- The following program is brought to you in part
by a special grant from the Friends of Channel 21, Inc.
♪ ♪
Gay people have long been America's invisible minority,
but all of that is beginning to change.
In the next half hour,
we will be exploring some of the responses
gay people are making to the discrimination and hostility
they have faced in society.
We will also look at some homosexuals
who have come out, openly accepting and affirming
their sexual orientation to themselves and to others.
In one way or another,
the gay response promises to affect us all, gay or straight.
The present challenge to traditional
sexual roles and stereotypes
is likely to have wide repercussions.
I'm having great difficulty in making any sort of integration
between my musical self, myself as the artist
and myself as a lesbian trying to relate socially,
politically and personally with the lesbian community.
It's very difficult for me
and I have to daily think about it,
talk to people, which is also difficult
because I do not know any other woman
who is in this music school,
in this institution where I have been,
where I have been for like six years
who can talk with me about
at perhaps a more advanced level,
what it is like to be a lesbian political feminist woman,
who is also a singer, who's a musician, an artist.
I'm a newspaperman by trade.
I'm interested in the world. I'm interested in events.
And I've spent my day, spend it with reviewing
events that are unfolding,
A lot of its bad news and a lot of it's good news.
My own life has its share of bad news and good news,
but coming out has meant more good news than bad for me.
At work, my sexuality really doesn't come into play.
I have a lot of time to, um--
I spend a lot of time in close contact
with a great number of people
and involves a lot of diplomacy
and I think they love me for who I am.
I think my sense of humor
shows more than my sexuality at work,
and I think that I relate to being my own gayness,
much the way I relate to my sense of humor.
That it's something that colors the way I live
and it's a part of me that I love a lot.
- The new openness is perhaps
the gay rights movement's most important achievement to date,
but gay people have always been around
even when they've been less visible.
In the historical evidence
and in the anthropological evidence of simple societies,
we find a ubiquitous quality about homosexual experience.
- We know that a number of historical figures
have been gay, although the list
is certainly much shorter than it should be.
Part of the problem is that to achieve recognition,
many gay people have felt the need
to disguise their sexuality,
but whether acknowledged or not
gay men and women have contributed prominently
to politics, literature, the arts,
and even professional sports.
What we're dealing with a variety of human experience,
which has not, despite a great deal of oppression
and a great deal of restriction,
either disappeared or simply gone underground.
- Walk me out? - Her bark is worse than her bite. Wait a minute, Kate.
- Homosexuality may not have gone completely underground,
but in the media, it has been either hidden or distorted.
Early Hollywood films, such as "Office Wife,"
made use of sexual role reversals or inversion for comic effect.
While the sexual orientation of the rather manly woman
in this film was left vague,
the resulting impression was to confirm gay stereotypes,
for homosexuality was widely and broadly believed
to be a case of role reversal.
- Cigar? - Not one of yours, thanks.
- Who you are. - You are you!
- What are you! - What do you want?
- Of course, the same kinds of comic role
reversals and stereotypes were used with men.
- You look perfectly the opposite in those clothes.
- These aren't my clothes. - Well, where are your clothes.
- I've lost my clothes!
- But why are you wearing these clothes!
- Because I just went gay all of sudden!
- Homosexuals have also been exploited in porno-erotic books
aimed at straight men.
These books often portray
a totally unrealistic lesbian couple.
The reader is sexually aroused
because he can fantasize himself as the savior,
who arrives to make a real woman out of one of the two.
The suppressive attitude is possible
because many men falsely and fearfully believe
that a sexual and emotional involvement
between women is incomplete, unless a man is involved.
♪ ♪
- Positive portrayals of gay people
have begun to appear most recently
under mounting pressure from the gay community.
While stereotypes are still common,
more realistic gay characters are also appearing.
One film, "A Very Natural Thing"
is not typical of recent Hollywood efforts.
It is both a low budget and limited distribution film,
but it's frank celebration of gay love makes it a landmark.
-Not at all, but I feel it.
I know I shouldn't ask, but still, it's nothing.
- Look, we enjoy each other, right?
We have fun together and that's all.
Love means never having to say you're in love.
- A group of Madison gay people discuss how the issues
raised in this program affect their lives.
- Here we are let into--
One thing that's really important is
having to go and look for role models.
Having to go and find out and looking in books
and watching movies and having the immediate reaction that,
"Well, I'm not like that.
Is it really like that?"
- Do I really have to be like that?
-Exactly. - To be a homosexual, yes.
- Well, geez, how am I going to decide if I'm butch or fem?
You know.
- With a lack of information
and all you have is some negative feedback,
some stereotypes from the general public
or bathroom remarks,
you get the idea that while you simply can't be that way
because you know you're not sick and you know that
you're not a monster and yet these people are,
so therefore you must not be gay.
And so like you withdraw back into the closet.
- Yeah, it's enormously important for people
who are just beginning to realize their sexual orientation
to have a support group of real live people,
not paper stereotypes, to give them an idea
of both of the variety of the gay experience.
It's just as varied as the straight experience.
- If the challenge to stereotypes
is a dominant theme of the gay response,
an equally important theme has been
that gay is good, not sinful.
The Christian and Jewish faiths
generally view homosexual practice as a sin,
condemned in the Bible.
But many gay people have left the church as a consequence.
Others, as represented by this
interdenominational gay service in Chicago have organized
to change their churches' stance on homosexuality.
They are opposed by fundamentalist ministers
like Reverend Warren Heckman of Madison, Wisconsin
who offers guidance toward a more normal sexual lifestyle.
- So consequently, I would like to be like Jesus Christ
in reaching out with love and concern to my fellow man,
whether they might be a thief,
whether they might be someone who has been in prison,
whether they might be someone who is homosexual.
- Homosexuality, in the first place,
is as morally neutral a state as is heterosexuality,
regardless of the ways in which psychiatrists have been confused
and divided about the subject of homosexuality.
They now, certainly, believe that homosexuality,
experienced by homosexual persons,
as a given, psychologically and morally.
Homosexuality can, therefore in no way,
can be compared to specific act of sin.
- I guess probably my opinion and my conviction
with regard to homosexuality is strictly from the Bible.
For example, in I Corinthians 6, verses 9-12,
the apostle Paul wrote there to the Corinthian church.
Let me just skim through a few of these phrases,
he speaks there saying that,
"The wicked will not inherit the Kingdom of God.
"We're not to be deceived, neither the sexually immoral,
"nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes,
"nor homosexual offenders, nor thieves, nor the greedy,
"nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor swindlers,
"will inherit the Kingdom of God."
- The Bible can be used to prove
just about anything you want to prove.
The fact is that the scriptures have been badly misused,
as well as mistranslated and the whole process
of interpreting scripture throughout history
with regard to homosexuals and homosexuality
is probably the worst abuse of scriptures.
- In the Bible, we find instances in the relationship
let us of say, of Ruth and Naomi,
which give off very strong indications of lesbian love.
In the experience of David and Jonathan in the Book of Samuel
we find strong indications, once again,
of a homosexual experience.
And even when the Bible condemns Sodom,
Sodom was not considered reprehensible
because of a sexual aberration.
- For instance the Sodom story
is now seen by most Biblical scholars
for what it was intended to be,
that is a story about inhospitality.
In fact, indeed, therefore, the church,
the churches who reject the homosexual
are probably guilty of the sin of Sodom
since they are evicting of the stranger
and abusing the stranger.
- I think it's perfectly clear
that in the writings of the early church fathers
and in the earliest Christian texts,
homosexuality was strongly condemned.
But you must remember that all sexual activity
outside of the most restricted kind,
within the framework of a marriage, was condemned.
You're talking about a religion
which in its roots is basically anti-sexual
and which has always suspected pleasures
that could not be circumscribed
within the framework of a religious life
as it was defined by the early Christians.
I think it's important to point out
that in other religious experiences,
the Islamic for example, we find no such hostility.
The Koran says nothing that is hostile about homosexuality
nor do we find it in Confucianism in China.
- The history of the homosexuals' rejection
by the church has in recent years sparked
collective action by gay ministers and parishioners.
They seek both an acknowledgement
of the gay lifestyle as morally sound
and of their rights to equal treatment in the church.
The Chicago Consortium of Gay Ministers includes
representatives from most of the national gay church groups.
The largest groups are Integrity,
a group within the Episcopal Church,
and a group called Dignity in the Catholic Church.
Other gay groups such as the Presbyterian Gay Caucus
are increasingly active.
- The various gay religious groups in this country
began to emerge around 1968 on the west coast.
And at first they were small,
didn't seem to attract much attention,
but within the past, oh, seven years
they have grown until they have become
perhaps one of the major aspects of the gay movement as a whole.
- Non-gay people have related to our caucus
and many of them have had to be as careful
as the gay people do in identifying their affiliation
because of the tremendous homophobia in the church
and the tremendous fear that, which is a very real fear,
that their positions within the church will be jeopardized.
- I suppose if I were going to summarize
the purpose of these groups in a word,
it would be to say that here you have a group of Christians
who despite all of the persecution leveled at them
by the church over the centuries, have chosen to stay.
And why have they chosen to stay?
I think it's because they've decided to take
the gospel seriously in all its fullness.
And especially they have decided to take seriously
the idea that the gospel is universal,
that it extends to all women and all men
and that any attempt to put a limit on that is really
an attempt to put a limit on the grace of God for his people.
- I find it difficult to walk into a church
and feel at home [laughter] because of the whole,
because of all these pronouncements that have come out.
I feel very ill at ease even though I have realized
that my Christian upbringing has had a lot to do with
shaping some of my basic moral values.
- Well I find it interesting that the churches,
and of course mostly we're talking about
the fundamentalist Christian churches,
they seem to be the most vociferous
on the issue of homosexuality.
- And the least informed.
- Well, informed is one thing, theology is another. - Yeah, really.
- All the information that they need is that there's a homosexual,
you know, and then they turn to Leviticus.
And it's always been interesting to me
that these Christian churches would rely so heavily
on the wrathful, Old Testament chapters
and pretty much ignore the whole doctrine of love
that comes across fairly strongly in the New Testament.
- I can't be kind to the church on any ground,
mainly because the ethic of love,
whether you're using the Old Testament
or the New Testament to measure it,
has often been interpreted as you love somebody sufficient
that you can change them so that they can be happy.
[group chuckling]
- And this is how I most often see the church
interpreting love toward the homosexual.
And what I think of constantly,
when I think of the church and homosexuality,
is guilt, is making people guilty
and unhappy and miserable.
- Putting homosexuality into the sphere of morality,
in which it does not belong, the church is saying,
traditionally at any rate, is saying you have to choose
between being a Christian
and acting on your sexual orientation,
which is like saying I have to choose between
being a Christian and being five feet six inches tall.
- The advent of psychology as a respected discipline
might have countered religious dogma on homosexuality,
but instead the new behavioral scientists
accepted the stereotypes and reinforced sin with sickness.
Recently, however, psychiatrists and psychologists have
reexamined their view of homosexuality.
- The American Psychiatric Association
has a significant role in defining mental disorders.
One of those mental disorders, in the past,
has been defined as homosexuality.
This underwent some study a few years ago
and as a result of that study,
a committee of the American Psychiatric Association
recommended that homosexuality itself
be dropped as an official diagnosis.
The social stigma that continues to accompany
a homosexual orientation results in many persons
concealing their personal preference.
As a result, probably no study anywhere really accurately
captures the numbers of persons.
It is clear that it is a sizable minority.
The estimates at times have been as high as ten percent.
- The official positions of psychiatry and psychology
have changed recently, but many gay people are still
reluctant to seek counselling from straight psychiatrists
because their reputation for treating
homosexuality as an illness.
A number of alternative counselling
and social service referral centers have sprung up
around the country to serve the gay community.
Madison, Wisconsin has several
staffed mainly by gay people themselves.
Lesbian Switchboard is one such center.
- You know, we don't put any heavy trips on anybody.
We don't-- We give a lot of support
to the lesbians in the community.
I would say when somebody comes in here, and has questions
about lesbianism, we try to be real non-biased.
We try to be real informative.
We try to let them talk it out
and for them to kind of come to some decisions on what is,
what is it that they're trying to find out.
What are they identifying with?
Where are these fears coming from?
How can we help them with those fears?
We are not politically-- We do not advocate lesbianism.
We're here to help the people who do come to have questions.
- Madison's Gay Center, like the Lesbian Switchboard,
provides counselling and related services,
but to a predominantly gay male clientele.
- A lot of straight counselors are afraid of gay people.
They think gay people are strange and different
and they think that they have unusual sorts of problems
or that the homosexuality is the problem.
And a gay person can come here and talk to other gay people
who are very accustomed to the idea of being gay
and say, "Look, I've got this problem with my life
"that may or may not be associated with sexuality
and I want to talk about it."
And I'm perfectly comfortable saying to a client,
"Look, is your sexuality any problem to you?"
And if the person says, "No." I say, "Great."
"It's good to hear.
What's the problem?"
And very often, though not always,
straight counselors are not willing to do that.
- Madison's Moon Tree Counseling Center
serves both gay and straight women,
but once more, the key ingredient for gay clients is support.
- One reason a lesbian is more likely to come to the Moon Tree
than go to an M.D. or Ph.D. therapist is,
I think still, traditional therapists take the orientation
toward lesbians or homosexuals in general
that there is something wrong or askew
when it comes to their sexuality.
And I don't believe that, that sexuality is something
that all human beings want to integrate more into their lives
and for some reason our culture does not encourage that.
So when a woman, a lesbian, comes,
generally she's fairly comfortable with her sexuality.
- The impact of supportive gay counseling
along with psychiatry's new acceptance of homosexuality
means that for a growing number of gay people
psychological oppression need not be
as crushing as it once was.
- I think it is an important thing
in the history of social movements
that homosexuals have begun to organize themselves
and to make their demands,
to make their demands for legal equality, to be sure,
but also to insist that the very culture
that generates homosexuality, that is the desire, for example,
perhaps to live differently,
not necessarily inscribe within the framework
of a traditional family existence,
although that may not be so bizarre.
That it may not be so heinous.
That all of that means that homosexuality,
homosexuals I think for the first time
have begun to come out of that kind of self-effacement
and that kind of tremendous self-contempt
which has enabled them to at least present a program,
to organize for a program, to say that they
have not only a right to live as they choose to live
but that they have something to offer in a society.
- For a long time, the independent standard
of personal adjustment has been heterosexuality.
And that without any-- not some independent measure
against which gay people and straight people might do
relatively good or, you know, better or worse when compared.
They have simply been comparing us automatically
to a standard of heterosexuality as the norm.
- The reason for that automatic comparison
to a heterosexual standard,
seems to me that since homosexuality was closeted,
was hidden, your average shrink did not know homosexuals
as anything other than patients.
If you were to come up with a theory of heterosexuality
based on the population of people who went to see shrinks,
I think you could make a pretty good case
for heterosexuality being abnormal.
- The most tangible aspects of the gay response
are the proposed changes in the laws.
The Consenting Adult Laws are aimed at legalizing
the private sex lives of gay people
and removing the major rationale
for discrimination in employment and housing.
In eighteen states, indicated here in the shaded area,
oppressive sex laws have been repealed.
About 40 cities and counties
have also passed non-discrimination ordinances.
But in the remaining states,
gay people can still be legally barred
from an enormous number of unrelated jobs
that require what is described as "good moral character."
The list is long and varies from state to state.
These are but a few.
Attorney Karla Dobinski speaks about the problem.
- I think some of the most common legal problems
that gay people face are related to common things
like jobs and housing.
Another problem for women and for some men would be child custody.
If a person's gay, there's still some feeling in the country generally
that fact on itself means there's an unfit parent,
which obviously isn't true.
And that's changing but it still is a problem.
One of the major problems, though, is the fact that
their relationships aren't recognized.
So, when someone dies, if they haven't had a will
and a very clear, strong will,
their property won't pass on to the person
who would be most likely to receive it.
Things like visitation in jails or in hospitals
when someone's in trouble is curtailed
because of the unrecognized relationship.
There's a vicious cycle.
There are people who say homosexuality,
because of the Bible, because of religion,
because I don't like it, is immoral,
therefore we're going to put laws on the books against it
and those laws reinforce the next generation saying,
"Well, if there's laws against it, it must be wrong."
- In Wisconsin, where repressive sex laws are still on the books,
gay people have been lobbying for change.
Representative David Clarenbach, among others,
has introduced consenting adult legislation
with the backing of the gay community.
- I'll be introducing this legislation this session
because there is sexual repressive laws
on our books in Wisconsin.
I think our society generally is very hung up about sex
and those laws reflect those hang ups.
I think it's high time legislatures started dealing
with the realities of the situation,
that people are having sex against the state laws
and as a result the state laws ought to be changed.
- I really don't believe that legislation, anymore,
is um-- is so-- is so-- is a legal question
so much as it really is a political question.
The real issue, in my estimation,
in terms of its passage, is whether the majority
of our citizens are willing to accept homosexual,
as well as heterosexual, freedom.
I don't perceive that the vast majority of our citizens to say,
I don't perceive that even a minority of our citizens
are prepared to still accept it.
- I think that the best argument that can be made
to comfort those legislators
that aren't comfortable with supporting this legislation
is simply that it is a matter of individual rights.
That government does not have a right to intrude in your bedroom
and tell you what you can and can't do
in the privacy of your own home.
And I think that's the most useful argument that can be made.
- A lot of my friends who are in the closet think that it would be--
They'd lose a lot of their security by coming out.
Well, I think they'd gain a great deal of security,
because you know how you're going to react to situations.
There's no having to think twice about it.
In any event, there's more social space that way
and things become easy after a while, I think.
- It's funny because for me it was a little different coming
from a really different culture.
After telling my male friends, they kept on insisting
that I wasn't really homosexual,
that it was some sort of a phase that I was going through.
And they would always say things like, you know,
when a woman went by, look at that woman.
- And you said why? [laughter]
- When I finally have come out,
it's like I can really worry about the things in life
that I think are really worth worrying about.
- Afraid of the worries. [laughter]
- Freeing of energies. That's what it means to me.
- And really a whole lot of how people react to you
depends on how comfortable you are with yourself, I found.
So if I'm really comfortable with being gay,
people aren't apt to get so freaked by it.
The preceding program was brought to you in part
by a special grant from the Friends of Channel 21, Inc.