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Recently and old friend has come out on holiday to my area. His name is Michael and he's a retired Chief-Super in the Metropolitan Police in his late 60's, now I've known this guy since I was about 12, and we've always been pretty close - I think I kinda saw him as a surogate grandfather as a kid.
In recent years I've come to realise that whilst he means no harm, he has strong and prejudical views on certain "Groups" of people within Society. EG: He thinks homosexaulity is wrong, though he's prepared to accept that individuals may prefer it. However he'd disown his son if he'd turned out to be gay. Similiarly he whilst he has many Black friends he wouldn't approve of his daughter marrying a black man. ??!!??!!??!?!?!
Long Hair, appears to be another one of his other little prejudices. He can't honestly understand why a "nice young man like me" would want to have long hair. Inspite of my efforts to explain to him that its only my hair that is changing and not my nature, I can see his genuine confusion over this matter. (He thinks I'm going to become a yob!)
Now this is a well educated man and formerly a very senior policeman in Britains Top Police force, and he really is a nice guy. He just has biggoted views that have been impressed upon him throughout his live.
Whilst I deplore his opinions, particularly on Homosexuality and Race, I can't bring myself to dislike this man, he's just a "loveable biggot" it seems such a contradiction in terms.
Does anyone else wrestle with similiar feelings about close friends? If so how do you deal with them?
how do you deal with them?
The easy answer is by being more broadminded than they are, and that's not just a smartass reply. You can understand that you have here a basically nice guy who has worked all his life in a situation where he has been required to 'conform' in appearance and in attitude. Had he been prepared to be more broadminded, he would not have risen up the ranks.
Now you can demonstrate to him that you are not a demon, even though your beliefs and looks are not the same as his.
I know a guy who is always coming out with racist sentiments. Not only anti-black, but also anti-semitic (the latter is odd, because he's a jew himself!). The funny thing is, observing his actual behaviour, he never exhibits any discrimination against anyone. He seems to be another 'loveable biggot'?
Your ex-police friend is someone from the older generation. It is more disturbing when you face prejudice from your own age group, I should think.
In the late 19th and early 20th century it was the norm for men to have substantial moustaches. This is how I can imagine an older man might have addressed a younger one in those days:
"Why the devil don't you grow a moustache, my dear fellow? Make a man of yourself! Surely you don't want to look like a bloomin' woman!
cheers, Barry
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That statement got me thinking. I find it incomprehensible that a group of people, who are at the receiving end of bigotry every day of their lives would be bigots themselves.
That is why I cannot understand the gay-on-gay bigotry. The bears can't stand long hair, and the muscle Nazis eschew all but the most buffed and ripped, and the rest of the clones hate facial hair.
Being a longhaired, mustachioed gay man with a bit of a belly, I can't believe the number of rude commets I get from my own "group"
Hi William,
As much as we would like people to be good enough to recognize their own shortcomings most can't. It is a sad thing when people who experience prejudice in one way seem unhesitating in their willingness to dish it out upon another, but that just makes them human. Humans tend to want to think well of people like themselves but really, gay people have just as much right to be as unpleasant as anybody else out there. This is an issue close to my heart as I am often the one pointing out the same about long haired women on other boards as people try to idolize them all with only good qualities. This is certainly not to say gay men are more likey to be cruel or rude, they are just the ones you hear the most from if they are the group you surround yourself with. Gay men are not the only ones that should know better, everybody should but they are the ones that let you personally down.
Next time a gay man derides your hair simply ask them if somebody has ever made rude remarks about their sexual orientation and how they felt about it. Making that connection for them could be just what it takes to get them to think before they comment again. People are entitled to their visual preferences but when it comes to insulting somebody else over it, hairwise on in any other way, then their words are out of bounds.
Elizabeth
Your 60 year old friend is a product of a lifetime of living through a period of time when things we see today didn't exist openly in his day or where so scorned that "underground" was more than a Civil War railroad. Also, frankly, the older people become the more "living" they have under their belts. Their perspective of many things is longer and wider and deeper as they get older. LIfe when you're older isn't so simple because the number of years of doing it--living--really make for valumes of experience and observations the rest of us don't have yet. And their prejudices are reflective of the time they were growing up and those with whom they associated throughout their lives.
I guess we grow up for a while in a narrow place, then, with middle age, things sort of broaden out as life's varieties offer their appeals, but then, in older age, that narrow place returns, sealed up somewhat by a lifetime of living and a lifetime of making judgments and evaluations about choices and consequences. The key that your friend struggles with is "fitting in". I just see so many older friends and relatives that lose their interest in this fast paced, ever-changing world of ours. Their song might be "Stop the world, I want to get off."
So long hairs and gays and Brittany Spears are hard to understand when your mind is filled with so much from so many other times and places and experiences, I guess.
Don't be hard on the guy. Just love him as you always have and overlook his well-meaning (but still hurtful) experessions. If the shoe was on the other foot, he'd probably do the same for you, eh?
Josh
That's what I figured...
But then there's the other extreme of political correctness... it sometimes seems like your living in a life full of your own contratictions...
very well put!!!!
Keep it long!!!
~Rob
I know what you mean - I used to get that when I had long hair first time round in the 70's, but not this tome round. Also when I had a beard (I had short hair at the time) some people didn't like it. It was a decent beard, but some people just don't like beards.
I guess we're all bigots about something, so here's my rant - nothing to do with long hair!
I'm a fan of out of town supermarkets, and I can't understand why some people want us go back to high streets full of separate grocers, butchers, greengrocers, bakers, fish shops etc.
cheers, Barry
Well, he may have some education but probably not all that much when it comes to certain historical facts as in the case of hair. You can't do much about this since someone has to have the intrest to learn more and then do the work themselves to expand their knowledge base. He is obivously firmly rooted in a semi-current social mindset which is all he knows. In these kind of cases they usually end up having to get used to living around you and as long as you are confident and true then their world view becomes a little larger and they find that accepting you isn't so bad after all.
As we go through life we come across people who like ourselves
are less than perfect. People who dislike another class of people
as opposed to an individual who has wronged them, usually have many other problems in coping with daily life. If you observe
them closely they blame other people for their own shortcomings. You comment that your friend is in his late 60s and obviously in good health which is also a plus. The aveage life seems to be around 75 even though lots of people live much, much longer. To have reached the wonderful golden age of his late 60s with possibly as little as 5 or 6 years left, it is sad that this guy is spending energy disowning his children and discriminating against minorities.
Most of the movies I have seen and the stories I have read dealing with the death of someone all end with a mental peace of mind coming to the dying person as they prepare for their death. In
real life, however, I have seen some people, not just a few, full of anger and rage up to the last breath.
It is wise to continue loving them, stay our of harm's way and hope before it is too late, they too can learn to love the people who love them, especially their children.
Hey Sorted, thanks for a really thought provoking post. This one has been on my mind some time before answering. I would say he is loveable until he turns on you personally. Questioning comments are one thing but if you were a son he hypothetically turned against, that would be very difficult to bear and forgive. As another example, should you ask him to hold a bi-racial child of yours and he choose to spout off some unsavory sentiments about mixing of the races you can bet he would cease to be lovable in an instant in your eyes. I think it is because it is only about hair in his talks with you, and no accompanying demand that you cut it, that you can shrug it off easily at this point.
My live and let live tendency has me thinking there is nothing intrinsically wrong with his beliefs in themselves and he is entitled to hold them as reprehensible as they may be to others. I am still in conflict over this idea though, it grates on me to think his ideas might be just as legitimate as mine, but I am sure that goes both ways. It all comes down to how others are treated though, any ideas being pushed on others are where the problem lies. He can be firm in his knowledge that men should not have long hair but that hopefully will not outweigh the respect that he has for you to choose otherwise for yourself. Sorted, you should not try to change him any more than you would want to give him a shot at convincing you that your ideas about long hair are wrong.
As long as I am dispensing the advice, don't feel bad about loving him as you do. Each person's circle of friends would be very small indeed if they all had to meet strict standards of perfection according to our personal beliefs. A lot of people don't even live up to their own goals and to meet another's is even less reasonable an expectation. You can like many things about him but not all, just look out for compromising your own ethics. The choice to continue handling his beliefs does become important if he turns harassive to you or others. That is the point where making excuses for his behavior would be a problem.
Elizabeth
Me too....
But all in all I think your spot on... you sum up the situation perfectly... in a rush to leave now so I don't know it can actually verbalise that into a sentence. But - all in all I think your right!