A Long Road Traveled

The last time I got as close to the White House as I did this week was many years ago—six years after the Stonewall riots, when I was a 13-year-old National Spelling Bee participant from St. Margaret’s School in Lowell, Mass. We spelling bee kids didn’t make it into the White House that day—we stood outside as first lady Betty Ford spoke to us from a balcony. By then I already knew I was gay. Raised in a staunch Catholic home and taught (and tormented) by nuns, I was certain that an open homosexual (that was the only term I knew back then) could never be allowed inside the White House. I knew nothing of the nascent gay-rights movement—it hadn’t reached Lowell in 1975. All I knew was that that whatever words there were to describe what I was, it would have to be suppressed forever. I assumed that I would have to either become a priest or figure out some other way to hide.

Thankfully, time marched on, and I eventually became a politicized college student rather than a candidate for the priesthood—and ultimately I kicked open my closet door and came out. But I can’t help thinking about that personal history as I replay the reel of yesterday’s visit to the White House in my head. As the executive director of SAGE, an advocacy group for LGBT senior citizens, I was invited, along with some 200 other LGBT leaders, to join the Obamas in commemorating gay pride—which falls this year on the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots.

I was accompanied by three SAGE members: a lesbian couple who are 86 and 91, who reminisced about voting for FDR and described Barack Obama as “the most inspiring politician since Adlai Stevenson,” and a Stonewall veteran and founder of the Gay Liberation Front, an activist group formed in the aftermath, who proudly chose his SAGE T shirt over the ties worn by every other man in the room.

Apart from celebrating, we had gone to the White House to make a point: that older people have to be included in the Obama agenda for LGBT progress. And we did what we came to do, with one of our members (the Stonewall vet) even receiving a personal meeting with the president and Mrs. Obama. But as I stood with my partner, in the front row, some five feet from the presidential podium, I realized how intensely personal this experience was for me. I thought about how each member of the SAGE contingent has had our own life’s journey—and each of us was moved deeply and differently by that moment.

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Proposition 8 Gives Rise to New Generation of Gay Leaders

After state voters passed Proposition 8 on November 4, gays, lesbians and their straight allies took to the streets in Los Angeles and West Hollywood, demanding the repeal of the ballot measure that bans same-sex marriage in California. The outrage over the vote also brought about several boycotts that forced “Yes on 8″ contributors like L.A. Film Festival director Richard Raddon out of a job.

But one of the more interesting and sometimes overlooked post–Prop. 8 developments has been a shakeup within the gay establishment and the rise of younger activists looking for a seat at the power table. Dave Valk, a 21-year-old senior at UCLA, and Joe Townley, a 30-year-old Internet entrepreneur, founded, with others, an activist group called Demonstrate Change. Vincent Jones, a 32-year-old staffer at Common Cause, expected to do more outreach in the African-American community, which mostly voted for Proposition 8.

In the meantime, the California State Supreme Court will hear arguments from gay-rights lawyers probably in March, asking the court to overturn Prop. 8 and legalize same-sex marriage in this state once again. To keep the “No on 8″ cause alive, Valk, Townley and people like them have been gearing up for protests in January and February, as well as a possible March on Washington in April. Other gay activists in Los Angeles — young and old, rookies and veterans — are also organizing a more grassroots-oriented gay-rights movement, with Rick Jacobs of the Courage Campaign providing support.

In our article published shortly before the election, polls showed voters who opposed same-sex marriage gaining ground on voters who backed same-sex marriage. The article, “Riding the Cultural Divide with Proposition 8,” explained the national consequences of either outcome, as well as the mounting turmoil and trouble unfolding inside the campaign to defeat the measure.

See Proposition 8 Gives Rise to New Generation of Gay Leaders
LA Weekly, CA