Curious Bodies

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
Also on this website:

Toby Johnson's books:

GAY SPIRITUALITY: The Role of Gay Identity in the Transformation of Human Consciousness

GAY PERSPECTIVE: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe

SECRET MATTER,

GETTING LIFE IN PERSPECTIVE

PLAGUE: A NOVEL ABOUT HEALING.

 

Articles and Excerpts:

Curious Bodies

What Toby Johnson Believes

The Joseph Campbell Connection

 

"The Evolution of Gay Identity"

"St. John of the Cross &
the Dark Night of the Soul."

Avalokiteshvara at the Baths.

 

Adam and Steve

Gay retirement and the "freelance monastery"

Seeing with Different Eyes

 

The Techniques Of The World Saviors

Part 1: Brer Rabbit and the Tar-Baby
Part 2:
The Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara
Part 3:
Jesus and the Resurrection
Part 4:
A Course in Miracles

 

How Gay Souls Get Reincarnated

The D.A.F.O.D.I.L. Alliance

Toby's friend and nicknamesake Toby Marotta.

 

The necessary corollary of affirming pleasure is that incarnation in the flesh is a thing to be honored, relished, and celebrated. Such an affirmation directly challenges the dualistic notion that the soul and body are separate, even conflicting, entities. Body and soul are not in opposition. The body is good.

toby bare chested shirtless

It's a kindness to others to show your body and to enjoy seeing the bodies of others. Because our sexual awareness is tied into vision and objectification, we males especially long to see others' bodies. We feel frustrated when we can't satisfy our curiosity. For gay men, nudity is an affirmation of us as curious bodies. It feels good to go bare chested. It feels good to see other men shirtless. It reminds us we're in pleasure-loving flesh. Nudity is good.

 

People clothe themselves for decoration and for protection from the elements (these days including unfiltered U.V. radiation). Clothes are wonderful. One of the joys of being gay is often knowing how to dress well: to adorn oneself and others in ways that create beauty and interest. People also clothe themselves for protection from other people's judgment and sexual interest. Clothing can enhance attractiveness by hiding flaws. Though that kind of thinking supports the notion there are such things as flaws. The obsession with hiding our bodies causes untold suffering, unhappiness, and frustration. Baring all allows these anxieties to abate. Naked, we forget to be ashamed of our bodies.

In our all-male world, we seldom worry about being raped if we show our bodies. In the straight world, this is a real concern. Women are raped in part because sexually repressed, angry males rebel against the competitive, hierarchical system designed to restrict sex to alpha males through the dynamic of women's selectivity. Rapists force themselves on women who are helpless or whom they imagine to be "asking for it" by making themselves attractive. Modesty is both a mechanism of self-defense for women and a demonstration of power and ownership by dominant males. (Middle-eastern cultures that veil women and seclude them from public view demonstrate this in the extreme.)

In a very practical way, feeling good about one's body and showing it proudly--and appropriately, of course--helps self-esteem, allays neurosis and anxiety, and motivates one to take good care of oneself. Concern with the body is not foolish vanity; rather, it is good stewardship over one's place in creation. Taking care of yourself and sharing your success in that endeavor with others is a simple, practical way of creating beauty and improving a little piece of the world. Appropriate nudity is a dramatization and demonstration of God's primordial "Behold, it is good."

Excerpted from GAY PERSPECTIVE: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe (Alyson, 2003)

 


BACK to Toby's home page

 

 


Visitors: