A Very Gay Dream

The other night I had pizza for dinner. Pizza induced dreams are always noteworthy ones.

There I was, sitting beneath a giant shade tree, reading and minding my business on a cloudless summer day, when I happened to look over and see a group of people meeting in the park. Many of them occupied themselves with hand-painting signs, setting up to protest something. Many of them were shirtless- men and women alike. As this was a dream, I shrugged off their immodesty and went back to minding my business.

A young woman came and sat beside me. She offered me a t-shirt. That's when it occurred to me that I was shirtless as well. A crowd was gathering in the street, pointing fingers and calling names at the half-dressed people, so I quickly threw on the offered shirt to hide myself. I could smell the electricity in the air. Something awful was about to happen.

My t-shirt was no ordinary t-shirt, however. Like the signs, it had some kind of slogan on it. Instantly, I was pulled into the protest, and I didn't even know what we were protesting.

After a moment, all the protesters stood up together, faced the angry crowd, and stripped down naked. They were nudists from a nearby nudist colony-- but they didn't want to live on the colony anymore. They wanted to be welcomed into society like regular people. The crowd was infuriated. They began throwing stones at the naked people, dragging some of them into the street, kicking and punching them. Even children joined in on the action, calling names and throwing rocks.

Fortunately, I stayed out of sight. The young woman who gave me the shirt took my arm and pulled me out of there before anyone could spot me. I noticed she wore a shirt like mine.

When we were safe, I told her how I felt about this whole protest thing.

I told her, why should we welcome the nudists? They're exposing themselves in public, for crying out loud! No one wants to look at their naked bodies. Little children can see their private parts. If they don't have any respect for the people wearing clothes, why should we have any respect for them? Let them be naked on the colony that is reserved for them, or in the privacy of their own homes. If they want to live in the city, they need to put clothes on.

Suddenly, for some mysterious reason, the struggle of the Native Americans flashed through my thoughts. I immediately changed my mind. What right do we have to tell the nudists how to live? Because they're different? With different traditions and opinions? They shouldn't have to hide themselves from the world. They shouldn't have to conform to our standards. We're all in this world together. We should learn to share.

And then I thought, what's so wrong with being naked anyway? Aren't we all human? We cover our children's eyes, throw stones, and call out hateful names... but the nudists are just the same as us- without clothing.

The young woman seemed pleased with my response. She hooked me up with her email address and we went our separate ways.

When I woke up I understood.

I had a gay-rights dream.