimaginable stress and risk - risk of death, beatings, being totally outcast, cut off, ostracized, or even worse. It still does, though it's getting better.

I don't say any of this to diminish or belittle any racial tragedy, oppression or genocide. Certainly the terrible things listed in the last sentence of the previous paragraph happen and happened to any number of races over the centuries.

But it's not like you suddenly realize you're black at puberty like most pansexuals discover later, or admit to themselves that they're differently sexed or oriented at n point in time, and eventually have to choose to break it to their parents, family and friends and "come out", or stay closeted. The shock to a pansexual's family and peers and even themselves can be enormous - and undoubtably leads to the high suicide rates of the pansexual/pangendered.

And yeah, it's getting better. There are at the least cursory laws in many places that - at least, on paper - protect the pansexual from hate crimes and violence.

And I don't think it would be unreasonable to say that the path towards openess itself has been made easier for the pansexual/pangendered by the original civil rights movements, women's lib, and other human rights movements that have come before.

You cannot possibly hide it.


How perfectly natural it must be to want to hold your lover's hand or walk arm in arm on a walk through a sunny day through a park or share a quick hug and a kiss before one leaves the other on travels - but to not be able to overcome one's fears that they may be brutalized for doing so. How easy it would be to forget to "act straight" and accidently display affection to your significant other at the wrong place and at the wrong time.

Though, I suppose the same could apply to an interracial couple in the wrong place at the wrong time.
posted by loquacious 07 June | 03:19
To turn that argument around, at least you could see and know people of your fellow race, and commune with them.


To clarify and be more clearly clear and all that: By "you" I meant "one", or even "we" or possibly even "they", as in "at least one could see and know people of one's fellow race", of course.

I ate a couple of cloves of garlic earlier and I'm higher than a cat stuffed in a sack of freshly shredded catnip, woo. Dizzy, niacin flushed and goofy and etc.
posted by loquacious 07 June | 03:54
ok, you really suck at being the non white person
posted by ethylene 07 June | 08:41
Pffft. I got more rhythm and soul than a Gospel revival meeting the day of the second coming, and more moves than James Brown on an electrified dancefloor.
posted by loquacious 07 June | 10:37
(oh, i'd like to think that all the people my age are now the ones programming/producing tv--Will & Grace, and Showtime, and Ellen, etc) : >

I'm curious, do you really think Will And Grace is a positive portrayal? I go back and forth about it, and I'm very curious about what other folks think. There's no doubt that it increases exposure, normalizes homosexuality, and makes it harder to ignore the fact that many of us are queer. On the other hand, it trades in stereotypes and features characters whose primary personality trait is their selfishness (all four of them). I have no doubt about how shitty (and racist) I think the portrayal of Karen's maid is.

Anyway, I'm not all up in arms about it, I'm just curious what other people think.
posted by omiewise 07 June | 10:38
loquacious--

I'm not sure that it's ever really possible to make a convincing argument comparing oppressions. On the other hand, what's certain is that racial and ethnic differences (not the same thing) have been used in far more macro-level oppression than has sexual preference. We just don't have the same histories in the world of genocide and -cleansing events being directed toward people based on their sexuality. Perhaps based upon gender, but not really sexuality. Which is, of course, not meant as an argument about who hurts worse, just a reminder of history.

I do agree that issues of difference are central to the psychology of human beings, and that sexual difference and gender are persistent issues for many many people. But you might be surprised at how often race comes up in the consulting room.
posted by omiewise 07 June | 10:44
I have no doubt about how shitty (and racist) I think the portrayal of Karen's maid is.

Well, if all the characters are shitty and selfish, why should the "minority" character be any different? That's a weird kind of racism in itself.
posted by jonmc 07 June | 11:08
omiewise: I agree with all that. The impossibility/possibility of a convincing argument. The macro-level oppressions and genocides.

But I certainly made a decent stab at a convincing argument, despite the comparisons of apples and oranges, and the fact it's such a subjective argument no matter what.
posted by loquacious 07 June | 11:44
Timing out, || “You’re Jewish, aren’t you, Seymour?”.

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