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IT'S TIME

By Jean O'Leary and

Bruce Voeller

Employment discrimination against lesbians and gay men is in many ways exactly the same as discrimination against any other minority; a refusal to apply the same standards of competence and reliability to one group of people that are applied to others. And the rationales for such discrimination are often identical. New York City's firemen, for example, are arguing that firefighting teamwork would be jeopardized by including people that the majority of the team doesn't like just as they did when they opposed the inclusion of blacks. Parents are claiming the right to "protect" their children from teachers they don't approve of, just as they did with Catholics or Jews or blacks. And employers in service industries are saying that discrimination is "necessary" to prevent their customers from taking their patronage elsewhere just as hey said about other "unpopular" minorities.

But in some ways, anti-gay employment discrimination is very different. And the reason is that, unlike most members of racial or ethnic minorities, the vast majority of us are able to "pass." We are already integrated into the work force and we are not an economic underclass. Our problems are that we are forced to live in fear that we'll be "found out" and fired. and that our need for secrecy makes it impossible for most of us to work or speak out for our own dignities and rights.

That's why it's so hard to prove anti-gay discrimination. Very few people are willing to make a public fuss about being fired from one job, when they know that notoriety is the one thing they don't need if they hope to get another. And that's ɔne reason whywe're not asking 'or affirmative action. There's no way to take a census of any group of employees and find out which ones are gay not without violating everybody's privacy. Before we go on to say what we are asking for, it might be a good idea to take up this question of "privacy" because it nvolves another important diference in the discrimination jay people face. Everybody ecognizes the right of emloyees not to talk about their ace, religion or national origin, but nobody's telling them they nustn't talk about it. But 1omosexuality is supposed to be about "sex," and everybody <nows that's a private matter. So when we say that we demand he right to be open about our ives if we choose, we're told hat that's "flaunting" and is otally unsuitable in a work

situation.

What's often ignored, however, is that homosexuality is no more about sex than heterosexuality, and that heterosexual employees are always "flauntng. They bring their spouses

or dates to work-connected events and chat about who they went out with last weekend. They tell their co-workers which members of the opposite sex they find attractive, and they have no qualms about embracing or kissing in public places. But we are required to censor ourselves in ways that nobody who isn't gay can possibly realize and often, even when our bosses and everyone we work with knows we're gay, the one unforgiveable thing is to talk about it. It isn't our "privacy" they're concerned about, it's their own insecurities and fears.

In a world in which heterosexuals can pretend they don't know any gay people, it's perfectly possible for them to go on believing the lies and the stereotypes. For this conspiracy of silence feeds prejudice and discrimination, and there's only one way we know to stem the cycle of secrecy and fear; we are asking for civil rights laws which would allow us to be as open as anyone would allow us to be as open as anyone else about our lives.

More than 40 cities in the U.S. and Canada have now adopted such legislation, most often as amendments to existing Human Rights statutes. And while these laws have not had the effect of bringing vast numbers of lesbians and gay men "out of the closets" (there is still too much prejudice, and too many hassles to be faced from those who would ridicule and hate us), they have significantly reduced the "fear of discovery" that has tormented so many gay employees, and they have encouraged the hiring of openly gay people by employers whoon the model of previous civilrights legislation-can now tell the bigots that "I must obey the law." A major objective of the gay-rights movement is the passage of such laws in every major city, in the state legislatures and in the Congress, where a bill, cosponsored by 39 members of the House, has already been introduced.

Regrettably, victims of prejudice are no more likely to be free of prejudice themselves, and as each new group in our society has asserted its need for anti-discrimination legislation, there has been resistance from members of some groups which have already won their rights. Members of religious and ethnic minorities resisted civil-rights protection for blacks, and men who had themselves suffered discrimination, resisted protec-

tions for women.

Gradually, however, as all of these groups have gained antidiscrimination protection, they have formed alliances based on a single idea-that any standard of employment is unacceptable which falls to judge present or prospective employees on their individual merits.

That standard has yet to be applied to us. Spokespeople for

HIGH GEAR/JUNE 1978

said that

ethnic and racial minorities-believing the same sort of lies about us that the majority had believed about them--have sometimes discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is "not the same thing" as discrimination on the basis of race of national origin. And some members of religious minorities--forgetting their own struggle to retain their individual, freely chosen moral values along with their jobs-are saying that "it isn't the same thing because being gay is a matter of free choice." (This is a debatable argument in any case, since many researchers believe that sexual orientation is established by the age of six.)

Our closest alliances thus far have been with women's groups, possibly because they find it easier to understand that sexrole stereotyping is the basis of anti-gay prejudice. And the recent International Women's Year Conference in Houston has Imade it clear that the women's movement is equally committed to the rights of gay women.

Half of us, of course, are women--something which our opponents often find it necessary to ignore. But we are also a subgroup of every religious, racial and ethnic minority; of the handicapped, the aged and the young. And for this reason alone we think we

belong in the coalitions.

The Gray Panthers and many student groups have recognized this, and have issued statements in support of gay rights (perhaps because the old and young have yet to achieve widespread civilrights protections themselves), and similar statements have been made by a wide variety of religious groups, including the National Council of Churches, the National Federation of (Roman Catholic) Priests Councils and the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. We've

also done well with professional and scientific organizations such as the American Psychiatric and American Psychological Associations. We've received considerable support from legal organizations and we've had help from the courts which, with a few notable exceptions, have made it much harder for government employers to discriminate.

Since there is no applicable law in most places, however, the courts have had no power to curtail private discriminationand this is where we need additional support for our legislative goals, from those minority groups which we have seen as our natural allies but have yet to include us among their concerns.

Despite their commitments to the idea that nobody should be fired for any reason isn't directly connected to their jobs, the natural allies which have most often failed to include us have been the unions. Apart from all the major teachers' unions, few of them have issued statements in support of gay civil rights. And apart from members of San Francisco's Central Labor Council, few other unions have attempted to negotiate antidiscrimination clauses into their contracts. This may be because in most places it's harder for gay workers to let their union leaders know how many of them there are, but we think it's important for union leadership to take a stand right now-before the threatened witchhunts force them to protect or abandon their gay members. It's a major goal of our movement to obtain increased union support.

In some ways, the situation with employers has been easier, perhaps because so many of them know the losses they would incur if they fired their gay employees. Few industry groups have offered legislative support, but a significant num-

non-

ber of major corporations, including such titans as AT&T, IBM and Bank of America, have adopted official discrimination policies. Another of our major goals is to increase the number of such policy statements from employers, and to help them to understand that they aren't just agreeing to hire lesbians and gay men who want to stay in the closet but are recognizing that gay employees have as much right to join and speak out on behalf of groups like the National Gay Task Force as Jewish employees have to join the B'nai B'rith and black employees to support the NAACP

Like other human rights movements, the gay-rights movement is now experiencing the inevitable backlash, and it seems to have come right on schedule, about eight years after the activist phase of our movement began. And this backlash is having a predictable effect: for each gay woman or man who steps further back into the closet, another is stepping out into the light and saying "enough;" and with each

evidence of the extent and virulence of the discrimination against us, new support is coming from others who recognize that any form of discrimination is a threat to

themselves.

We are confident that through our own efforts, and the support of our natural allies, gay people will win our right to equality in employment. We are also sure that this will be done without our inclusion in affirmative action plans. It's impossible now, and when it becomes possible-when each one of the millions of lesbians and gay men in this country is no longer afraid to stand up and be counted-affirmative action won't be necessary.

A PLACE FOR OURSELVES

By Dennis Highland

I like to go out to some of the gay discos in town and dance; I always have I enjoy the gay atmosphere, the escape from a hectic work week, and the temporary reprieverom an inhibitive straight society. I like the idea of a place where one man can hug and kiss another without the risk of causing a scene.

The advent of the gay disco was a welcome development and change from the gay meeting places that were prevalent only a few years ago. No longer would we have to confine ourselves to the debasing surroundings of public parks and dingy little bars. It

was great to have fashionable gay places, and social outings became more enjoyable and desirable because of them.

But now a change is taking place in some of the gay spots around town. It seems that many

straights have determined that it is "in" to go to a gay disco downtown and have a good time, even though there are many attractive non-gay places located throughout Cleveland and its suburbs. Over the past few months I have seen an increasing number of non-gay couples frequenting places that I thought were originally intended for gays. On more than one disconcerting occasion I found that I was part of the only "nonmixed" couple on the dance floor.

This is not to say that I feel all straights should be banned from gay bars; after all, gay people also go to "Non-club" establishments as well. It's just that I feel a large group of gay people would not be ordinarily welcome at a straight establishment, as the impression would be that we are "trying to take over." So why should straight people be permitted to inundate the few places we have?

I am not sure whether the problem is due to the increasing attractiveness of the gay discos, the novelty of going to a gay bar, or the desire of the bar owners to make as much money as possible; it could be a combination of all three factors. But as of late, when I go out to dance I feel more and more as though I'm on exhibition. I even overheard the term "damn faggot" between a man and a woman on the dance floor of a gay disco. Just who do some of these people think they are?

For far too long, gay men and women have not had a pleasant social establishment where they could act and be themselves. At last we now have a small, but growing number of places to go to. And we must not lose them.

We need a place for ourselves; a place where we can feel "at home," where we don't have to worry about straight ob-

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