IGF CultureWatch

Let me tell you three stories.

First story. One of my best friends, a middle-age man with whom I worked on AIDS issues in the 1980s, sent me an e-mail several months ago saying that he had recently tested positive for HIV. He acknowledged that he was extremely embarrassed to be confessing this fact: The message we had all promoted then-as now-was to have only "safe sex" and to use "a condom every time." "I must have neglected to use a condom," he said simply.

Second story. I was at my local grocery store during the late summer when I ran into a casual friend I've known from the bars, a man somewhere in his late 40s, I'd guess, and we stopped to chat. He said he recently found out that he was HIV-positive, which he confessed surprised him. "I thought I was safe because I was exclusively a top," he said. "But apparently not." I gathered that he was already taking an antiviral combination, which suggested that his T-cell count was low, so he may have been infected some time ago.

Third story. A good friend, an older man, told me that early this fall he had his first HIV test in several years and was surprised to learn that he was HIV-positive. Not only that but his T-cell count had sunk to the 100-150 range, clearly qualifying for an AIDS diagnosis. "I did what I considered 'safe sex' and assumed I was uninfected. I never had any symptoms that I recognized as being HIV-related," he told me. "But then I noticed that I was getting tired easily and wanted to take naps throughout the day. I thought that was just a function of getting older, but evidently not."

These men are all Americans, fellow Chicagoans. And, most of all, friends. World AIDS Day will be observed on December 1. Do I care about AIDS among people I do not know and will never see or meet? Only marginally. What I do care about is gay men in the U.S., in my city, in my neighborhood. In short, I care about my friends, present and potential. Anyone who cares as much about total strangers in foreign lands as he does his friends and people in his own community has a strange idea about the value of personal relationships.

I lived through the first wave of AIDS, 1981-1996. I lost a lot of friends during that time. Suddenly it feels as if I am beginning to live through a second wave of AIDS infections-not necessarily resulting in deaths this time, at least in the medium term, but decisively altering people's lives.

When people's T-cell levels decline to a certain point, they have to begin an anti-viral drug regimen that involves taking one to four drugs every day at the same time every day. If they travel, they have to pack their drugs and make sure nothing interferes with their drug regimen. They have to do this for the rest of their lives. And some of the drugs have inconvenient side effects, from nausea or wooziness to diarrhea to unpleasant dreams. But taking the drugs is better than not taking them.

It seems vitally important to remind people that AIDS is still a threatening presence in the gay community. I have read estimates that 20 percent of those infected do not know it. I have seen no statistical support for that estimate and I am sure the number is far higher-40 percent? 50 percent? Recall that the Centers for Disease Control acknowledged not many months ago that for years it had underestimated the number of people annually infected with HIV by more than 40 percent.

Every year, every day, young gay men come out and begin engaging in sex. They may think they are invulnerable, they may be heedless, or they may never see a safe-sex message or have had the term "safe sex" spelled out for them. When I have visited bathhouses or back-room bars, I have seen people of all ages and ethnicities engaging in unprotected sex. Clearly safe-sex messages have lost their impact or are not reaching them in a persuasive fashion.

Many people seem to care more about AIDS abroad than in the U.S. President Bush has sponsored billions of dollars in funding to prevent AIDS in third-world countries, but said little abut AIDS in the U.S. Some evangelical churches are involved in helping to combat AIDS abroad, but show no interest in AIDS in the U.S. It seems clear that they are interested in helping heterosexuals abroad, but want nothing to do with homosexuals in the U.S.

So it continues to be up to us.

Every national campaign has its moments of revelation, straws in the wind of change. For me, one of the most memorable blew past in a snippet of video.

It was June. Hillary Clinton was conceding the Democratic nomination to Barack Obama. A few minutes into her speech, as she called the roll of her supporters, she hit on the words "gay and straight." The camera angle was such that you could see young people in the crowd behind her erupt in boisterous cheers. A few minutes later a mention of "gay rights" elicited the same reaction.

Those young people, it struck me, were reacting to Clinton's gay-friendly rhetoric the way we are used to seeing social conservatives react to gay-hostile rhetoric: with joyful recognition that their brand of pro-American values, their brand of patriotism, was being affirmed. The "moral values" energy was on our side.

In 2004, when President Bush beat Sen. John Kerry in a tight race, we thought we had learned the continuing, indeed renewed, potency of values issues (read: gay marriage and abortion). An activist state supreme court had legalized gay marriage; Republicans gleefully seized the issue by putting gay marriage bans on state ballots, energizing the party's social conservative base. At a moment when voters were looking for stability and strength, the Republicans wove gay marriage into an overarching security narrative: America's core values were being challenged by radical Islamists from without as well as radical judges from within, and Republicans could be trusted to stand up to both. On the defensive, Democrats scrambled to change the subject, triangulating away from their gay and lesbian supporters.

What a difference four years makes. Again activist judges, this time in two states (California and Connecticut), order same-sex marriage. Again gay marriage bans sprout on state ballots. Again the public craves stability and security, though this time the threat is economic. On paper, the ingredients are the makings of another 2004.

But this time the results were entirely different. In 2008, Democrats used gays as an applause line, embracing us as a symbol of the change agenda. More important, Obama embedded gays in a security narrative of his own: America has been weakened by divisive politics and fruitless bellicosity; inclusiveness can restore the country's tattered unity, rebuilding strength at home and prestige abroad. This time it was the Republicans who mumbled and changed the subject, steering away from social issues both in their choice of nominee and in their campaign.

Which election, 2004 or 2008, tells us more about the future? You could argue that the values vote of 2004 was a fear-driven blip in the larger trend toward gay integration. Or you could argue that 2008 was really about the economy, and that culture-war issues will resurface when pocketbook issues recede.

It is too early to say, but that has never stopped a journalist before, so here goes: To me, 2008 looks more like the new normal. The cultural backlash against gay equality is far from over, and the marriage fight, in particular, has years to go. But the core message of legal equality has gotten through.

Now, "gotten through" does not mean "always wins." It means that the presumption of gay equality is at least as prevalent as the presumption of gay inferiority. According to Gallup polls, a clear majority of Americans now believe that homosexual relations between consenting adults should be legal and that "homosexuality should be considered an acceptable alternative lifestyle." In 2008, for the first time, Gallup found that as many respondents judged homosexual relations "morally acceptable" as judged them "morally wrong." At about 90%, support for "equal rights in terms of job opportunities" is now so overwhelming, as to be a nonissue.

What about marriage discrimination, then? Opposition to same-sex marriage remains predominant. Here, however, the problem is that the public sees gender as part of the core definition of marriage, not as a discriminatory detail. Eventually, albeit slowly, that is likely to change.

Meanwhile, the public already accepts the legitimacy of legal same-sex unions, provided they are not called marriage. Strikingly, a recent poll by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, a Democratic-leaning firm, found that a majority of young white evangelicals, ages 18 to 29, favor either gay marriage (26%) or civil partnerships (32 percent). That places young evangelicals closer to the overall population than to their older confreres. In the foreseeable future, the principle of same-sex unions, though perhaps not "marriage," will be uncontroversial even on the Christian right.

I think, though I can't prove this, that there are two important transitions happening here. Both are good for gay and lesbian Americans, but one will require some hard rethinking.

The first is that the antigay culture war is winding down. The public has weighed the Karl Rove narrative (culture-war politics strengthens America by defending our values) against the Barack Obama narrative (culture-war politics weakens America by undermining our unity) and has come down on Obama's side - certainly for now but possibly for much longer.

Harder for us to adjust to will be this: The civil rights mind-set, with its focus on antidiscrimination laws and court-ordered remedies, has outlived its usefulness. There are still discrimination problems, of course-for example, when schools turn a blind eye to harassment. By and large, however, the public no longer regards gays as an oppressed minority, and by and large we aren't one.

The old civil rights model, with its roots in an era when homosexuals were politically friendless pariahs, focuses on such matters as protection from bigoted employers and hate crimes. In truth, for most gay Americans the civic responsibility agenda, with its focus on service to family (marriage), children (mentoring and adoption), and country (the military), is more relevant and important. With a comparatively sympathetic administration and Congress taking office in Washington, the time has come to pivot away from the culturally defensive pariah agenda - the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, for instance - and toward the culturally transformative family agenda.

Priority 1, and well ahead of whatever comes second, should be federal recognition of state civil unions. Obama supported this, as did, for that matter, all the other Democratic candidates. Marriage will take a while, but federal civil unions, though not a cinch, are attainable in the course of the next four to eight years, and they would be hugely beneficial to gay couples, who would get access to immigration rights, Social Security benefits, spousal tax status, and much, much more. Federal recognition of same-sex unions might also break the back of the "don't ask, don't tell" military policy. How can one part of the U.S. government banish gay couples while the rest embraces them?

Perhaps I'm Pollyanna. Perhaps the antigay political volcano is merely dormant, not dying. Perhaps it is too early to move on from civil rights. But I think it likelier that the country has turned a corner in the culture wars. If so, the question will be whether we can turn with it.

Every year I think about writing a Thanksgiving column, but-wouldn't you know-every year I would think of it too late to get it into the paper in advance, making it pretty uninteresting if not entirely useless. So this year I am writing well in advance.

I am aware that I am not enough of a public figure to make people interested in what particulars I am thankful for (compare the typical Sunday supplement feature like "Five Things Michele Obama is Thankful For") but my hope is that by listing some of my things, I can suggest to readers categories of things to consider being thankful for that they might not otherwise think of.

I am thankful that I live in the United States. No one need run a chauvinistic line about this being the greatest country in the world, &c., in order to be aware of the benefits of living here-a written constitution, a bill of rights (free speech, free press, and the rest), and regular elections that let us change the administration. American voters do not always choose wisely, but they can sense when something has gone wrong and try to effect a change.

I am thankful to my parents for so much that to list all the things would be a lengthy task. But let me just mention that they managed to instill not so much a specific morality (though if honesty and courtesy are virtues I hope they did that) but a sense of moral seriousness about the business of living and relating to others. I do not manage these things perfectly, but at least I am aware of my shortcomings as moral lapses.

I am thankful to the friends who have been valuable supports and companions (even if often by email these days) over the years. Names are unnecessary; they know who they are and I hope they know my appreciation.

I am thankful for the composers who have excited, inspired, emotionally moved, and entertained me with their compositions. The list is not long. It suffices here to mention Rachmaninoff, Ravel, Shostakovich and Vaughan Williams.

I am thankful that my native language is English. I am terrible at learning foreign languages, but English has become a-dare one say, the-international language, so I am lucky that I do not have to struggle to learn a second language to communicate in a closely knit world.

I feel neutral about being gay, although I will say that it works pretty well for me. However, I am deeply thankful that I lived into and came out in an era when there was beginning to be a large and vibrant gay community to provide a supportive environment as I learned to negotiate this new self-understanding.

I am thankful that my apartment is warm in the winter, my refrigerator is well stocked with food, and that clean drinking water comes out of the tap when I turn the knob. Many people in the rest of the world have few or none of these things.

I am thankful for the members of the gay listserv I am on. Their comments have stimulated, informed and sometimes irritated me in ways that have been enormously helpful for my thinking and writing.

I am thankful that medical research has made enough progress that we now have drugs that keep those of us infected with HIV alive for a prolonged period. We can hope that the longer we stay alive the better are the chances of further improvements in the drugs, and the possibility of a cure.

It is hard to say this in public, but I am thankful for people-friends and otherwise-who over the years have pointed out-if not always in a kindly manner-my various (and apparently numerous) character and personality flaws and deficiencies. Though it was not always part of their intention, they helped me become a better person.

I am thankful that my parents did not foist a religion onto me. They decided to let me choose for myself. I ended up choosing no religion at all, deciding that all religions are a tissue of myth and imposture, and have done great harm to mankind.

I am thankful for the unexpected opportunity over the last few years to write about art for my newspaper. And I am thankful for the artists whose works have challenged my mind, delighted my eye, and lured me into looking at things more closely than I was accustomed to doing.

This is hardly a complete list, but it will do for a start and perhaps prompt your own thoughts as America's annual day of giving thanks approaches.

He is the most gifted political figure in two generations. He ran a smart, disciplined, and innovative campaign that made the most of his charisma, toughness, and confidence. When hit with a possibly fatal compilation of inflammatory clips from his pastor, he rose to the occasion with a searching and luminous speech on race that dared to treat his audience like adults. He responded to the financial crisis with a calm deliberation that belied his adversaries' charges of unreadiness. As he redrew the political map on Nov. 4, he gave our nation a moment of redemption that prompted dancing in the streets of the world.

In the process, Barack Obama showed the LGBT movement how to win. More on that shortly.

The other big news of the election - the revocation of marriage equality by California voters - has provoked plenty of drama, from massive marches to racial scapegoating. Some are claiming that the Nov. 15 protests across the country are the true start of the marriage equality movement, but that is false. The flashpoint of Proposition 8, like Stonewall before it, galvanized large numbers of people, but in both cases the movement's pioneers began laying the groundwork more than a decade before.

The racist recriminations directed by some against African Americans for the Prop 8 vote were an awful counterpoint to Obama's transformative victory. Some even blamed Obama for the result because of the increased turnout he generated, but Nate Silver of www.fivethirtyeight.com points out that new California voters actually opposed the initiative by 62 to 38 percent.

Furthermore, singling out African Americans out of all electoral subgroups for casting blame, aside from being monumentally counterproductive, ignores the fact that Prop 8's opponents included the California NAACP, the National Black Justice Coalition, the National Black Police Association, the National Congress of Black Women, and many black pastors. That we lost (although the pro-gay numbers improved from 2000) calls not for bitterness but for reassessment and recommitment.

Kathryn Kolbert, President of People for the American Way Foundation, wrote on Nov. 7 about the far right's wedge politics: "The Religious Right has invested in systematic outreach to the most conservative elements of the Black Church, creating and promoting national spokespeople like Bishop Harry Jackson, and spreading the big lie that gays are out to destroy religious freedom and prevent pastors from preaching about homosexuality from the pulpit."

Not only must LGBT advocates improve our own outreach efforts, we need to avoid playing into right-wing hands as we do when we denigrate religion and talk about taking away churches' tax exemptions. We are too often reactive, while our adversaries are strategic. We need to catch up.

In the aftermath of Prop 8, some in our community have resorted to bad old habits: ranking oppressions; referring to "the LGBT Community" as if it were monolithic and distinct from the black gay community; calling the marriage fight a "white thing"; and making disparaging generalizations about one another instead of working to build trust.

Obama's landmark campaign offers gay activists many lessons: Believe in yourself. Tell your story. Frame the issues rather than letting your adversaries frame them. Wrap yourself in faith, flag, and family - the other side deserves no monopoly. Listen to people who disagree with you; you may find common ground and supporters in unexpected places. Do your homework. Organize in a way that motivates and empowers your volunteers. Speak to your listeners' better angels instead of rebuking or pandering to them. Talk to voters like adults. Don't flee from challenges, rise to them.

One who rose to the occasion on Nov. 15 was comedian and actress Wanda Sykes, who publicly came out at a Las Vegas rally, saying that the Prop 8 supporters "have galvanized a community. We are so together now and we all want the same thing and we are not gonna settle for less. Instead of having gay marriage in California, no, we're gonna get it across the country. When my wife and I leave California, I want to have my marriage also recognized in Nevada, in Arizona, all the way to New York. ... I am proud to be a woman, I'm proud to be a black woman and I'm proud to be gay."

The source of progress is risking the next step, whatever that is for each of us. Yes we can.

Proposition 8 passed, revoking marriage rights for gays and lesbians in California and setting back the gay-rights movement throughout the country.

So did similar bans in Florida and Arizona, not to mention an Arkansas ban on adoption or foster parenting by unmarried couples. Supporters of the latter ban-written expressly to thwart "the gay agenda"-apparently believe that it is better for children to languish in state care than to have loving gay parents.

With the pressure of the election behind us, we can step back and talk about long-term strategy. What must we do to convince majorities that our love is just as worthy as theirs?

Some will complain that we shouldn't have to convince them. In an ideal world, that would be true. In the real world, it's useless whining. Let's face it: complaining that we shouldn't have to fight for fundamental rights never helped anyone secure their fundamental rights.

Here are my top five strategic suggestions as we move forward.

1. Tell our stories. A striking feature of the various anti-amendment campaigns was the invisibility of those they were supposed to help: gay people. I'm grateful for straight people who support our rights. But straight people can't directly illustrate the palpable ways in which our families matter to us.

For every time the 'Yes on 8' campaign showed that little girl telling her mom how she learned in school about two princes who got married, I wish 'No on 8' would have shown a little girl asking her mom why Aunt Ellen and Aunt Portia can't get married. Or a little boy asking his two adoptive dads-who sacrifice to make his life better-why they can't get married.

I'm guessing that focus groups showed that images of actual gays turn off swing voters (which, if true, would be further evidence of the stigma we still face). I'm skeptical about focus-groups-focus groups, after all, gave us New Coke.

But whatever was true for the campaign, it's time now for the long view. Over time, people tend to be more pro-gay the more they know actual gay people.

2. Cut the vague talk about "rights" and "discrimination." It's wrong to take away rights, right? Well, sure-but we need to be more specific than that.

Gay-rights opponents cleverly granted the premise that it's wrong to take away rights, and then argued (falsely, but effectively) that marriage equality meant taking away THEIR rights, specifically their parental and religious rights, or that gay adoption interfered with a child's right to a mother and father.

It's not enough, therefore, merely to demand "rights" or to oppose "discrimination." We need to flesh out why these rights matter and why this particular discrimination is harmful and wrong. That requires talking about the moral value of our relationships-and not just talking about it, but showing it (see #1).

3. Use words like "bigot" and "hate" sparingly. There is no doubt that some of our opponents are hateful bigots. (I've got the mail to prove it.) But 5.7 million California voters?

No. Most of those who voted yes are people you'd recognize as your coworkers, your neighbors, your grandma. Misinformed? Absolutely. Shortsighted? Without a doubt. But generally not hateful.

Furthermore, as a strategic matter, labeling widespread religious and parental concerns as "hateful" doesn't typically convert those who harbor them.

4. Don't let opponents hide behind religion. Eighty-three percent of weekly churchgoers voted in favor of Prop. 8, and they contributed a large percentage of the $36 million raised to promote it. Ninety percent of self-identified atheists and agnostics voted against it.

To be sure, there were progressive religious organizations and individuals who strongly opposed the amendment. We should continue to harness their enthusiasm: God, after all, can be invoked by all sides of the political spectrum. But we should also recognize the dangers inherent in accepting beliefs "on faith."

In my view, America is due for a healthy dose of religious skepticism, as well as a vigorous conversation about what religious freedom means and why.

5. Patience, yes; complacency, never. Time is on our side. California marriage-equality opponents drew 61 percent of the vote in 2000 but only 52 percent this year. Voters under 30 heavily opposed Prop. 8.

Meanwhile, ordinary gay and lesbian citizens are motivated like they haven't been in some time. They are peacefully demonstrating outside churches and city halls; they are donating time and money; they are coming out to friends, neighbors, and co-workers.

Ironically, opponents' efforts to "protect children" from learning about gay people has not only catapulted us to the front of the news, it has increased our determination to make our everyday presence known.

We need to do that for our own dignity. But we also need to do it for those children, who deserve an equal chance at "happily ever after" regardless of their sexual orientation. Keep fighting the good fight.

Soon after Barack Obama earned his place in history last Tuesday, the praise from gay rights organizations was effusive. "This is the dawn of a new political era of hope and engagement in the life of this country," proclaimed the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "This election represents a paradigm shift," said Joe Solomonese of the Human Rights Campaign.

One can understand why these organizations feel reason for celebration. The last eight years have seen the passage of more than 20 anti-gay state marriage amendments, an attempt by the President of the United States to write discrimination into the Constitution, and congressional foot-dragging on bills ranging from employment nondiscrimination to hate crimes. Barack Obama, meanwhile, supports everything on the gay rights agenda short of marriage equality.

But even as the state fights continue - with Wednesday's Connecticut court ruling opening the door to gay marriage there - at the federal level, the gay rights movement can expect to feel some serious cognitive dissonance in its enthusiasm for Obama. Even if our new President has a "mandate," with the economy in the tank, two ongoing wars and widespread demand for major new initiatives on health care and energy, gay rights are hardly a priority. Especially for a man who is politically strategic - or careful - to a fault, and will go to great lengths to avoid repeating the Clinton "don't ask, don't tell" debacle.

While Obama's success is on balance a good thing for gay rights, contrast that to what was lost on Tuesday. In California, thanks to the passage of Proposition 8, 18,000 already-married gay couples may lose that status and no gay person will be getting married in the country's most populous state for the foreseeable future. Same goes for Florida and Arizona, which also passed marriage amendments. In Arkansas, gay couples lost the right to adopt children. And it's worth noting that many of the voters in Obama's winning coalition, notably blacks, remain culturally conservative - and helped those referenda prevail.

Gay groups acknowledge the setbacks, but say they're outweighed by the legislation that will come with a President Obama and a Democratic Congress. The three major items they cite are a hate crimes statute that would punish anti-gay violence more harshly than other violent crimes, legislation to ban anti-gay employment discrimination and repeal of the law barring openly gay people from serving in the military.

All these bills are significant, but are they truly likely to get off the back burner, with so many other things at full boil? Perhaps. If so, would their passage trump anti-gay marriage amendments in three states? No. There are principled reasons for those considering themselves "pro-gay" to oppose hate crimes laws as they criminalize thought, not action. Nor is there evidence that they reduce anti-gay violence. Regarding employment discrimination, there are no reliable statistics determining the actual number of people who have been fired or denied a job because of their sexual orientation. And change isn't likely to come on gays in the military until the military leadership advises it. Moreover, during the campaign, John McCain said that he'd be open to a "review" of the policy should the brass recommend it.

In 1993, gays similarly welcomed Bill Clinton into office with much enthusiasm. Their fervent support was answered with the President's gays-in-the-military misstep, (the first misjudgment of the Clinton presidency), and was followed with his signing the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996.

To avoid the disappointments of the Clinton era, gays should keep trying to win hearts and minds at the state level - without investing too much hope or energy in Obama. While the President-elect has spoken inclusively about gay people, he does not have a legislative record on gay rights and has displayed the same knack for political opportunism as our last Democratic President. Obama was more than happy to employ "ex-gay" gospel singer Donnie McClurkin in an attempt to win the votes of socially conservative blacks in the South Carolina Democratic primary. And while he nominally opposed Proposition 8 in California, that opposition consisted of nothing more than a letter sent to a gay Democratic group in San Francisco.

To be sure, having a President who speaks empathetically about gay people - and Obama has done this more than any presidential candidate in history - will, in and of itself, change the national tone on homosexuality. Obama will probably also hire a liaison to the gay community, a post that Clinton inaugurated and that President Bush left vacant, and invite gay leaders to the White House. All together, that may help tear down homophobia, the last acceptable societal prejudice. Indeed, the mere fact of having a black man in the White House may lessen Americans' anxiety when it comes to thinking about another minority. All these positive outcomes are possible, but last Tuesday's losses, and cold political reality, are too great for gays to get their hopes up.