‘The Quiet Gay Revolution’

June 15, 2007

The national status quo when it came to gays was so ingrained for so long, it’s easy to forget how spectacularly successful American society has been in progressing towards equality. It’s possible, as a straight white guy, my perspective is skewed, but as yesterday’s vote in the Massachusetts legislature reminds us, we’ve come a long way.

Michael Kinsley explains in Time that the “whole spectrum of debate has moved left.”

The debate of 14 years ago about gays in the military seems almost quaint. Kids grow up today with gay friends, gay parents, gay parents of friends and gay friends of parents. If only blacks and whites were as thoroughly mixed together in society as gays and straights are.

Kids are also exposed constantly to an entertainment culture in which gays are not merely accepted but in some ways dominant. You rarely see a reality show without a gay cast member, while Rosie O’Donnell is a coveted free agent and Ellen DeGeneres is America’s sweetheart. The notion that gays must be segregated out of the military for the sake of our national security must strike Americans younger than, say, 40 as simply weird, just as we of the previous generation find the rules of racial segregation weird. (O.K., run that by me again: they needed separate drinking fountains because … why?)

That’s a really good point, which shouldn’t be taken for granted. A decade ago, when Vermont became the first state with a civil union law, the right screamed bloody murder. Now civil unions are common, it’s considered a “moderate” policy position, and conservatives can’t think of any reasons to oppose them anymore.

We still see prominent conservative “leaders” using anti-gay rhetoric, but their slurs make them look like idiots. We still see Republican presidential candidates insist that the military should reject well-trained, patriotic volunteers if they’re gay, but they come across as entirely incoherent on the subject.

Dems used to be terrified to support issues like civil unions and gays in the military, but the fear is gone. America has progressed, the Dems have kept up, and Republicans look foolish falling behind.

Shhh.

  • While it’s true that gay rights have made great strides in the 40 or so years since the Stonewall Riots, the US is very far behind Europe and Canada. Now it appears that South America is pulling ahead of us.

    Gay rights bill passes Colombian Congress

    BOGOTA (Reuters) – Colombia’s Congress approved a bill late on Thursday granting same-sex couples rights similar to their straight counterparts, a move seen as the biggest advance for homosexuals in this Roman Catholic country.

    The measure, supported by President Alvaro Uribe but opposed by the church, grants gay couples living together for more than two years the same social security and estate inheritance guarantees as heterosexuals in common law marriages.

  • We still see prominent conservative “leaders” using anti-gay rhetoric, but their slurs make them look like idiots.

    It depends on the audience. I have the unfortunate blessing of two born-agains in the extended family, and in their worldview the only thing worse than gays is abortion. To them, this is what sustains their interest in politics, and the political process. I may laugh and ridicule them for such narrow views, but they will still turn out and vote for these conservative “leaders,” irrespective of the multitude of sins committed by these conservative “leaders.” Dogs to the whistle, as it were.

    Pavlov would be tickled.

    -GFO

  • Yeah, I think that a lot of progress has been made because as gays have come more into the mainstream and felt like they could come out of the closet, a lot of misunderstanding has been overcome. I think a lot of people saw gays as sick or as predators, and didn’t understand the differences between, say, a gay and a transgender person, a bisexual, etc. But I think there’s still a long way to go. With gays and women, depending on the particular person, prejudice tends to more often be less than that against African Americans, I think. But, as with prejudice against African Americans, I think it’s easy to underestimate the degree to which prejudice just goes underground, so to speak. Also- and this is just my guess, coming from a straight guy who doesn’t have a lot of gay friends- it seems like a lot of gay people still stay in the closet.

  • This also reflects the report recently published that indicates that the US in fact consists of a growing majority of people who are generally progressive thinkers.

  • “Also- and this is just my guess, coming from a straight guy who doesn’t have a lot of gay friends- it seems like a lot of gay people still stay in the closet.”

    It may also be that many gay individuals simply do not carry themselves in what many non-gays believe to be a gay stereotypical manner.

  • It is great– I have been noticing that change in the young for a while. But one reason those right-wing bigots still keep their anti-gay rhetoric going is that those who still vote with the bigot mentality really care about this issue. On the other hand, those who are accepting of gays don’t automatically vote against Repubs for being associated with that bigotry. For straight people who are not prejudiced but are rich (or think they are going to be) and vote Repub, that bigotry against gays–it’s not that worrisome.

  • Michael W said it first and it’s one of those things about the US that puzzles me and, I suspect, the rest of the world.

    Why is the US so damn ass-backwards on this? I mean, Columbia isn’t exactly a hot bed of radicalism. Neither is Spain or … any country that’s gotten a clue. Why do US pols still listen to a steadily dwindling number of knuckle-dragging bigots? Why can’t the Dems just show footage of Fred Phelps and his brood of snakes disrupting funerals and say: “We’re not going to be like this”?

    I know there are bigots in other countries and I’m sure they’re just as rabid, obnoxious and disgusting, but in other countries they’re treated appropriately: Like the smelly drunk guy who sits at the back of the bus and rants at things no one else can see.

    Grow up, America! Grow a pair Democrats!

  • As a gay white guy, I share your perspective. We’ve come a long way. I think the “separate” part of the battle is over, and now it’s “equal” that is being addressed.

  • #8 Sagacity– so true! Last month, I went down to South Florida for my cousin’s Bat Mitzvah, and it disturbed me greatly to hear my wealthy uncle and his equally-wealthy friends talking up the Republican Party. There was a significant number of medical doctors in that crowd, and all of them are in favor of stem-cell research. And they all want abortion to remain legal. And when I brought up the subject of gay equality, they all seemed to have a laissez-faire attitude about it. So, essentially, they were Republicans only for financial reasons, the concerns of the rest of the population be damned. For a bunch of doctors– people who took the Hippocratic Oath to help people– it seems a bit more like a Hypocritic Oath to be that unconcerned with humanity at large. Furthermore, for Jewish citizens to kowtow to a party that marches in lock-step with Bible-thumping fundamentalists, and, furthermore, uses hatred of the “other” (be it gays, Muslims, or any other group) to turn out its voters, is just wrong on so many levels . . .

  • “whole spectrum of debate has moved left.”

    It should be worth noting that it always moves left. Forty years ago this week we got the Loving v. Virginia decision, which overturned segregationist bans on interracial marriage. And now the idea of returning to such a ban would be unthinkable. We should stop calling it moving to the left and start calling it moving forward.

  • ““Also- and this is just my guess, coming from a straight guy who doesn’t have a lot of gay friends- it seems like a lot of gay people still stay in the closet.”

    It may also be that many gay individuals simply do not carry themselves in what many non-gays believe to be a gay stereotypical manner.”

    If I may comment on #7…..

    True, a lot of gay people stay in the closet. But a lot of us gay people are just ordinary folks. If you were to meet me, you’d be perhaps surprised to find I’m gay. I don’t lisp. I don’t walk with a mince. I don’t particularly like Barbara Streisand, Judy Garland, or Madonna. I don’t shriek “FAAAAABulous” at the end of every other sentence. I’m just your average middle aged white guy.

    In fact, some folks when they meet me see my “Wedding” ring and hear me talk about “Us this” or “We that, and are given to ask “So, Steve, what’s your wife’s name?” I love answering the question with “Richard.”

    Richard, however, is not amused. He prefers “Reason for Living” as a description.

  • “… but they come across as entirely incoherent on the subject.”

    Never underestimate the power of incoherence.

  • #7- I see what you are saying- people who I assume are in the closet may not be, and I just don’t know them and their circle of acquaintances well enough to know that fact. Still, some people I encounter definitely are not openly gay, but give me the impression that they are because of their actions.

  • Swan, @5

    It’s not so much that boatloads of gays stay in the closet. It’s more — like Eeyore says — that they’re ordinary folk. And like any other folk, some are more extrovert and will let you know somehow (whether you want to know or not, sometimes), and some won’t b/c they figure their bedroom behaviour is none of your beeswax. Both of my son’s godfathers are/were (one’s gone now) gay but only one of them made a point of it. The other… He didn’t hide in a closet but he didn’t make a big deal of his sexuality, either.

    It’s like with religion; do you always know, who among your acquaintances is a Catholic, who a Protestant (and of which stripe)?

  • Oh, and Michael W, @3,

    US has always been lagging behind the rest of the world when it comes to “morality”; it’s not just gays. When I came here 34 yrs ago, almost nobody (except some gays ) would dream of inviting me and my “concubin” to a party — we weren’t married; we lived in sin. And we had to at least pretend we weren’t, because of his position (chair of the Eng dept at the U). Once we got married, the doors opened all of a sudden.

    But, in Europe, nobody even blinked at such an arrangement; indeed, what puzzled them was that we felt it necessary to pretend.

  • It’s not so much that boatloads of gays stay in the closet. It’s more — like Eeyore says — that they’re ordinary folk.

    No, I know, I know- I know lots of gay people don’t act stereotypically gay. I didn’t realize my original comment might make me sound like someone who thought that gay people who are out always act like a stereotype, but plenty of people I’ve known, who I’ve known were gay (maybe I’ve known 2 dozen gay people), didn’t act stereotypically gay. And then there are plenty of examples of famous people.

    But I mean more like Gov. McGreevey of NJ- I think I encounter / hear of more people who are in the closet than I would expect- I mean, in my personal life, someone who would insist they weren’t gay- really in the closet. Again, as I said in my original comment, I don’t know lots of people, so I guess it’s just the impression I get- not a representative sample.

  • I mean, I know that acting stereotypically gay doesn’t necessarily correlate with whether you’re out of the closet or not. To me it seems like even 50% of men who are out don’t even act so much like a gay stereotype.

    But, think about it, I’ve been acquainted with maybe a few thousand- at most- people in my life, and had, at least, hundreds of friends, relatives. Out of everyone I’ve been acquainted with, close or not, I’ve known maybe 40 people tops that were definitely gay (I have to revise my original estimate upward a little because there were actually many gay people at my law school). If one out of ten people are supposed to be gay, that’s a lot of people still in the closet, even if I just count people that I knew from my teenaged years and up. And I never did anything to avoid gay people, besides what ever selecting effect discrimination in society at large might work to discourage gays from participating in activities I was involved in.

  • “True, a lot of gay people stay in the closet. But a lot of us gay people are just ordinary folks. If you were to meet me, you’d be perhaps surprised to find I’m gay. I don’t lisp. I don’t walk with a mince. I don’t particularly like Barbara Streisand, Judy Garland, or Madonna. I don’t shriek “FAAAAABulous” at the end of every other sentence. I’m just your average middle aged white guy.”

    amen! well, except i do love madonna.

  • “I don’t lisp. I don’t walk with a mince.”

    I’ve been trying to think of any gay male I know who fits the effeminate/campy profile. Even when I include drag queens, I only come up with three people. Same goes for the “Lesbian biker/truck driver,” profile.

    But if I think about straight guys who fit this profile, I can write a long list. If you’ve ever travelled through parts of the South, ya’ll know what I mean.

    By the same token, you have to search a while to find a grouping of women who are more effortlessly butch than some of the ladies who live in the Mid-West.

    Either that or there’s some sort of massive take over in progress and I haven’t been informed.

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