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Kyla Uribe
Professor Encinias
CAS 115
11 November 2023

Community Event #3: Reading and Discussion With Edgar Gomez

On Thursday, November 9th I had the fortune of meeting Edgar Gomez, an author of an
award winning book called High-Risk Homosexual. This event was held by the Central American
and Transborder Studies located in Manzanita Hall, room 361 from 9:30-10:45am. Edgar Gomez
read some of his book, along with a poem he wrote, and was able to answer some questions at
the end of his discussion. His memoir High-Risk Homosexual details his journey of being a gay
Latinx man in the United States with machismo cultures and influence.
Gomez started his presentation by explaining the cycle of hatred and homophobia that he
faces everyday. There was a time in his life where he constantly went to protest because the
government was slowly stripping away the rights of queer people. He felt as though he was
starting to live to fight, forgetting what he originally was fighting for which was queer rights. He
then began to read a poem called “I Love Being Gay” which listed all the things he loved about
his life and who he was as a person. I found it really funny but heartfelt, it reminded me of the
things that I love. After his poem he then went on to state “for a long time of my life all of those
things that I said I loved most about myself were some of the things that I hated most about
myself” because he felt that those things hindered him being the man that his family wanted him
to be but wasn’t.
He then started to show us a copy of a paper his family and he received when he was
born, called “What Is A Boy?” This document or instruction manual as Gomez described it,
informed the parents what a boy is, what he is going to become, and how to keep loving him.
However, this document forces and teaches the machismo culture, which is a system that works
to elevate men and masculinity by oppressing women and femininity. Edgar Gomez continues to
talk about the concept of machismos and how even though there are rules like not showing
emotion, vulnerability, or femininity there comes many benefits. Such as getting drunk, having
sex, fighting, and Having as many kids and families as you want. But as a queer man if those
things don’t appeal to you then that’s a problem.
Gomez explains that the reason why straight men who subscribe to machismo hate queer
people is because they see all of the hard work these men are putting in to maintain what they
have and they just say “Eh we don’t really want that.” So in reality these men who support
machismo culture feel as though queer people are disregarding their value and work of what they
have. And in their head they feel that it’s easy to “get rid” of queer people rather than accepting it
for what it is. Gomez was stuck between coming out of the closet or keeping it a secret around
age 13. He realized that he didn’t want to end up like the men in his family who were your basic
machismo Latinx men. He had many role models on how to be a man but he didn’t have any role
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models on how to be queer or how to find his own alternative path, so he had to find out on his
own.
After his reading, he opened the floor up for questions. He discussed his relationship with
his mom and his family back in Nicaragua. His relationship with his mother is good, she is really
supportive of the book and even apologized for how she reacted and treated him when he was
younger. His family in Nicaragua have most likely not read it because the topic of being queer in
Nicaragua isn’t really accepted by all. A question that was asked was “What was the most
difficult part about writing your memoir?” Gomez responded that the hardest part was getting
over the shame and embarrassment that his family was going to read, and coming from a culture
where it's taught to hide your feelings and bottle things up, he went against it and wrote his life
story for everyone to read. Another question was ‘How did your family react to your book?”
Gomez stated that he didn’t tell his mom until 6 months after it was published, eventually it
started getting successful so he shared it with her and she read it. After 3 months, she called him
sobbing on the phone and apologizing and acknowledging everything that had happened.
The last question that was asked was “Are you going to make another book?”, He
responded to this by saying: yes. The title is going to be called “Alligator Tears” which will be
about growing up poor in the early 2000’s in Miami and how his queerness affected that. I hope
to be able to read his new book that he says will be finished by next year. I was very happy to
know that he still talks to his best friend, Arturo, to this day and visits him about twice a year.
Also when asked if he would translate the book to Spanish so his family in Nicaragua and other
people in South and Central America could read it, he responded saying that he would love to
translate it however that there is no demand for it.
Overall, I really enjoyed meeting and discussing High-Risk Homosexual with Edgar
Gomez. His personality, his perspective, and his words were very inspiring and intriguing. I was
happy to have met the author behind a book I've read in class this semester. I can’t wait to read
his new book when he publishes it next year.