The Castro Theater in San Francisco
“O, yes,/ I say it plain,/ America never was America to me,/ And yet I swear this oath— America will be!”
Despite the fact that Langston Hughes, in that famous poem, voices the legitimate grievances of African Americans, American Indians, and immigrants of all types, there is nevertheless one downtrodden type of people that he fails to mention: homosexuals. But that sort of “oversight,” that kind of neglect, is so common throughout our history that it can be quite easy to simply overlook it. We shouldn’t. And it’s not my intention to single out Hughes. Rather, what I want to point out is, first of all, our country’s historical detestation for homosexuals, and, secondly, what (if anything) that aspect of our history might tell us about our current moment.
But, to be clear, this is a blog post. In fact, it’s a personal blog post. I’m relying almost entirely on memory. There is little here other than my personal perspective. This statement is not a thesis, an essay, or a research paper. I am not even attempting to marshal facts in favor of my argument. I am, rather, sharing my own insights, and they are insights which I genuinely believe to be valid. Others may disagree or perhaps some will remember things differently: that’s fine. But I am here presenting the world according to me, and, if you were gay in that world, you were more than just an Invisible Man; you effectively never even existed in the first place.
There is a lot of commentary, if not a general consensus, that our history with slavery is either taught poorly or just outright censored. But that has not been my own experience. It is not my intention to challenge the veracity of the experience that others claim to have had. I am merely stating my own truth. And, in that truth, I grew up with a knowledge of our dark past with African Americans. I cannot remember a time when I didn’t know that many of our founding fathers were slaveholders. I distinctly remember learning about the infamous Three-fifths Compromise. I very clearly learned that the Civil War was obviously fought over slavery. Perhaps red states teach things differently, but in the blue, northeastern state where I grew up, there was no prevarication that I can recall on any of these topics.
And, while I’m willing to acknowledge regional differences, the world that I recall was not, in fact, limited just to my own corner of the country. I remember, for example, the national broadcast of the TV miniseries Roots. That series reached tens of millions of families throughout the country, was nominated for dozens of Emmys, and presented what possibly remains the most searing, graphic, and terrifying portrayal of slavery that I have ever seen. To be clear: that broadcast took place in the 1970s! I later read the book version of Roots and found that to be extraordinary as well (but I’m not going into any of the controversies about the author). And it remains at least somewhat unclear to me why that sort of long ago “reckoning” (to use some modern parlance) appears to have either been forgotten or is just oddly overlooked (although I hint at some possible answers below).
While untold millions of us were learning about slavery in our schools and on our TVs, however, there actually was a topic that really did get completely censored into absolute oblivion: homosexuality. Unlike the well-covered topic of slavery, there was never any class material of any kind, not even in health classes, that addressed the topic of homosexuality or even so much as acknowledged its existence. Unlike the award winning television shows about slavery, there were no tv shows, movies, or books that I encountered which portrayed any sort of homosexual activity. The very idea was beyond unthinkable. There were, of course, famous homosexuals who were mentioned in school. But their homosexuality was never acknowledged. For example, I remember a High School English class that taught us about Walt Whitman. But our textbooks did not include any of the explicitly gay Whitman poems. Our textbooks could and did teach about slavery; they did not say so much as a word about homosexuality.
To be gay in that day and age was to be viewed, I will assert, in a similar manner to how we view racists today. Just a very few decades ago, if one were to announce that they were gay the results would be similar to what would happen today if someone were to walk into a graduate class at an elite, liberal university and announce that they were a proud and lifelong racist: all friendships would be immediately and irrevocably severed, all family ties would be irredeemably strained if not forever broken, all educational and professional prospects would instantly vanish, and one’s life would effectively be over (perhaps before it had barely even begun). Homosexuality simply was not countenanced in any way, shape, or form. How could it be an acceptable form of behavior when, for all intents and purposes, it didn’t even exist?
Now, at least some of the potential counter arguments are obvious. Perhaps the most obvious, in fact, comes down to one name: Harvey Milk. After all, didn’t he become the first openly gay man elected to political office (in San Francisco) all the way back in the 1970s? And, on top of that, didn’t the first Pride parades get off the ground years before Milk’s election? Yes, all of that is certainly true; but, here’s the thing: I never heard anything about any of those historical developments at the time: not a word. I am, after all, talking about a world that had no Internet. So how would I have heard about those milestones of gay rights? There very well may have been some news coverage, but news coverage then was not the kind of 24/7 onslaught that we are accustomed to now. So it was very easy to miss certain stories unless they received sustained and high profile coverage in multiple publications. But that’s just not the way homosexuality was covered. Not until AIDS.
That massive wave of death, that pandemic of the 1980s, was the first period of time that I can personally remember where widespread discussion of homosexuality actually became at least somewhat unavoidable. But only somewhat. And even then: the neglect and condemnation of those who were suffering was a wonder to behold. When homosexuals finally did gain some measure of visibility, it was only because they were literally dying in the streets, and even then the minimal response from most politicians and commentators was heavily laced with judgment of the homosexual lifestyle. The message that I recall from that time spelled out two options: continue to accept your nonexistence and be miserable, or live your gay life openly and die. Welcome to America (it never was America to me).
But haven’t things changed? A lot of people today would insist that the gay rights story is one of the great victories of our age. In a breathtakingly short time, homosexuals have gained an astonishing measure of acceptance. Well, to a large extent I would say that such estimations are highly subjective and relative. Things are always changing, yet somehow they always seem to stay the same. Breakthroughs are almost always followed by setbacks or backlashes, so much so that the original breakthroughs sometimes begin to fade from memory altogether (see the reference to Roots above). And some questions are never resolved. Abortion, obviously, is one such question. And so is gay marriage. Any advocate for gay rights who declares victory on the subject of gay marriage probably means well, but, I’ll be blunt, they are a fool. It took the Right fifty years to effectively fight back against Roe v Wade; they will be fighting at least that long against Obergefell v. Hodges. And, at some point, the culture will shift, the balance of power will tilt, and when they finally sense an opening, they will pounce. And they may win. Gay marriage is as secure as our free and fair elections. We take all these things for granted at our extreme peril.
After all, how could our society possibly have changed so dramatically in such a short period of time? My own theory is simple: it didn’t. How could homosexuals go from despised untouchables to beloved members of society more or less, historically speaking, overnight? Simple: they didn’t. Human nature simply does not change that fast. Prejudice and bigotry simply does not fade that quickly. It just doesn’t. And I remember the all-pervasive hate I grew up with. It was real. And it still is.
So what actually happened? Why did polls start to suddenly indicate majority support for gay marriage? I personally feel it’s more or less a quirk of historical timing. We happen to be passing through a period of time when the Left has won control of most if not all of our major cultural institutions: universities, publishing houses, newspapers, entertainment industries, etc. And the relatively small group that controls these institutions happens to be the same relatively small group of Liberals that believes in gay rights. Public opinion then follows the coverage and pro-gay message pushed by these institutions. In other words, people didn’t change, but they learned that they had to pretend as if they had changed. (Yes, I realize some of these observations are similar to Right Wing talking points, but I’m leaving out the hysteria.) And If, by some historical misfire, conservatives had wound up in control of our cultural institutions (much in the same way they managed tremendous political success in the Senate and the Supreme Court), homosexuals would have never been granted so much visibility, gay marriage would have very likely remained unpopular, and most people would have never felt the need to pretend otherwise.
Obviously, recent events (such as the passage of the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” Bill) seem to vindicate at least part of what I’m saying. And I personally have not been even the least bit surprised by these developments. Why would I be? America always was that way to me. But maybe, someday, America will be.
Nevertheless, I swear no oath. I’m just not as hopeful as Langston Hughes. Can you blame me?
