News & Opinion
CONTACTStaffCAREER OPPORTUNITIESADVERTISE WITH USPRIVACY POLICYPRIVACY PREFERENCESTERMS OF USELEGAL NOTICE
© 2024 Pride Publishing Inc.
All Rights reserved
All Rights reserved
By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Private Policy and Terms of Use.
Way back in the mists of the last century I moved to Edinburgh to come out. I was 23 and anxious and exhilarated in the same breath. Edinburgh is a small city, and the gay community there was concentrated in a brief strip of caf's and bars, known locally as the pink triangle. At its heart was the Blue Moon (it's still there), and I remember the immense courage I had to summon to walk through the caf's doors'straight into the arms of David, an extroverted, confident linguistics major newly returned from a semester in San Francisco. He was the first gay friend I made, and the fact that he was partnered (as were all the friends he would introduce me to), challenged my own wretched stereotype of gay men as commitmentphobes. I recall, with shame now, how I would find myself reinforcing popular misconceptions by telling friends that while I was attracted to men, I could be 'romantic' only with women. This was nonsense, of course, but years of conditioning had taken their toll. It took many more years and several failed relationships to reverse its pernicious effects. (As I write this, my boyfriend and I are days away from celebrating our 10th anniversary.) The fact is that every straight person grows up surrounded by examples of functioning relationships; few gay people do. Although it's changing (thank you, Modern Family), we still don't have enough love stories in our culture. The absence is misleading. Of the 1,000 people polled for our
first annual sex and relationships survey, a little over half are in a relationship. So why is it the other half that gets all the attention? Because for a long time our relationships were covert, when they were possible at all, driven underground by stigma and hostility. Oscar Wilde was a brilliant man, but a poor role model. His dismal trial and lonely demise have haunted generations of gay men, a cautionary tale with a repulsive message: The penalty for your kind of love is rejection and death. Given the circumstances, it's extraordinary that gay men and women were able to develop healthy relationships at all; the fact that they always have is a testament to our perseverance.
It's not often you get to talk to people about love, but when you do, the experience can be humbling. As we put this issue together there were moments when I felt profoundly grateful to be gay, for it seemed that in the struggle for legitimacy we have truly learned to value our relationships and families as the miracles they are. To quote Rodney Hill, father of Catherine Opie's 9-year-old son, Oliver ('The Opie Bunch'), 'the idea that I could become a grandparent someday was just flabbergasting.' Like many others, Hill grew up in the 1980s when 'family values' was a code for exclusion and our relationships were conducted in the shadow of AIDS. No one in this issue summons that era more eloquently than our cover stars Tom Ford and Richard Buckley ('Tom and Richard Forever') whose first few dates were squeezed in between hospital visits to dying friends. And yet AIDS was also the catalyst for marriage equality, spurring a new generation of activists determined to make sure that we reach a day when people like Edie Windsor ('When Edie Met Thea') will never again have to go through the pain and distress of nursing a partner through ill health and death only to suffer the ignominy and financial hardship of having a 44-year relationship invalidated by the law. This issue emerged as a response to a series of gay teen suicides last fall that galvanized Dan Savage's It Gets Better campaign, but if there's one thing we learned from the results of our survey, it's that the youngest respondents were likely to be the most liberated when it comes to marriage (some 80% desire it) and having children. It may, in fact, be the first generation that doesn't find the concept of being grandparents 'flabbergasting.' If we are not quite there yet, we get closer every year. Happy Valentine's Day.
Want more breaking equality news & trending entertainment stories?
Check out our NEW 24/7 streaming service: the Advocate Channel!
Download the Advocate Channel App for your mobile phone and your favorite streaming device!
From our Sponsors
Most Popular
38 Male Celebs Who Did Full Frontal Scenes
November 17 2023 5:18 PM
These are all the celebrities Who came out as LGBTQ+ in 2023
December 31 2023 12:19 PM
29 LGBTQ+ celebs you can follow on OnlyFans
April 18 2024 1:00 PM
26 actors who showed bare ass in movies & TV shows
February 28 2024 1:50 PM
16 times male celebrities had to say they weren't gay
April 17 2024 11:57 AM
21 LGBTQ+ reality dating shows & where to watch them
April 03 2024 4:01 PM
15 Unforgettable Gay Kissing Scenes From TV & Movies
February 14 2024 10:20 AM
14 queens who quit or retired from drag after 'RuPaul's Drag Race'
April 04 2024 12:56 PM
40 steamy celebrity Calvin Klein ads we'll always be thirsty for
January 04 2024 10:54 AM
The 15 Best LGBTQ+ Movies of 2023
December 04 2023 10:32 AM
Watch Now: Advocate Channel
Trending Stories & News
For more news and videos on advocatechannel.com, click here.
Trending Stories & News
For more news and videos on advocatechannel.com, click here.
Latest Stories
Josh Cavallo opens up about the injury keeping him off the field
April 18 2024 1:17 PM
Relatable! Rihanna stans 'Drag Race' & Bravo just as much as we do
April 18 2024 12:36 PM
On Anal Sex Day, crack up with The Bottom's Digest
April 18 2024 10:40 AM
How Todrick Hall is giving back to the community
April 17 2024 8:35 PM
Here's who 'Drag Race' fans on social media want to see win season 16
April 17 2024 5:05 PM
Andy Cohen responds to all the recent Bravo & 'Housewives' chaos as more ensues
April 17 2024 3:56 PM
Not just JoJo Siwa: 30 songs made for an artist & released by another
April 17 2024 3:16 PM
How The Pride Store celebrates National Tea Day: A tale of two brews
April 17 2024 2:14 PM
Here's why Netflix's 'Baby Reindeer' is our new twisted queer obsession
April 17 2024 12:17 PM