It Gets Better

Many, many years ago - okay, more than thirty years ago, I had a brief but interesting career as a disco singer. No need to go into all the twists and turns of that crazy part of my life now -- that'll have to wait for another blog. I'm bringing it up to mention that I had two talented, young, gay dancers who worked with me, and that, in a round-about way, is what this story is about. More specifically, how young gay people can often feel isolated, hopeless and alone, judged by hypocrites and intolerant people and therefore why what Dan Savage and friends are doing with the It Gets Better campaign is so important.

Back in those complicated 70s, there was a rich brew of alternatives entering the mainstream, and this stew wasn't limited solely to the music. It incorporated alternatives of all types. Obviously, some choices were easier for the status quo to accept than others, which is probably why some groups tended to stick together - remember the flower children? I fell into this group. Those were the days when alternatives to the strict mainstream lifestyle came out in droves - hippies, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transsexuals, anti-establishment-intellectuals, -- an eclectic blend of sub-cultures had emerged from behind the scenes, with all their colors, choices of clothing, hairstyles, drug selections, and sexual preferences. I suppose many of us looked and acted like we had come from another planet to the previous generation, and they treated us that way too. In San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, cities I grew up and lived in, there was safety in numbers -- sort of. At least like-minded people gravitated together.

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