Brian McNaught
Same-sex intimacy, particularly between males, can be a
challenge to maintain for gay and bisexual men, and extremely
threatening to heterosexual men.
Are You Guys Brothers?, a
question asked of male couples throughout the world, is a very personal
and candid look at the topic through the lens of an immensely happy and
successful 32-year relationship. Brian McNaught and Ray Struble, both
Irish Catholic, Midwestern children of seven, met in Boston in their
twenties as one was beginning a career as a "gay activist" and the
other was entering the world of commercial banking. Their love became
the envy of their families and friends, marked by open communication,
good humor, patience, and spirituality. They would need all four to
navigate the mine-filled waters of childhood sexual abuse, alcoholism,
intense religious and political opposition, dramatically-disparate
incomes, a sexually-open relationship, aging, erectile dysfunction, and
an often unsupportive and frequently dysfunctional gay community.
Today, they are officially married, and the "gay activist" is now
educating his spouse's former Wall Street colleagues on gay issues in
offices around the world. This book is funny, deeply moving, and highly
instructive, of particular interest to gay men and women who seek
guidance in building and maintaining their relationships, and to
heterosexual men and women worldwide who want to better understand not
only gay people but also how to get past the roadblocks to
intimacy in their own relationships.
Named "the godfather of gay diversity training" by
The New York Times,
Brian McNaught is an internationally-acclaimed presenter to corporate
executives and government officials on the topic of gay, lesbian,
bisexual, and transgender workplace issues. His spouse, Ray Struble,
was the Managing Director of Global Equity Sales for Lehman Brothers.
Brian is a certified sexuality educator and counselor, the author of
five other watershed books on sexuality and the creator of six
highly-praised educational DVDS that are used in training throughout
the world. All of his books have been required reading on college
campuses and his DVDs have been shown on PBS television stations
throughout the United States. Brian wrote a syndicated column in the
gay press for twelve years, co-hosted a radio program, served as the
Mayor of Boston's liaison to the gay community, and currently advises
former Surgeon General David Satcher on matters of national sexual
health. He graduated from Marquette University with a BA in Journalism
in 1970, was a conscientious objector to the war in Vietnam, was fired
for being gay by the Catholic newspaper of the Archdiocese of Detroit,
and has worked since 1974 as an educator on gay, and more recently,
transgender issues. You can learn more about Brian or reach him at
www.brian-mcnaught.com.
On the
occasion of a heterosexual friend’s 60th birthday, Ray and I gave
him a nicely framed picture of us on our 20th anniversary in Central Park. In it, I was behind Ray, holding him
lovingly. Our heads were touching and we were both smiling happily. It was a
beautiful shot, one we have given to our closest friends and family members.
Our friend Jack thanked us with genuine enthusiasm, as did his wife Jean. He
then handed it to the other two heterosexual couples who had just shared in the
wonderful meal and delicious cake, and who were passing around cards and opened
gifts for appreciation.
The next
day, the two husbands who had been passed the photo, independently called Jack
to say how unsettled they had found themselves feeling while looking at it.
These were both very successful businessmen with whom we had shared more than
one evening of dinner and board games in Jack and Jean’s home, and who had
engaged Ray often for his opinion on the stock market.
My feelings
were hurt, as they unfortunately often are when I let down my guard with
heterosexual men and women and then learn that they were not quite as
comfortable as they had given us the impression of being. Like the time that
Ray and I, during our tenth year together, were entertaining his folks at our
cabin in New Hampshire
and we asked his dad to say the grace before the noon meal. We all held hands,
closed our eyes, and listened as Art solemnly gave thanks for the food, and
then reminded God that it wasn’t too late to send two good women into Ray’s and
my life so that we might get married and have children. But I get hurt less
often and less deeply today than I did ten or twenty years ago because I’m much
less invested in the acceptance by others, gay or straight.
Reflecting
on that incident at the birthday party prompted me to wonder recently if my
father would have displayed the same photo of Ray and me in an embrace on his executive
desk in the Public Relations department of General Motors. Would Ray’s father,
despite his unrealized dreams for Ray, do the same in his Wichita real estate office, if he were alive
and still working? Did their love of their sons ever embrace us fully for who
we are, or was there any embarrassment with our intimacy, or shame that we
weren’t “real” men?
I often
quote Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, a radio talk show host and former
principal of the Iran-Contra scandal, who warned during Bill Clinton’s
administration that if the President allowed openly gay people to serve in the
military, “no real man would ever
enlist again.” Most members of my corporate audiences laugh at the lack of
sophistication of North’s observation, but my guess is that many of these same
people would privately wonder about my relationship with Ray, as the vendors in
Istanbul boldly asked us many, many years ago when we walked through the Grand
Bazaar, “But, who’s the wife?”
If two men
are captured in an intimate pose, does it mean that one or both of them are
“unmanly”? The very same photo of us in
Central Park would draw little, if any, negative response from men in Italy, China,
South Africa,
or other countries where we have witnessed intimacy between all men as a common
daily occurrence. Heterosexual men from India, in fact, have told me that one
of the first lessons they needed to learn when they moved to the United States
was not to hold the hand of their male friends in public, as it is seen in the
U.S. as unmanly and an indication of homosexuality, which in America, they
sensed, are the same.
That does
not mean that men in these other countries are completely comfortable with
homosexuality. Our tour guide in Cambodia,
for instance, in response to my query about local attitudes toward gay people,
told us that there are very few homosexuals in Cambodia. They’re all in Thailand,
due to the fertilizer they use in that country to generate three crops of
mangoes annually. The homosexuals in Cambodia,
he said, are transsexuals who want to be reincarnated as women in their next
lives because it’s easier in Cambodia
to be a woman. (I decided that it was “a teachable
