A disturbed peace

Prophecies: Stonewall 10 years from now

By Brian McNaught

Prior to graduation, the eighth graders at the parochial school I attended traditionally made a list of prophecies about the future of different class members 10 years hence. We predicted, for instance, that Margo Morris, the

"come out."

Steve Endean, through the Gay Rights National Lobby, will have secured passage of a bill prohibiting discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and Alberta Savancozzi will leave the convent.

Rubyfruit Jungle, the Dave

table admitting to their heterosexual side. Paul Diederich and I will be talking to each other again.

Scott Kelly will seek out Sr. Digna and admit it was he who stole the dinger and major grant money will be awarded to national projects aimed at meet-

come out," all as celibate (but a couple of them will not be telling the truth).

The National Gay Task Force will have a membership of 60,000 and Sr. Digna will leave the convent.

A Bruce Lee-type will capture the attention of the gay commun-

I

quently to other countries to assist the growing international civil rights movement; the gay press will begin making a profit and I will finally be able to tell my folks what it is exactly I want to do with my life.

Alberta and Elaine will meet and fall in love; Scott Kelly will

class clown, would end up in jail. Kopay Story, Take Off the Masks ing the needs of elderly gays and ity and self-defense classes will admit he's bisexual and Margo

Aiberta Savancozzi, who claimed to be an Italian princess, we said would wind up in a convent. Scott Kelly, who stole the dinger out of the exchange bell and dropped it in Margo's bucket purse when Sr. Digna began her search, would continue to be a gigolo.

With the celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the modern Gay Civil Rights Movement, it is perhaps appropriate that we too make some predictions for 10 years down the line. After all, this anniversary of the Stonewall Revolt is not unlike a graduation. Even the most casual observer would have to admit that within the last few months we have

graduated into a new level of respectability. Time magazine's cover story declared we are the most fashionable folk in town. Masters and Johnson made

some mistakes in their recent report but not in announcing we generally have better, more inti-

mate sex than our straight friends; more than perhaps even Marabel Morgan. And, believe it or not, this morning I actually saw a television program which didn't warn parents about "the controversial nature" of the discussion prior to their presentation on homosexuality. Surely that must be considered a commencement into a new decade of growth! Why then shouldn't we too have our prophecies?

Now prophecies, you must understand, are not the result of committee vote. I should state from the very beginning that there were no women working with me on these predictions, nor blacks, Hispanics, disabled persons or members of the Socialist Workers Party. Prophets have to work alone, which is perhaps why they get more done but are rarely welcome in their own land.

It should also be noted that some prophecies are not easily understood and that it is only with time and a great deal of faith that they are comprehended. For instance, only Anita Bryant Green, with the prompting of her husband and minister, had the faith to see that the California drought, flood and mud slide were God's punishment for homosexuality as predicted by the prophet Isaiah who said in chapter 33, verse 24: "No one who dwells there will say 'I am sick'."

Most prophecies, however, are easily comprehended and it is these which I wish to share with you now. To get things started, I predict that in 10 years the "Gay Bob" doll will be a collector's item. The Massachusetts Secrstary of State, Elaine Noble will write a best seller and Don Embinder will hire me to host his television talk show.

Paul Gilbert will chaperone the gay couples at the 1949 Cumberland High School Junior Prom.

and Rock Hudson will finally

and The Front Runner will all have been made into movies. The Front Runner will be nominated for Academy Awards for Best Script Adaptation and Best Supporting Actor. Lily will open the envelope.

There will be a major number of Americans identifying themselves as bisexual, among them a group of lesbians and gay men who were previously uncomfor-

lesbians.

We will resolve forever the question: "Will the movement ever be unified?" and editors of gay newspapers will agree as to whether the "g" in gay should be capitalized.

Most major religious denominations will be conducting ceremonies for gay couples. One Roman Catholic Bishop and three Episcopal Bishops will

spring up throughout the country. Slow dancing will come back into fashion on Fire Island. Lesbian couples and gay male couples will live together in households with elderly and young straight people. No one in the country will be cooperating with the effort to change to the metric system.

American gay and lesbian leaders will begin traveling fre-

will get out of jail and enter the convent.

All in all, they will be exciting years for all of us. The country will mature sexually, we will all regain our sense of humor and hope, the Florida Citrus Commission will hire the Village People to sell their product and I will again be able to drink orange juice.

A little craving never hurt anybody

By Reed O'Brien

In the last year or so there has been a virtual explosion of gay fiction now that we have become worthy of the attention of the major publishing houses ever searching for major profits. New titles and reissues of old ones are suddenly flooding the market.

Clearly, this new attention has

Dancer, it is self-consciousness.

To cluck over the apparent amorality is to miss the point entirely.

The lives we see in Dancer from the Dance are tragic but they are not necessarily sad. This notion, of course, that gays have to be sad -while, of course,

straights live only on primrose lanes is just homophobic crap. We all know the quiet desperation that haunts those suburban streets, the enormous

had its effect on gay writing which has quickly -eagerly -matured. Gay fiction, in fact, seems to be well ahead of its community in striking out beyond the parochialism of the tragedies that are lived in those homosexual sub-culture. The novels are no longer "just gay." But the gay press continues to treat them as such siphoning off some shallow, glib lessons about the good/bad of gay life.

We are a tragic people. Actually, I am proud of our tragedy. It's part of our bond with one another. And tragedy is ennobling. It's part of our beauty. We are heroes. I, for one, don't ever wish to see a portrayal of some sweet and ordinary gay life. It is the extraordinary in our lives, after all, that makes them valuable. In Dancer from the Dance, Andrew Holleran has done more to redeem us all in presenting his outlandish tale than if he's concocted some innocuous image of ordinariness and gay domesticity. Who wants to be domesticated? It's a lie and it's not even good PR.

"Dancer is existential without being existentialist. It's almost a classical tragedy. The illusion is the real. You know it's illusion, you know you're being had each time but you have to do it anyway if you're to live. You may to a degree choose your illusion--for gays, life is commonly a costume party but being elective, however, does not make it any less real and compelling. Dancer from the Dance is a highly ambitious novel. It reaches for a universal statement and in a way it is no more gay than is Sartre's The Age of Reason a story of heterosexuality though its motifs are mainly heterosexual.

-

Holleran's characters are people who live at a high pitch, at metaphysical peaks of enthrallment and in the full knowledge of the illusion of enthrallment. I

there is an identifiable theme to

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neat, shuttered houses, and any way if straight life ever approached its ideal, they'd all die of dullness. (Straight, to me,

means far more than heterosexual just as gay surpasses homosexual.) I cannot disown the people of Dancer with their preoccupation with beauty and the passionate pursuit of it and why should I? They don't do so badly. Nobody comes to a tragic end, all go on except one who dies the peaceful death we all hope for.

The novel will probably not get

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the attention it deserves and likely will not win the prizes it merits because it's gay. wholeheartedly and unspeakably gay. Perhaps I have over-praised the book because it speaks so well drawing from my community. But I think not. Its a novel I would give to anyone and say. yes, this is the gay life. These craving men yearning to live while they live are me, too. And if you don't share this craving, it is you who should be ashamed, not me. Your ordinariness is your sin. Repent!

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