Ines Schinazi
The Manhattan summer, filled with pent up heat and the polluted desire of lust, ignites Katy Perry’s voice, making it the perfect soundtrack for half of an instant, as Lindsay Lohan kisses Samantha Ronson behind the DJ booth, in a scene so surreal it could emerge straight from “The L Word.”
Flash forward to the end of summer. A lazy Sunday near Union Square. Katy’s voice still lingers in our ears. Two summer interns sip on red wine while trying to forget the word “Monday.”
Out of the blue, but in perfect harmony with a sense of destiny, Samantha Ronson, herself, walks right past us. A moment of hesitation, just to check if we are dreaming or already too drunk. As instinct hits, we frantically sprint behind her, (and our waiter chases after us, with the unpaid bill.)
In a state of half delirium, we follow Ronson, to the miniscule NYC Deli where she buys her cigarettes. Inside, my friend is struck with sudden, uncharacteristic, shyness. So.it’s all up to me. It’s a “make” or “break” moment.
I gather up the courage to speak to this completely high/hung-over/not so nice looking/ skeletal being. I compliment her music. Silence lingers in the air, as she slowly processes my words. Then, underneath her little signature hat, she says, “Hi, I’m Sam.” and gives me a smile. And, just like that, she walks, coolly, into the downtown sunset, leaving us stuck between packs of cigarettes, and our own laughter.
Yes. These are the times in which we are living. The times of chasing a famous person’s, not so famous girlfriend, down the street, and pretending to know her music. It is (or it was, for I believe their romance is already passé, as I write this) the time of Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson.
It had been a messy sort of summer. First, Katy Perry sang about kissing a girl. Then, actress, Lindsay Lohan admitted she was in love with DJ Samantha Ronson. Even darling little socialites and heiresses, like Casey Johnson and Courtenay Semel, weren’t immune to the raging trend, as they dated each other.
It didn’t stop there. Two months later the world was in a “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” frenzy. Scarlett, Penelope, and Javier painted a new sort of relationship, and the world seemed to devour it.whole.
Just as the summer began to wind down, the French film, “Les Chansons d’Amour” arrived right on cue. The film painted a three-way love story, filled with beautiful confusion. The actor Louis Garrel, who usually portrays virile masculinity, even experimented with another man.
After this heavy injection of sexual experimentation via pop culture, my mother sadly shook her head, and proclaimed these films “A true depiction of our times.” To her, it seemed that our generation, loved (or fucked) whatever was in front of them at that specific instant, regardless of gender.
In short, we are just a bunch of starving, confused, kids. My mother comes from a time when things were simpler (or perhaps more complex.who knows?). One was either gay or straight, and this notion of a “free, fluid, sexuality” did not exist.or at least it wasn’t talked about.
The recent depictions of fluid sexuality in entertainment seem inspired by “real life trends.” At least, this is my personal observation. Is this simply a consequence of our evolution in society as beings? Or are we being pushed towards this fluidity by other factors, such as technology?
These days, most of us, exist in two worlds. We live in the “real world” and the “virtual world.” This allows us an abundance of possibilities and fluidity.
In the virtual world, information flows with great speed, intensity, and freedom. We’ve got everything at our fingertips, and we don’t have to choose, between “this” or “that.” In a sense, we can have more than one thing, and be more than one thing.
I communicate through machines, relying on wires and electricity. Yet it is all very palpable and real. Everything gets tangled up, and inevitably the “virtual world” overflows into the “real world.”
Perhaps, this encourages us to rip up our labels, and roam free from rigid definitions. Our personal identities become increasingly “flexible” and “elastic.” Living between the virtual world and the real world has taught us to “adapt,” according to our “audience.”
In the virtual world, everything is fluid. Information is abundant and ever evolving, just like the identities that create and mold it. Maybe the desire, to move away from the rigid definitions, of “gay” and “straight,” is our way of transposing “cyberspace fluidity” into the “real world.”
I don’t want it to seem like I’m sugarcoating the situation.
We aren’t nearly to the point of free love and tolerance. Lesbians are generally still thought more acceptable or at least prettier to look at, than gay Men, both in the media, and in real life. And if we need any more proof of existing homophobia, there is also the recent passing of proposition 8.
Yet, I do believe that the virtual world plays an immense role in shaping our actions in the real world. Despite the obvious existence of homophobia, most of the world does seem at least a bit more open to alternatives and difference.
It seems that, cyberspace fluidity has begun to pour out, into our real life interactions. It may even play an important role in the current evolution of romantic relationships and allow us to start “un-defining” sexuality.
In the spirit of fluidity, I dare to mix in some philosophy, by borrowing Rilke’s words. Rilke wrote, “…only someone who is ready for everything, who excludes nothing, not even the most enigmatical, will live the relation to another as something alive and will himself draw exhaustively from his own existence.” Clearly avant-garde, Rilke may have envisioned what was to come.
Yeah. I think it is going to be a fluid mess. Let’s just hope it will be as pretty as “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.”
