SHe Said

compiled by Howard Israel

“In my experience, most kids have a sense as early as 4 or 5 of whether they’re gay or not, and by 7 or 8 that identity is there. Some will tell you it was always there. The trick for parents isn’t monitoring whether their kids are gay or not but just letting them be who they are. Besides, if you’re as open-minded as you believe you are, you’ll be okay with it either way.”
-Don Clark, a psychotherapist, who’s spent 30 years counseling gay clients and families, in an article titled “Would You Really Be Okay With a Gay Kid?” by David Hochman, Details magazine, Mar. 17, 2008.

“I frequently see patients as young as 2 or 3 setting off the gaydar of their parents and teachers, and says it’s always a cause for alarm, or at least confusion, for the parents. They like to appear cool and relaxed about gender issues, but deep down they’re not acknowledging what they really want, which is for their kids to be ‘normal’ members of society.”
– Dr. Edgardo Menvielle, director, Gender and Sexuality Development Psychosocial Programs, Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., in an article titled “Would You Really Be Okay With a Gay Kid?” by David Hochman, Details magazine, Mar. 17, 2008.

“To unite with white Christian fundamentalism like Pat Robertson is an absolute disgrace. For black people to pretend that kind of Christian fundamentalism, which justified slavery and justifies racism, is a colleague in anything is to be blind to the realities that we’re facing. We who have suffered and do suffer should be the most sensitive to the suffering of others. We don’t want this undeserved suffering put on us, and we should therefore, clearly, not participate in putting such suffering on others. We ought to know better.”
– Rev. James M. Lawson Jr., commenting on church-based homophobia in black America, in an interview titled “Out of step with many of his faith” by Leonard Pitts, Jr., Detroit Free Press, Apr. 29, 2008.

“We made a commitment to do something different. We wanted to make sure, make a way so that people from various communities, and particularly the GLBT community, would have a seat at the table, would have a voice, would have a vote when we nominate our president of the United States. We are expecting record, historic numbers of GLBT members at the convention as delegates at the party’s summer convention in Denver.”
– Leah Daughtry, chief of staff, Democratic National Committee, during her speech at the National Black Justice Coalition’s convention, ExpressGayNews.com, Apr. 25, 2008. Daughtry has faced considerable criticism for her handling of LGBT issues is now supporting gay Democrats.

“She was still the same person, she’s still the same person, but the package had just changed. Everything that attracted me to her, or him, is still there, and we’re comfortable.”
– Fran Brunner, speaking of her marriage to wife, Denise, who was once her husband, Donald, in an article titled “Through Sickness, Health and Sex Change” about the legal and personal issues that arise in mixed-gender marriages when a spouse has a sex change, New York Times, Apr. 27, 2008.

“Oh, God. I keep forgetting that I’m 25. I think I’m probably having some issues around that number. Am I desperately trying to hold onto my youth? Honey, am I a gay cliche?”
– Joshua Janson, interviewed in an article titled “Young Gay Rites” about gay men in their mid-20’s marrying in Massachusetts, New York Times Sunday Magazine, Apr. 27, 2008.

“[There are] vastly different politics many of us queers have, specifically about LGBT issues, about what constitutes progress and regress and hypocrisy and someone being on “our side. Why is it assumed, then, that every gay person is for ‘gay rights’? Or that every trans person is for the same sort of trans right? It’s something that comes up fairly often, sometimes from within the community, sometimes from the opposition. I don’t know how many times I hear a spin-off of ‘Let’s stop this in-fighting and focus on the real enemy,’ with the assumption that we all already agree on the goals of this loose band of activisms and activists known as the LGBT rights movement.
– Alex Blaze, commenting on the gap between identity and politics and the wide spectrum of politics among certain sectors of “queer” communities., in her blog, http://www.Bilerico.com, Apr. 24, 2008.