Lawrence Brings It All Back Home
IN STRIKING DOWN the Texas law that made consensual sex in private between members of the same sex a criminal act, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, speaking for the majority…More
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Case Against Marriage Equality Implodes
Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in his dissenting opinion that the exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage rests on “pretty shaky grounds.” Though I rarely agree with Scalia, when he’s right, he’s right.
MoreMarriage Just Lets the State Back In
WHAT DO YOU DO after you’ve won one of the most important Supreme Court cases in decades and shoved the state, kicking and screaming, out of your bedroom? Apparently,…More
How the UN Can Advance Gay Rights
With its ability to impose individual criminal responsibility for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, the ICC represents a momentous advance in international justice.
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New Gene Theory Rests on Bad Science
Fundamentally, [Michael] Bailey believes that gender identity and sexual orientation (in men) are predominantly determined by congenital factors. These could include in utero hormonal molding of critical areas of the brain, but for the underlying cause Bailey strongly leans towards genes.
MoreAppalachian Subculture
“Hillbilly” and “queer” are two words that oppressed groups have tried to reclaim. Being a member of both subcultures is often a double burden, one that many mountain people are eager to escape.
MoreAt the Michigan Womyn’s Music Fest
The Michigan Womyn’s Music festival was by 1982 thriving on 650 acres of privately owned land, where the separatist ideal of uninhibited women-only space took root. Making the pilgrimage to the fern forest where one could party without a shirt became the rite of passage for political dykes of my generation.
MoreBeauford Delaney and the Art of Exile
As it did for his friend James Baldwin, exile offered Beauford Delaney the space to work through his sense of being different; it also gave him somewhere to hide from that difference.
MoreCan Will & Grace Be “Queered”?
There is a queer subtext in Will & Grace, but it’s contained inside the gay-but-normalized text, a kind of marginalized Greek chorus that’s embodied in the character of Karen Walker and her relationship with Jack.
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Lord of the Ring Taps a Gay Archetype
Tolkien created a fantasy world from which heterosexual romance is almost entirely absent. Instead, this world comprises a fellowship of nine single men all bound to each other by their solemn word, with the bond of Frodo and Sam at its core.
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