Last night, your intrepid correspondent headed out the turnpike to Seven Springs (aka the middle of friggin nowhere) for an evening of laughter and yuks at a charity fundraiser for the Pittsburgh Foodbank. Our goal was to see KDKA talk host and friend-of-the-lesbians John McIntire as well as a bunch of other funny people of whom we had no knowledge. 

When I drove past the tee pee themed barbecue restaurant, I should have noticed the little red flags.

That place was a literal cess pool of yinzers and yinzerette wanna bes.  At least 75% of the audience had their glory moment in 11th grade and kept the hairstyle to prove it.  The biggest laugh of the night seemed to be reserved for the buffoon imitating callers to WDVE rather than the highstyle humor of Alan Cox and other Pittsburgh luminaries.  Well, that and anyone who used the phrase "limp dick."

But the fun for us homos was the incessant stream of homophobia filling the crowd.  They didn't laugh at the Brokeback Mountain jokes b/c they are stupid homophobes who wouldn't know satire if it broke into their doublewide and stole their prize beer can collection.  As the jokes rolled on, our discomfort grew. 

Obviously, I can take a homo-themed joke.  It wasn't the jokes that bothered me.  It was the almost universal gay-loathing that filled that room after every mention of man-on-man sex.  It is when I have to start worrying that someone is going to get in our faces b/c we "look" like lesbians.  It is when someone asks me why I came and I have to censor myself b/c I probably need to not tell them I do a lesbian correspondent bit with one of the comedians. It is when I have to refer to my partner as my "friend" just in case someone is going to hassle us. 

I mock the attendees.  But I still think they deserve basic human rights like the freedom to marry, to reproduce at will and walk about their daily life unmolested by bigotry.  That's what makes me different.

Not returning to Seven Springs am I.