Sunday 17 August 2008

Shame in the Park

London Pride and Manchester Pride get some of the biggest musical names in the country.

York Pride? A covers band called Jesus and the Felchmonkeys.

(The several over-fifties readers I know of might not understand the full implications of the name; to them, I suggest a nice cup of tea instead of brooding about it.)

Now, York University Students' Union, us, happened to have the largest banner, near the entrance. It really looked as if we were running the whole show, and people behaved accordingly.

So, when Jesus (an astoundingly wobbly man) of Jesus and the Felchmonkeys came onstage in a frilly bikini and a sink plunger, we laid our heads in our hands and cried.

When he mooned the audience, we died a little inside.

If I were allowed to choose a representative of the LGBTQI community, to wave about at the straight/cis passers by, I might choose... well, not him....

Anyway, we handed out some leaflets. They were good leaflets, if a little EXCITABLE!!! because one of our officers loves the humble exclamation mark, and the underline tool, and Caps Lock, a little more than is healthy. QUEER!!! Hooray!!!!

Anyway, Hagrid and I filled out some surveys about our sex life (which is astonishingly dull, if the questions are anything to go by - have YOU ever used poppers while receiving anal intercourse? I thought that was oddly specific, too).

Here are the first question, verbatim.

1) Are you a) a man, or b) a woman? This survey is for men only. If you are a woman, do not complete this survey.

The second question was "Are you a trans man?" which was nice. Of course, the rest of the questions demonstrate that they'd forgotten about trans men altogether, but meh.

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Incidentally, he's now on the phone to Kim, who works in Jorvik Viking Centre. Not Eboracum Roman Centre, say, but Jorvik Viking Centre, with all the big Vikings on the side and all the Viking stuff in it.

One of the visitors to Jorvik, in Jorvik, while Kim was wearing her Jorvik Viking costume, asked, sincerely, whether she was a Roman.

This was because she is female, and Vikings were all men.

Someone else complained that there were only two Viking re-enactors. There were four. Two had vaginas.

But... the Vikings were all men, godsdammit, and I with my Massive Penis of Saxon-Bashing will tell you so!

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I just wrote an ending to this post explaining that I now want to be a fireman when I grow up, with astonishing illogic.

I have the spine of someone sixty years older. I don't remember a life without constant back pain.

Career plan fail.

4 comments:

Daphne said...

D'you think they had fun writing the questions for the sexual survey? They do seem a bit random, if that one was anything to go by. Send them a few for next year. And Jake Thackray's song "Isabel makes love upon national monuments".

Anonymous said...

Jesus was quite a sight to behold, I must admit. I never thought that the second coming would wear high heeled platforms, a shiny cowboy hat and have a sink plunger affixed to his stomach. I also never expected Christ our Lord to show his bare bottom to a field full of people including small children...

It would have been fun and all if it was in a club, but in a park it was just embarrassing...

The reason that Olli is of course talking about firemen, was that there was a fire engine parked up next to the river, and all the gay men went to ogle (the firemen, not the vehicle).

On the note of the firemen I have also thought it would be quite good to be fire auxillia. I thought they had done away with the whole thing but apparently I am wrong... I don't work close enough to a fire station to be part of it but the thought is there. Similarly, I have had, since I can remember, the desire to be an RNLI volunteer, but living in York, we may be a little land locked for that:
"This ship's about to run aground, where the hell are you"
"Umm... stuck in traffic on the M62..."

Silverback said...

I'm just enjoying my tea !!!!!!!!
(sorry, can't underline here)

Oliver A. FP said...

Daphne: Dr Seuss! Have you done it in a boat? Have you done it with a goat?

H: I did SO NOT go to ogle, I went so I could sit in the fire engine and wear the hats.

Silverback: Good!!! Tea is a BROWN DRINK MADE FROM LEAVES! Crazy!!

(y'all think I'm exaggerating. You're WRONG!!!!!!!)