Box Turtle Bulletin

The Daily Agenda for Friday, August 3

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Amsterdam, Netherlands; Belfast, UK; Cork, Ireland; Hamburg, Germany; Hanoi, Vietnam; Leeds, UK; Liverpool, UK; Salem, OR; Stockholm, Sweden; Swindon, UK; and Vancouver, BC.

Other Events This Weekend: Divers/Cité Montréal, QC; Summer Diversity Weekend, Eureka Springs, AK; Zia Regional Rodeo, Santa Fe, NM.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
A Murder in Miami Reveals Homosexual Presence: 1954. It’s funny what it took in 1954 for a major metropolitan area to discover that there were gay people in their midst. I say it’s funny, but it can only be funny today, nearly sixty years later; it was certainly no laughing matter then. It was in the early morning hours of August 3 when a young couple looking for a secluded spot along North Miami’s “lover’s lane” found the body of William T. Simpson, a 27-year-old Eastern Airlines flight attendant, lying in the middle of the roadway in a pool of blood. He had been shot on his right side, his head had severe lacerations and his right index finger had apparently been pierced by something. About 500 yards away, police found his 1950 cream-colored convertible, with the front seat spattered with blood and a .22 caliber shell on the floor. It appeared that after the assailant fled, Simpson was able to get out of the car and stagger to the road before collapsing and bleeding to death.

Miami News, August 9, 1954

Five days later, police formally charged two young men, Charles W. Lawrence, 19, and Lewis Richard Killen, 20, with first degree murder. The two men didn’t just confess to the murder, they bragged about it. It turns out that they had been rolling gay men in the area for several weeks. Lawrence would hitchhike and allow himself to be “picked up” by an unsuspecting mark, and Killen would follow in a green Chevy. They would then rob the victim after he pulled over to a secluded spot. Lawrence carried a gun, and it was he who pulled the trigger. One former high school buddy recalled that Lawrence “had an intense hatred of homosexuals.”

In the ensuing investigation, police appeared surprised and alarmed that there were so many gay men in the area. It shouldn’t have been much of a surprise. Local papers had been reporting that Miami’s sheriff deputies and Miami Beach’s police department had conducted several bar and beach raids since the previous November, arresting gay men and charging them with “vagrancy.” When a young girl was murdered in July, police responded, illogically, with five nights of gay bar raids to “make things hot for sex perverts in Miami.” On July 18, the Miami Herald published a letter to the editor proposing a final solution to the problem: “Just execute them all.” But on the same day that Lawrence and Killen were charged, the Miami News‘s front page headline looked as though detectives had stumbled upon an entirely new discovery: “Pervert Colony Uncovered In Simpson Slaying Probe”. They obviously had a hard time understanding what local gays were telling them.

A colony of some 500 male homosexuals, congregated mostly in the near-downtown northeast section and ruled by a “queen,” was uncovered in the investigation of the murder of an Eastern Air Lines steward…. Peace Justice Edwin Lee Mason said today, “I certainly learned a lot during this investigation I never knew before.

“I not only was surprised at the number of homosexuals turned up in the murder investigation but I was amazed to find out that there were distinct classes, not only based on age groups, but also on the ages of the persons with whom they liked to consort and groups based on types of perversion.”

…”We learned — among other things — that Simpson was bisexual. We also learned that there was a nominal head of the colony — a queen.”

Investigators, following a line of thought that possibly the murder might have been for succession of the title, and that Simpson may have been the “ruler” of what the investigators then believed to be a quite small group of homosexuals in Miami asked one man, who made no secret of his leanings:

“Was Simpson the ‘queen?’

“No,” came the response. “The queen is –” Here the man named a person quite prominent in the community.

“How many of you are there,” an investigator said he asked. “Twenty –Forty?”

“Oh, more than that.”

“A hundred?”

“Make it closer to five hundred,” came the staggering reply.

Dade County’s population was around 700,000 in 1954. For such a large city, five hundred was still enough to throw Miami’s newspapers in an immediate uproar. On August 13, the News began a three-part series on homosexuality, with the first installment calling it “A Disease ‘Worse Than Alcohol’.” The following day, the News reported on “How L.A. Handles Its 150,000 Perverts”. “This thing is like cancer,” Los Angeles police chief Thad F. Brown told the News. “It keeps getting bigger and bigger each year. We process about 150 homosexuals a month who are caught in the act.” The paper pointed to a solution. “The police in Los Angeles have a policy of harassment,” the paper reported. As Brown explained, “We keep a constant check on bars and restaurants where they hang out. We try to get the licenses of the places catering to them.” In the third installment of the series, the News warned about “Great Civilizations Plagued by Deviates” — Greece, Rome, and Miami:

Police of several communities have watched with growing concern the gathering spots frequented by perverts and two departments have started all-out war against homosexuals. Miami Beach Police Chief Romeo Shepard says he will continue to harass homosexuals in Miami Beach. “I simply want them to get out of town,” said Shepard.

Sheriff Tom Kelly, who staged a big raid on homosexual gathering spots last Saturday, made a similar statement. “I will keep on harassing the homosexuals until they understand they’re not wanted in Dade County,” said Kelly.

The Miami police department has shown a reluctance to bother perverts. “If I ran all of the homosexuals out of town, members of some of the best families would lead the parade,” Police Chief Walter Headley once said.

A local attorney, E.F.P. Brigham, proposed legislation to deal with the problem:

If a sexual deviate is accused of molesting a child or any person for that matter, and manages to beat the charge in court, the state will still have the right to order a mental examination for the offender.

If the person is found to be a sexual psychopath (and that does not necessarily mean insane) the state will then have the right to institute civil action to put that person in an asylum for the rest of his or her life or until such time as a cure can be effected.

Miami was in a full-blown panic over the presence of gays in their midsts, a panic which would soon reach the statehouse in Tallahassee where it would rage well into the next decade. House speaker Ted David called for stronger criminal penalties for “confirmed sexual deviants… to meet the needs of Florida’s big cities.” Miami’s mayor, Abe Aronovitz, would make anti-gay campaigns a centerpiece of his administration. And what about Killen and Lawrence, the two men who were charged with first degree murder? After claiming that they killed Simpson because he made sexual advances toward Lawrence, they were convicted of manslaughter in November and sentenced to twenty years in prison.

Michael Hardwick Arrested: 1982. It all started in July, when Michael Hardwick threw a beer bottle into a trash can outside of an Atlanta gay bar. A police officer cited him for public drinking. He went the courthouse, payed the $50 fine, and thought nothing more of it. For some reason, his payment wasn’t recorded correctly, and when his court date came and went, a warrant was issued for his arrest. On August 3, a police officer went to Hardwick’s apparent to serve the warrant. The police officer entered the apartment (accounts differ on how he got in), and discovered Hardwick and another man engaged in oral sex, which Georgia defined as “sodomy” under the law. The officer announced that they two were under arrest. Hardwick shot back, “What are you doing in my bedroom?”

The arrest was humiliating for the two men. Hardwick recalled that the police officer brought them to the police station, he loudly made sure everyone there knew that he had arrested them for “cocksucking,” and that they should be able to find plenty of what they were looking for in Atlanta’s city jails. Hardwick posted bail within the hour, but was detained for twelve hours near other criminals who had been told why he was there. Hardwick had never fought for gay rights before, but that moment changed him. “I realized that if there was anything I could do, even if it was just laying the foundation to change this horrendous law, that I would feel pretty bad about myself if I just walked away from it.”

After the local district attorney decided not to press charges, Hardwick decided to sue Georgia’s Attorney General Michael Bowers in federal court to overturn the state’s sodomy law. The ACLU agreed to take the case on Hardwick’s behalf. The case ultimately made it to the Supreme Court which, in a surprising move, the Court upheld Georgia’s sodomy law. Surprising because the Court had built a solid case history upholding the rights to privacy for heterosexuals to engage in private, non-procreative, non-marital sexual behavior in the privacy of their bedrooms under exactly the same terms as Hardwick’s case. But for gay people, that same right to privacy simply vanished. It wouldn’t be until 2003, when the Supreme Court would finally admit that Bowers v. Hardwick “was not correct when it was decided, and it is not correct today,” that sodomy laws were overturned nationwide in Lawrence v. Texas.

[Source: Joyce Murdoch & Deb Price, Courting Justice: Gay Men And Lesbians V. The Supreme Court]

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

And feel free to consider this your open thread for the day. What’s happening in your world?

Exodus’ dissenters latch onto Gagnon’s sad theology

The Restored Hope Network is a collection of ex-gay ministries that broke from Exodus International over it’s less strident, more truthful new approach. The new theology at Exodus is not only contrary to their past path, it’s unacceptable to some of the largest and oldest member ministries.

The Problem

The primary points of contention that the defectors have are:

• it is inconceivable that a person can simultaneously acknowledge that one is gay and also be a follower of Christ; and
• same-sex attracted people can be healed of their same-sex attraction and become opposite-sex attracted in precisely the same way that heterosexuals are.

I phrase these differently than they might because I want to illustrate their distinction from Exodus.

For example, a member of New Hope Network would likely say that God can work miracles; Exodus would agree. RHN might claim that immediate overnight change was never the goal; Exodus would agree. RHN might say that small changes are evident and that temptation can reduce over time; Exodus would agree. RHN could insist that a change in attitude can impact a person’s life and that an identity which is focused on Christ rather than on sexual attraction makes one a new creature and old things are passed away; Exodus would shout hallelujah and not detract from a single word.

But the real distinction is in what RHN will not put in words. Behind discussions of “hope” and “restoration” and “holiness” is one difference: Exodus no longer holds to any expectation that it’s members will become straight. And New Hope Network refuses to give up what they call the “hope” that they will.

And, to be very blunt, RHN knows full well that they aren’t becoming straight. That doesn’t take a seven year study by evangelical university professors; just a mirror. But that’s beside the point.

What RHN refuses to give up is the theological assumption that they must. In other words, while reality illustrates that no RHN members are now heterosexual, they believe that Scripture requires that they be so. And while failure to live up to Scripture is a given in Christian circles (and is, indeed, the notion behind “Grace”), failure to try is sinful.

But Exodus has not only given up trying to be straight, they have stated that there is no Biblical demand that they do so. They no longer see the mere act of existing as a same-sex attracted person to be contrary to God’s Will – provided that one live according to Scriptural demands about sexual expression. To RHN, that is heresy.

The Defectors and their Hero

Interestingly, the break is not necessarily along factional lines or even degree of animosity towards “the homosexual agenda”. These are not necessarily the ministries that have been the most hostile to gay people in the past.

For example, at the beginnings of the Uganda situation, I corresponded with Jason Thompson and he was willing (briefly and in a limited way) to try and intervene. He also clearly expressed that he had no interest in any anti-gay political efforts and seemed (at the time) to be supportive of change in Exodus. But, as he is the latest to leave Exodus, it’s clear that the change he sought was not in theology.

But, for me, the post perplexing of this shift is whom the defectors have latched onto as their voice on matters of faith: Robert Gagnon.

Those who read here regularly know that Gagnon is a man with an inflated ego (perhaps the single most arrogant person I’ve ever encountered), a fiery temper, a unquenchable thirst for demeaning others, and some beliefs that cause a sane person to scratch their head. He is so convinced of his conclusions that he is sloppy, inconsistent, and downright comical about getting there. He is the sort of Christian who finds Christ inconvenient and would prefer that it be Paul’s message that is paramount (except when Paul gets too soft on sinners at which point he simply creates a new meaning for the texts).

But despite his history of temper tantrums, name calling, and behavior that is anything but Christlike, it is to Rob Gagnon to whom the Restored Hope Network has turned. Actually, it is to Gagnon that they have given control.

The Board of Directors of this group consists of Stephen Black, Andrew and Annette Comiskey, Joe Dallas, David Kyle Foster, Michael Newman, Anne Paulk, Frank Worthen, and Dr. Robert Gagnon. The Board, in the future, will be elected by the members. Aaaaannnd, to be a member you must be unanimously voted in by the Board. Every year. That’s after you turn in a comprehensive application proving that you support the teachings of Gagnon, um, er, the Network.

Rather an exclusive group. Just like their theology.

A Sad Theology

I don’t pretend to be a theologian. I neither speak nor read Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic, or any of the early languages in which doctrine was debated.

But I’m not absolutely devoid of any basic understanding of Christian teaching and I am capable of reading comparative translations enough to know when a claim is diametrically opposed to both the language and the spirit of Scripture. And, frankly, with Gagnon it really isn’t all that difficult. The absurdity of his positions never occur to him, and the Restored Hope theology is no exception.

Take for example, this opening declaration in the organization’s Statement of Basic Beliefs:

Salvation is a gift that cannot be merited by human deeds (Gal 2:21; Rom 3:24-25; 5:15-16; 6:23; Eph 2:8-9) but naturally and progressively produces obedience as a fruit of the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit (Matt 7:16-27; John 15:1-8; Gal 5:22-23). When believers succumb to sin, the kindness of God calls them to confession of sin and repentance (Luke 15:20; 17:3-4; Rom 2:4; 2 Cor 12:21; 1 John 1:8-10; Rev 2:5, 16).

The bracketing statements, while clearly representing the “God’s Gunna Get Ya” approach to the faith, are fairly standard positions of Christianity. But it’s that middle part that is something which is foreign to me. And I was raised with a whole heap of “God’s Gunna Get Ya”.

Taken as a whole, this reads like, “yeah, yeah, I know the Scripture says you can’t work your way to heaven, but if you are actually on your way to heaven then it will be evident in your strict obedience to the Law.” That’s not the new part. Where Gagnon leaps is in assigning to “obedience [to the Law]” the role of being a fruit of the Spirit.

But the “fruits of the Spirit” – the physical attributes that can be seen in the life of a person who is living in harmony with the Spirit of God – are already listed. And the list doesn’t include “obedience”. In fact, they are pretty much the opposite of “obeying a list of rules”. Galations 5 says:

You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.

So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.

What the author of this section is saying – and saying without ambiguity – is that obeying the Law is not the point. You are free from the Law if you follow one commandment: love your neighbor as yourself. Not free to abuse each other, but free from a set of rules and laws because “love each other” handles every situation, even the ones not in the rulebook.

If you live according to your own selfishness (the flesh), you will exhibit hatred, manipulation (“witchcraft”), jealousy, rage, excesses, and an out of control life. But if you are living by the Spirit and loving your neighbor you will exhibit these fruits of the spirit: love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (I dare say that if Christianity exhibited those seven attributes with regularity, few would have anything bad to say about the faith).

If you read that list again, you’ll notice that “obedience” isn’t there. One doesn’t live decently towards each other because the Law said to. Rather one lives decently towards each other because if you love then you don’t need the Law. It’s completed, it’s fulfilled, it’s superseded by love.

This is a beautiful passage for those who believe in love as the sole commandment. But anti-gays who ignore themes and leap at words are also fond of Galations. Lookie, it says that those who exhibit “sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery” will not inherit the kingdom of God. And since they know (cuz they know, ya know?) that this means Teh HomoSEXshulls (see, it has the word “sex”, see? see?), they dance with glee that you, you degenerate, are gunna burn! And they can’t wait!

But if we approach the Scripture to see how it applies in our own life – not in how to use it as a tool against others – and we recognize that this phrase is presented as counter to “loving your neighbor”, then it ceases to be controversial or a weapon. We can all agree that sexuality that is abusive and manipulative and debauches ourselves and others is inappropriate and wrong. Whether using Christian morality or an atheist’s ethical code to “do no harm”, that’s not in debate. If we see the theme (love) and don’t focus on a few select words, it’s impossible to see this passage as a call to obey Levitical codes of social conduct.

There’s more – much more. His reference to John 15 is an example of exactly the same thing: if you follow Christ, others will know it because of your love, all distorted by Gagnon to mean “obey the rules in Leviticus”. But I don’t really need to take it on.

What Gagnon Contributes

This is enough to give a flavor of what Gagnon contributes to the organization: a basic underlying belief that actions and behaviors matter more than attitudes or how we treat each other. And nothing could be clearer than a deliberate misunderstanding of one of the strongest endorsements for a faith that rejects the codebook and the rigidity of Leviticus for a life of love and compassion for others. Gagnon erases the freedom found in the fulfillment of the Law into one law: “love each other”, and sees in its place a call to obedience to the minutia and dictates of a rulebook.

Perhaps, after all, it’s not that surprising that this is the theology that the ex-Exodans have adopted. If we all are free to seek morality and holiness in our lives in accordance with something so vague as “loving others”, that’s frightening. If, like Exodus, you find a sexual ethic that disallows same-sex behavior in your own life but you ever allow that others may find a different call, then how do you know you’re right?

And what if you’re wrong? What if you let someone believe that they can marry someone of the same sex and you don’t tell them that Gods Gunna Get Them? It’s not love to let them go to hell, you know. Love means convicting them of their sin and denouncing their heresy and condemning them of perversion and refusing to appease their desires to be treated like everyone else. (Ooop, scratch that last part, it’s too close to “love your neighbor as yourself” so I’m not going to think about this now. La la la la la, I have my fingers in my ears. And besides, IF I was an evil vile homosexual like you – which I’m not because I’m a struggler not a sinner – I’d WANT someone to take away my children and fire me from my job and throw me in jail and disrespect my marriage. And I’ll just keep telling myself that over and over, even though it is absurdly and obviously false.)

And what, even worse, if you begin to question just how loving your own faith is? OH NO!!! You might be so tempted to put love as more important than the details of Leviticus that YOU sin! And don’t know it! And then YOU burn forever because you loved too much!!

What a sad burdened theology. The freedom that the author of the letter to Galatians spoke about is the furthest from their faith. Freedom has too much responsibility: don’t tell me to love people, tell me what to do. In detail.

It’s a sad, bound up, restricted theology that treats its adherents as children, too immature to know how to behave in love so you have to give them rules.

It’s a religion for bureaucrats. Give me a rulebook. That way I don’t have to think, I don’t have to adapt, I don’t have to respond to circumstances but can just hide behind a rule.

And most of all, I don’t have to care.

Correction of the Day

From the New York Times:

An earlier version misstated the term Mr. Vidal called William F. Buckley Jr. in a television appearance during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. It was crypto-Nazi, not crypto-fascist. It also described incorrectly Mr. Vidal’s connection with former Vice President Al Gore. Although Mr. Vidal frequently referred jokingly to Mr. Gore as his cousin, they were not related. And Mr. Vidal’s relationship with his longtime live-in companion, Howard Austen, was also described incorrectly. According to Mr. Vidal’s memoir “Palimpsest,” they had sex the night they met, but did not sleep together after they began living together. It was not true that they never had sex.

That correction made a better obituary than the actual obituary.

Another Ministry Leaves Exodus

Via David Roberts at Ex-Gay Watch comes word that another ministry has left the Exodus International network. Portland Fellowship, an Oregon-based ministry which had been known for its comparatively moderate image, announced (PDF: 94KB/2 pages) that it has “removed its affiliation with Exodus until changes in leadership take place and the mission is restored.”

Like many of the other ministries which have also left the Exodus network over the past several months, Portland Fellowship Executive Director Jason Thompson cites two distinct disagreements with Exodus:

The problem for many Exodus ministries, including Portland Fellowship, is the two-fold message; 1) there is no eternal reason to seek repentance for the self-identified and practicing ‘Gay Christian’; and 2) that change simply isn’t a goal or a strong reality for the majority. So what is the point of Exodus? At the recent annual Exodus conference, Alan opens the conference by answering the question with, “the answer that came to mind was the thing I was looking for was I didn’t want to be alone anymore.”

This significant shift in the historical work of Exodus, along with several other statements, theological disagreements (specifically regarding the issue of sanctification), and problems in leadership resulted in most of the strongest, longest-lasting Exodus Member ministries breaking their affiliation with Exodus International, and begin working to create a new network. [Emphasis in the original]

With that last sentence Thompson justifies his actions, partly, by citing other longstanding Exodus ministries which broke with Exodus to joing the Restored Hope Network, which announced a  weekend conference in September in Sacramento, California. While Thompson doesn’t indicate whether he will join Restored Hope, this statement points to that direction. Portland Fellowship had been an Exodus member ministry since 1988.

Hollywood Chick-Fil-A 24 hours later

Today I trotted back to the Hollywood Chick-Fil-A, scene of yesterday’s Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day. I think it’s important to get some perspective.

This was yesterday:

And here’s that same street almost exactly 24 hours later:

And here is yesterday:

And the same spot today:

They are not empty by any means. They aren’t going out of business any day soon.

But over time they will experience the cost of being the “anti-gay chicken place”. When all the hoopla dies down over “freedom of speech” and the “overbearing mayors”, all that will be remembered is that Chick-Fil-A is anti-gay. And one day of ‘support the biblical definition of marriage’ simply can’t make up for it.

Details of Tanzanian LGBT Advocate’s Murder Emerge

Maurice Mjomba

Identity Kenya’s Denis Nzioka has followed up with the brutal murder of Tanzanian LGBT advocate Maurice Mjomba, whose decomposing body was found in his home in Dar es Salaam on Monday. According to Nzioka:

The report (sent in Swahili) by the eye witnesses says that Maurice was found ‘slumped on a couch with his mouth and nose shut lid with a tape.’

Mjomba, according to eye witnesses had ‘his hands bound tight behind his back and that he appeared to have been beaten ‘savagely.”

‘Walipomaliza tuliruhusiwa kwenda mwona. Mbaya! Alikalishwa chini akiegemea kochi. Amefungwa plasta mdomo na pua. Mikono amefungwa nyuma ya mgongo’ (When we were allowed to see him, it was bad. He was seated on a couch in the house. His mouth and nose were gagged. His hands were tied behind his back

…Furthermore, the witnesses recount the horrific discovery of blood oozing from his genitals and say ‘Yaelekea sehemu za siri nikama zimejeruhiwa maana damu nyingi imetoka sehemu hizo.’ (It seems his private parts were injured as there was a lot of blood coming out of them.)

The report does not say if he was found naked. They also report that Mjomba’s body had started showing signs of decomposition.

There has been no confirmation of whether anything was stolen from Mjomba’s home. He was last seen last Friday, but friends reported that by Saturday they were unable to reach him by phone. Nzioka points out that Tanzania’s press has been silent on the murder.

Mjomba was a trained HIV/AIDS coordinator in Tanzania, and he worked as a human rights advocate at the Center for Human Rights Promotion (CHRP). His work focused on combatting discrimination against people with HIV/AIDS and in providing outreach to intravenous drug users. He also worked with regional organizations to provide sexual health awareness for LGBT populations.

Tanzania is on the coast of East Africa, and shares borders with Kenya and Uganda.

The Daily Agenda for Thursday, August 2

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Amsterdam, Netherlands; Belfast, UK; Cork, Ireland; Hamburg, Germany; Hanoi, Vietnam; Leeds, UK; Liverpool, UK; Salem, OR; Stockholm, Sweden; Swindon, UK; and Vancouver, BC.

Other Events This Weekend: Divers/Cité Montréal, QC; Summer Diversity Weekend, Eureka Springs, AK; Zia Regional Rodeo, Santa Fe, NM.

Doubted prostate massages would cure homosexuality.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Should homosexuals be treated?: 1913. The very word “homosexuality” had only entered the English language two decades earlier, but already medical and mental health professionals were debating the merits of trying to treat gay people. Among them was Columbia University’s Abraham A. Brill, who, as the English translator of Sigmund Freud’s writings, had singlehandedly introduced Americans to Freud’s teachings and became known as the father of American psychoanalysis. The August 2, 1913 edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association published Brill’s talk at the AMA’s convention in Minneapolis in June, where he discussed how his encounters with homosexuals shaped his understanding of them:

Of the abnormal sexual manifestations that one encounters none, perhaps, is so enigmatical and to the average person so abhorrent as homosexuality. I have discussed this subject with many broad-minded, intelligent professional men and laymen and have been surprised to hear how utterly disgusted they become at the very mention of the name and how little they understand the whole problem. Yet I must confess that only a few years ago I entertained similar feelings and opinions regarding this subject. I can well recall my first scientific encounter with the problem. Ten years ago, when I met a homosexual who was a patient in the Central Islip State Hospital. Since then I have devoted a great deal of time to the study of this complicated phenomenon, and it is therefore no wonder that my ideas have undergone a marked change. Tout comprendre c’est tout pardonner, I have met and studied a large number of homosexuals and have been convinced that a great injustice is done to a large class of human beings, most of whom are far from being the degenerates they are commonly believed to be.

Part of the injustice, Brill concluded, lay in the fact that physicians were offering quack advice on treating homosexuality:

…I can never comprehend why physicians invariably resort to bladder washing and rectal massage when they are consulted by homosexuals, unless it be to kill the homosexual cells in the prostateso that their place may be taken by heterosexual cells, as one physician expressed himself when one of my patients asked him how massage of the prostate would cure his inversion. It is an unfortunate fact that such ridiculous ideas are often heard in the discussion of psychosexual disturbances. Only a few months ago a patient told me that he was told by two physicians that his hope for a cure lay in castration.

Castration may cure (in its way) homosexuality — and all other sexuality with it — but of course it should be no surprise that prostate massages had little curative effect. Brill added, “Investigators agree that homosexuality is no sign of mental or physical degeneration,” and he agreed with those views. Nevertheless, he described three cases in which he claimed to have “cured” homosexuals after only six to ten months of psychoanalysis. In the discussion that followed, Dr. D’Orsay Hecht of Chicago noted the incongruity:

I was also impressed with the effort of Dr. Brill to correct homosexuality by decrying it. But if in the eye of the specialist homosexuality is but a contravention, socially speaking, and if it has just as much right to a hearing from the point of view of a sexual act as has heterosexuality, I really cannot see why the homosexual should care to be delivered from his homosexuality, except that he feels disgraced by it. Then again, a large number of homosexuals are in no way abhorrent of themselves in respect to their natures; they seem to be perfectly happy and perfectly well adjusted, probably in a restricted sense, and these patients probably are not worth while treating as Dr. Brill treats them. If we accept homosexuality as a condition which has as much right to exist as heterosexuality, why should we address ourselves to the duty of treating it?

Reagan Bans AIDS Discrimination: 1988. Acting on a recommendation from a 13-member AIDS Commission, President Ronald Reagan ordered a ban on discrimination against federal workers with AIDS. His actions, however drew sharp criticism for not acting on many of the other wide-ranging changes recommended by his own commission, which urged federal legislation to protect HIV-positive workers. The President instead urged “businesses, unions and schools to examine and consider adopting” similar policies. Vice President George Bush, who was running for president, had already endorsed the commission’s recommendations which included spending an additional #3.1 billion to combat the disease. Dr. Frank Lilly, the commission’s only openly gay member, criticized Reagan’s limited action. “We’ve got a blueprint for a national policy on AIDS,” he said. “It’s a piece of whole cloth. You can’t pick and choose your own menu from it.”

More fully American in Paris.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
James Baldwin: 1924. He was born to poverty in Harlem, the son of a pentecostal preacher and a mother with, as he put it, “the exasperating and mysterious habit of having babies.” As he grew older, his father groomed him for the family business of saving souls, but when Baldwin turned seventeen, he left the business and his home and journeyed to an entirely different world in the Village. He began writing book reviews for the New York Times, focusing on books about “the Negro problem, which the color of my skin made me automatically an expert.” Some of his essays led to a few fellowships which allowed him to leave New York for France, where he stayed for the next six years and would spend the better part of his life. While in Europe, Baldwin learned two surprising things: 1) that he was never before more thoroughly an American as he was the moment he landed on French soil, and 2) “I was forced to admit something I had always hidden from myself, which the American Negro has had to hide from himself as the price of his public progress; that I hated and feared white people.” And from working through those two issues, he came to a profound realization:”I imagine that one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, that they will be forced to deal with pain.” He also worked through his ambivalence of what it was to be an American. “I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.”

Baldwin’s first novel, 1953’s semi-autobiographical Go Tell It on the Mountain, written during his first sojourn to France, became an instant American classic. His first collection of essays, Notes of a Native Son came out two years later. Despite his success, his publisher turned down his third novel, Giovanni’s Room. Baldwin, this time, had tried to break two barriers. The first was that Baldwin’s characters were all white. Baldwin was an established Negro writer, his publisher argued. This book, they feared, would alienate his audience and ruin his career. “They would not, in short, publish it, as a favor tome. I conveyed my gratitude, perhaps a shade too sharply, borrowed money from a friend, and myself and my lover took the boat to France.”

Of course, Giovanni’s Room broke a second barrier; the two main protagonists were gay lovers. And yet the themes were similar to those confronted in Baldwin’s two earlier works. Just as Baldwin had to escape New York so he could work out the alienation he felt for the land that he loved, the American “David” in Giovanni’s Room had also found himself in Paris, torn between the expectations of marriage to his fiancé and the love that he felt for his Italian lover. Other novels — 1962’s Another Country and 1968’s Tell Me How Long the Train’s Been Gone — also dealt with homosexual and bisexual themes in a unflinching and nuanced way. In an essay that was included in the 1961 collection Nobody Knows My Name, he tackled the argument that homosexuality was somehow unnatural:

…To ask whether or not homosexuality is natural is really like asking whether or not it was natural for Socrates to swallow hemlock, whether or not it was natural for for St. Paul to suffer for the Gospel, whether or not it was natural for the Germans to send upwards of six million people to an extremely twentieth-century death. It does not seem to me that nature helps us very much when we need illumination in human affairs. I am certainly convinced that it is one of the greatest impulses of mankind to arrive at something higher than a antural state. How to be natural does not seem to me to be a problem — quite the contrary. The greatest problem is how to be — in the best sense of that kaleidoscopic word — a man.

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Long lines and pickets at Hollywood Chick-Fil-A

There aren’t many Chick-Fil-A locations in Los Angeles, so this one in Hollywood was the center for the Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day. I forwent my delightful Healthy Choice frozen meal (I wasn’t in the mood for “Country Breaded Chicken”) and went to see how things were going.

This was the view from the corner:

And anti-gays were lined up to show their animosity to equality. The drive-through line snaked through the parking lot and down the street. The man in the first truck in this picture drove in from Sylmar, about 18 miles away.

The woman on the corner seat straddling the post had just finished giving some sort of interview to the man in the plaid shirt. She works for a non-profit that helps out the homeless and hungry. I didn’t catch its name.

More jolly Chick-Fil-A patrons.

–

And a few more. There were far more drive-through customers than sit-down patrons.

For the most part it was a quiet ordeal. No furious ranting, no Bible waving, no screaming. The two fellows here on the left in the blue and taupe, however, argued the entire time I was there. Something about economic policy. I couldn’t figure out which was there to support whom but they certainly were enjoying themselves.

I left and swung by Jack in the Box for something called an All American Combo. It was delicious, but I don’t think my system was ready for two jumbo patties, 1,359 calories, and 80 grams of fat. I guess that means celery for dinner.

Game on, chickenboy

Sarah Palin helps politicize eating at Chick-fil-a

Today is Chick-fil-a Appreciation Day and some half-million people have pledged to each fried chicken sandwiches out of appreciation for something or other. What that something or other consists of depends of how politically savvy the person interviewed happens to be. The less sophisticated are “standing up for what the Bible says”, though they are a bit at loss to know what it says as few have actually read the book. Those more sophisticated are “defending free speech” and “opposing the political correctness that is pervasive in our culture”. The strident few who genuinely think that they still have a chance of winning will talk about “defending the family and the biblical definition of marriage”.

Mike Huckabee, today’s sponsor, says

Let’s affirm a business that operates on Christian principles and whose executives are willing to take a stand for the Godly values we espouse by simply showing up and eating at Chick Fil-A on Wednesday, August 1.

You’ll notice that nowhere in his objection to “vicious hate speech and intolerant bigotry from the left” does he even mention exactly why Chick-fil-a is in the news. And no one, I repeat NO ONE, is “showing I’m opposed to those perverts” or even “fighting the homosexual agenda” (or, at least, not while the cameras are on).

And that is important – more important than today’s bump in sales for the chicken filleters. Today’s battle is over an issue that those who oppose us are afraid to articulate.

We’ve stayed out of the chicken wars. Mostly – for me, anyway – because it’s inconsequential and silly. What Dan Cathy said was offensive and his contributions to anti-gay groups long ago dissuaded me from eating at his fried chicken emporium. But they were not so far past the vale that most Americans would be shocked or horrified. He’s a “Standing up for Jesus and the Family” type of bigot, not a “God Hates Fags” type of bigot and most people don’t have a problem with personal belief, so long as they aren’t the Phelps’ brand.

And that’s one reason why social-position boycotts are largely ineffective.

While a hundred million Americans or so do not favor marriage equality, the National Organization for Marriage couldn’t get 50,000 people to pledge to stop drinking Starbucks Coffee. Because while they may not support equality, they don’t really care that you do. They aren’t going to stop lending their next door neighbor their lawnmower just because he has a “support Referendum 74” sign on his lawn and they sure as hell aren’t going to give up frappe mochachinos. It’s just coffee, get over it.

So we have not joined any call to formally boycott Chick-fil-a.

Will I encourage you to make personal buying preferences? Absolutely. But I’m not signing on for some big media-driven, failure-destined, effort to convince the public that the organizations which Dan Cathy supports with the profits from his business are objectionable because they support the ex-gay ministry which is dangerous and ineffective and so, hey, wake up I’m still talking here.

And we aren’t alone. Other than a few well-intentioned souls on Facebook, no one else – GLAAD, HRC, prominent leaders – has been calling for a boycott. There have been efforts to educate, protesters, people debating on TV, but no boycott.

Until now.

Although none has been called, a “boycott” of sorts is under effect. And, oddly enough, it wasn’t supporters of marriage equality that have created this boycott.

Mike Huckabee has made a statement. He has caught the ear of the media. Today all the news outlets are reporting his Chick-fil-a Appreciation Day. It’s not some nameless protesters on some corner who turned the spotlight on Chick-fil-a’s anti-gay activism, it’s those who support it.

Eating at Chick-fil-a has now become politicized. It is a statement. And the statement is only vaguely about marriage. Eating at Chick-fil-a, especially today, says “I can’t come right out and say it, but I oppose homosexuality and the social inclusion of those who so engage”. It’s an unnamed, but well understood, declaration that you either support or oppose gay people being fully included members of society. At its core, the media stunt is all about being “pro-gay” or “anti-gay”.

And that is about the worst thing that could possibly happen for Chick-fil-a. The company has a new label: “the brand of choice for anti-gay people”.

Positions of opposition – and regardless of how it’s phrased, this is unquestionably a position of opposition – are hard to feel good about. One can “stand up for my side”, but a campaign of “I don’t like those people” leaves one feeling nasty and dirty and kind of like those people you saw when you were young and swore you’d never become. And that is exactly what Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin have created.

For such a campaign to work, Chick-fil-a would have to draw enough new consistent customers to make up for lost customers. There would have to be a majority (or sizable minority) of Americans who define themselves in terms of opposition to gay people. Those who run to buy their paper bag full of self-righteous arrogance and contempt for others today would need to sustain this drive far beyond one day and become day after day, year after year, chicken eaters.

That isn’t going to happen; these aren’t new customers; its just a political statement. And it’s a statement that can draw half a million people for one day, but one that is out of tune with the 75% or so of Americans who supported dropping Don’t Ask – Don’t Tell and the two thirds who think civil unions would be okay. It doesn’t even sit well with many who couldn’t find a gay issue they support but, well, they just don’t like to think of themselves as anti-anybody.

As Chick-fil-a’s champions clearly fail to understand, the lost customers are not just gay people, not just equality supporters, but also those who don’t wish to make a statement at all. While half of the country doesn’t fully support equality, few want to wear the “anti-gay” label. Most would be happy eating their chicken and a pickle on a buttered bun without a thought as to how it impacts their neighbors, but now they can’t. Anti-gay activists aren’t letting them.

So they won’t.

McDonald's alternative: Southern Style Crispy Chicken Sandwich

Chick-fil-a, from this day forward, has a subconscious association. It has a vague connection with politicians and television preachers and bigotry. And that vague subconscious association will cost them dearly. We need not boycott – and I very much hope that we do not. We don’t have to.

Mike Huckabee has shifted the game. There’s now a new definition of winning. We don’t have to illustrate a loss of business to show that some boycott is effective.

Rather, Huckabee has doubled-down and the risk is all his. If Chick-fil-a chugs on along, it says nothing about us; we didn’t boycott. If they lose business share, as I predict, it paints anti-gay activists as being cause for failure.

And that’s a “boycott” I can support: one which I don’t have to articulate or even support. One in which my opponent does all the work and takes all the risk and one that costs me nothing.

I can’t know for certain that the ill will created today will have sufficient impact to show up as a serious loss in long-term business. It may be that most Chick-fil-a customers are already part of a demographic that is comfortable with the anti-gay label. It may also be that Huckabee’s stunt will make too little impact and fade too quickly. But I think I can say with confidence that it will be a long time before a sizable chunk of the American public will consider Chick-fil-a in their fast-food choices and their growth potential has been severely curtailed.

So give today your best shot, Huckabee. Game on, chickenboy.

“Haven for Perverts” Raided in Gay-Friendly Beirut

Thirty-six "shazoz" (perverts) were arrested here last Saturday night

As the city of Aleppo fell under siege to the Syrian army last weekend, 200 miles to the south the Lebanese mukhabarat/secret service raided a cinema with a reputation for showing gay pornography. On Saturday, July 28th, 36 men were arrested for being what local television called “shazoz” (perverts) and carted off to Maghfar Hbeish, a jail reserved for those in drug- and prostitution-related arrests.  According to local gay activists, information about those arrested was almost impossible to come by for several days – the police weren’t talking and the only report of the raid was on local Murr TV, a station with an established reputation for anti-LGBT reporting. In this 24-second TV spot you can see plainclothes mukhabarat getting out of unmarked white vans carrying assault rifles and advancing on the cinema.

Beirut is well known as a mecca for gay men throughout the middle east (and worldwide) and local activists were caught off guard, left wondering “why now?” — this was only the second raid of this size in the last 5 years.  While homosexuality is technically illegal under Article 534 as “contradicting the laws of nature,” a  judge ruled in 2009 that homosexuality can’t be prosecuted under that article because the laws of nature are contradicted all the time.  (Can we use this argument with homophobic Bible-thumpers in the US, please?)

The story from here, however, only gets worse:  on the following Tuesday, July 31, the executive director of Helem, Lebanon’s primary LGBT advocacy group, was finally able to speak with officials at the jail about the arrested men.  While an official report has not yet been filed, Charbel Maydaa was told that all 36 men were subjected to anal probes in order to ascertain their sexuality — those who “passed” the test were reportedly released.  An anal probe in this context consists of a physician of some sort checking the man’s anal cavity for traces of sperm and dilation diameters.

These are the only facts as of today; Helem has created a poster calling out local MTV (not related to the U.S. station) demanding release of the men and is considering its options.

Meanwhile, faced with the question of “why now?”, blame in the local gay community began to coalesce around one Joe Maalouf, host of the popular “Inta Horr” TV program famous for its hidden camera pranks.  Last May, Maalouf hid cameras in a similar theater north of Beirut in Tripoli and showed men engaged in sexual acts — the next day local mukhabarat conducted a raid and the cinema’s doors were sealed with red wax, the government’s sign that an establishment has been closed due to immorality.  Saturday night’s raid had no known connection to Maalouf but some in the gay community, assuming he had a part in it, began a campaign to out Maalouf in this video posted to Youtube.  Spearheading the outing campaign (which has since divided the Lebanese gay community — Helem has condemned the outing) was Georges Azzi, a former Helem member.  Azzi defends the attempted outing in this statement:

“For those criticizing me for “outing” joe maalouf, i admit that this is not the ideal solution,but no other reasonable solution worked with him or mtv in general so far, because of him 36 individual most of them are much less privileged than him and completely dependent on their families were outed in a very ugly way, he gives himself the right to live his life because he can afford it while denying it to others. I am aware of the risks i took by doing so, but the idea is not to out someone but rather exposing his hypocrisy to deny him the ability to spread hatred.”

Maalouf, for his part, is threatening to sue and has meanwhile left the country.

Other than confirming the arrests and stating that the men were subjected to anal probes, there is still no official government statement on the cinema closing or whether the men who were not released will be tried under Article 534.  On the bright side, after reports of the controversial anal probes, LCI News, a Murr TV competitor, made the news report below.  The report is sympathetic to the gay community and gives substantial airtime to Maydaa, calling Lebanon the “Republic of Shame” for the raid and subsequent tests.

A transcript of the same report can be found here.

The Daily Agenda for Wednesday, August 1

TODAY’S AGENDA:
National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association Convention: Las Vegas. The NLGJA’s annual convention begins today with a different format from previous years. Instead of being just an NLGJA convention, it will be the UNITY convention being jointly held with the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA), National Association of Hispanic Journalists (NAHJ), and the Native American Journalists Association (NAJA). The convention begins today at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Convention Center and continues through Saturday.

Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Amsterdam, Netherlands; Belfast, UK; Cork, Ireland; Hamburg, Germany; Liverpool, UK; Salem, OR; Stockholm, Sweden; Swindon, UK; and Vancouver, BC.Hanoi, Vietnam; Leeds, UK;

Other Events This Weekend: Divers/Cité Montréal, QC; Summer Diversity Weekend, Eureka Springs, AK; Zia Regional Rodeo, Santa Fe, NM.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Rep. Jim Kolbe Comes Out: 1996. On July 12, 342 Congressional representatives rushed to pass the so-called Defense of Marriage Act into law. The three openly gay representatives, Steve Gunderson (R-WI), Barney Frank (D-MA), and Gerry Studds (D-MA) spoke passionately against the bill, making their status as gay men relevant to the debate. Reps. Jim Kolbe (R-AZ) and Mark Foley (R-FL), who were closeted, quietly voted for the bill. Almost immediately after the vote, San Fransisco activist Michael Petrelis began an email campaign to urge other activists, journalists and publications to reveal their secrets. The Advocate had a policy against outing public officials, but since they were following up prior reports and rumors from other media, they felt that if those reports could be independently verified through three different sources, the next step would be to approach the lawmakers and ask if they were gay. “They were verified, and The Advocate contacted Rep. Jim Kolbe of Arizona and Rep. Mark Foley of Florida, both Republicans, to ask them to explain their votes in favor of DOMA as well as to talk about their sexual orientation.” The Advocate continued:

Both men objected to the latter line of questioning. “Even members of Congress should be allowed to have personal lives,” Kolbe, 54, said in a telephone interview. “The issue of my sexuality has nothing to do with the votes I cast in Congress or my work for the constituents of Arizona’s fifth congressional district.” Upon reflection, however, Kolbe decided to come out soon after talking to The Advocate, saying the magazine’s questioning of him was a chief factor. Foley, in written answers to The Advocate‘s questions, stated his belief that “a lawmaker’s sexual orientation is…irrelevant.”

Kolbe decided to beat The Advocate to the punch (Foley wouldn’t come out until 2006, when he resigned after sexually suggestive Instant Messages between him and a 16-year-old page). On August 1, Kolbe revealed that he was indeed gay. ”That I am a gay person has never affected the way that I legislate,” he said in a statement. ”The fact that I am gay has never, nor will it ever, change my commitment to represent all the people of Arizona’s Fifth District,” which includes Tucson and the southeastern corner of the state. Rep. Franks came to Kolbe’s defense. ”In general, Kolbe has voted against bigotry and discrimination,” he said, ”so his overall record is intellectually honest on this issue.” Petrellis reacted positively to the outing as well. “I think it’s a terrific development that we now have an equal number of openly gay G.O.P. members of Congress.”

Kolbe was reelected to his seat in 1998, and in 2000, he became the first openly gay person to address the Republican National Convention. His speech about free trade and he didn’t come within ten miles of addressing gay rights, but the Texas delegation protested by bowing their heads, purportedly in prayer. (Ohio anti-gay activist Phil Burress called for Kolbe’s arrest on sodomy charges.) Meanwhile, Kolbe continued to defend his vote for DOMA on states rights grounds. “My vote on the Defense of Marriage Act was cast because of my view that states should be allowed to make that decision, about whether or not they would recognize gay marriages,” he said. “Certainly, I believe that states should have the right, as Vermont did, to provide for protections for such unions.” He voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment in 2004 and 2006. By the time he was wrapping up his congressional service in 2006, Kolbe telling local audiences in Tucson that “in a few years,” same-sex marriage would be normal and uncontroversial. He retired in 2007.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Lionel Bart: 1930. His professional songwriting career began in the 1950s when he began churning out pop hits for several British singers. But he is best known as the author for the book, music and lyrics for the smash 1960 London musical Oliver!, based on the famous Charles Dickens novel. When the show opened on Broadway two years later, it earned him a Tony for Best Original Score. In 1963, he wrote the theme song for the the James Bond film From Russia With Love. Bart’s style — and lifestyle — came to epitomize early 1960s Britain, palling around with Noel Coward, Brian Epstein, Judy Garland, Shirley Bassey, and even Princess Margaret, who called him a “silly bugger” for the way he squandered his finances.

Bart continued writing for the West End, scoring respectable successes with Blitz! (1962) and Maggie May (1964), but Twang! (1965) was a horrible flop, and La Strada (1960) closed on Broadway after only one performance. By then, he has broke and in serious decline due to alcoholism and LSD. By 1972, he was bankrupt and slid further into drinking and depression. By the early 1990s, he quit drinking and began attending Alcoholics Anonymous, but between his diabetes and nearly-destroyed liver, his health was permanently damaged. He died in 1999 after a long battle with cancer.

Yves Saint Laurent: 1936. One of the greatest names in fashion got his start at another storied fashion house, Christian Dior. In 1957, Dior was so impressed with Saint Laurent’s designs for the firm that Dior named Saint Laurent to succeed him as designer. When Dior died suddenly later that year, Saint Laurent became the head designer at the House of Dior at the age of 21. Saint Laurent’s 1958 collection is credited for saving the firm, but by 1960 his relationship with Marcel Boussac, the firm’s owner, soured. In 1958 and 1959, Boussac reportedly pressured the French government not to draft Saint Laurent into the army to fight in the Algerian War of Independence, but after the critically panned 1960 season, Saint Laurent suddenly found himself conscripted and undergoing combat training.

This would be Saint Laurent’s low point. Hazed by fellow soldiers and fired by Dior, he lasted only 20 days in the military before he was sent to a military hospital due to stress. While there, he was placed under sedation and given psychoactive drugs and electroconvulsive therapy. Years later, he would point to this period as the genesis for his later problems with drinking and drug addictions.

After he was released later that year Saint Laurnet and his partner, Pierre Bergé, founded their own fashion house under Saint Laurent’s name. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Saint Laurent would set several fashion trends: safari jackets, tall thigh-high boots, and the Le Smoking tuxedo suit for women. He was also the first major French designer to come out with a full ready-to-wear line, and he was the first designer to use non-caucasian models on his runway works. His personal life also indulged in several 1960s and 1970s trends, partying at Regine’s and Studio 54, drinking and snorting cocaine. He nevertheless maintained a hectic schedule of designing two full haute couture and ready-to-wear lines each year. Because of his drug use he could barely walk down the runway at the end of some of his shows. After 1987, he began turning his design work over to his assistants. He retired completely in 2002 and died in 2008 of brain cancer in Paris.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

And feel free to consider this your open thread for the day. What’s happening in your world?

Gore Vidal Has Died

From the Los Angeles Times:

Gore Vidal, the iconoclastic writer, savvy analyst and imperious gadfly on the national conscience, has died. He was 86. Vidal died Tuesday at his home in the Hollywood Hills of complications of pneumonia, said nephew Burr Steers.

Vidal was a literary juggernaut who wrote 25 novels, including historical works such as “Lincoln” and “Burr” and satires such as “Myra Breckinridge” and “Duluth.” He was also a prolific essayist whose pieces on politics, sexuality, religion and literature — once described as “elegantly sustained demolition derbies” — both delighted and inflamed and in 1993 earned him a National Book Award for his massive “United States Essays, 1952-1992.”

His 1948 novel The City and the Pillar was the first major American novel to feature unambiguous homosexuality. His public feud with conservative columnist William F. Buckley was legendary: