TWO'S BRAVE BATTLE

TWO [Truth Wins Out] executive Director Wayne Besen has issued the following press release:

"I am proud to announce that Truth Wins Out has finally moved into its new Manhattan office! For the past three years, I had run the organization out of a small studio apartment in Brooklyn. While I loved the short commute and liberal dress code, space was extremely tight. As the organization grew, so did the stacks of media packets, brochures and educational materials. Even my cat, Critter, began to complain about the lack of space. Clearly, the time had come for Truth Wins Out to find an office. This is especially true, when you consider that our main "ex-gay" opposition, Exodus International, has a one million dollar budget, thirteen staff members and a large office complex to plan its destructive "pray away the gay" operations. Exodus also has a quarter-million dollar youth program to shame vulnerable teens into renouncing their sexual orientation. To effectively compete with Exodus and stop them from shattering more families and ruining more lives - it was time to spread our wings. The new office space also makes it possible to have volunteers and interns. There is finally a place where they can work and use their talents to help further Truth Wins Out's crucial mission. I hope you will consider a tax-deductible contribution to help us cover our new office space."

I know there are people who are leery of contributing to some gay rights groups because they're afraid their money will simply go to pay the six figure salaries of some of the officers. [Years ago I was shocked to see the salaries of some of the people working for Gay Men's Health Crisis! I don't know if this has changed.] But TWO is still a small outfit with dedicated activist Besen and others doing what most other gay groups don't seem to be doing: monitoring groups like Exodus, reporting on their activities on a regular basis, and organizing counter-protests and other campaigns to counteract the ex-gay industries distortions, lies, and blatant hatred. This is extremely important work.

So think about making a contribution if you can.

Check out Two's web site here.

Rum Dump at the Stonewall Inn

I've reported in the past how utterly disappointed I was in the "new" Stonewall Inn -- to put it mildly -- the historic bar where began the modern-day Gay Rights movement. (There was a movement even before the Stonewall rebellion, let's make that clear.) This mostly straight-owned bar with its deluge of drunken straight tourists from The Duplex, closeted bartenders, weird hostesses, and an almost total absence of gay pride finally made a little burp in that direction, although it was activist Wayne Besen who deserves the credit for it. He got the bar's owners to stage a "Rum Dump" at the bar to protest and publicize the fact that Jamaica (from whence comes Myer's Rum and Red Stripe Beer) has become "the most homophobic place on Earth." But there are other world-wide trouble spots, as Besen reports on his blog, which is essential -- and scary -- reading.

I've no doubt the owners of the Stonewall see this as a chance for publicity and probably don't care all that much about the situation in Jamaica (and can probably afford to lose the one or two bottles they had of Myers Rum) but at least it's a step in the right direction. But this Stonewall Inn is not and never has been (nor, I believe, will it ever be) the "historic" Stonewall Inn" regardless of its name and its location. LGBT groups will hold occasional events there because of this "history," but it's clear to me, at least, that the owners are less interested in history than they are in the kachung of the cash register, and I'm sure they would say "we're businessmen, who can blame us?" But they did play up the history of the bar in interviews for the gay press, in which they were often mistaken for a gay couple.

Wonder how big a crowd they got for the Rum Dump?

But if Besen can keep at the owners and get them to support more activist-oriented events and protests, maybe the bar can at some point turn into what it should be, or at least some approximation thereof.

But forgive me if I don't hold my breath.

In the meantime, if you see any of the offending Jamaican brands in your local gay bar, ask the manager not to order any more. A complete and total boycott of Jamaica and its products is what is called for, as Besen has noted.

Mixed Emotions

I have very mixed emotions, as many gays do, with the results of the recent elections.

One one hand, the democrats won, which is good, to say the least. We have the first Africa-American president -- also very good. And he is at least gay-friendly, although he doesn't support gay marriage and has too many evangelical-type friends to suit me. The main problem -- among many -- with the Republicans is their idiotic alliance with the religious right, their failure to understand the need to separate church and state. I hope Obama doesn't make the same mistake. Certain of his remarks during the whole mess when he had that homophobic, ex-gay gospel singer on his tour gave me the idea that on some gay issues Obama just doesn't get it. But that's true of most family men when it comes to us gays.

At least we have a better chance under the democrats of getting various gay rights bills and gay marriage bills passed. If the Republicans had won, we wouldn't have had any chance at all.

Still, whatever [relative] elation many of us feel over Obama's win is minimized by the passing of Proposition 8 in California, which bans same-sex marriage. While I appreciate that Obama always mentions gays and lesbians when he talks of Americans, we must keep in mind that religious family man Obama does not support gay marriage (which, I have said, is as much about human equality as it is about marriage).

Wayne Besen looks at the reality that many blacks do not support gay marriage or gay rights and are indeed homophobic, but he argues -- correctly, I believe -- that it is more about educational levels than race. His column on this makes for an interesting read. While I think an anti-gay "machismo" can affect even educated men, it does tend to be less educated males of all races who are externally or internally homophobic, and are -- if homosexual -- on "the down low." Still, many gays -- many of whom supported civil rights for blacks their entire lives and even worked hard for civil rights -- are disappointed that some members of this oppressed minority group are so willing to oppress another.

But as I have said before, rather than letting this engender inappropriate and equally hypocritical racist feelings in those of us who are gay and non-black, it is better to remember that their are many out and proud black gay people, and many straight blacks are very supportive of gay rights. Besides, think of the mixed emotions that many Americans who are both black and gay feel during this time.

Let's keep things in perspective.

Still, it's hard not to see the irony and feel just a bit bitter. The same day that the first African-American president is voted into office -- an historical occasion, long in coming -- gays are told by the passage of Proposition 8 and other bills that we are second-class citizens. that our lives and loves are unequal and our feelings don't matter.

In other words, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Nastiness in the Blogosphere

I've been a bit appalled by the level of nastiness I see on GLBT message boards and blogs and I wondered if it was getting worse (due, perhaps, to the election year) and what other factors might be responsible. I contacted some prominent as well as lesser-known bloggers and well-known gay people (Wayne Besen, Andrew Sullivan, Michael Musto etc.) from all sides of the political spectrum for their responses and have written an article which I call "Nastiness on the Blogosphere." I think it contains some interesting opinions on the subject. [This was originally intended for the New York Blade, but since they've gone from weekly publication to bi-weekly they don't have as much room for general think pieces as opposed to hard news.]

On the gay web site queerty, a heated debate is going on as to whether a certain gay periodical has improved since the new editor has taken over, and if said editor is gay, straight or bisexual -- and if it matters. A diversity of opinions are expressed, so diverse in fact, that it’s as if the people posting are not only not part of any community, but are actually from separate planets. The comments become increasingly personal. One poster who is an actor is told that he’s too ugly and untalented to get a job. Another person, quivering with self-hate, leaves a message that reads "I’m not bisexual but I wish I were and I’d kick the asses of all the faggots who say it has to be one way or the other." The majority of posts, at least on this particular thread, are jarringly nasty.

What’s going on here? Is the level of viciousness on LGBT blogs and message boards increasing, and if so, why is it happening? There could be several factors to blame for all the in-fighting: 1.) different factions of the LGBT movement who have been lumped together for political reasons but who may not really relate to one another; 2.) Out and Proud gays versus in-the-closet gays who use the anonymity of the Internet to put in their two cents but who look at gay life very differently from out-of-the-closet gays; 3.) young gays versus older gays; 4.) Other, less obvious factors. The question was put to several bloggers.

Andrew Belonsky of Queerty says " I think it's primarily political differences - on queerty, at least. I don't think that blogs have made gays any nastier, no. There's always been infighting in every social community, so why should we be any different? That said, however, many commentators can get particularly cruel and ugly, which really isn't the most constructive activity unless you actually have a point."

Andrew Sullivan sees it a bit differently: "I'm afraid it has always been true that gays have viciously attacked other gays online." he says. "It gets personal very quickly. Some of it is classic minority group self-loathing; part of it is just classic gay bitchiness; part genuine outrage, especially at pretty useless gay political groups; and partly it's a function of very familiar patterns of varying outness. We really do need to get better at being calmer."

Andres Duque, who has a Gay Latino blog entitled Blabbeando [blabbeando.blogspot.com] says "Some bloggers engage in over the top demagoguery, sensationalistic arguments and shock tactics to engage their readership -- and increase traffic -- and some responses might react to that. Personally I prefer to stake a view without slandering or insulting others and try to be respectful of others who may disagree with my views and perhaps this is why I rarely get a negative or nasty comment on my blog. It might not be as titillating to some, but not sure that I want to attract readers who run on the latest scandal."

Aureliano DeSoto, Post-Doctoral Fellow in LGBT studies at Carleton College in Minnesota [americanqueer.blogspot.com], says "LGBT folks as well as everyone else, have very little sense of etiquette or really know, for that matter, how to articulate critical commentary in ways that are not ad hominem and personal. This might just be a general function of the coarsening of our larger public culture."

"From a socio-cultural perspective," DeSoto adds, "lesbians and gay men have engaged in sometimes quite vociferous debate over what, how, why, and who constitutes gayness, really from the Mattachine Society of the 1950s onward, when the question was whether gay people constituted a separate category of experience or were just sexually different ...The movement of these questions onto the Internet is just a continuation of conversations that used to mostly happen in community papers, newsletters, flyers, wheat-pasted manifestos, and at the bar.

"And I would say, for what it's worth, that LGBT people are avatars of Internet culture, so perhaps there is some greater meaning to whatever perceived increase of hostility and aggression [there is] on gay blogs. Generational differences and dimensions of outness do seem to be more prominent in online media, especially the latter, since for many the Internet is an anonymous space, and that has empowered ... closeted men who have no public expression of gay identity but an investment, sometimes quite conservative, in these questions -- not to mention their participation in sexual online cultures such as Manhunt or Craig's List."

"I think the Internet has always been a place where cowards become bold and attack anonymously," says activist and Truth Wins Out President Wayne Besen [waynebesen.com]. "What has changed, of late, however, are the issues - two in particular. The first is the presidential elections. There are many spiritually and emotionally empty people who live vicariously through candidates and wrap their identities around these leaders. They become larger than life - almost like Gods. So, if you criticize the candidate, these individuals take it as a personal sleight and react insanely over the Internet. I saw a glimpse of this when I criticized Obama over using "ex-gay" gospel singer Donnie McClurkin. The level of irrational Internet comments and e-mail was mind blowing. People really need to get lives - or at least get a grip."

"The second issue was the debate over including trans people in ENDA," says Besen. "From the standpoint of trans people - and many of their supporters - this was not just policy, but an existential question. If abandoned by the GLB community, they would have been left to fend for themselves. So, it was quite understandable that it got ugly, raw and personal. Were the trans people about to get shafted supposed to smile and take it? Sometimes it is important to throw down and duke it out. Much of this occurred on the Internet and it wasn't pretty - but, in the end, the fight may have been pretty important."

Some bloggers have had kinder, gentler experiences. Says Michael Musto, "I recently started a blog, "La Daily Musto," on villagevoice.com and the tone of the comments is generally upbeat. There’s some bitchiness, but generally in a good-humored way. So not all gay blogs elicit pure hate from their readers -- except whenever I mention Clay Aiken. But if there IS a rise in blog comment bitchiness, I’d say all of those factors [you mentioned] are involved. The anonymity gives people who generally can’t express themselves a chance to vent and to go overboard because they don’t have to suffer any consequences for it. And the different LGBT subgroups often resent each other (the "straight acting" ones often hate the out, femmy ones, and so on), and drag out their darkest biases which they probably would not trot out in public."

"This is a political year with much at stake," says Wayne Besen, "so there is a natural tendency for such attacks to multiply. Politics is about power and with this comes a brutal struggle, and this accounts for much of the nastiness online.

"I wouldn't get alarmed, as things ought to calm down in 2009."

Truth Wins Out

Wayne Besen, author and activist, is executive director of Truth Wins Out (TWO), a group that is dedicated to exposing the lies of "ex-gay" groups who promote homophobia and self-hatred and who dupe confused homosexuals into believing they can turn straight. Numerous ex-gays who have appeared on talk shows to talk about how straight they've become have been caught cruising gay bars in town only hours later. Groups such as Exodus try to convince homosexuals that they can "convert" via a combination of prayer and what one might call "stupid pet tricks."

You can check out Truth Wins Out's website here.

Two has just released two Internet commercials which debunk the idiotic and offensive claims of the ex-gay moment. You can check out one of them here on youtube. [NOTE: the photo above is from the ad. That is not Wayne Besen but ex-gay survivor Nick Cavnar.]

Wayne crossed swords with a homophobic "ex-gay" in a comical fashion on the Daily Show. You can read my report of this amusing episode here.

I hope TWO gets all the support it deserves.

And I think Wayne Besen is great.

The sad thing is that many gays who don't keep up with things have no idea how many hate-mongering, homophobic assholes are out there, many of whom point to the bible to justify their anti-gay prejudice. The blog Good as You (GAY) has a link to a radio interview between "ex-gay" Charlene Cothran and a few other self-justifying homophobes which you can find here.

Gay-Friendly Closet Cases

OR I GET A SHOCK AT THE STONEWALL INN

Some months ago a bartender at the newly reopened Stonewall Inn in New York City informed me that although he certainly "fooled around" with men, he had a girlfriend and that was that. "We’re very happy," he told me." I know that’s not what you want to hear."

Well... no. Not from a bartender working at the Birthplace of the Modern-Day Gay Rights Movement. Since he cut off all discussion once he noticed my understandable perplexity – this was the Stonewall, after all – I never did discover if he was telling me he was bisexual or simply a gay guy who needed a "girlfriend" to show to mama and papa and the outside straight world (which happens more often than anyone realizes, even today). Judging from his conspiratorial tone as he told me about his homoerotic activities, I fear it was the latter. It was as if he were saying that men were okay for sex, but for a real relationship he had to have a woman.

[Let me make it clear that I was not cruising this guy, who was in his twenties and nice-looking but not my type at all. I've been told that he generally tells patrons he's "straight" and he did not use the term "bisexual" with me, so he's not even proudly bi, let alone gay. Maybe he doesn't want it getting back to his girlfriend that he has the hots for men as well. Now and then the gal pals of these "straight" bartenders waltz into the bar all bubbly and totally clueless.]

So much for Gay Pride.

And this in the Stonewall Inn, no less!

At least he admitted he has sex with men, which many "straight" bartenders (most gay bars in New York and elsewhere now have at least a couple), go go boys, porn stars and hustlers do not. The strange thing is we are not talking about homophobic ex-gays or people like former gay porn star and Republicans' darling Matt Sanchez, who denounce gays and the gay lifestyle with vehemence. No, this is a much stranger phenomenon. It seems that nearly forty years of Gay Rights since the Stonewall Riots has created a bizarre and unexpected by-product: Gay-friendly closet cases, men (and undoubtedly women) who work almost exclusively among gays but who insist that they are straight, often despite evidence to the contrary. Or any half-intelligent gay person’s "gaydar."

Gay Activist Wayne Besen, author of Anything But Straight, once told me [via email]: "I think every town has at least one closeted bartender or stripper that slinks around the gay bar, but just can't quite come out. It is very sad." Watching a "straight" bartender one Saturday night at a hot leather/denim bar in Chelsea intermingling with sweaty gay guys and half-naked go go boys when he could easily be waiting on "hot babes" in a second avenue singles bar makes me wonder if he actually expects anyone to think he’s totally hetero. I have seen other "straight" bar backs and bouncers coming on to men under the influence of alcohol on their nights off, as if they can’t give in to their homosexual impulses unless they’re inebriated. This is not what we meant by Gay Power. [In a 2006 study by the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, 9.4% of men who identified as "straight" said they had sex with men; of those 70% were married.]

Why would a straight person want to work in a gay environment? Some will drag out that ancient canard about gays being better tippers (as if there’s been some kind of scientific survey) or that they simply "like" gay people (Which kind? Drag queens? Leather Kings? Bears?) Often gullible gays accept these people as 100% straight because they figure anyone who hated being perceived as homosexual would hardly work in a gay bar or in gay porn. But the very homoeroticism of the atmosphere is what often attracts them. Their internalized homophobia, a desperate need to be seen as "macho," somehow above and superior to the crowd, is what keeps them in the closet. It’s as if they’re saying, "hey, it’s okay if you’re gay – but me? I’m not gay!" If you kindly, ever-so-gently suggest they may have at least some gay or bi leanings they react as if you’re suggesting they’re terrorists.

Let me say that when I heard the Stonewall Inn was reopening I was very excited and made sure I was there for a drink on opening day. (Yes, I was alive during the Stonewall Rebellion, but I was much too young to go to bars, thank you very much, although I have great respect for those who were there, many of whom are thankfully still with us.) I mean, the Stonewall Inn was where it all began. Yes, there was a Gay Movement even before Stonewall, with such groups as The Mattachine Society, but the movement was much more low-profile before 1969. So perhaps one can imagine how I, a man who has had a lot of Gay Pride for many decades, felt when a bartender in The Stonewall Inn virtually whispered to me that he "fooled around" with guys as if it were something to be ashamed of. The man is as clueless as his alleged girlfriend (and you can imagine how clueless I think she is. But then I think women who date bartenders in gay bars -- or gay/bi men in general -- are about on the same level of reality as women who get engaged to lifers in prison.)

The whole point of the post-Stonewall Gay Rights movement was for gays and lesbians (and genuine bisexuals) to accept their homosexual feelings with pride, to seek out same-sex relationships that would be honest and fulfilling, not to hide behind the fake girlfriend or wife-as-beard. Even today, there are countless married homosexuals cruising bars for one night quickies.

But perhaps we should interpret it as a positive sign that we now have a better class of closet queen? Instead of telling fag jokes at the coffee machine (we hope), they’re serving us drinks and introducing us to their girlfriends!

Gay versus "Ex-Gay" -- Guess Who Wins?

Just watched The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, which featured a sketch in which a medical mystery examiner investigated the case of one Wayne Besen [photo on the left], who realized he was gay at an early age. Besen seeks the “cure” which is promised by Richard Cohen, the asshole author of a self-published 1991 book entitled Coming Out Straight. Cohen was a self-hating homosexual who was celibate for a decade, got married and had three children, had a male lover on the side for a time, but still insists he is totally straight. Sure.

The sketch featured the real Cohen, who didn't seem to realize he was being made fun of – mercilessly. I don't recall the audience being told that Wayne Besen is actually a gay activist who writes wonderful pieces on his web site, and is also the author of Anything But Straight, which excoriates the ex-gay movement. [I'm not certain why the audience wasn't let in on the joke.]

Cohen demonstrates some of his idiotic methods for turning people from gay to straight on the bemused reporter, who suggests that Besen give them a try. Six months later he checks in with Besen, and finds him lustily necking with a boyfriend on the sofa.

Besen was a good sport to participate in this, but I was a little disappointed that he wasn't interviewed or introduced by Stewart, who instead chatted with another author. Still, I'm sure Besen was glad that the show zapped some of these ex-gay idiots as they deserve.

A little nitpicking: There were some dumb moments, but I guess it's only fair – considering the sketch was basically pro-gay and geared for a largely straight audience -- that the presumably straight reporter (I know nothing about the comic actor who portrayed him) act a bit uncomfortable with all the gay – and “ex-gay” -- goings-on. I know they were making fun of Cohen, but the business with the reporter tossing a football at him – which Cohen fumbles – is kind of dopey, especially now that we all should know that there are plenty of gay athletes who'd have no trouble catching a football [a fairly useless talent except on the football field]. We know Cohen isn't straight not because he can't catch a football but because his admitted gay past and boyfriend tell us all we need to know.

What about the three kids? you might ask. Well, most gay men are perfectly capable of having sex with women, even if [for some] it's only a kind of hands-free masturbation as they penetrate the female orifice. (No, we won't get into bisexuality as this point, thank you.) If Cohen was unhappy leading a gay lifestyle, that was his business. But his trying to make a name and career for himself, exploiting people as full of self-hatred as he is to make a buck, is deplorable. To prove that he is now completely straight, Cohen let out a gross "manly" belch [I guess he thinks gay people can't burp – even though he did]. What a buffoon!

On the plus side, we got to see the good-looking Besen happily necking open-mouthed with an equally attractive male lover. Way to go, Wayne! (The irony is that Cohen would probably be very happy to neck with Besen, who would probably want to throw up at the very thought.)