… but enough about me

There’s a clever little short story that made an impression on me as a young college kid, just fresh out of the closet, just beginning to figure out how to use my newfound super powers. (For good? For evil. For good? For evil. Good? Evil…)

It’s called Am I Blue? In it, all the gay people are blue, and the narrator is trying to figure out if he (or is it she?) is blue too. I think he (or she) is a sort of pale blue, somewhere in between. Anyway, it’s not the gender the matters, but the concept: What if we were all suddenly revealed? (Bearing in mind, of course, that some of us reveal ourselves just fine without any trouble at all, thank you very much. We can’t help ourselves!)

There are a ton of us. It would be a big damn blue planet.

(Oh … wait. Too late.)

What would happen if we were all suddenly revealed in a way that was obvious to everyone? Say… by our absence? What would it be like if gays stayed home? Here’s something some of my more clever colleagues cooked up:

I, of course, cannot call in. I am a professional homosexual at my little gay network, and I am already fighting the good fight! We have to keep those gay wheels turning, or the entertainment industry would shut down. It’s the gay people in non-gay jobs that could make a difference. We’d notice the school teachers, security guards, bank tellers, bus drivers — certainly the waiters.

If all the gays stayed home, we’d all be a little blue.

UPDATE: There is some good, clear thinking about the impact of this project at Queerty. Most interesting is the analysis of how the focus has changed — or, rather, been completely lost. A fine idea in theory, but impossible to measure effectively in the real world.