Talking about gay-to-gay issues

Sunetro Lahiri and Farhad Karkaria

It's tough for a straight man to write about what it means to be homosexual. As someone attracted to the opposite sex, we don't know the sort of obstacles gay people might have faced from their families, their loved ones. We don't know the sort of condescending eyes that might greet them at work. We don't know of the bigoted heckling they'd have faced on the streets. We are the rich one per cent of the world in that sense, cocooned in our mansions, protected from the everyday struggles of life. Our perceptions are blinkered. Sure, we might extend all the support we can to gay people. But, we still won't know what it really means to be them.

That's why a new podcast called GAYBCD acts as an eye-opener that removes the blinkers. In it, two queer Mumbaikars in their early 30s - Farhad Karkaria and Sunetro Lahiri - give listeners a window into their world. They talk about the Big C, or coming out. They discuss how their parents came to terms with their choice in life. They dissect what it means to find a surrogate family within the community, before whom they can express the vulnerabilities that they'd otherwise have to let fester inside. And the best part is that they go about the whole thing in such a boss-relax-this-is-normal manner that even as a straight person you're compelled to think, "Hey, wait a minute, even I have faced the same issues that these guys have."

Lahiri tells us, "People need to understand that queer problems are universal human problems. For example, we've talked about losing parents, and also about them not being okay with one aspect of your personality. That's not unique to us as a community. So, irrespective of your sexuality, you can feel in a similar way," meaning that despite the apparent differences between straight and gay people, we are all just two sides of the same coin.

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