At first glance, someone so “white” could be forgiven for not being aware of gay activism in the U.S. that goes back to the ‘50s. Many, possibly even most, modern gays are unaware of it, too. And some might excuse him for ignoring the Stonewall riots as they were in 1969 and didn’t begin to permeate public consciousness beyond NY until the next year, but, as the Times indicates, he “loosely defines the ‘60s as the period from 1963 to 1974.” That would include not just the period involving Stonewall but four years of growing pride events across the country celebrating its anniversary, and the development of gay groups on countless college campuses. His ignoring that [versus being ignorant of it], and their continued, even larger and broader existence today is irreponsible, and, yes, homophobic.

What about Jose Sarria in 1961, the first out gay to run for public office? He could have made note of the fact that the organizer of the still famous 1963 March on Washington for Black civil rights was organized by an out gay Black man, Bayard Rustin. The White House was first picketed by gays in 1965. Demonstrations in the ‘60s against antigay military policies [which he could have linked to the number of medal-winning gay vets who have since come out and bills in Congress today to admit gays to the military] predate that as does the first statewide decriminalization of sodomy in Illinois—a MAJOR change in American culture and jurisprudence that he could have linked to the Supreme Court decision “legalizing” sodomy nationwide in 2003. In 1971, Frank Kameny is the first out gay to run for Congress, and was a major player in our first great national triumph [with international influence] that occurred in 1973 when the American Psychiatric Association ruled that gays are not inherently mentally ill. A decision that got wide mainstream media coverage.

And 1974 was a watershed year for us as Kathy Kozachenko and Elaine Noble, became the first out gays elected to public office, and already elected Allan Spear came out. Along with Sarria’s and Kameny’s attempts, he could have linked that to the number of out gay office holders today.

Employing the “where are they now?” angle so much, he could have included David Mixner who, while closeted then, played a key role in the challenge of Eugene McCarthy to LBJ and was one of the organizers of the Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam in 1969 that had tens of thousands descending upon Washington and millions of participants across the country and Europe. That was when Mixner became friends with student Bill Clinton, who organized a parallel demonstration at Oxford [used against him by Bush pere when they ran against each other]. Years later after coming out, Mixner was instrumental in many gay rights campaigns, including helping engineer Ronald Reagan coming out against Prop 6 which would have banned gays from teaching in California, and, more famously, helped elect Clinton [and then fell out with him over DADTDP].

And, as mentioned, there was the huge role lesbians played in the women’s movement [as well as a scandalous effort to drive them out led by feminist matriarch Betty Friedan]. But, hey, just because gays were major players in that and the other two main subjects of Brokaw’s solipsistic book, as well as being one of two issues that gave rise to the extremely powerful and rich “Religious Right,” why should he “see” us any more now than he did forty years ago? Being gay is not a choice but ignoring us is, just as not “hearing” the many LGBT voices and issues that have boomed across those decades.

Tell me again, please, what HRC, NGLTF, and GLAAD have accomplished?

Regardless of Stonewall, which didn’t receive much coverage outside of New York, I didn’t hear much about gay rights until around 1972. In all honesty, it was the feminist movement that seemed to provide much of the impetus because the involvement of lesbians.

he made it very clears that, at that time in the 60′s, there was no “gay rights”, “coming out” or anything pro-homosexual. it was NOT accepted (even with the peace-loving hippies) and it was something very few people discussed because it was considered so very wrong.

the war was going on, people were in constant fear… the culture and the counter culture were at a remarkable impasse. it was not a good time for any civil rights, much less gay progress… which could be why it was notably absent from his book.

(but really, what do i know… i wasn’t even born yet!)