FIRST TIME TERROR
It’s funny how often people use the word “terrified” when they describe how and when they bought their first copy of DNA.
Usually this terrifying event happens in the late teens or early twenties. In many cases, nervous first-time readers have travelled many suburbs away to buy a copy from a newsagency that’s not their local. Often the purchase is accompanied by several blokey “decoy” magazines bought at the same time – Surfing World, Four Wheel Drive or Fishing with DNA discreetly tucked away at the bottom.
I remember this terror. Buying copies of Outrage or Campaign back in the ’80s meant owning up to my sexuality. In public. To strangers. I assumed, probably falsely, that the shop assistants judged me after I left the store. But as I became older and emboldened, buying gay magazines without shame became my badge of honour. I learned to love the confidence it took to buy a gay magazine and how empowered I felt reading it.
Interestingly, I’ve had people confess that they’ve been so freaked out about actually buying the magazine that they’ve found it easier to steal it! They’d rather risk being caught shoplifting a gay magazine than face the potential judgement of the bored teenager working behind the counter. It’s unlikely that bored teenager is going to suddenly realise you’re gay because you bought DNA. She worked that out a while ago when you bought Vanity Fair – and she doesn’t care.
DNA has helped lots of people come out – sometimes inadvertently when their parents have discovered their secret stash of magazines. But I’ve also heard heartwarming stories of supportive mums or dads who’ve bought the magazine for a recently out son.
We’ve also helped ease many a young man through a complicated period of his life. I recently met a charming up-and-coming actor whose opening line was: “I’ve spent so many hours masturbating over your magazine.” “Good,” I thought. “A job well done!” He continued: “DNA has given me a great deal of pleasure. I didn’t have enough room in my bedroom for the whole magazine so I ripped out the pages I wanted to keep and hid them under the bed.”
The arrival of the digital version via the app has taken the terror out of the purchasing experience. I’m kind of sad about that. For me it was a rite of passage. Now DNA just magically appears on your iPhone or iPad every month without any human interaction at all. Where’s the challenge?
The app comes at the same time, I hope, as shifting social attitudes. A friend’s eight-yearold son was watching a marriage equality story on the news recently and ask, “Mum, does that mean that if I don’t meet a girl I like I can marry a boy?” When she told him yes he seemed pleased with that idea.
A generation of gay people who don’t live in terror of something as intrinsic to their being as their sexuality – what a breakthrough!