Unfortunately, much of gay history has seen persecution and oppression: “Homosexuality has…never received an acceptance, parity, or equality with heterosexuality.” (Edwards, 15)  And Plummer argues, “Homosexuality in this culture is a stigma label.  To be called ‘homosexual’ is to be degraded, denounced, devalued or treated as different.”  He continues, “In this culture, the cost of being known as homosexual must be high.” (175)

However, regardless of this repression, the LGBT experience is not the product of a decaying society with languishing moral codes and questionable values.  Homosexuality has existed during times of strict moral codes, such as in Victorian England, or in times of decadence, such as Caligula’s Rome.  The issue then is not the existence of homosexuality but its visibility.  As Tim Edwards explains, “Male homosexual practices have occurred across all centuries in all societies, yet the male homosexual identity and more particularly the gay man and gay community are a more recent phenomenon.” (15)

Today there is a greater form of visibility and acceptance than in any other period in the modern world.  For many, this has been progress, an unparalleled advance with few, if any, drawbacks. However, although there has been much gained, the belief that our advancement is without setbacks is erroneous and frankly, dangerous.  This visibility has brought with it a stunning, awe-inspiring silence, with the power to influence the world in a way never before thought possible.  Although gay people experience a world in many ways far less dangerous than in previous centuries with the power to engage opponents in dialogue and affect change, their actual empowerment is at best ambiguous.  I do not deny that gay power exists, in any sense of the word, but the actual power of gay people has been changed, perhaps even co-opted. 

Our community has for sometime been obsessed with developing an image...an image of its LGBT members whose purpose was to create acceptance, to grant its members access to what the strait community has enjoyed all along.  But it is this image, trapped behind the glass of scrutiny and the vacuum of economic interests that has silenced and suffocated its members.  On the outside, we appear beautiful and cutting-edge, while as a movement our radical nature has fizzed, our tendencies are wholly consumerist, and a silencing of other gay voices not conforming to that image has commenced.  Our image is beautiful, but what we have done to construct it is hideous and frightening.

The following paper will evaluate the contemporary gay experience.  I will propose that this change was gradual and began with the symbolic Stonewall Riots and throughout the 1970s.  I will then argue that as “gays” fought for change, the new attention attracted capitalists who viewed this emerging group as a new target for exploitation.  It is this influence by advertisers and businesses in general that began to construct the gay identity, right under the noses of the very individuals who fought for empowerment to create their own identity.    Finally, I will show how this consumerist image has been used to assimilate “gays” by making them “acceptable” and silencing the very radical notions that had brought them together in the first place.

This transformation began in the late 1960s and early 1970s.  Directly preceding this period of change had been what is referred to as the Homophile movement.  This was a time characterized by the emergence of several groups such as the Mattachine Society designed to promote the homosexual cause.  This was very different from the militant era as in many ways because the Homophile movement was generally characterized by its “unradical nature.”  Few Stonewall militants believed the Homophile movement was widespread enough in impact or in effort.  However, to disregard the importance of this step in gay history is to provide an unfair and untrue rendering of that period in time.  As D’Emilio contends, “Although the discontinuities between the pre- and post-Stonewall eras are glaring and undeniable, the tendency of liberationists to dismiss their forebears has obscured how much they owed the homophile effort and how much it achieved.” (240) 

Nevertheless, the Homophile movement, it is agreed, was but a predecessor to liberationism and so was set at sharp contrast with the militant voices felt at Stonewall and throughout the 1970s.  In fact, Edwards argues that the liberationst movement, “Was also an attack on the previous reform movement which had ‘merely’ sought to attain equal rights for homosexuals rather than transform the whole of society.”  And so, a combination of various important catalytic events shaped the ideological perspectives of younger homosexuals who had grown up in a world that was somehow less tolerant of oppression, and less interested in upholding repressive traditions.  This combined with the existence of the Homophile movement that, although not radical per se, did push the notions of Homosexuality into at least discussion, versus the extreme silence characterizing its previous position. 

These new radical tenets had powerful effects on younger homosexuals and these tensions first surfaced at the Stonewall Inn on June 27, 1969.  This club, a notorious gay bar in New York’s Greenwich Village, was not unlike most other gay bars in New York and around the country.  And so, like other environments of its kind, it was subject to arbitrary raids by police designed to weed out homosexuals and oppress their “gatherings”  (Adam, p 81) According to Village Voice Luscian Truscott, in his article on the riots called “Forces of Faggotry”, on that night in June, after a raid typical of a heterosexist governance, some drag queens and the bar management were removed forcefully and placed in paddy wagons.  It was at this point that other gays, standing outside in a large crowd grew angry, first catcalling and booing and then throwing progressively larger and larger handfuls of coins at the police.  Eventually, the crowd became unruly and chased the police into the bar where they were sequestered.  Several officers were injured in the riot.  The next evening, a similar event occurred until riot squads disbanded the crowds.  (Teal, 1-6)  Tim Edwards summarizes the outcomes claiming, “Police raids of homosexual premises were not uncommon and, in fact, they had been increasing in frequency and vociferousness since the second world war. “  However, “The difference was that this time the blacks, go-go boys, and drag queens fought back.” (25)

There is much debate over the immediate impact of the riots.  Many saw the riots as an isolated event with no social power while others perceived the riots to have been a “taking over of the streets by gays,” and a stance for “gay power.”  As poet Allen Ginsberg, himself present for part of the exchange noted, “Gay power!  Isn’t it great?… We’re one of America’s largest minorities…It’s about time we did something to assert ourselves.” (Teal, 7)  It was a confused, energetic time that followed.  Countless walked the streets of Greenwich Village after those events distributing flyers calling to “Get the police and the Mafia out of gay bars.”  Only weeks later, the powerful and militant Gay Liberation Front was formed to give greater voice to this new polarized community.

This moment in history changed the gay movement.  Bruce Bawer in his article, “Notes on Stonewall” asserts, “…The patrons at the Stonewall bar refused to go quietly when police carried out  routine raid on the place.” and, “Their refusal escalated into five days of rioting by hundreds of people.” He continues, “The rioting marked a pivotal moment because news of it spread in every direction and sparked the imagination of countless gay men and lesbians around the world.” (23)  Militancy had emerged as a powerful force in the gay movement from that point on and as a result various advances through the GLF the Gay Activists Alliance (GAA) and countless other gay organizations. And therefore, “The Stonewall uprising of 1969… inaugurated a decade of path breaking gay political action in the 1970s.” (Gluckman et al, xiv) In fact, Edwards asserts, “Within a month, the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) was formed.  It was started in the West Village, New York, and within weeks was spreading like wildfire through every major city and state in North America.” (26)  Furthermore, after Stonewall, there could be found over a hundred new gay organizations in less than two years (Adams, p91)  

Of course, this new militancy was not as sudden as many might believe.  As D’Emillio says, “The Stonewall riot was able to spark a nationwide grassroots “liberation” effort among gay men and women in large part because of the radical movements that had so influenced much of America youth during the 1960s.” (233) The new youth movement of gay people was largely influenced by the New Left, the Civil Rights Movement, and protests against the Vietnam War.  As Adams asserts, “The new militants…typically came out of the student and other New Left movements and carried with them the current debates and precepts, which they turned to issues of gender and masculinity.” He continues, “Radicalized by their experiences in black and student organizations, they were now thinking through their own lives with new concepts and were taking a militant message to new constituencies.” (82) 

With this new militancy emerged the new notion of “gay power” that helped forge some of the greatest gains in the history of gay movements.  Such gains included marked steps in law reform.  As Dennis Altman suggests in, The Homosexualization of America, “More significant may be something that only occurred in the seventies, namely the creation of positive protection of homosexuals by the legal system.” (24) In fact, “Antidiscrimination laws are now on the books in nine states and almost one hundred cities and counties.” (Gluckman, et al., xii) This was as opposed to simply repealing laws that had been oppressive to homosexuality before.  Further, “(These laws) take two forms: recourse to the police to protect homosexuals against private vigilantes and punks…and the move to include homosexuals within the ambit of various anti-discrimination and human rights ordinances.” (25) 

Other changes occurred both socially as well as in the medical field, a long time oppressor of homosexuals.  As Amy Gluckman and Betsy Reed assert in their book, Homo Economics, “…It was just a century ago that medical textbooks…detailed the nature of gay life.  Sexual interest in a member of one’s own gender was seen as a disorder, an inversion of all that was healthy and morally sound.” (xi) As a result, the burgeoning gay movement targeted these medical perspectives with vigor.  Certain subsequent victories for gays included the American Sociological Association’s no-discrimination resolution in 1969; the calling for decriminalization by the National Association for Mental Health in 1970; the decriminalization of homosexuality in various states including Connecticut, Colorado, and Oregon in 1971; and the rejection by the National Association of Social Workers of the medical model of homosexuality in a 1972 resolution. (Adams, 88)  However, as Adams suggests further, “Perhaps the best-known success of the early 1970s was the assault mounted against American psychiatry, which resulted bin the 1973-74 removal of homosexuality from the American Psychiatric Association’s official dialogue manual.” (Adams, 87)

Another progressive move came in the forced transition between the word “homosexual and “gay.”  As Herdt and Boxer assert, “Homosexuality was (a term) viewed pathologically, as a disease…” this while “Gay…signifies identity and role…but also a distinctive system of rules, norms, attitudes, and beliefs from which the culture of gay men is made, a culture that sustains the social relations of same sex desire.”(4-5) And, the difference marked a shift from an imposed identity of homosexual to a self-empowered identity with the cultural perspective brought by the term gay.

Ideological shifts both within and without the gay community also characterized this period.  As Altman argues in his landmark article, “What Changed in the Seventies?” much of the change resulted not only in visibility but there was a “major shift in the ideological view of homosexuality, and connected with both of these factors the development of a large-scale commercial world…”  (55) Here begins the major shift in gay identity construction that characterizes most clearly the gay culture of today.  For, “One cannot understand the homosexual experience without recognizing the extent to which we have developed a certain identity ad behavior derived from social norms.” (Altman, 1971:2)

However, the commercialization of gay identity was not due to a natural progression of the militancy that had brought the above reforms, but instead from the forces of the market and the will of capitalists and the larger consumerist society to colonize a new market segment and construct a new, dependent consumerist identity.  As Altman argues, “In essence the commercial gay scene represents not so much the liberation of the homosexual as his co-option into mainstream consumer society.” (57) Edwards asserts, “Gay men in the 1970s were often willingly co-opted into capitalist consumerism through the specific developments of their subculture.” (3) Essentially, the average gay person would become acceptable not only because he was like everyone else, but because he looked, acted, and most important consumed like everyone else. 

This change was subtle but vastly important.  Before the 1970s, the voice of homosexuals everywhere was vastly inaudible and in those instances where it was heard, it was often screams of horror and oppression bringing smiles to the collective faces of an America interested in their demise.  Homosexuals had been outcasts and even the medical profession with its vastly powerful sphere of influence labeled them as sick and deviant affirming the prejudices of much of mainstream America.  With this in mind, it is not difficult to see why commercial America (business, advertisers, etc…) largely ignored gay individuals as a possible market segment.  After all, businesses do not often market their products to the “mentally-ill” nor do they wish to be associated with such groups for fear of mainstream backlash.  As a result, the only “businesses” that catered to homosexuals were those that provided services peculiar to homosexuals such as baths and gay bars.  In fact, the reality that most of these businesses were themselves controlled by “criminal syndicates”(i.e. “the mob”) adds credence to the untouchability of such group’s money by the mainstream (Altman, 19)

This invisibility changed drastically, however, with Stonewall and the subsequent militant aftermath.  Gays were no longer considered invisible since their voices were heard in protest across the nation and around the world.  Also, the deviancy and illness attributed to homosexuals was no longer a reality, with the APA and other such organizations removing homosexuality from their list of psychological pathogens. 

Now that gay people were visible and also no longer so “clearly” tainted with images of immorality and disease, it became easier for business to entertain the idea of gay people as a new market. “The hunger for visibility and acknowledgement…is a strong one for gay men and lesbians, and it’s a hunger that market forces are finally poised to satisfy.” (Gluckman et al, xv) In this way, capitalists can be seen as “hungry sharks” that, smelling the sweet blood spilled by gay militants in their tragic quest for liberation, flock in overwhelming numbers to feed on the confused and disjointed gay movement.  With this visibility therefore, came not only opportunity for the LGBT community, but also for those interested in profiting from an obviously numerous minority, which had been previously untapped.

And so began the incorporation of gay America into the mainstream realm of consumerism, a process that was as confusing for gay individuals as it was for the hapless strait community.  At first, however, the “sharks” looked from a distance to most in the LGBT community as rescue boats sent to take a drowning minority to shore of American liberty.  It was at this fragile point that the debates between militants, who used discourse that attacked patriarchy and capitalist society as oppressors of gay individuality, and assimilationists who believed strongly in the idea that “gays were just like everyone else.”  Such rhetoric coming from the assimilationists can be best summed up by the proclamations of the New York Gay Man’s Chorus chanting, “We show the straight community that we’re just as normal as they are!” (Altman, viii) 

The militants tended to fight the encroachments of gay liberties by businesses supporting the rhetoric of men like Carl Wittman in Refugees from Amerika: A Gay Manifesto, writing “Liberation of gay people is to define for ourselves how and with whom we live, instead of measuring our relationships by strait values.” (Adams, 81)  Assimilationists on the other hand resisted these notions because they saw themselves as wanting what others they knew had: peace, tranquility, and the American Dream.  As Altman argues, “The development (of gay culture) is rooted in widespread socioeconomic changes…the dominant values and structures of sexuality in modern liberal capitalist societies.” (viii) A downfall of most social movements is the point where the price of activism and critique is more expensive than simply fading into normalcy, living ones life like everyone else.  Consumerist America offered many gay people this window: it was no longer necessary to look different, act different, and be so different; homosexuals could be just like everyone else, something many had always wanted. 

As time passed, capitalists created modes of expression and images that were imposed on the gay community, and which soon became the gay community. As Harris argues, “Once we achieve national unity, we immediately attract the attention of manufacturers, who begin colonizing us as a market, thus hastening our assimilation into society at large.” (62)  It was then, as previously argued, that the attractiveness of the “gay community” as a “lucrative” untapped market was developed (Hall, 85.) 

The “hungry shark” hypothesis provides a clear view of bloodthirsty businesses rushing at the very scent of the spilled blood of those militants in the gay community.  As Lois Hall argues in her article, “The Construction of Gay Habitus,” “The development of gay marketing and its related habitus has not been accidental,” she claims, but “it has been forged by marketers (both gay and strait) from the opportunities offered by niche marketing strategies through the inherent tensions in the post-Stonewall lesbian and gay civil rights movement.” (78)

Yet, this model is not entirely accurate as it fails to mention the complicity of other homosexuals in this consumerist colonization. As Daniel Harris suggests in The Rise and Fall of Gay Culture, “The commercialization of gay culture was not an act of rape, of colonialist expansion, of an unprincipled oppressor preying upon the defenseless minority that groveled at its feet.”  He continues, “We invited corporate America into our lives, begged and pleaded with it to recognize our economic potential…(and thus) the selling of gay culture was a synergistic arrangement, a marriage of convenience…” (6) Barry Adam corroborates this point when he observes that, “While gay liberation zapped public institutions, a new class of small businessmen (and some women) began carving out a commercial ghetto…(and thus) capitalist environments cultivated new institutions compatible with itself.”  (106)

Harris’s point and Adam’s observations are well taken and the complicity of many homosexuals should not be overlooked by any means, as even the above Hall quote does not deny.  However, I do caution the reader from revising the previous perceptions too much.  If Harris is guilty of anything other than brilliant observation, it is also his ability to essentialize.  Who is the “we” he refers to?  It is important to make the proper distinction, that the “we” refers not to all gay people, but to those who forcefully invited the commercialization and to a lesser extent those who passively accepted that entrance (the former being gay business men and women; the latter the average gay consumer.)  Those who absolutely are not complicit are those I refer to as the militants who were virtually crushed by this betrayal and who Harris unwittingly silences.

 It is also important to point out that although gay business people and consumers alike are somehow complicit, the degree of exploitation is not equal; while gay people received benefits from this acceptance by advertisers, the remainder of this paper will prove how much they compromised, and lost in return.  Therefore, our model is slightly complicated by Harris’ contribution but not overly so: instead, we may retain our image of the “hungry sharks” devouring the Movement while gay business owners acted like greedy fishermen, dumping the chum into the sea insuring their attraction. 

For instance, as a vice-president of Budget Rent-A-Car says in a Business Week interview, initially his business was concerned over advertising to “gays” but soon overcame their reluctance because “For very little money we reach a potentially large audience that travels a lot, has high disposable income, and feels more loyal to the advertiser.” (September 3, 1979, p118.)  And to further this point, Hall points out that previous to overt advertising in gay publications and such, corporations had been involved in what M. Bronski called “gay window advertising” where marketers “had long been courting gays through codes in mainstream publications.” (85)

Regardless of whether or not one group is more exploitive than another, the above situation may for our purposes be labeled as “Reciprocal Exploitation.”  This is the notion that two sides of a business deal, social activity, or political compromise are so engaged largely for their own benefit and see the compromise as exploitive of the “other.”  Therefore, in this case, gay businessmen and women as well as consumers allowed capitalists and advertising images to influence them so that at the same time they could assimilate more readily and gain what they saw as acceptance.  This type of activity led the New York Times magazine to proclaim that gay publishers “regard exploitation as a first step toward social integration.” (Hall, 86)  This despite claims by advertisers and their respective firms saying, “We market to gays and lesbians for business reasons because we want to sell our products to consumers.  It doesn’t get more complicated than that.” (Hall, 90)

However, notwithstanding capitalist objections, Altman argues that the very, “Development (of the gay community) is rooted in socioeconomic changes over the past several decades and corresponding changes in dominant values and structures of sexuality in modern liberal capitalist societies.” (Viii, 1983)  Thus, there is much more to it than “business as usual.’  The very notion of “gays” evolved because of socioeconomic changes in the gay community. 

If, then, we begin to understand the fundamental changes in the gay community after Stonewall as being more about socioeconomic change and co-option by consumerist forces, the following model of that progression will allow us to see just how the gay image today was ultimately formed.  The following model shall be henceforth referred to as the Reciprocal Exploitation model of Assimilation (REA.)  The crux of this theory rests on a three part progression: first, Marginalization of those forces that complicate mainstream society and thus assimilation; second, Manipulation of the remaining components of that non-purged group through the creation of an “image” and a cultivation of particular, consumer tastes; finally, Maintenance of those particular images and tastes through reproductions of those tendencies in consumerist discourse and the media.

The first phase of this sinister progression rests on the marginalization or purging of the more radical and thus less easily digestible components of the particular group that mainstream consumerist society wishes to absorb.  The over-arching goal of gay conservatives,” Is often assimilation, an so if the issue or strategy smacks of radicalism, they want no part of it.” (Gluckam et al, xvi) In the case of the gay community, various groups were severed, often unwittingly, by this process left to fend for themselves and more often than not silenced and suffocated by the expulsion.  As Altman points out, the views of radical gay activists perceived this progression with horror observing that the new gay visibility lacked, “Any real challenge to the dominant social order,” an idea which had been paramount at the movement’s inception. (1) And as Jeffrey Weeks argued, “The strategic aim of the gay movement must not be simply validation of the rights of a minority within a heterosexual majority, but the challenge to all the rigid categorizations of sexuality, categorizations which exist…to control people’s behavior in very rigid ways.” (19)  Stoltenberg further claims, “ do not know of a movement or liberation which has betrayed its revolutionary potential so soon after its inception as the male-dominated movement for the liberation of ‘gay people.’” (124)

Those expelled were those that challenged patriarchal definitions of sex that did not conform to acceptable images of mainstream society, those that did not wish to conform to such images and those who would not be quiet when told to do so.  The most obvious of those silenced were men and women conformed to a myriad negative stereotypes constructed by a heterosexist nation for repressive purposes. 

Among these were drag queens who had previously, as Daniel Harris asserts, been intricately linked with the gay militancy and in particular with the Stonewall riots themselves (Teal’s account corroborates this point.)  Edwards claims, The development of drag queens and camp culture commercially brought effeminacy into the public sphere.”(46)  Harris asserts that drag queens and gay men linked to “camp” – a particularly effeminate and stereotypical expression of gay identity at the time- were actually quite militant in those expressions, idolizing caddy actresses such as Garland and Crawford not as a wish to be feminine, but in a wish to use powerful women gaining victory over men as their own symbolic victories over a macho culture (11-13.) This point was entirely lost on much of gay youth and gay assimilationists who saw effeminate men and drag queens as signs of “self-loathing” and unhealthy individuals (Harris, 209.)  As Hall points out, the articles of the Advocate, a magazine perfectly aligned with the assimilationist cause, specifically attack these groups claiming, “The most flamboyant, nelliest ‘queen,’ if one takes the time to try to know him, is revealed as a very unhappy individual,” an assertion more often than not completely unsubstantiated. Other groups such as “transsexuals and transvestites were cast as social misfits.” (82)

Another blatant departure from radicalism came in the silencing of women in the gay movement, in particular, lesbians.  As Hall asserts, “The visibility of women in (the Advocate) dropped drastically by 1979, when editors decided to give up trying to appeal to women.”  They argued, “There was insufficient common interest between gay men and lesbians to continue to court women readers.” (84) This difference in interest had much to do with the more radical nature of lesbians at the time, who unlike men, were very much influenced and linked to the feminist movement.  And so, Hall continues, “It is apparent that the raison d’etre of lesbian feminist publishing…was to critique the ideological and material structures of society and the connections between them.”  In short, this “contrasted sharply with the Advocate’s more assimilationist agenda, which, from the beginning, had been more concerned with working with ‘the system.’” (84)

Although not a sect of the gay movement per se, the elimination of sexually explicit advertising or materials from the pages of gay publications such as the Advocate (see Appendix 1a-c) provided an ideological purging of sexual discourse from the gay media which effectively marginalized and silenced this part of the movement.  As Hall writes, “The decision to exclude sexually explicit material from the main body of the magazine was made in the hope that mainstream advertisers would find the Advocate a more hospitable context for National ads,” although these explicit ads were placed into a separate supplement, often available at newsstands or to subscribers at a nominal fee. (83)

Ironically, “The protests of those who still denounce an entity called the establishment… are falling on increasingly deaf ears.  This is ironic, because…the perks consumed by the gay middle class represent the gains of what was originally a radical movement.” (Gluckman, xv)

And so, as the notions of Reciprocal Exploitation took firm hold of the gay community, its first phase, marginalization of much of the more radical elements of the gay community succeeded slowly but effectively by the end of the seventies.  However, as the first phase was operating as planned, the second phase, the manipulation of the remaining factions began to take shape.  This phase was far more complex than the silencing of groups that wanted no part of such mainstream functions to begin with; this phase involved the construction of a gay image that was to be imposed on “gays” everywhere as well as “straits” in an effort to assimilate but also to usher in the second half of the exploitation which was the manipulation of that image to cultivate particular tastes in consumption.  

First, gay publications did their part by constructing a useful image of the ideal gay person, an image largely unrepresentative of even the gay men who survived the initial purging.  As Gluckman and Reed point out, “Gay marketing organizations were churning out compelling self-promotional materials, boasting of a community with impressive demographics, profligate spending habits, and high levels of discretionary income.” (xvii) The Advocates then owner, “Goodstein established the gay playboy and his ideal environment as central to the magazine and, beyond its pages, as a viable market segment for forward-looking advertisers.”  Hall continues, he “Flattered his audience with an idealized image of the Advocate’s reader: male, employed, “responsible.” With a ‘meaningful lifestyle’…an attractive body, nice clothes, and an inviting home.”  (82)

 In fact, this was largely unrepresentative of the average strait man, much less gay man, although the image was virtually copied from the already “established figure of the (strait) male consumer” found in Esquire and other such periodicals. (83) Further, this image was almost inextricably white and affluent to a point of excess.  As Harris implies, “The commercialization of the gay man’s body was one of the inadvertent consequences of gay liberation, which, after rescuing us from our closets, placed us at the mercy of our vanity cases and our medicine cabinets…” (108)

To make matters worse, “The first issue of the Advocate under Goodstein…contained a readership survey designed to tell publishers about their audience’s reading, buying, and social habits.” (82) Regardless of the absence of inquiries of the reader’s political or ideological affiliations, the survey itself that was subsequently used to reinforce the “gay image” described above, was statistically flawed and blatantly biased.  Nevertheless, this survey was cited as truth, shaping perceptions of “gays” by the strait community and by gay people themselves. 

This survey even led the Advocate’s publisher, Peter Frisch to propose that, “Gays are everywhere and we are the most affluent of any minority.” (83)  Indeed, it was “These images (that) may have been the evidence necessary for advertisers and marketers to convince themselves and their clients that there was, or could be, a ‘gay market.’”  And perhaps in the most disgusting display of image construction, Frisch decided to go as far as to list “must haves” that would define the gay consumer.  These “must haves” included, “A convertible.  A sports car, a foreign car…some fabulous wardrobe.  You take umpteen vacations and weekend trips a year and have a second home…” (86) It is difficult to imagine that even the most arrogant Advocate readers would possibly characterize themselves in this way, much less aiding anyone in the use of the word “umpteen.” (Who says that?)

 But other gay “spokesmen” supported this characterization saying, “For gays, it’s a matter of showing that you’re in the ‘in’ group…you know how to dress and you know how to decorate your apartment.  You’re no longer the outsider you were in High School.”  And so such images of gay men allowed them to take their first “real’ steps toward acceptance and assimilation as such features appealed to a hurtful past of exclusion.  Instead, by conforming, it appeared that “consumption (was) a viable way to gain access to a community and modicum of acceptance.” (86)  In fact, as Gluckman and Reed contend, “The explosion of marketing to lesbian and gay men has only made …contrasts more visible.”  Indeed, “As advertisers vie for the loyalty of wealthy, professional gay shoppers, clean-cut models appealing to a demographic group have suddenly appeared in magazines, on television, and on billboards.” (xiii) As a result, “Because other segments of the gay community do not enjoy such attention, this phenomenon has highlighted deep fissures in a group that has used its unity to push for political advances.”  Furthermore, “By priviledging some gay people (and some visions of what it means to be gay) over others, recent economic advances have called into question the very premise of a gay community that is united by sexual orientation than it is divided along economic, racial, and gender lines.” (xiv)

To further this point, Dennis Altman consistently discusses gay culture and senses of fashion and style almost interchangeably.  He evaluates notions of “gay chic” as having been instrumental to what gay sensibility was and its “important” influences on American culture overall.  It is this type of rhetoric, even by such prestigious members of the gay intelligencia that also inadvertently linked gay with consumerist tendencies. 

But it was by no means enough to control the construction of the image of the ‘gay man.”  As a part of this progression, it became important to direct his consumption and cultivate his particular tastes.  Indeed, as Hall recognized, “to encourage consumption was not enough: Gay magazines also needed to cultivate particular tastes.” (91) Indeed, “The magazine appealed unapologetically to readers’ aspirations toward both material and cultural accumulation.”  And as Isaac Mizrahi once was once quoted as saying, “Not political activism but wigs were the route to gay liberation.” (92)

As Altman asserts, “gay chic” –that stylistic term for gay style- “stresses conspicuous consumption and a sense of self-preservation and artifice, reflected in that exaggerated leather, punk, and glitter fashions associated with such places.” (19) There appeared to be great changes in the gay community directly surrounding the advent of consumer colonization. 

Gay bars, discos, and expos all became linked almost inherently with gay culture and how it was characterized.  “The development of the gay commercial scene…is to a large extent a reflection of the new openness and self-affirmation by homosexuals, and thus markedly different from the traditional forms of gay business.” (Altman, 19)  Disco, for example, an originally gay cultural phenomenon, was obviously an extreme crossover into mainstream, but with that crossover to the strait world came countless recording studio advertisers back over to the gay world, now sensing the gay community had influence there. (Hall, 93) 

Also, the 1980 gay expo in Los Angeles is worthy of note – a large exposition of “several hundred exhibitors and with an official proclamation by Mayor Tom Bradley, the exhibition showed both the extent to which gays are seen as an attractive market and the way in which some people see this factor as a political basis.” (Altman, 20)  Christine Riddiough further asserts, “The (gay) bars have been and remain, even now, the focal points of the gay and lesbian community.  They are the most stable institutions in a frequently unstable world.” (14) And Altman argues that it is at these bars, “that most homosexuals first meet others like themselves and are able to express themselves in ways denied them in other areas of their lives.” (21)

Altman then evaluates the construction of the gay ghetto, areas like the Castro or The Village where gay businesses and individuals exist with greater ease.  He observes, “Such areas are marked by a certain sameness: they seem at first sight to be populated almost entirely by men under the age of forty-five, dressed in uniform and carefully calculated style dedicated to a hedonistic and high-consumption life style.” (31)

And so with these examples, it appeared that not only were specific tastes cultivated but the very definitions of ‘gays” in general were inextricably linked to commercial enterprises such as those bars, expos, and even ghettos.  Altman suggests that, “No other minority has depended so heavily on commercial enterprises to define itself.”  (20) Adam refers to the commercialization of sex in bathhouses, as “efficient sex delivery systems” that had become legitimate forms of cruising, which previously oppressed, now were made legitimate by their control by capitalists. (106-7) Altman further contends that desire itself had been commercialized both with the gay image as well as the packaging of sex and sexual discourse, thereby coming full circle controlling all aspects of the gay world, even those originally expelled. 

And the power of gay marketing is by no means illusory.  In fact, as Hall explains, “When Absolut took the risk of placing ads in gay magazines, no gay man would serve anything but Absolut.  Those ads took Absolut from fifth place to the number-one selling premium vodka in the country.” (86) Thus, the exploitation was not imaginary and the power of those advertising techniques as well as their results proved immense.

Thus, the second phase of assimilation proved as relentless and effective as the first, not only constructing an image, controlling particular tastes, but even packaging tastes and sexual rhetoric, previously expelled, in new ways for greater acceptability.  The third phase emerged from that manipulated image and those cultivated tastes and took the form of a vastly reproduced assimilation, the very maintenance of the oppression.  The very maintenance of this oppression is expressed through hegemoized notions of acceptance and broader culture, which appear to incorporate the “gay man” but which simply incorporate his image and exclude much of what has previously been, could now, and will ever be meaningfully contributed from this category of individual.

As Lois Hall described the nature of gay marketing, she asserts that this activity, “necessarily engages with fundamental struggles within the post-Stonewall gay civil rights movement that may be characterized as…to be accepted as “just like everyone else’, the assimilationist model, and on the other hand,” she says, “To be the thorn in the side of heterosexist, patriarchal, gender-normative, sex-averse, dominant culture, a more radical queer project.” (77)  This not only summarized the original battle fought at the onset of the exploitation but also characterized the rhetoric of the maintenance of such exploitation. 

In many images and rhetoric used by advertisers, publications, and the greater media, the radical notions of the movement became commodified and themselves trapped within the very assimilationist rhetoric that had been foreign to “militants” in the seventies.  As time progressed, the silencing of the real protest succeeded and it was replaced by false protest that no longer existed outside the dominant paradigm of heterosexist norms and impulses.  As Daniel Harris observes, “In the last 25 years, the subculture has been ravaged by an unlikely enemy, the gay activist himself.”  He continues, “(The gay radical’s) political agenda is strangling a sensibility that homosexuals are asked, in the name of acceptance, to muffle and tone down, modeling themselves in the image of the staid heterosexuals.” (252) 

However, As Dennis Altman adds, “The acceptance of group diversity in America has always existed within very severe limits,” and so, “groups are allowed to maintain their identity within American society only to the extent that they are prepared to subscribe to the dominant values of the society; to go outside these values is to be denounced as un-American.” (ix) And so Altman observes the very key to social acceptance necessary for acceptance of homosexuals and thus also the formula for the maintenance of the repression relevant for that assimilation. 

And such publications as the Advocate perpetuate this process even as late as the early nineties.  As Hall explains, “In 1991 four of five women on the editorial staff were fired or resigned over the magazine’s lack of commitment to lesbian staff and content.” (89) And, in 1992, in a move to completely obscure sexual content, “The Advocate moved the classified section of the magazine out of its newsstand version altogether as part of what Niles Merton called a 2-year “mainstreaming plan.” (90)  And then in 1994, “Then editor Jeff Yarbrough reflected on the removal of sex ads…‘we need to clean up our act and get a little more happy and shiny to attract advertisers.” (89) This in 1994!!!

And as Adam contributes, “The irony of the 1970s, then, was the ease with which gay and lesbian aspirations were assimilated, contained, and overcome in societies…The gender challenge,” he notes, “became a daily affirmation of the end of the decade, whether as gay male masculinity or lesbian feminist nationalism.  The socialist challenge of the New Left helped contribute to its opposite: a bigger commercial ghetto.” (106) And Harris adds, “Ultimately…the consolidation of homosexuals through mass culture will result in the dissolution of our own sense of collective identity as well.”
(62)

The LGBT community has, essentially, been co-opted.  Its radical nature is no longer what it once was.  For instance, rather than attack notions of the nuclear family, patriarchal categorizations and other forms of oppressions, gay people today fight on assimilationist terms entirely, not only fighting battles for “the right to marry” and “gay adoption” – notions foreign to militants years back who loathed such constructions- but even celebrities, the very essence of mainstream culture, such as Rosie O’Donnell and Ellen Degeneres, are used as our spokespeople.  By all accounts, the maintenance of the gay image and the cultivation of particular forms of consumption are alive and well.

In the debate over gay assimilation, there are a number of perspectives, each nuanced, and each staunchly defended.  There are many who believe the assimilationist movement of gay Americans, have been wholly beneficial.  Others acknowledge concessions, but argue that the ends justify the means.  Supporters of this position ultimately believe that in order for homosexuality to gain acceptance, it must in many ways curb its own nature for the sake of gay people to lead “better”, more successful lives.  And if these concessions or commercializations do occur, it is well worth it.  .  This form of commercialization has actually, according to Altman, acted as a step toward liberation for “Many gays coming to terms with their sexuality, or isolated in small towns or suburbia.” (57) Altman continues, “The invention of the gay minority as a definable consumer market is itself a step toward acceptance, even if acceptance defined by narrow economic criteria.” (18) 

And Hall does observe that, “Gay marketers commonly remark that advertising to a respectable gay consumer produces a “positive” visibility that, in turn, is beneficial to lesbian and gay rights.”  And she comments further, “Underlying a faith in the power of gay visibility may be some relief that the successful construction of a respectable, consuming, homosexual public is precisely what is needed for openly gay people to gain credibility and acceptance.” (93) Indeed, Altman asserts, “The need to repress one’s homosexuality is declining, and there is less necessity for the enormously painful barriers erected by so many people against recognizing the potential in themselves.” (22)

In this regard, I do not soundly disagree with Hall or Altman’s observations, nor do I whole-heartedly disagree with those that champion assimilation and its gains.  In fact, if it were not for much of the strides and gains made, this very article might have been impossible to write.  However, the fact that this article was written at all, is testament to the debate’s existence, and I argue, the very serious problem plaguing Gay America. 

While I do not reproach those who support assimilation, even assimilation at any cost, I do disagree with them.  While I concede gains have been made, I ask that we re-examine those gains to see if they are in fact, worth the losses, and that they also are pushing us in the right direction.  Here I will summarize five consequences of the gay assimilation through its commodification: first the marginalization of minority gay men and women; second, the decrease in radical gay culture; third, the decline in distinctive gay culture; fourth, the economic backlash; fifth, the decline of true gay parity.

First, the marginalization of gay minorities has been an extreme concession in this “fight for acceptance” that simply cannot be overlooked.  Women are one such group that have made the brunt of these concessions by either being silenced, made invisible, or reconstructed in the eyes of the media and consuming public.  Altman himself argues that, “They appear in the most conventionally feminine modes” so that “lesbians are fundamentally, biologically and stylistically, feminine and female, and that they will consume in an accordingly gendered way.” (94) The basic creation of the “lipstick” lesbian as an acceptable and beautiful image of gay women has all but silenced previously implicit modes of rebellion and questioning.  Now, lesbians are to look like everyone else, that is, the acceptable form of the strait woman (note: this phenomenon largely occurs in the strait community as well, where larger or “unattractive” women are marginalized.)

And gay minorities in general, i.e. non-white, non-wealthy gay people are often made to vanish from the movement’s forefront as a whole.  In general observation of the gay movement in the media, for example, gay minorities are noticeably absent.  From television shows that are considered “ground-breaking” and “unifying” by strait and gay audiences alike, such as Queer as Folk, Will & Grace, Ellen, and countless other such broadcasts, minority members simply are not there.  And in some cases, even when the attractive, white men do become poor) e.g. through crystal meth addiction as in Queer as Folk) they are saved by their wealthy friends.  Overall, as Hall explains, this commercialization has essentially caused an “erasure of the diversity of gay and lesbian lives…” in favor of efforts “to construct a lucrative image of the consuming gay man (which) may have worked inadvertently against the magazine’s original commitment to securing gay civil rights.” (91-3)  Hall argues that “readership surveys that exaggerated gay people’s youth, income, and educational levels…(silenced) the real contours of the multicultural, class stratified gay population…with considerable costs to lesbian and gay civil rights.” (93) 

Ultimately, this silencing of gay minorities has two obvious negative reproductions: first, the gains in acceptance made by certain gay groups will inevitably be more successful than others, with some still suffering in the shadows, unbeknownst to their counterparts; second, this shadowy suffering causes stratification among the communities, often pitting them against one another: black-white, male-female, “butch”-“queeny”, rich-poor, and so forth through countless permutations. 

Second, the decline of radical gay culture is a significant drawback to the assimilationist strategy with dire long-term consequences.  For years, gay culture stood for a sort of definitive backlash, rebellion against social mores that were considered not only commonplace, but necessary.  The gay movement at Stonewall, however, saw these views as repressive and damaging not only to gay people, but humans as a whole.  As a result, they fought not only for acceptance, but acceptance within the context of altering the rigid social order, acceptance by tearing down the walls around those who would not accept them, rather than knocking gently at the door.  Certain views radical gay people held included but were not limited to, explicit sexual activity and imagery, vanquishing gender norms, de-linking gender and sex, and most importantly an end to hegemonic institutions of oppression, namely the state of marriage.

On almost every single point, the gay community has acquiesced to the wills of the majority and generally abandoned many of these views, often supporting the opposite.  I remind the reader of the changes in the media as a whole, and namely, those in the Advocate already asserted as the premier, flagship gay magazine.  Hall asserts that since, “same-sex eroticism, in particular, poses a threat to the social order…as a result, its elimination from the public face of gayness is necessary to allow for professional-managerial gay assimilation.” (94) As a result, we saw sexually explicit material completely dropped from the Advocate, once a staple of radical gay culture and necessary to the questioning movement.  But not only has the Advocate and other gay magazines de-radicalized, they have ultimately become trendy weeklies, along the lines of Us Magazine with various references to quasi-political or social commentary to perpetuate the image of an “Advocate.”

Instead of radical content, the Advocate has opted for the trendy sparkle of celebrity.  With lead stories and covers such as, ”The L Word,” “Nicole Kidman: Summer Movie Preview,” Queer Eye for the Strait Guy,” “Queer as Folk,” “Johnny Knoxville,” “Antonio Sabato, Jr.;” Six Feet Under: Michael C. Hall,”  “Charlize Theron,” and so on.  And the content of the magazine itself is only a reflection of its lead stories and covers.  For instance, in the October 12, 2004 edition, the table of contents more than resembles a copy of Entertainment Weekly: most of the magazine lends itself to categories like ‘music,” ”books,” ,”dance,” art,” and even a feature article on “America’s Next Top Model” and gay men’s obsession with Tyra Banks.  Also in  that edition was a Poll that asks readers a deeply profound question: “Would you be less inclined to see Alexander if his relationship with Hephaestion is depicted as purely plutonic?” Now although this does ask readers to be aware that the media might be trying to silence gay imagery, 70% of readers said “yes” they would be disinclined to watch the film with the following comments: “Less Inclined?  How about not at all!  Ditch the theater and pick up a Gravitation DVD.  Trust me.”  Or “I don’t watch Oliver Stone movies.  Period.”    Or best yet, the comment that hits the nail right on the head, “I want to see the movie because it looks cool…I don’t think an issue like that would ever make me not want to see a movie.”  Perhaps, the militant focus is misdirected?

Or take a look at February 17, 2004 edition featuring “Robert Grant and Kyan Douglas as 2 of our Top Ten Bachelors.”  Doesn’t Cosmo do something like that?  Or the March 2, 2004 edition whose almost sole devotion is to “Oscar Coverage.”  And such articles as, “Jake Gyllenhal and Heath Ledger are ‘ Cowboys in Love: 2 Hot Stars, 1 Gay Film!”  I almost couldn’t put it down!!  And then we proceed with countless references to MTV (7-6-04), references to countless stars and celebrities and several movie reviews which although they are about gay issues like Kinsey, miss the boat on the actual content and critique the cinematography and plot.(8-17-04)  And of course, self-proclaimed “Biggest Issue in History!” doers not pay homage to the long gay history but instead has Kyan Douglas the rest of the Queer Eye for the Strait Guy Crew “PLUS K.D. Lang, Harvey Firestein, Esera Tualo, Margaret Cho, James Marsden…and ANOTHER PLAYGIRL MODEL COMES OUT!” I definitely couldn’t put that one down!!  In the end, we wonder if Hollywood has completely hijacked gay media and brainwashed and whitewashed it into a “truly sensible” form of entertainment..

But celebrity is not the only obsession gay media has and in particular the Advocate.  Gay Marriage has more than its fair share of the stage.  For example, from 2003-2004, of all the magazines the Advocate produced, more than half made countless references to gay marriage, including between one and five articles each.  None of the articles questioned the validity of gay marriage or marriage in general as a previously seen hegemony.  Instead, many articles had titles such as, “Yes, they’re married,” (10-21-04),  “P-town ‘I Dos’” (6-6-04),  “Marriage Laws and Disorder,” (5-25-04), “Gay Marriage: Love and Danger” (3-16-04),  “Valentine Gays: Married in Canada and Everywhere Else” (2-17-04) and countless others. 

And then, of course, the Covers.  Such as the March 16, 2004 cover “Gay Marriage: Tearing America Apart,” featuring sitcom star of It’s All Relative, Christopher Sieber,” or the banner on the “Biggest Issue in History which claims to have a gay marriage wedding album inside.  Or the inevitable merging of the two obsessions such as on the April 27, 2004 cover which reads, “42 Music Stars on Gay Marriage: We’re for it!”

In one personal example I encountered, on the night of the 2004 American Presidential election, an election known far and wide for its divisive nature and alleged implications for the gay community, I wandered on my way home from a depressed Election Party into a Chelsea Bar.  To my horror, I witnessed the drag queen, who was performing on stage, allude to the election only as “Where is everybody?  Oh yea, something is going on tonight, right?  Some political thing, I don’t know.  I’m not into politics.  Hey Queers, get in here, I’m more interesting.”  Had this been any drag queen, it would have been sufficient as evidence of a decline in some drag queen’s radical natures from Stonewall.  But worse still, this particular drag queen had been voted the best (and therefore most representative) in 2004 by HX Magazine.

It can and will be argued that gay marriage and celebrities are big sellers and reflections of the times we live.  This is what people want to read about or countless other points.  It is true, celebrities and gay marriage are huge topics today, but we must avoid a reversal: we must ask, are these topics in the media because people want to read about them, or do we want to read about them because they are so prominently displayed.  And even discussing such topics can have merit, to show the diversity of gay lives; however, when it becomes the dominant form of expression, it because irresponsible and betrays gay past in favor of a commodified gay present.

Third, there has been a significant economic and political backlash that is inextricably linked to the gay community’s efforts to assimilate.  Even the benefits of assimilation themselves are not stunning examples of gay victories: “…Being lesbian or gay today does exact various economic costs – lost jobs, fewer promotions, discrimination in housing and healthcare.” Furthermore, “Citing recent civil-rights “advances” is rather like viewing the glass as one-fifth full, when it’s really four-fifths empty: in forty-one states it is still legal to fire an employee solely because he or she is homosexual.” (Gluckman, xiii) Worse still, however, are those conservatives that observe these exaggerated claims and use them in “arguments against civil rights protection by the Christian right and conservative legislators.”  (93) This all despite reports from Badgett that “gay men earn on average 27% less than heterosexual men, whereas lesbians earn about the same as heterosexual women,” which comes to about 74% of what heterosexual men make. (94)  So, although assimilation seems to be advancing gay America, it has done so slowly and in some cases, caused a very powerful backlash which overall appears to be pushing gay America back.

Fourth, as per assimilationist’s efforts to make gay culture one with the mainstream, there has been a clear and ironic decrease in attainable gay parity in America. Hall writes, “The Advocate (and other such publications) presumes and represents a unified gay discourse and sells a homogenized gay readership to advertisers.”  Furthermore, “The increasing circulation of gay and lesbian images in consumer culture has the effect of consolidating an imaginary, class-specific gay subjectivity for both gay and strait audiences.” (95)

As I have discussed, the gay community has been marginalized and manipulated so that there has been a decrease in the senses of community, when publications and the media focus on “the personal over the political as the locus for change.” (Hall, 83)  In fact, the hijacking of gay images and replacing them with highly romanticized and often erroneous images in an effort to ease the strait community into acceptance has actually hindered the gay community in a long-term way.  If in fact, gay people seek to be accepted, a gay parity with heterosexuality, we as a community must be accepted as being only an extension of strait community rather than an opposing image.  We must be looked upon as interesting and diverse as strait people as a whole so that generalization would be as out of place on gay people as strait people now. 

But by manipulating a single gay image, that of a white, wealthy male with certain good tastes and elegant manner, we are essentializing ourselves. If strait people are continually exposed to media images of a certain type of gay person rather than a diverse community, it is easier to write us off as an aberrant person, a single type that is different from “normal” people.  If we were seen as a diverse group, then it would be easier to see us as a community much like strait people with differing views, activities, interests, appearances, etc.  With one image, we are easily pigeonholed.

In this article I have advanced certain distinct notions of what gay America was, became, and is currently.  I argue that we have changed considerably, in some positive ways and in some negative ways.  Overall, it is important to question our current views on assimilation and the manner in which we try to attain it.  Although progress is good, we must not lose sight of our goals and thereby lose sight of what and who we really are.  I fear, that if we do not change course, we do not reconsider our current marches, we may be left not with a dynamic, powerful gay community, but instead with a silent image of what others might want us to be.


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