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One again, the Met's hired thugs have roughed up your editor, and this time I wasn't even doing anything wrong! Long-time readers may recall that a couple of seasons ago, the Met's crack security corps caught me redhanded in the heinous act of stuffing free parterre boxes into the Met's season brochure display racks. They explained their point of view to me in a confab that mostly consisted of me sitting on a bench in the plaza and about six of them threatening me with physical violence, calling me a "faggot with a bad attitude" and finally encouraging me to get my "ass out of the plaza." I'm a law-abiding kind of guy, you see. So for the past couple of years my behavior at the Met has been squeaky-clean. No attempts to peddle the zine anywhere near the theater. But apparently that's not quite good enough. On the evening of March 23, 1996 I was making my way through the crowded lobby of the Met, very much looking forward to hearing Catherine Malfitano and Greer Grimsley in Salome. I had a couple of copies of the zine in my hand. Suddenly this security guard ripped the magazines from my hand, growling, "You can't distribute that faggot trash here!" He then dragged me through the lobby, and, in full view of hundreds of people, confiscated my ticket, ripped it up, refunded my money, then "escorted" me from the premises. I wrote a letter of complaint to James Naples, the House Manager, who replied with a denial that the guard ever used any antigay language and that, in essence, I deserved everything I got. Wow! If Sybil's pseudocops get so rough on a measly little zine editor, imagine what dire penalties they must hold in reserve for such endemic Met misbehavior as ticket scalping or child molestation! So now I don't go to the Met so much, and when I do, I spend most of my time looking over my shoulder, for fear that something might set off one of Mr. Naples' gorillas. Has anyone else observed or experienced homophobic treatment at the Met or at any other opera house? Write and let me know. james jorden
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