~~ really stupid linguistic wibbling...

am i like, the only one that finds the word "gays" kind of offensive?

i don't know what it is, i'm stumped if i try to find a reasonable explanation. it just seems like... i dunno. icky. like something pc-type people would use about "those people with that lifestyle that are really quite nice, and they're normal, actually", and yet... why? it's a perfectly valid plural form of "gay" (which by the way, i'm also not in love with, but am okay with). it's like there's some nuance of usage, but a certain segment of the population..... i dunno!

has anyone else noticed? am i insane?

no matter -what- context i find it in, no matter -what- the person is saying, if they use "gays" as plural, i flinch. it puzzles me, but i suppose there is a possibility that it's not a complete idiosyncrasy. also, "a homosexual" connotates a certain... er... intellectualization of the idea that might be veiling distate, often enough, but i can differentiate between the use of this for "i'm using very formal language for everything" and just some throw-away use, which sets off subliminal alarms. like i said, just "gay" is fine, though it acquires... a weird tinge for me if it's -continuously- used to -describe- someone. as in, "i'm gay" and "that gay man" and "i'm not gay". it's just like... using any epithet would bother me in this way, like, "i'm a woman" and "that woman" and "the woman said". you're obsessing that it's a woman; why?

but the "gays" usage doesn't need to be repeated, as i said. it just connotates "them" to me. like, i'm well aware it's used as a self-label most of the time, too, or is it? i mean... is this a british thing or an american thing? i mean, in america, there's the "gay, bisexual & trans alliance" or the "rainbow alliance" in school-- they don't call themselves queer or anything. sigh. i'm baffled. in the news and media they say "homosexuals", never queers (since it used to be a disparaging term), and, more rarely, "gays".
    perhaps i've become sensitized through fanfic. in the sorts of fics/contexts where "gays" or even "gay" is used most often in hp fic, i feel there's a certain... flat-footedness, a certain amount of stereotyping and ignorance and perhaps even slight homophobia i can detect. it's all very subtextual and subtle, but i really think it's there. i can trace a definite correlation in the fics that feel "off" overall in terms of queerness portrayal and the fics that would use the term "gays". and er... i can't really draw a conclusion except to say, "huh."

on a contradictory and futile note, saying "queers" bothers me too. heh.
    actually, this is possibly related to how you don't exactly say "straights", do you. you say "heterosexuals", but only in a very specific context. you say you're "straight" (singular) but not plural so much. this is probably a part of why it bothers me.
    "gay men" and "gay women" is okay. "so-and-so is gay, btw" is okay-- i suppose because it's an adjective rather than a noun at that point. hmm.
    (and all of this does little to address barb's rather interesting essay on the possibilities of seeing harry as metaphorically `gay' within canon, and the use of metaphor in the hp books to denote disenfranchised groups).