PAGE2Q-Notes T October 1992
Index
News
CRC endorses anti-gay discrimination
resolution 4
Chambers fighting own denomination 1
Gov. Campbell's bloody hands cleaned
by court 1
Initiatives target gays 1
Lesbian health issues are focus of conference... 14
MCSP continues Casino Night investigation 4
P-FLAG produces national PSA 1
P-FLAG and Time Out host workshop 15
Sting operations move to airport area 14
Womyn discuss gender policy at
music festival 12
Features
AIDS Commission loses Magic 16
Charlotte's gay and lesbian film series announces
third season 12
Columns
Qassifieds 25
Community Businesses 22
For the Record 23
Fun and Gaymes i... 19
GLAAD Notes 10
National Notes 9
One of Our Own 22
Organizations 27
Out and About 26
Out of the Darkness 4
Personals 25
QFYl 23
Quips and Quotes 11
The Soft Spot 17
Sounds Good 16
GAYANI
PRESS A
D LESBIAN^
5SOCIATION
Q-Notes
Vol. 7, No.lO, October 1992
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P.O. Box 221841
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Editor David Stout
Associate Editor David Prybylo
Associate Editor Dan Van Mourik^.
Copy Editor/Typesetter Arlene Robbins
Administrative Manager Toni Tatu
Production Frank Dalrymple
Classifieds & Personals Larry Jackson
Photographer Justine
Contributing Writers: D.J. Instant T, The Dalmatian,
Mark Huffstetler, Ann Michele, David Prybylo, Gordon
Rankin, David Stout, Toni Tatu, Dan Van Mourik, Jim
Yarbrough
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Beginning to feei better
Out. To some of us the word can strike
terror in our hearts, paralizing us with the fear
that others might discover our secret lives. To
others, it is the battle cry of militant gay
activism, empowering.us with pride and for
ever ending our shame. To still others, it is
part of the arsenal of political struggle, arm
ing us with the means to reveal those who
would work against us. However we might
respond to the word, whatever connotations
we might attach to it, ‘out’ remains a little
word with a titanic power and is arguably the
most controversial in the gay and lesbian
vocabulary. Nevertheless, few of us would
find it easy to define.
October 11 is National Coming Out Day,
so it is appropriate for us to consider what that
means to us and for us - especially in this
election year when gay men and lesbians
have gained the attention of both political
parties in unprecedented ways.
Coming out is not a one-time act. Though
most of us could point to a particular date as
the time when we came out, the reality is that
all we can truly point to is a date when we
began to come out. For most of us, this is the
time when we participated in our first overtly
gay or lesbian activity - attending a gay bar or
telling a friend or relative about our orienta
tion for example.
Although we often refer to coming out as
an act, it is perhaps better defined as a pro
cess. Most of us discover that we have
different sexual and affectional desires dur
ing adolesence (though we can reflect on our
childhoods and recognize homosexual
thoughts and feelings we could not define at
the time). This is a period of conflict as we
weigh the directives of society to conform
against our internal need for same-gender
affection. We deny (“this is just a phase”), we
negotiate (“if I go to church more often, God
will make me straight”), we get angry (“what
did I do to deserve this?”), we grieve (“I’ll
never have a normal life”), and finally we
accept. And when we do, we begin to feel a
little better.
Sometime after this internal coming out,
we begin to come out to others. We tell our
friends and relatives - usually in that order -
and we start the gradual process of becoming
gay or lesbian. We learn about drag queens
and leather studs, deisel dykes and lipstick
lesbians. We go to gay discos and read gay
novels. We meet other men and women who
feel as we do and we begin to make the
thousands of adjustments to our lives and our
personalities as we leai’n how and where we
fit in. And when we do, we begin to feel a
little better.
For some the process of coming out is
terrifying and debilitating. We shield our
hidden lives from view, refusing to disclose
our true natures to others. We don’t tell our
families because we’re protecting them. We
don’t tell our non-gay friends because they
wouldn ’ t understand. We don ’ t tell our bosses
and co-workers because we would lose our
jobs. We keep our closet doors tightly bolted
and spend our lives hoping and praying that
nobody finds the key. And each time some
one comes close to discovering the truth we
feel worse.
For the rest of us, the process of coming
out is heady and liberating. Each new person
we tell, each act - big and small - of restruc
turing our perception of reality so that it is
more in line with our way of thinking is seen
as a victory. As we shed the horrible manacles
of our own homophobic upbringing we dis-
coveraricher, fuller, more loving world. And
we feel a little better.
Most of us begin the process of coming out
because we are tired of living lives that are
clearly incomplete. We are aching for the
same kind of love and acceptance we see our
straight peers receiving, so we enter the gay
subculture in search of more satisfying lives.
It doesn’t take long, however, before we
discover that the gay subculture is just as
varied, jil’st as layered, and in some cases just
as rigid as mainsU’eam society. Our perfect
lover has not been waiting for us to arrive at
the disco, we do not suddenly become the
center of attention (unless, of course, we have'
perfect bodies, in which case the attention
thing quickly gets out of hand), and while we
might feel more comfortable in the company
of other gays, we discover something new to
worry about; being openly gay or lesbian.
Most of us adjust to life in the gay subcul
ture, but we soon find that we must lead dual
lives. We are out to our friends and relatives,
but we remain in the closet on the job. Many
- if not most - of us remain in this plateau of
coming out for a long time. Few of us,
though, if given the option would actually
choose to live this way. It is a taxing and
dizzying wire to walk, and we begin to resent
a society that forces us to live this way.
Worse, we begin to resent the voices of those
farther along the ‘out’ spectmm calling on us
to move forward.
Those who have progressed beyond this
plateau, however, tell us that coming out
further only increases the quality of life. Call
ing a halt to the double life, they say, frees one
to pursue more productive goals and en
hances one’s sense of self-worth. Taking the
next step - whatever that may be - will, they
say, make us feel a little better.
Considering what we’ve already been
through, I see no reason to doubt them.
-David Prybylo
Associate Editor
The State of Gay
More than one person has predicted the
breakup of the United States. Not all agree on
just how the states should be divided—along
racial, religious, cultural or political lines or
some combination thereof—^but most see each
state deciding for itself just what type of
“country” it wants to become. Minnesota
may be an all-white state, Nebraska may be
Catholics only, Georgia an all-black state.
New Hampshire all Irish or Arizona all Re
publicans.
In the new order, we could have the State
of Gay. I doubt we’d meet with any opposition
with so many wanting to ship us off some
where anyway. Oops! That should be the
State of Gays and Lesbians. Or could we
compromise with the State of Homosexuals?
But, no, that leaves out bisexuals. Okay. The
State of Gqys, Lesbians and Bisexuals. But
what about transsexuals? And straights who
like us more than their own kind? And cross
dressers? And... All right, we’ll need to work
on the name.
Once we’ve crossed that hurdle, we could
pass laws that make closet doors obsolete and
all live in harmony. Except, of course, for
those who don’t believe drag queens and
dykes are “true gays.” And lesbians with a
“no penis policy” who exclude gay men from
their gatherings, yet would be highly of
fended if men did the same. And the “A” gays
who place themselves above everyone else.
And all the homosexuals who think trans
sexuals are very sick people. And all those
who believe bisexuals are living a lie. And
those who still view homosexuality as a men
tal illness and believe we should all be in
therapy because we’re actually straight. And...
Hmmmm... Never mind.
—Dan Van Mourik
Associate Editor
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