Homosexualy and Gay Rights | Ronald Reagan

Contents:

• WHEN REAGAN SAID GAY
• ADAPTED OM SECRET CITY: THE HIDN HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON BY JAM KIRCHICK. PUBLISHED BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY. COPYRIGHT © 2022 BY JAM KIRCHICK. ALL RIGHTS RERVED.
• THE REAL RERD OF THE REAGANS ON GAYS AND AIDS
• HOMOSEXUALY AND GAY RIGHTS

WHEN REAGAN SAID GAY

Dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill by crics, the legislatn would mandate that “classroom stctn by school personnel or third parti on sexual orientatn or genr inty may not occur krgarten through gra 3 or a manner that is not age appropriate or velopmentally appropriate for stunts acrdance wh state standards.

”By permtg parents to sue school districts that fail to enforce s vague provisns, the act would effectively bar classroom discsn and dividual exprsn on a wi range of subjects not necsarily limed to homosexualy and genr inty. Gay stunts and the children of same-sex upl, for stance, would likely be hibed om talkg about their liv, and teachers uld face the wrath of angry parents simply for discsg historil events volvg gay people, such as the adly 2016 attack on a gay nightclub bill’s proponents sist that the measure has nothg to do wh harmg the digny of gay dividuals but rather is aimed at ensurg age-appropriate sexual tn.

In 1988 the Brish Parliament passed a measure preventg lol thori om “promotg homosexualy” or “the teachg any mataed school of the acceptabily of homosexualy as a pretend fay relatnship. Ten years later, the Rsian Duma unanimoly passed legislatn “for the purpose of protectg children om rmatn advotg for a nial of tradnal fay valu” prohibg the dissematn of “propaganda” of nontradnal sexual Asenc-Rhe/Tampa Bay Tim, via Associated PrsWhile brandg gay people as child molters has been a staple of right-wg rhetoric around the world, there has long existed a stra of Amerin libertarian nservatism that ems the legal enshrement of such prejudic as an vasn of privacy and a dangero enhancement of state power.

ADAPTED OM SECRET CITY: THE HIDN HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON BY JAM KIRCHICK. PUBLISHED BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY. COPYRIGHT © 2022 BY JAM KIRCHICK. ALL RIGHTS RERVED.

”Much like the current Florida bill, the Briggs Iniative was ambiguoly word, such that would have permted the firg of not jt gay teachers but also anyone who spoke out on their behalf. The measure was part of a natnal backlash agast the advancement of gay rights that began the prev year wh a mpaign by the Florida Cs Commissn spokwoman and gospel sger Ana Bryant to repeal an ordance Miami’s Da County that prohibed discrimatn on the basis of sexual orientatn. A Field poll published September 1978 found 61 percent of California voters supported banng gay teachers, a figure nsistent wh natnal proponents of Proposn 6 lookg at what seemed like an unobstcted path to victory, those opposn wonred what one of the state’s most popular Republins, s former ernor Ronald Reagan, thought about the measure.

Reagan’s own language: “Anarchy, ” he told the former ernor, who had ed that word to scribe mp unrt at Berkeley, would be unleashed classrooms statewi as stunts lodged spur charg of homosexualy agast their teachers. ” He ma a more substantive se his syndited lumn published a week before the electn, refutg the claim that gays had a greater propensy to be child molters and the nard that they joed the teachg profsn to rec imprsnable Electn Day, voters rejected Proposn 6, 58 percent to 42 percent, a nearly exact reversal of what the polls dited jt two months earlier.

Reagan monstrated regard to gay teachers was sorely lackg durg his princy, when he spent years ignorg the AIDS crisis, refg even to mentn the name of the disease killg thoands of gay men until his send Ms. Bryant’s nox Save Our Children mpaign of the late 1970s, today’s effort at stigmatizg gay people fds popular backg, wh some 51 percent of Amerins supportg laws to ban classroom discsns of sexual orientatn. But moral panics, by fn, eventually lose their steam, and Republins of nscience should not let the passns of the moment overwhelm their stated mments to dividual rights, personal privacy and limed Kirchick is the thor of the forthg book “Secret Cy: The Hidn History of Gay Washgton.

THE REAL RERD OF THE REAGANS ON GAYS AND AIDS

It was 3:15 on the morng of June 26, 1980, and Congrsman Bob Livgston was extraordarily dnk, hidg the ngrsnal gym beneath the Rayburn Hoe Office Buildg, petrified that a team of highly traed right-wg homosexual assasss workg on behalf of Ronald Reagan was about to kill him. This acunt of the alleged “homosexual rg” that ntrolled Ronald Reagan, and the efforts to expose on the eve of the 1980 Republin Natnal Conventn that nomated him for the princy, is piled om terviews wh several of the survivg participants and documents unvered the papers of former Washgton Post Executive Edor Ben Bradlee. “That stuff, ” or what Kemp adviser Ju Wanniski termed “the homosexual thg, ” had dogged the upstate New York ngrsman and former profsnal football player sce the fall of 1967, when the syndited newspaper lumnists Drew Pearson and Jack Anrson published a piece lkg Kemp to a “homosexual rg” operatg wh Reagan’s gubernatorial office.

” The “slanr” and “old lumny” that the virile ex-football pro and father of four might be gay, journalists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak wrote at the time, was a “vic nard, ” the sort of “poisono” “garbage” one found “submerged the polil sewers” and other “gutter munitns” that “not only do gross jtice to their victims but also mean and pollute mocratic ernment. Behd those closed doors, McCloskey suggted strongly that the possibily of Kemp as a nng mate was proof that the “homosexual rg” around Reagan, long dismissed as mor, might be somethg all too real.

HOMOSEXUALY AND GAY RIGHTS

Bt began llg him antilly to report that “homosexual people were very close to Reagan’s mpaign learship, ” that they were “nng” Reagan’s mpaign, and that “the suatn is absolutely out of ntrol. ” It was not until a boozy lunch wh a man claimg to have been a “long time Reagan associate, ” however, that Bt found what he believed to be the “smokg gun” provg that Reagan was ntrolled by homosexuals. ” After hearg om Bt, McCloskey agreed that a Kemp nomatn would revive the 1967 “Sndal Sacramento, ” possibly leadg to revelatns about the other homosexuals Reagan’s orb and thereby imperilg the GOP ticket.

An Eisenhower-era executive orr barrg gay people om holdg feral ernment jobs (on the grounds that they were supposedly more sceptible to blackmail) had led to a purge of thoands of workers, and while the civil service lifted s ban 1975, gays were still prohibed om holdg secury clearanc (a rtrictn that would not be lifted until 1995). Livgston’s md began to procs the jumble of thgs he had seen and heard over the past few weeks: the long-standg mors about Kemp; the supposed gay work encirclg Reagan; McCloskey’s ntact who claimed that he, too, had been h on by gay Reagan; Bouchey’s ti to var Lat Amerin juntas and paraari.