Gays go on the march in Washington

Continued from Page 1-E pose a block at least equal to 25% of the voters in any other

community.

Larry Bush, a full-time writer for the Blade, Washington's gay newspaper, claims his semimonthly tabloid has a 20,000 circulation and a readership of over 50,000, making it the largest local gay newspaper in America.

But Bush, who agrees that Washington is a good place to be gay, also has reservations about

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how well today's march will serve the national gay community.

"For example," he said, "I saw no real effort to get out the religious gay groups here." This would have been especially effective, Bush believes, in light of Pope John Paul II's recent endorsement of American Catholic bishops' statement condemning all homosexual activity.

Organizers of the march, while not contending that all segments

of the gay community will be equally represented, pointed out that such representative organizations as "Parents of Gays" have been brought into the Washington demonstration.

There are 32 chapters of "Parents of Gays" across the country and a news conference was organized on their behalf yesterday.

The parents' organization sought at its press conference to "issue an appeal to the parents of the 10

million lesbians and gay men in the United States to join in a new and aggresive drive to end discrimination against their children."

Congress is not expected formally to end discrimination against anyone's gay children. But if today's march is any sort of success, Congress probably won't say anything about the subject at all which at least from the gays' standpoint is an improvement over what Anita Bryant would like to see happen:

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