THE CAUTIOUS CLOSET OF THE GAY CONSERVATIVE - The Washgton Post

Contents:

• THE ULTRANSERVATIVE BROTHERS PULLED STRGS REAGAN’S WASHGTON. THEN ONE OF THEM WAS OUTED AS GAY
• ARE THE DOLAN TWS GAY? OR RELATNSHIP EX-GIRLIENDS?
• SO IS GRAYSON THE GAY TW?
• THE CAUTIOUS CLOSET OF THE GAY CONSERVATIVE

THE ULTRANSERVATIVE BROTHERS PULLED STRGS REAGAN’S WASHGTON. THEN ONE OF THEM WAS OUTED AS GAY

In the new book Secret Cy: The Hidn History of Gay Washgton, thor Jam Kirchick expos how fears and prejudic around homosexualy shaped printial polics for s, om the Cold War-era purge of gays and lbians om every level of ernment to the rise of the nservative movement.

ARE THE DOLAN TWS GAY? OR RELATNSHIP EX-GIRLIENDS?

But one of the fierce pillars of the nservative muny had a secret: Terry was gay — a realy his fellow Republins uld no longer ignore after he died of AIDS a few days after Christmas, 1986.

SO IS GRAYSON THE GAY TW?

Here, Kirchick trac the story of Terry Dolan’s posthumo outg a Washgton Post obuary, and Tony Dolan’s outraged rponse — cludg an alln to Post edor Ben Bradlee’s own gay brother — that subsequently ran the Washgton Tim. Of all the many gay men workg the Reagan admistratn and nservative movement durg the 1980s, none more vividly exposed the punishg ntradictns of their prer existence than Terry Dolan. Dolan spent a lot of time at the templ of bodily self-perfectn (three hours the weight room every morng and sometim a quick rd exercise durg lunch) to mata his footg what thor Randy Shilts lled the “aristocracy of bety” that fed the 1980s urban gay male subculture.

THE CAUTIOUS CLOSET OF THE GAY CONSERVATIVE

Though Dolan was reful never to acknowledge his homosexualy outsi the environs of that world, he was not exactly a mol of discretn. One eveng, after addrsg a bs tra associatn at a Denver hotel, Dolan scend to the lobby for a night of prowlg the lol leather bar scene cked out the era’s “gay clone” uniform (tight jeans, leather wboy boots, flannel shirt, and studd leather wristband), the atten to whom he had, jt moments earlier, served up a genero helpg of right-wg rhetoril red meat none the wiser.

Dolan’s anizatn, meanwhile, sent out fundraisg letters like the one signed by far-right Republin ngrsman Dan Crane, clarg, “Our natn’s moral fiber is beg weakened by the growg homosexual movement and the fanatil ERA phers (many of whom publicly brag they are lbians).