[KS] Re: response to open letter

[goodwins]

REPLY sends your message to the whole list
__________________________________________

Hi Stephen, Young Rae Oum, et al.!

I imagine readers with direct and/or indirect knowledge of contemporary
gay lifestyles quickly recognized Mr. Body's intended meaning in using
the terms "boys" and "available".

Similarly, anyone without such knowledge might just as quickly form an
erroneous impression from the remark. Perhaps this was the case here? I
think no harm was intended!

Best,

Mike Goodwin


Stephen Epstein wrote:

> Greetings,
>
> Thank you for your message.  Having read your note, I can understand
> your concerns about the message I posted, but from conversations with my
> colleague, I can assure you that he regularly uses the term "boys" to
> refer to men of age; I take it that this is quite common among openly
> gay men in discussions of or within their own subculture.  You're right
> that I change this to "men" in my own introduction; I don't feel
> comfortable using the term myself.  I certainly would not have forwarded
> the note unless I had understood him to be talking about consenting
> adults.  Similarly, in the conversation in which the topic of
> homosexuality in Korea came up, he spoke in very similar terms in his
> assessment of the New Zealand gay scene and, as I recall, equally used
> the term "availability" with specific reference to the relative openness
> of men to engage in same-sex encounters here.
>
> If my post to the list of my colleague's remarks was ill-advised and
> offensive to you (and others) I would like to submit my very sincere
> apologies; the last thing I would ever want is to be supportive of an
> even covertly racist agenda, and I regret my insensitive oversight in
> passing on his unedited comments without full consideration of how the
> presentation of his response could be regarded.
>
> Best, Stephen