>From Gay & Lesbian Americans

  COME OUT!
  CONGRESSMAN STEVE GUNDERSON

 Steve Gunderson, you have been in Congress 11 years now and you
are still not a sponsor of the gay and lesbian civil rights bill.
Yet all the while you've been going to gay bars and having gay
lovers.  We know this first hand from multiple reliable
witnesses.  We've met a young man who travels with you in gay
circles and who has identified himself to us as your "boyfriend."
How long do you intend to keep up this double identity--out to
Washington gays, in vis a vis Wisconsin voters?

     Steve Gunderson, while an arch-conservative like Barry
Goldwater called the compromised "Don't ask, don't tell" policy
for gays and lesbians in the military insane, saying "It's time
to deal with this straight on and be done with it," you voted for
this compromise---both with your vote in Congress (September
28th) and with your personal example.

     Steve Gunderson, your idea of gay rights is selfish and
self-serving.  It really only establishes the right to a
comfortable closet for people of privilege like yourself.  Have
you no group social responsibility?

     Steve Gunderson, no person is an island, and your closetry
(along with all the other closetry in this country) affects other
lives--not just your own.  Closets silently validate the right
wing!  Closets inflate the numbers of uninvolved, apathetic,
disinterested and sometimes even of the right wing (Republicans
and others).  Closets deflate the numbers of gays, lesbian and
concerned non-gays.  In so doing, closets empower the right wing
and drain power from gays and lesbians, and from those at the
forefront of the fight against AIDS.

     Meanwhile, Steve Gunderson, AIDS is ticking away like a time
bomb in the bodies of hundreds of thousands of gay men and other
Americans.  Teenagers are catching AIDS as fast as gay men used
to.  Homophobia is killing gay men directly in gay bashing and
indirectly in neglect of the AIDS epidemic.

     For God's sake, Steve Gunderson, come out before any more
die.  Your closetry is not necessary.  There are more openly gay
elected officials in Wisconsin than any other state in the Union,
and everybody in Western Wisconsin knows your secret anyhow.

     Steve Gunderson, become part of the solution--not a part of
the problem.  Face it, closets are part of the problem.  You have
been part of the problem.  Stop holding back the clock.  Too many
of us have no time to lose.  In fact, Larry Kramer says, "We've
already lost the war on AIDS!"  Stop dragging your feet, Steve
Gunderson and come out for gay rights!

Tim Campbell
Gay & Lesbian Americans/Midwest Division
(612) 872-9692

----------------------------------------------------------------

MEMORANDUM
To:  Steve Gunderson
From:  Michael Petrelis
Date:  October 6, 1993
Re:  Your closetry is killing gay and lesbian Americans

Why have you forgotten that silence=death?

     As you perform an intellectual fan-dance in the pages of the
Congressional Record, AIDS continues to decimate our community,
and gay and lesbian youth commit suicide in epidemic proportions.

     While you take decades to sort out issues surrounding your
homosexual orientation,  your closetry directly validates the
right wing.

     Just as you may not want to be judged on a single
irrelevalnt factor, your homosexuality, so too don't the millions
of gay and lesbian Americans whose accomplishments on a daily
basis stand to become totally irrelevant next to the single
question of whetlier or not they are gay.

     Gay and lesbian Americans have experienced what it feels
like to have our lives--who we are, what we are, and what we have
accomplished--reduced to and judged by a single irrelevant
factor.  And all the while, without a gay Republican congressman
with far greater access to the media than the average gay man,
speaking out to counter the  intrusive and painful weaponry of
lies.

     Talking about, explaining or defending one's personal and
private life under a public microscope is not a violation of a
so-called right to privacy, especially when a public official
wants to visit a public gay bar where members of the gay public
congregate.  Then, any right to "privacy" is null and void in
such an incident.

     People who do not know an openly gay Republican congressman
from Wisconsin are hurling bullets of ignorance and prejudice
encased in stereotypical labels at gays and lesbians.

     We ask you how much more death and damage must gay and
lesbian people endure before you learn a lesson from the struggle
of blacks, Jews, and other minorities and integrate your gifts of
our diversity into the House of Representatives?

     How much longer will you allow homophobic biases,
prejudices, and discriminatory policies to bleed our national
energy before coming out?

     How many more gay and lesbian Americans have to die before
you come out of the  closet?



Gay and Lesbian Americans
P.O. Box 77533
Washington, DC 20013-7533
(202) 546-4124

Gay & Lesbian Americans is a coalition of grassroots leaders
committed to civil rights for gay and lesbian people.


- Bob Summersgill        |      Xq28 -- Thanks Mom!
  XE605C @ GWUVM.GWU.EDU |