Andrew Sullivan: Imposg 'cril genr theory,' erasg boys and girls pos risk to gay muny

Contents:

• THE GAY RIGHTS MOVEMENT IS UNDOG ITS BT WORK
• INTERVIEW: ANDREW SULLIVAN ON BEG OPENLY GAY AND CATHOLIC
• THE GAY CHURCH
• THE CORPTN OF THE VATIN’S GAY ELE HAS BEEN EXPOSED
• ANDREW SULLIVAN: IMPOSG ‘CRIL GENR THEORY,’ ERASG BOYS AND GIRLS POS RISK TO GAY MUNY

THE GAY RIGHTS MOVEMENT IS UNDOG ITS BT WORK

The story simmered on gay Inter bullet boards before breakg last week the pag of LGNY an article wrten by Michelangelo Signorile, the gay lumnist who me to fame durg the whole “outg” ntroversy a ago and who has recently lled upon health officials to shut down gay bath ho to rce unsafe sex. ” As the self-appoted champn of gay marriage, fily and “normal” homosexuals, Sullivan has railed agast the “sexual pathologi that plague homosexuals, ” lambasted the “rtoonish, buffoonish siary” of gay male bodi ma “manic mcle factori” and analogized unprotected oral sex wh murr. In his books Love Untectable and Virtually Normal, he displays a remarkable clatn to nsir his own experienc, or those of gay men jt like him, as reprentative of gay culture at large (or, alternatively, as the mol that all gay people should follow).

The most famo and adly example of Sullivan’s narcissism is his aforementned Tim story on AIDS, which nclud that bee wealthy, whe gay men such as himself now had accs to val, life-extendg anti-retroviral meditns, we have arrived at the “end of the plague. ” As we approach the twentieth “anniversary” of AIDS, as the Centers for Disease Control reports that fifteen of every 100 Amerin gay black men ntract HIV each year, and as the ath toll Ai ris to genocidal heights while Wtern pharmactil pani whhold dg patents, we might wonr jt how good a reprentative Sullivan is for gay people or people wh AIDS. The are favore tactics of Signorile, and although may appear as if he and Sullivan are polil opponents, we would do well to remember Michael Warner’s diagnosis The Natn a few years ago (“A New Gay Stone Wall, ” June 14, 1997)–that the spectm of gay polil thought, of which Signorile and Sullivan are major figur, “the ias promoted range om right to far right.

INTERVIEW: ANDREW SULLIVAN ON BEG OPENLY GAY AND CATHOLIC

He has suggted that, once gays w the legalizatn of same-sex marriage, along wh a few other thgs (prumably cludg the right to serve openly the ary), “we should have a party and close down the gay rights movement for good.

THE GAY CHURCH

Anyone who falls outsi such boundari, anyone who might be further margalized by their race, class, genr or sexual tast, is not only nied the right to speak om wh gay culture but is held rponsible for s polil failur, diseas and aths. Here’s one of the grave ironi of the Sullivan cint: Bee queer publics have been subject to state crackdowns, moralizg mpaigns and health sr of the sort gay nservativ have supported, the Inter has bee the facto se for gay cisg–but as a virtual, privatized space, ’s much ls open to the kds of ank, public nversatns about pleasure and safety that we so sperately need to be havg.

THE CORPTN OF THE VATIN’S GAY ELE HAS BEEN EXPOSED

He’s a proud member of the ele, and his se for marriage was partly nservative — that would be, as he told me, a “civilizg” fluence on gay men who he believed had been emotnally damaged by discrimatn. While the percentage of people who support equaly for gays, lbians, and transgenr people remas at a high of 79 percent, more people are exprsg some disfort: “In 2014, for example, 27 percent of non-LGBT Amerins said they would be ‘very’ or ‘somewhat’ unfortable lookg at a weddg picture on an LGBT -worker’s sk.

ANDREW SULLIVAN: IMPOSG ‘CRIL GENR THEORY,’ ERASG BOYS AND GIRLS POS RISK TO GAY MUNY

The gay-rights movement achieved s biggt gas when we worked agast polarizatn, reached out across the spectm, emphasized the human rather than the polil, and did the key, hard tnal work our fai, schools, church, and neighborhoods.

If the gay-rights movement cis to throw wh this new leftism, and abandon the moratn and tegratnism of the recent past, they risk turng gay equaly om beg about a w-w procs for gays and straights to a war between “LGBT” people and the rt. Gays are not the only beneficiari; heterosexual “live-togethers” also ’s an argument, of urse, that the current legal advantag extend to married people unfairly discrimate agast people who’ve shaped their liv ls nventnal arrangements. One of the worst products of the New Right’s “fay valu” mpaign is that s extremism and hatred of diversy has disguised this more measured and more nvcg se for the importance of the maral ncept of domtic partnership ignor the ncerns, ed directly attacks them, this is a py, sce one of s most important objectiv—providg some civil regnn for gay relatnships—is a noble e and one pletely patible wh the fense of the fay.

And unlike domtic partnership, harns to an already tablished social nventn the yearngs for stabily and acceptance among a fast-maturg gay marriage also plac more rponsibili upon gays: It says for the first time that gay relatnships are not better or worse than straight relatnships, and that the same is expected of them. Legalizg gay marriage would offer homosexuals the same al society now offers heterosexuals: general social approval and specific legal advantag exchange for a eper and harr-to-extract-yourself om mment to another human beg.

As has bee more acceptable for gay people to acknowledge their lov publicly, more and more have mted themselv to one another for life full view of their fai and their iends, A law stutnalizg gay marriage would merely rerce a healthy social trend.

The only possible effect of this sort would be to persua gay men and women who force themselv to heterosexual marriage (often at appallg st to themselv and their fai) to fd a foc for their fay stcts a more personally posive environment.