Promiscuity and hedonism are not the death-knells of gay life.

There's a widespread belief in Britain that all homosexuals are prurient maniacs, bent on hard partying, careless loving and precious little else - besides maybe their Madonna collection.

Far from encouraging homosexuality, this belief says: 'You need to rein yourselves in and stop flaunting your sexual difference.' Sadly, it's of the same ilk as: 'I've only just managed to accept that the homosexshuls exist, but I don't want to hear about or see them!' Both are utterly egregious beliefs to hold, and both are still alive and well.

But we're not stupid. We're well aware that the only acceptable gay in Britain is a quiet one or a dead one. That both Oscar Wilde and Freddie Mercury were only given the respect and acknowledgement they truly deserved after they had died is a rather telling fact about how little progress we've made.

I particularly enjoy this prejudice though, because they are talking about me and my generation when they insist on slamming gay hedonism alone. Those of us growing up in the gay mainstream, in an age where a song can sit atop the American charts for six weeks despite containing the word 'transgendered' - I am, of course, talking about Lady Gaga's revolutionary Born This Way.

Lady Gaga or no Lady Gaga, the majority of young gay men in the UK are seen as flamboyant revelers with not a single shred of decency or respect for the wider community. They are forever sleeping around to try and validate their chronic loneliness, and AIDS is a disease that only gay men have - and most of them, at that. If you get too close, you might even catch it.

In our predominantly heteronormative society, there is no middle-ground afforded to gay people, and prejudices are seldom challenged with enough force or weight to actually make people shut up and listen. You're either confused (or 'closeted') or a screaming queen in denim cut-offs and a muscle vest. Not much has changed since the 1950's, then, despite our long-overdue legalization.

Sorry guys, given that my seemingly hazardous sexuality and the appendaged lifestyle means that I am far happier than the majority of my heterosexual peers, and a damn site more comfortable in my own skin, I doubt if I'll be reining myself in any time soon.

But that isn't to say I'm a shameless, careless hedonist on a never-ending search for dangerous pleasure. I'm quintessentially 'me', and 'me' just so happens to be happy and outgoing. Attach my homosexuality, and I'm supposedly guilty of a crime against society by doing what my straight counterparts have been doing - legally - for centuries.

Where do we think the 8 billion people on planet Earth came from? They're definitely not the byproducts of homosexual nookie, though it would be utterly hilarious if that were the case. No - they are the results of 8 billion heterosexual 'unions'. That's an awful lot of sex, and I'm willing to bet that just under half of those 'unions' are what Christians would call, through pursed lips, 'illegitimate'.

I can't imagine anything worse than a life of monogamy. And, let's be frank, that is the salient issue here. In conservative Britain, monogamy is one of the great and virtuous pillars on which our society is built, and is something only the straights do. It upholds many a marriage, and since gays cannot legally 'marry' in the UK yet, wider society seems to think we have nothing better to do than put ourselves about.

For some bizarre reason, a gay man who sleeps around is not awarded the same brotherly back-slaps, knowing winks and heightened social status as his heterosexual counterpart.

Take a look at Ryan Giggs, the man who, at the present moment, makes Boy George look celibate. For despite his many affairs - and one with his brother's wife of eight years - he is still being lauded for his footballing talent and was publicly celebrated on the pitch last week. If he had been a gay man, his career would have been given the red card instantly. That's not pedantic, it's plain and simple fact.

Consider the foul treatment meted out to George Michael, one of this country's greatest singers and musical icons, and gay. When the public saw him away from the recording studios and learned of his promiscuous lifestyle, his family-friendly image evaporated in to thin air.

The majority reaction to the knowledge that George Michael liked sex just as much as Rod Stewart was disturbingly reminiscent of Victorian England and the conceit that children should be seen and not heard. The same appeared to be true for homosexuals. We're seen as society's silent partner.

To point out that gay people might actually want to capitalize on their romantic yearnings and (whisper it!) have sex with one another is to take a sledgehammer to Britain's bedrock values and shatter the gleaming illusion that homosexuals live in the leper colonies beyond the castle walls.

It's as if they're willing to accept the label - albeit with five thousand spoons of sugar and countless assurances and reassurances that No, I'm not going to come on to you and 'force it down your throat' - but not what the label fundamentally applies to. It makes very little sense in a country that likes to style itself on acceptance and tolerance, though we're not as liberal as we think we are.

It makes even less sense when you look at Rihanna's latest musical pornography and scratch your head in flabbergasted wonderment that something as harmless and wholesome as a gay kiss is either censored outright or shoved past the watershed mark, along with rape, murder and explicit phone-lines advertising 50+ women in silky underwear. It doesn't just rub salt in the wound, it makes the wound bigger and bloodier.

There's only one way the wound can be closed, and that's if we separate promiscuity from homosexuality once and for all. At least on the surface. They should be mutually exclusive, not one and the same.

After all, we're doing nothing new and certainly nothing the straights wouldn't do.

I fear it's now getting to the point where even gay men are starting to question their lifestyles. Am I really a wasteful hedonist? Have I really had more partners than the average straight guy? Am I really a salacious drain on prim-and-proper society? They seem to have this ingrained image of themselves at 45, still sweating it out at a gay club surrounded by people half their age and wondering when the next conquest is going to walk through the door in a tank-top and pipe jeans.

But as troubling as this image might be to some, promiscuity and hedonism need not be the death-knells of gay life. Sure, we are statistically more likely to stay socially and sexually active for much longer than heterosexuals - attribute that to a fatter wallet and no children, or to the seductive sense of danger that comes with being an 'other' on the scene - but that is not a bad thing.

We are also far more likely to succumb to depression and abuse the club scene, viewing it as a necessity rather than a luxury, an escape. That is a bad thing.

Though in many instances, hedonism adds to the breadth and depth of the gay experience and keeps us young, active and carefree. It's what draws a diverse crowd to our pubs, clubs and bars on a Saturday night, and it is surely the heart and soul of the Gay Pride parade.

Contrary to popular belief, we're not all serial sex addicts with a taste for poppers and Kylie Minogue. In the real gay world, there is a middle ground that the rest of society wouldn't dare afford us, because the truth would be more shocking to them than the assumption - that there are some relatively 'normal' gay blokes out there! And by normal I mean - dare I say it - 'straight acting'. To many, the idea alone is a non-sequitur.

We're happy, we know it, and we really want to show it! So what if I've had more than 2 or 3 sexual partners? So what if I like a drink and a dance? It is not a crime, it is not corrosive on society, and it is certainly not an exclusively 'gay' phenomena, nor should it be conflated as such. For many like me, it's merely a way of life, and we're proud of it.