Sign of the Times In fact, a whole stack of signs to mark the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots (sponsored by MasterCard!). Of course, Gay Street was called that long before “gay” meant what it does today, but its prominent location in the West Village has always been a cause for mild mirth. After the ’69 riots, the word “gay” was widely adopted and had a pretty good run. The profusion of identities—some that would have been covered under “gay” but also a few new ones—is nicely captured by the pileup of signs. One wonders what it will look like in another fifty years…?
• The Vatican announced that in October it will canonize scholar-priest John Henry Newman—hailed as a breakthrough, because Newman is widely assumed to have been gay, a condition that in the past would have instantly disqualified him from sainthood. A Catholic convert of monstrous erudition and considered the greatest Catholic theologian in English, Newman lived with a man named Ambrose St. John for 32 years and willed that he and St. John be buried in the same grave. Whether he’s truly the “first” LGBT person to be canonized is open to doubt. In light of Frédéric Martel’s recent revelation that the Church hierarchy is overwhelmingly gay (In the Closet of the Vatican), it may be assumed that many men who’ve been canonized over the centuries were secret homos. What’s more remarkable is that Newman is the first Englishman born after the 1600s to be canonized. Surely the Vatican’s aversion to LGBT people is exceeded only by its aversion to England!
• The Vatican issued a 31-page guide on gender identity in June that stated unequivocally that God created two sexes, man and woman, full stop, thereby defining whole categories of people out of existence. Of course one is struck by how deeply out of step this position is with the times, but also by the fact that the Vatican still claims that it can legislate reality through a simple decree, a throwback to those carefree times known as the Middle Ages. Just as a medieval bestiary bore little resemblance to actual fauna, the new directive defines gender in a way that’s indifferent to reality—including the fact that around one percent of all newborns present some degree of gender ambiguity, plus the social fact that more and more people are adopting nonbinary gender identities. No doubt the Church would try to deny the existence of homosexuals if it could, but sometimes reality bites too hard to be defined away.
Bitch of a Backlash A brouhaha erupted in July after The New Republic published an on-line article by Dale Peck titled “My Mayor Pete Problem” in which Peck attacked Pete Buttigieg as an “Uncle Tom” who was selling out the LGBT movement. Peck repeatedly referred to the South Bend mayor as “Mary Pete,” invoking an old camp usage that people under fifty might not get. Following a firestorm of criticism, TNR took down the piece and apologized, claiming that it was intended as “satire.” But Peck himself wasn’t buying that line and made it clear that he meant the essay to be serious and, doubling down, added that he wanted to title it “Basic Bitch.” Beyond the obvious homophobia (though Peck is openly gay) and sheer nastiness of the piece, what’s striking is its disingenuousness, its lazy predictability. Clearly any gay person who could get this far in U.S. presidential politics would have to be ultra-square in every other respect, given anti-gay myths and stereotypes, so anyone in this position would automatically be easy prey for Peck. He slams Buttigieg for being a “beneficiary of white male privilege”—which may well be the case, but it’s also a tautology.
L.A. Bails on Stonewall World Pride in New York City, which marked the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, was as extravagant as predicted, with a parade that lasted over twelve hours, not to mention speeches, panels, art exhibitions, movie retrospectives, and other events that stretched out over days and weeks. Meanwhile, in the heart of our second largest city, Los Angeles, the annual Pride parade took place in West Hollywood on June 9th. There were events and speeches around the city—but not one event devoted to Stonewall’s 50th, and not a single mention of Stonewall in the speeches on Pride day! Don Kilhefner, who reported on this situation, says he asked L.A. Pride’s executive director about this lacuna, and she replied that there would be a “Stonewall Lounge” selling beer. All of this is surprising, as The G&LR was on the West Coast in the spring to promote our book In Search of Stonewall, and everyone seemed jazzed about the 50th. There was much discussion of the fact that the gay movement really started in L.A. back in the 1950s, and there has always been some bad blood over the fact that New York ended up getting pride of place. We thought that was a thing of the past, but it seems they’re still not over it.
Welcome! Don’t expect any deep philosophical insights this time; the photo speaks for itself. One could ponder why it is that the male phallus is so often invoked when one wants to send an insulting message. (Is this a Western trope?) Anyway, this is the image that greeted Donald and Melania Trump on the airstrip when they landed in the UK in early summer. Commentary on the web provided some added amusement, with most of it focusing on the length of the herbal penis and opining that it should have been much smaller to match widespread beliefs about a certain officeholder. The creator of this landmark, a student named Ollie Nancarrow, has been identified, but he doesn’t appear to be in Big Trouble as one might expect. The British press was reporting it as a celebrity item on the entertainment page.
