For the past day and a half or so, I’ve tried to figure out how to discuss this while a) not being boring and b) not being completely obnoxious.
Personally, I don’t care if a star is gay or not. It really doesn’t make aifference to anything or anyone. Will your enjoyment of Luther Vandross’s music suffer because of the fact that he was (by most accounts) gay?
I also don’t like the fact that there often seems to be a witchhunt to out celebrities. We don’t own them. They’re allowed to have private lives, and who they sleep with is none of our business. People like Village Voice columnist Michael Musto, who delights in grade-school innuendo and borderline name-calling, strike me as bitter queens who either spent their childhood being bullied for being gay and/or are spending their adulthood being bullied for being gay and want to pull someone else into their misery.
Truth is, none of us really knows if Clay Aiken is gay. He’s never said as much, simple as that. We all might have an opinion (and I’ll admit that my gaydar goes off whenever I see him), but there are straight dudes who act like sissies the same way there are gay dudes who don’t have stereotypically “gay” mannerisms.
The fact that Clay (by artificial insemination, apparently) impregnated the 50-year old sister of music producer David Foster (who’s 30+ year career has seen him work with everyone from Earth, Wind & Fire to Whitney Houston to Josh Groban) is…a little strange, and it rings ever-so-slightly of a publicity stunt. However, I (like plenty of other people) am a cynic. If Clay wants a kid and this is the means he chose to have it, then God bless him. If it is indeed a publicity stunt, then boo on Clay and his handlers for bringing an actual live human being into this mess (although what would having a baby by artificial insemination do for his career, considering it would just seem to compound the gay rumors…). It doesn’t matter to me, because I have no interest in Clay Aiken’s music and probably never will (unless he gets hip and walks away from trying to be the 21st century Peter Cetera).
What happened to the days when the music mattered and people didn’t really care what musicians did in their personal lives?
