SALON

Monday, Jul 11, 2011 12:01 PM UTC

Mel Gibson defended by gay adopted brother

Sibling interview fails to answer the question: If the star is so tolerant, why does he say such terrible things?

By

Topics: Mel Gibson, Celebrity, LGBT, Movies,

Mel Gibson defended by gay adopted brotherMel Gibson in "What Women Want."

Mel Gibson may have permanently sundered his relationship with the American public after half a decade of bad publicity – including a famous anti-Semitic tirade after being pulled over for drunken driving in Malibu and the leaked audiotapes in which he threatened ex Oksana Grigorieva with physical violence (with some racial slurs thrown in for good measure)  — but there is still at least one person in the world willing to defend the actor’s honor. That would be Andrew Gibson, 43: Mel’s gay adopted brother.

Andrew has kept a low media profile, but in an interview over the weekend with PerthNow (a subsidiary of Murdoch’s News Corp.), the other Mr. Gibson stood up for his famous sibling: “He never meant to upset anyone. I have never once heard anything anti-gay come out of his mouth,” Andrew told the paper. Which goes along with what that small contingent of Mel’s supporters in Hollywood (among them Danny Glover and Jodie Foster) have been claiming … that the actor is a loving, tolerant individual who sometimes says dumb things. Still, it’s hard to believe this vocal minority’s opinion when stacked up against the rest of the evidence of the “Lethal Weapon” star’s behavior.

After all, how do you explain that infamous 1991 interview, when Mel whined to the Spanish newspaper El Pais that he didn’t know why gay people love him since he didn’t talk, move or act like a homosexual? (This was the same piece where he told the interviewer that he didn’t like to “take it up the arse” before bending over and pointing to his butt, exclaiming, “This is only for taking a shit.”) Andrew gives it a shot:

“He’s a straight man and he was illustrating that fact. In the same way a gay man wouldn’t want to have sex with a woman.” 

No? No. There is no way to spin the Pais quotes to make Mel look like anything other than an ignorant homophobe. Even the actor had a better excuse for that occasion when he admitted in 1999 that he was “tickling vodka” during the interview.

Mel’s relationship with the LGBT community has had its up and downs after that point: He stuck by his Pais words in an interview with Dianne Sawyer in ’92, told Playboy in ’95 that he’d apologize to GLAAD when hell freezes over, but then seemingly relented and worked with the Gay & Lesbian Alliance to invite 10 queer filmmakers to the set of “The Conspiracy Theory” for a meet-and-greet in 1997.  Mel may have made his peace with gay community almost a decade before his other troubles began, but that doesn’t mean his comments in El Pais came from any place other than small-minded stupidity.

Andrew makes a far better case for his brother when he sticks to the personal anecdotes, like Mel’s gruff acceptance of Andrew’s coming out, “It’s not my choice, but I love you and you’re my brother.” The younger Gibson said it’s been a tough road to reconcile with his family, who “didn’t like my choice of boyfriends. They wanted me to go out with a Country Road queen and I like strong, dangerous men,” but he’s spent the past year in building up his contact with them. Andrew adds that Mel doesn’t care about the money he’s expected to lose in his divorce case, since “he would rather have love and happiness in his life.”

Nice words, but unfortunately Gibson may be past the point of no return. Mel has hung himself so thoroughly with his own words that its doubtful that anyone else’s could go very far in convincing us that the star’s documented bigotry is just one big misunderstanding.

Drew Grant is a staff writer for Salon. Follow her on Twitter at @videodrew. More Drew Grant.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 18 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Journalists file suit against Manning's trial secrecy: Plaintiffs including Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange demand press, public access to trial and documents
135 points136 points | comment
vote
Report: Nearly a quarter of Americans struggle to afford food
118 points119 points | 12 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
87 points88 points | 78 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
87 points88 points | 18 comments
vote
Ted Cruz against the world - How the Junior Senator is igniting the GOP civil war
70 points71 points | 16 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations