2011: A good year to be gay | LGBTQ+ rights | The Guardian

Contents:

• 2011: AN EXTRAORDARY YEAR FOR GAY RIGHTS
• 2011: A GOOD YEAR TO BE GAY
• A VERY LGBTQ : GAY MARRIAGE, TRANS RIGHTS AND A 'RABOW WAVE'

2011: AN EXTRAORDARY YEAR FOR GAY RIGHTS

This year was an extraordary one for many thgs — pecially gay rights. In September, the end of the ary's "don't ask, don't tell" policy allowed gay, lbian and bisexual people to serve openly. 'A Good Year To Be Queer' Among those appldg the recent stris gay rights is lumnist and activist Dan Savage, who told Sheir that was a "good year to be queer.

"[Clton] stood up for half an hour and lectured world lears on the fact that gay rights are human rights, " Savage says. He was standg next to a gay uple he didn't know, and one of the men asked Savage, "We're always happy for them, would kill them to be happy for ?

2011: A GOOD YEAR TO BE GAY

After s which gay rights have polarised US opn, the untry barely shgged September when a two- old law prohibg gay men and women om servg openly the ary was fally repealed, promptg thoands of gay soldiers to post g-out vios on YouTube – jt one more example of how the web has transformed gay visibily. To put that ntext, there are more people livg New York than the Netherlands, which 2001 beme the first untry to legalise same-sex stggle for marriage equaly has been one of the most bterly divisive issu Ameri, but after a seri of feats for gay-rights advot, the ti appears to be shiftg irrevobly their directn. In the 2004 electn, unr the keen enuragement of Karl Rove, no fewer than 11 stat passed ballot iativ banng gay marriage — a cynil get-out-the-vote ploy that helped swell Republin ranks at the pollg perceptn that marriage equaly was a poisoned pk chalice persisted up to the 2008 electn, when even Obama was reful to clarify that he wasn't favour of gay marriage, apparently heedg warngs om Bill Clton to give the issue a wi berth.

Yet this year's bat between the ragtag pack of Republin printial nome, the ual rhetoric nouncg gay marriage has been noticeably absent. Even Obama, facg prer odds for a send term, has said that he favours repealg the notor Defense of Marriage Act that has prevented feral regnn of gay marriag, even those performed stat where they are changed those few short years?

In many ways the transformatn of attus has been ongog for s, accelerated large part by the impact of Aids, which renfigured gay inty around muny and relatnships. In TV shows such as Glee and Morn Fay, gays are no longer ic stoog or punchl, their relatnships treated wh the same rpect as those of their straight unterparts.

A VERY LGBTQ : GAY MARRIAGE, TRANS RIGHTS AND A 'RABOW WAVE'

This was a quantum leap on 1990s shows such as Will & Grace, which the gay characters had the whiff of "nfirmed bachelors", to e the archaic phemism of obuary wrers, rarely prented functng relatnships, much ls young gay men and women today the ia that they will be able to marry and raise kids no longer sounds outlandish or ntroversial. They see gay upl gettg married stat such as New York and Massachetts.

They listen, alongsi their straight iends, to gay anthems by Lady Gaga, and watch popular gay-clive shows such as Te Blood. Most of all, they munite wh a diverse group of iends on Twter and Facebook, where gay and straight teens revel their shared cultural is all a long way om the wdowls gay bar wh the peephole the door Edburgh, where I first learned to socialise wh other gay people durg my first tentative steps out of the closet. Lookg back 's clear that this dramatic metamorphosis, om poppers to panis, reprented a broar shift gay culture, or – if you believe the mentator Andrew Sullivan – the "exorable evolutn" towards the end of gay culture self.

Sullivan may have been overly optimistic a 2005 article that he wrote for The New Republic, welg the recedg differenc between gay and straight, but he was the first to fully articulate the assiatn of gay inty to the mastream. A year later, when I beme edor of Out, seemed pertent to ask what functn a gay magaze would serve a world that, if not yet post-gay, seemed to be headg that Europe, many of the old prejudic were rapidly fallg away as one untry after another extend equal rights to their gay cizens. Berl and Paris both swore gay mayors 2001, and wh Chris Smh's appotment as Secretary of State for Culture, Media & Sport 1997, Bra had s first out gay bet mister.