The Truth About the Gay Agenda

The political season is upon us. Never mind that it has started obscenely early this go round, the bottom line is--it is upon us.

As politics begin to heat up, I am sure you will be hearing someone blathering on about "The Gay Agenda."

The great gay 80's duo, Romanovsky and Phillips joked about the Gay Agenda.

"As if gay people could agree on anything for one moment."

They speculated that there were gay people across the country with memo boards with a list labeled "Queer things to do today!"

They were, of course, joking.

Perhaps those of you who are not gay have wondered, does this Gay Agenda actually exist?

In fact, it does.

When I first came out in the late 70's the Gay Agenda was slipped under your door while you slept. It was printed on a mimeograph machine—white paper with purple letters.

Some people think the association of gays and lesbians with the color lavender came from the combination of the colors usually associated with the genders—pink and blue, being mixed to make purple.

Common misconception.

It was those early mimeographed Gay Agendas that are the real reason.

Before those mimeographed sheets I am not sure how The Gay Agenda was disseminated.

In the early 70's celebrities like Paul Lynde and Charles Nelson Reilly broadcast the agenda in code on game shows. I remember watching Hollywood Squares and Match Game when I was in high school and thinking, "there's more going on here than meets the eye," but I couldn't be sure.

Now I watch old clips of those shows and think, "but of course!"

I don't know how people got the Agenda before that. You'll have to ask someone who is both gay and older than me.

Like, maybe, Plato.

The first Gay Agenda I ever read was simple and reflective of the times:

>End job discrimination
>Don't let them say you're crazy or sick
>Fight Anita Bryant
>Make love often

About that last bullet point—what can I say? It was the hedonistic 70's. Gays weren't the only ones making a lot of love.

The 70's also gave rise to the Feminist movement and Lesbians were right on board with that one. I remember reading The Gay Agenda one morning with its references to "sisterhood" and "equality" and thinking, "Where would we be without the lesbians?"

None of the men minded the mention of "sisterhood." Gender bending terminology was common in the gay subculture of the time. This carried over from more closeted times when gay people changed the pronouns when speaking in polite company to protect themselves. A man might say, "I went out with her and she's a catch," when his date was really another man. It seems kind of pathetic now but remember when this started people could be arrested for dancing with someone of the same gender.

Imagine the penalty for those two same people having sex with each other...

In the early 80's the mimeographed pages were replaced for a while by copy machine print outs.

I heard someone high up had Xerox stock. I can't prove that, so don't repeat it. I just know I missed the smell of the freshly mimeographed page.

There's nothing like that new mimeograph smell.

Then one day in the mid-80's an unmarked box arrived at my door. I knew it had something to do with The Gay Agenda.

Sure enough. There was a fax machine inside. That's when The Gay Agenda started arriving via morning fax.

Those were heady times.

The Gay Agenda of the mid-80's was reflective of the dominant issues of the day:

>Take care of each other
>Fight Jerry Falwell
>Play safe
>Cuddle often

Cuddling was real big in the 80's. Some men wore stuffed teddy bears in their back pocket to indicate they were into cuddling.

It was sometime in the mid-80's that certain religious and political leaders got wind of the Gay Agenda. I don't know how it happened. Maybe one of the faxes went awry, maybe there was a spy somewhere. While they began to squawk about the existence of the Agenda, they never seemed to get the content of it right.

It seemed to be their agenda to misrepresent our agenda.

Their version:

>Indoctrinate the young
>Force public schools to teach the homosexual lifestyle
>Take over Hollywood so all TV programs and movies are just homosexual propaganda

Our version:

>Convince gay teens not to commit suicide
>End gay bashing in schools
>"Dynasty" rules!

What can I say? It was the 80's.

The Gay Agenda was delivered by fax until the advent of the Internet. (Goddess bless you, Al Gore.)

Daily emails soon replaced daily faxes. It was also around that time that something startling began to appear on the agenda:

>Legalize Gay Marriage.

For an old timer like me, this was quite revolutionary.

When I was in college I joined a gay rights march on the capital building in Tallahassee,FL.

A group of gay men marching on a phallus shaped building (complete with testicles) is an irony that was not lost on me.

All we wanted back then was an end to discrimination in the work place, so we wouldn't get fired from a job just for being gay.

Actually, I think we're still working on that one...

It never occurred to me we would be pushing for the right to marry in my lifetime.

The Agenda I received this morning looked kind of familiar.

That's not surprising. While it is true that the Gay Agenda does exist, the truth is, the heart of it doesn't really change much:

>Take care of each other
>Play safe
>Cuddle often

Wait. Is that the Agenda or my To Do list?

The final bullet point:
>Check the batteries in the smoke detectors

Well. that's just good advice for anyone.