OutRight
by Dale Carpenter

A MOMENTOUS DECADE

Ten years of columns reflect an era of turmoil and victories

In the second of two parts, Dale Carpenter remembers a decade of writing for OutSmart with excerpts from his favorite columns.

Gay couples, having tasted the second-class legitimacy of domestic partnerships, will soon demand a first-class treatment they would not have dared to dream possible a few years before. —“California’s Partners Law is a Principled Compromise,” October 1999

Bill Clinton went to Los Angeles last month to speak about pain to the very same group of gay politicos he brought to tears seven years ago…. He told them, as he did in 1992, “I have a vision for America and you are part of it.” Why the audience did not burst out in uncontrollable laughter at that moment is one of the great political mysteries of the age. —“Pain and Clinton LaLa Land,” November 1999

It isn’t the powerless who show mercy, it’s the powerful. It isn’t the timid who forgive, it’s the self-confident. It isn’t the weak who have patience, it’s the strong. And it isn’t the victim who looks a killer in the eyes and says “Live,” it’s the victor. This movement is going to have to be merciful to those who have done it wrong. —“Shepard, Falwell, and the Future,” December 1999

For anyone who thinks gays should stand irredeemably apart from society—either because we ought to be outcasts or because we ought to be revolutionaries—this must have been a frustrating decade. The political causes that most defined our movement in the 1990s sought to weave gays into the fabric of American life. —“The Book That Started a Counter-Revolution,” January 2000

When the Supreme Court held that the Boy Scouts of America may exclude openly gay scoutmasters, many gay civil rights advocates howled. One writer said the result “lent legitimacy to the bigotry of … institutions all over America.” That’s one way to describe the function of the First Amendment. I prefer to think of it as something free people should cherish. —“The Scouts’ Rights—And Ours,” August 2000

The Log Cabin Republicans’ (LCR) endorsement of George Bush has drawn criticism from Fire Island to the Castro. Gay political groups, notably the Human Rights Campaign, blasted LCR. The critics not only disagreed with the endorsement but seemed dumbfounded by it. Yet even if Gore is objectively the better choice for gays, the endorsement of Bush advances gay equality. —“How Could They?” October 2000

For Clinton, gays were an expendable constituency. He threw us just enough sops (an administration appointment here, using the word “gay” in a speech there) to keep us quiet when he betrayed us. We accepted this deal because, like a battered spouse, we thought we’d never had it so good. Having tied ourselves so closely to this man, we sit beside the stench of his moral putrefaction, in need of a bath. —“Goodbye to Clinton,” February 2001

Personally, I’d rather have one openly gay person serving as the AIDS czar than a hundred appointees under Clinton, the most important of whom labored over patents, housing, and relations with the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. —“Defying Left and Right,” May 2001

I don’t think she understood homosexuality, but she knew all about devotion, having lived with the same man for almost 58 years. My partner was more than tolerated by Grandma, he was expected. He was part of us, the same as if he’d been my spouse. It wasn’t a matter of gay rights. It was a matter of family…. On April 19, Grandma died. The hands that raised three generations of children were so distorted by crippling arthritis at the end that I could barely look at them. The kind blue eyes that could see into your core were closed…. Some of these preachers and politicians who talk so much about family values wouldn’t have been worthy to stand in her presence. You’re lucky to get one good mom in life. I had two. My love to you, Grandma. —“Real Family Values,” June 2001

One year after Vermont enacted its civil unions law—the closest thing this country has ever had to gay marriage—the most remarkable thing is how unremarkable that year has been. No meteors have descended on Montpelier; no plague of locusts has stripped bare the maple trees; husbands have not left their wives for nubile male youths; wives have not abandoned their children for sapphic music festivals. A few more experiences like this, and we may get nationwide gay marriage one day. —“Our First Anniversary in Vermont,” September 2001

We are in this with everyone else. We jumped from the towers in desperation. We climbed the stairs to save others. We called our lover in a frenzied last, “I love you.” Our souls went up from the rubble. —“The Inferno and Us,” October 2001

To most gay Americans the U.S. is basically a good country that sometimes does bad things. To the antiwar gay left, however, this is basically a bad country that sometimes does good things. The war [in Afghanistan] has exposed the fundamental cleavage between them and the rest of us as never before. —“Follies of the Antiwar Gay Left,” December 2001

The First Amendment created gay America. For advocates of gay legal and social equality there has been no more reliable and important constitutional text. —“The First Amendment to the Rescue,” March 2002

Our success in the cultural and political battles erodes the basis for the very community that organized to fight those battles. We ought to see our fragmentation as a marker of progress, not as a reason for despair. It’s a sign we’re winning. —“What Unites Us?” August 2002

When Bush won the presidency, we were told he would never hire an openly gay person to a post in his administration and would repeal the executive order protecting gay federal employees from job discrimination. On its website, NGLTF even featured a mock “count” of Bush’s openly gay appointees starting with 0, which is where NGLTF imagined the count would stay. After a dozen or so openly gay Bush appointees, including an ambassador, the NGLTF counter is gone. The executive order is still there. —“The Sky Is Not Falling,” January 2003

War and anachronism were everywhere. Consider the very room in which the oral argument [in Lawrence v. Texas] occurred. You look up and see a marble Greek-inspired bas-relief featuring two large men seated beside one another. Draped in robes covering their privates, they are nearly naked from the waist up, revealing six-pack abs, chiseled pecs, and bulging biceps. To either side of them stand young, lithe, and even more scantily clad man servants. The young men’s athletic bodies face forward, but their heads are turned to gaze at groups of semi-nude, well-built, sword-bearing men, who stare back at them. It drips homoeroticism and bellicosity. Beneath this tableau, on March 26, 2003, the Supreme Court of the United States considered the constitutional fate of a law banning gay sodomy. —“Court Report,” May 2003

Never before have we adopted a constitutional amendment to limit the states’ ability to control their own family law. Never before have we amended the Constitution to restrict the ability of the democratic process to expand individual rights. This is no time to start. —“A Good Defense,” November 2003

Writing from the conservative side, Dale Carpenter began his column for Out-Smart in 1994, when he lived in Houston. Now residing in Minneapolis, Carpenter is a University of Minnesota Law School professor. Many of his referenced columns are archived at www.outsmartmagazine.com. Other past columns can be read at www.indegayforum.com.

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