Fridae

One weekend afternoon, I decided to join a gaggle of gay friends whom I haven't met for a long time for coffee at the Starbucks right next to the human fishbowl of a gym known as California Orchard.

Having secured for ourselves a most strategic spot (read: right in front of the gym), we spent the afternoon initially engrossed in updates on what's been going on in each of our lives and amused ourselves with the latest salacious gossip floating around the gay grapevine.

While I was sipping my Latte in my usual demure demeanor, my pal, the Prada Poof, who's been admiring a Mary Muscle making his way to the gym, said icily: "Oh look� a Monet."

With that proclamation, the temperature around our table dropped to sub-zero.

Ever the wide-eyed ing�nue, I asked innocently:

"What do you mean?"

My query was answered with a carthorse snort followed by a world-weary sigh from the Prada Poof who then proceeded to enlighten the hitherfore "living-in-a-cave" me on the definition of the term.

"Dah-ling� a Monet is someone who resembles the works of French painter Claude Monet. To put it simply: 'From far, looks nice. From near, far from nice.'"

After our initial peals of evil laughter have subsided, our coffee session degenerated into an unspoken game of "Find The Flaw" involving almost every gay male member going into and out of the gym.

In fact, our afternoon get-together was soon transformed into the equivalent of a taping session for Are You Hot? The Search for Singapore's Sexiest (and Unsexiest) Gay Gym Bunny with each and every one of us taking turns to assume the role of the judging panel.

Making American Idol's resident queen bitch Simon Cowell seem like Mary Poppins by comparison, we judged every male "contestant" according to a most stringent criteria which includes their fashion flair: "No one his age should wear shorts that short!"

Their make-up (imagined or real): "Did you see his make-up? Looks like the work of an incompetent taxidermist with a trowel!"

Their manner of carrying themselves: "He walks like an epileptic penguin."

Their body shape: "He makes Kate Moss look like Chubby Checker!"

Or even a particular part of their human anatomy: "Oh Lordy! He has a Teletubby butt!"

To be fair (and really, really shallow), credit was given where it was due.

Cute muscled twinkies were regarded with the kind of Christian reverence usually reserved for the Nativity Scene at Christmas and the occasional walking sex bombs would elicit from our wanton tongues the most blush-inducing of comments such as (censored).

Despite the inherent cruelty and political incorrectness of what was happening, I must admit that I lacked the moral resolve to put a stop to the proceedings there and then, and was even swept along by the fun and laughter of the moment.

However, that evening, as I drove home in the distinctively deepening dusk, I began to reflect on what happened that afternoon and came to the none-too-original conclusion that living the gay lifestyle is akin to being in a beauty pageant - 24/7.

Let me explain.

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Whenever you walk by a group of gay men or into a room/club/sauna full of gay men, do you feel as if rows of imaginary placards are being raised in unison to assess your desirability on a scale of 1 to 10?

You could be just minding your own business or you could be all out to impress and it wouldn't really matter. You would still be judged by every single pair of homo-eyes and made to feel like a prize-winning poodle or a doggy school dropout at an international dog show - depending on your pedigree.

Perhaps we gay men have an inherent snob reflex and judge the world through impossibly high standards of perfection. Perhaps we are just gifted with incredible deadly tongues capable of slicing a man's ego into Ginsu-fine threads.

Perhaps what we are really judging are aspects of ourselves that we feel insecure about and the only way we can boost our gay egos is to make ourselves look or feel better - at the expense of others.

Or perhaps we are so harsh and critical towards other gay men because we see in them what we fear would and could happen to us: we could lose our hair, our physique, our youth, our beauty, our health, our personal magnetism, our flawless skin, our fashion sense and so on.

For my part, when I reflected back on why I did what I did, I realise that my need to pass judgment on others stems from one main driving force - my desire to constantly prove myself - as a gay man - to be better than others in order to (over) compensate for being gay.

Yet whatever one's reasons may be, the gay man's constant tendency and need to play judge and jury on their fellow gay men is paradoxical to say the least. Growing up gay, we could always remember how conscious we were of being "different" - be it in a school, at the playground or even at home.

Being "different," we acutely remember how hurt we were when the rest of our heterosexual peers judged us as "effeminate" and labeled us as "queers" or "faggots" just because we were more in touch with our feminine side and we don't happen to share their craving for female boobies.

The point is, we should have, from our experience, learnt not to judge others (especially our fellow gay men) - having been at the receiving end of the heterosexual community's often uncalled for and unsolicited judgment.

So why do many of us still adopt a "pageant mentality" and further alienate members of our homo-community by passing unfair (and unkind) judgments instead of seeking some common ground?

To be honest, I don't profess to have the answer for that question. But when confronted with this non-too-pleasing-but-hard-to-deny fact about gay living, I decided that my answer to that question would be as follows: I would strive to work hard towards being a better gay person to another gay person.

And if that doesn't constitute a good New Year Resolution for 2004, I don't know what will.