Amazon Trail by Lee Lynch Troix Bettancourt, from the Boston Alliance For Gay and Lesbian Youth, asked his audience at the 1993 March to imagine telling the pioneers at Stonewall about our accomplishments in the last twenty-four years. I, a closeted twenty-four year old in 1969, could not even have dreamed my own life today. The March on Washington. The Metro stations were packed beyond capacity with gloriously queer women and men of every variety. We were a fat river of excitement swelling the banks of the city. I couldn't go up or down a Metro escalator without crying. Either the top would cheer the ascending gays or those of us riding down would serenade one another. Home. Tonight the town council will decide whether to support or oppose a ballot measure denying equal rights to local gays. In the crowd of spectators a man in his thirties asks a woman in her sixties: "Are you one of them? You look like a nice grandmotherly type!" "I am a grandmother!" she replies. "And I've worked with and lived next door to gay people and they've been the most responsi- ble and nicest people I'd want to know." He leans close to her. "Do you think two men should screw each other?" She fires back, "How can you let paid bigots tell you what to think?" "Would you want a lesbian to do oral sex on you?" "If that's someone's choice it's their business." "In the schools they're having sex with the kids." "I've worked in a rape crisis center. I know most of the abusers are heterosexual men." "The homosexu- als are lying to you." National Women's Music Festival. I bump into a lesbian philoso- pher. A petition forbidding gay rights laws is circulating in her state. She's pondering the ethical conflict. Should she actively plunge into the fray? Should she continue her work as a lesbian thinker and writer? Which contributions holds most value for our future? I have the same conflict. We see, all weekend, how strong lesbian culture is, how far we've come. One night, Sawagi Taiko, a Japanese women's drum group from British Columbia, performs its mix of drumming, movement, theater, voice and poetry on the mainstage. Their sound is huge, their grace spine-tingling. I love that they cross-dress in black ties, white shirts, black pants. Their power elevates me far beyond the nasty tricks of the right wing. What a tragedy to throw down our instruments of art and pick up the weapons of pol- itics. Readers, performers come up to me, thank me for my work. I thank everyone back. Can we spare our philosophers, our musicians, our artists and writers and producers and spiritual leaders for the battle? Can we risk losing them to the physical and emotional damage wrought by this devastating campaign against us? Where will our demonstrators, our organizers, our strategists go for renewal if there is no culture to make us laugh or tingle with the greatness of us? Home again. A man tells me, "I think homosexuality is a moral de- fect, but I don't hate you." "Good," I reply. "I don't hate you for being heterosexual." He looks a little confused and goes on. "I wouldn't want a homosexual teaching my children." I remind him that we've always been teachers and done no harm. "I know," he says. "But there's a moral decline in the world. There are opposing cultures. Some day the two sides will clash. You may be my murderer!" Bend, Oregon. In a chilly timber town of 17,000 the right fore- stalls imminent moral decline by demanding that local libraries pull from their shelves Annie On My Mind by Nancy Garden, The Ar- izona Kid by Ron Koertge and Hey, Dollface by Deborah Hautzig, all on the American Library Association's Best Books for Young Adults list. The Oregon Citizen's Alliance demands that the library in another city put on its shelves an inch-thick photocopied compilations of distortions and lies about gay people entitled, "Facts about Homosexuality." The library director courageously refuses. The front cover of "Facts About Homosexuality" directs readers to a local business for copies. It is the shop many progressive peo- ple use. Uncharacteristically, I confront the owner. He says, "Thank you for your comments," meaning, "Ask me if I care." I get on the phone and spread the word. A stream of us visit the busi- ness. The owner takes the shop name off the offending volume. After the town meeting. We have won. A lesbian shakes the hand of a media person, thanking her for her coverage. As the lesbian turns away a man tells the reporter, "Better wash your hand." A non-gay man on our side challenges him. "That was a disgusting thing to say." Stonewall pioneers, this is gay life now, my daily life: being out at town meeting, taking on bigoted businesses, enduring per- sonal attacks, coalitioning with straights who don't bash us. And creating a dyke culture, living powerful moments of gay celebra- tion that give us the renewal you sought in the bars. We have accepted your legacy. Hiding is no longer a choice. Today we ponder where best to be flagrant. Like you, but multiplied by millions, we are the front line. We all . . . . . . . . And the Ban Plays On J.R. Stone Reactions to President Clinton's announcement of his policy on gays and lesbians in the military have ranged from contempt to approval. But response from local former servicemembers can largely be distilled down to a question: "What does this policy mean to me?" Former Washington National Guard Colonel Margarethe Cammermeyer was among the first to ask that question. Cammermeyer was discharged last year, after 26 years of service and a Bronze Star, when she acknowledged her sexual orientation during a secu- rity clearance interview. She took her case to the courts to fight for reinstatement, but was confident that Clinton would lift the ban, allowing her to return to duty. But, she says, "I don't know how my case will be affected by this [policy]." She is not alone. Sgt. Richard Kirton put a call in to his attorney after Clinton's announcement. Kirton was discharged after coming out to the media during Olympia's Gay Pride March last year. He says he is confused by the new policy. "Clinton's policy sounded a little better than I expected, but I am still disap- pointed," he says. "I am not entirely certain if it is possible for me to return to service under this policy or not." For Dr. Mary Ann Humphrey, a former Army Reserve Captain who was forced to resign her 9-year commission after a co-worker revealed her sexual orientation, there is no such uncertainty. "My chances of going back in are zero," she says. "I have made public state- ments, been interviewed on television, have written a book on the subject (My Country, My Right to Serve), and led the troops in the March on Washington. How could I give up my past? That's who I am." Lawyers at the Lambda Legal Defense Fund are scrambling to make sense out of the President's directive. According to Western Regional Director J. Craig Fung, calls have been pouring in from former service personnel, wondering whether they will be able to get back in, but, he says, "We just don't know yet." Clinton's directive removes questions about sexual orientation asked of new recruits, but what it does beyond that remains murky. The policy makes a distinction between status and conduct, saying that servicemembers cannot be discharged based on status alone. Saying that he wanted to end the "witch hunts," Clinton specifies that allegations of homosexuality are not, in themselves, enough to warrant investigation. The policy requires "credible informa- tion" and evidence to launch an investigation, but does allow commanders latitude in determining if such evidence is present. Associating with other lesbians and gays, going to a gay bar, reading lesbian or gay publications or marching in a gay rights parade in civilian clothes are not reasons for investigation, the policy states. Conduct which will result in investigation and discharge includes engaging in or having the intent to engage in any bodily contact, "whether actively undertaken or passively permitted, between members of the same sex for the purpose of satisfying sexual desires." A servicemember could go to a gay bar, but not dance with some- one, could march at gay pride, but not hold their partner's hand while they're doing it.Humphrey says such a policy is unconstitu- tional. "It allows gays and lesbians to serve in the military but they have to be heterosexual," she says. Servicemembers who say they are gay or bisexual will be "presumed" to be engaging in homosexual acts and will only be permitted to remain in the military if they can "prove" that they are not, and that they do not have the intent or propensity to engage in homosexual acts. Clinton lamented that the burden of proof lay on the servi- cemember, saying that it is one part of the plan he most objects to. Others are equally dismayed. Fung finds it untenable, "How can you prove that you don't have the intent? Do you make a promise never to do it again? How are they going to administer this? It's a very unworkable policy." Women's groups have been alarmed as well. The threat of being la- belled a lesbian has long been used to silence women in the mili- tary who complain of sexual harassment, and this new policy does not remedy that."Women have been lesbian-baited by straight men for years," one lesbian notes, "and now they will be asked to Tprove' that they are not gay." Clinton's battles on the issue of gays and the military did not end with his announcement. Senator Sam Nunn, chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, was moving to write the current ban into law but after three days of hearings has said he intends to codify Clinton's plan into law. This move will make it more dif- ficult for Clinton to ease restrictions against gays and lesbians further at some future point. Attorney General Janet Reno has expressed concerns about the con- stitutionality of the policy and legal challenges from Lambda Le- gal Defense and the American Civil Liberties Union are already underway. The complicated, convoluted policy has been called "a lawyer's dream" and Clinton's announcement will not be the last word on lesbians and gays in the military. . With Honor and Conviction: Margarethe Cammermeyer continues the fight by J.R. Stone Young Margarethe Cammermeyer proudly raised her hand and swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States nearly 30 years ago. She couldnUt have known then that she would battle the military ban in the courts, before Congress, and toss her private life into the public eye for all to see. Her struggle has been difficult, but she is not about to give up. Cammermeyer replied assuredly to the security clearance question in April 1989 that asked if she was a lesbian. "Yes, I am," she said. To her, it was about truth, honor, and integrity. She did not consider hiding her orientation; it was her duty to answer correctly. But that answer cost her a 26-year career. On June 11, 1992, Colonel Cammermeyer was discharged from the Washington State Na- tional Guard. "I felt like someone had given me a death sentence," she says. "Up until the end I was not believing that it would really happen and I felt I was waiting for a last-minute reprieve. The day I was separated, I felt very much alone and like a failure, sort of an embarrassment to myself. The woman who showed up at the press conference and said she wished I had died in Vietnam didnUt help much either." But Cammermeyer says that when she spoke to the crowd at SeattleUs 1992 Pride Rally, she knew that coming out had been the right decision. She received a standing ovation by nearly 50,000 gays and lesbians that day. "[T]he overwhelming amount of support and caring that I was shown at the rally reaffirmed that I really needed to continue, to do this course," she says. "It was very humbling and awesome." In a particularly memorable moment during her speech at the ral- ly, Cammermeyer recognized other veterans in the crowd and honored them with a salute. She later said that she just wanted to thank them for their service and their struggles, and she also thanked the people of Seattle for supporting her both "emotional- ly and personally." After that, CammermeyerUs case went to the courtsQand the public. Her life was splashed across the media. ABCUs Prime Time Live shadowed her every move at the Seattle Rally, and minutes after her speech, she darted off to be featured on KOMO-TVUs Town Meet- ing. She has been on a Donohue panel and featured on news shows such as Nightline, The MacNeil-Lehrer Report and David Brinkley. Cam- mermeyerUs story has been in nearly every newspaper and magazine across the country. "I felt as though I had very little right to my own privacy if I was going to try to change peopleUs way of thinking," she says. "I wanted people to know that trying to shut us in a closet wasnUt going to make us disappear because we exist in every facet of life." When she gave up that privacy, everyone wanted to know who Greta Cammermeyer was, and some were surprised when they found out. She is soft-spoken and gentle in nature, and could fit the descrip- tion of a mother, grandmother, or distant aunt. CammermeyerUs charm sold her message."I wanted people to see that we were just like everyone else in so many aspects of our lives. I hoped to reach people on a human level if they got to know me as a human being. I am not ashamed of my life," she says.Next fall, NBC will air The Greta Cammermeyer Story. Actress/director Barbra Streisand will direct the made-for-TV movie and Glenn Close will play the title role.Cammermeyer downplays the Hollywood atten- tion. "It is not my story but each of our struggles," she says. "I hope that [viewers] will understand our difference and learn to accept that difference from the story itself."Cammermeyer will continue her fight against the ban until she and every lesbian and gay man in the military can serve openly and equally."I am outraged that the President has parceled us out and said that we donUt have rights as full-fledged citizens," she says, "[and] I am furious that Senator Sam Nunn is trying to get the ban codi- fied in Congress."But she does see that progress has been made, that her struggle has been worth it. "This was a testing ground for our social commitment to change," she observes. "We now know our opposition and who our supporters are. Some of the stigmas have fallen away, the editorials have changed, and the support has changed. Suddenly [gays and lesbians] have now become people in our countryUs eyes." . The Gay Press Grows Up The gay and lesbian press has grown up, achieving an unprecented level of maturity and national clout. Gone are the days when a lesbian/gay magazine had to start out as a small, local publication put together in off-hours by a handful of volunteers. Magazines are now being born slick, full color and national, like Out and Deneuve. One telling indicator of the success of the gay and lesbian press is advertising. Flip through the current issues of some of the large lesbian/gay magazines and youUre liable to find at least a handful of national, straight advertisers. There has been some discord in the community over the fact that many of the most prominent of these national advertisers are al- cohol companies. But controversy over advertising is nothing new. The 900 number phone sex lines have long provided a significant chunk of gay magazines income, and some people have argued that that was inappropriate. This hasnUt been a problem for lesbian publications because the phone lines are primarily for men, and while lesbian magazines havenUt had to wrestle with the contro- versy, they also havenUt had those advertising dollars available to them. Lesbian magazines are still at a disadvantage in garnering large, national advertisers. ItUs no secret that gay men are, on aver- age, more affluent than lesbians, and are, therefore, more at- tractive advertising targets. But what advertisers are only be- ginning to realize is that both the lesbian and gay male communi- ties are very loyal consumers and will support businesses who support them. As straight advertisers play an increasingly important role in lesbian and gay publications, questions about their influence on content are likely to surface. Will editors feel pressured to tone down or censor what they print to keep straight advertisers happy? This new breed of gay and lesbian publications will also have to wrestle with an old problem: inclusions and balance. Are maga- zines which bill themselves as gay and lesbian really living up to that name. Recent problems at The Advocate which resulted in the loss of many of the female writers dramatically indicate that this is still a problematic area. With bigger magazines will come bigger problems and bigger responsibility, but the gay and lesbian press is poised to serve our community in a way never before possible. . LINER NOTES There have been times, in the past 12 months or so, when I've found myself actually sick of seeing and hearing gay stuff in the media, actually groaning. Now, don't get me wrong, the increased volume of media coverage is long overdue, but it has seemed, at times, like the media was stuck and spinning its wheels, covering the same ground again and again and never reaching any sort of deeper understanding. It is as if there were a handful of stock gay stories that were replayed and reprinted again and again with only minor alteration. But, ultimately, even this wheel-spinning coverage is good. If nothing else, it gets people used to saying and hearing the words "lesbian" and "gay". It makes the words less shocking and taboo. Changing attitudes is more difficult than changing laws (and changing laws has proven to be plenty difficult) and the media will play an important role if there is to be a fundamental change of attitudes. This high-volume media attention (and the crusades of the religious right) have put us on the national agenda, and, as uncomfortable as that place may be sometimes, we have to be there to do the education necessary to change things. The lesbian/gay community has, in the past, regarded the media as an enemy-understandably so. Smear jobs and disinformation in the media have caused our community pain and hardship. The media is a tool that can be used to bash us or it can be used to support and aid us. We cannot disown the media and they cannot disown us (no matter how much either side may try). There are intricate and complex relationships between our commun- ity and the media: we are media employees, and have the right to a discrimination-free workplace; we are newsmakers, and have the right to be portrayed accurately and fairly; and we are media consumers, and have the right to news and information which is important and relevant to us. The growing body of gay media fills in some of what the straight media has ignored, and serves our community in a way that the mainstream media is unwilling and unable to. But we have to keep pushing mainstream media because gay media is not necessarily available to every gay person and because straight people need to be exposed to this stuff, too. Straight people need to see and hear about us in a way that is realistic, thorough and fair. Listen to some of the things that are still being said (and be- lieved) about us-straight people really need to see it, too. Terri L. Smith . You Never Know by Lin S. Goodman The colors look different. I felt weird for a couple of days, just kind of off. My pupils always felt dilated. I felt speedy and fatigued at the same time. My friends and I decided it was sleep deprivation, sheer exhaustion, so I rested even more than usual. I don't know what's going on exactly, except that it's not unusu- al to have weird things going on inside me without explanation. I make an adjustment in my life and go on. But the colors. They really floor me. They're so rich. I've never seen them like this. It makes my eyes feel good as the colors wash over them and into my mind. It's all so abstract, but it's very real. It's like the M.S. The feelings it causes in the body are so ob- scure, so hard to explain or define. Is it a tingling? Well, sort of. Like when your foot falls asleep? Well, kind of. At least those are the experiences that come the closest to describing the hollow, electrical feeling that spreads through my legs. Or my back. It can feel so isolating when what goes on inside you is so unfathomable. One day I could walk and the next, I couldn't. Nobody came quick enough to get me to the bathroom so I peed in my bed. I cried like a baby. I learned to live my life in a wheelchair. To transfer in and out of it. To feel frustrated, guilty when anyone had to push me up a hill. I became aware of what was accessible and what wasn't (to find the way to Broadway meant mapping out where all the accessible curbs were). I got angry and took it out on all the wrong people. No one was to blame. This stuff just happened. It just happened.Just like everything else that was going wrong inside me was just happening. All that was breaking down in my body and all the tests and treatments the doctors did, all the tubes they put in and took out, the surgeries they performed. All the meds I was on and all the bad reactions I had. The ones that took me to the emergency room, landed me in the hospital, or in ICU for five frightening days or so. No one could predict what was coming. They still can't. It just happens. I've got this way of life I'm trying to live now. Sort of letting what's happening happen, going with the flow, surrendering to the fates that be. Letting go. I've just spent so much time wishing and wanting and holding on to whatever was mine because it was mine, even my pain. Working to control things I simply couldn't, planning plans that fell apart because life seemed to always get in the way. I think we all start out thinking we have a lot more control than we do because it feels safer, more secure. It's scary to think that bad things happen at random; that means they could happen to you, at any time. It's too vulnerable a feeling. And when something does happen, it feels better to think there's a reason for it, any reason. I've decided the things that happen to me, happen so that I can learn from them, so that my spirit can grow and shine like all spirits do, just varying in their brightness. I want to come from a more open, loving, positive place, because I believe that's where we are all meant to come from. It's not an easy thing to do, at least not for me. It takes a lot of cons- cious effort to not let the darkness cover the light. To let the light eat up the darkness. Is that making the colors look dif- ferent? I have this theory about human energy. We all have so much energy inside us and it's distributed to different extents, at different times, throughout our physical and spiritual beings. When you're sick, and the energy leaves your body, it's still inside you and needs a place to go, so it naturally goes to your spirit. As your physical self decreases, your spirit increases in strength, stam- ina and all-around energy. Maybe I'm just creating all this to make myself feel better about what's happening to me, but I've sure got myself totally convinced. Because that's how it feels. Is that why the colors look so different? It takes more energy now to make myself do the things I want to do. But it's o.k. because it's better to be tired for a reason than to be tired simply because I'm sick. And the dreaded bath- room, with all it's doom and gloom is still a tough place for me these days. But I'm learning just to go in, do my business and get out without thinking about it all too much. I'll never get used to how resilient the human spirit is. I keep running into things and I'll think, this is the wall I won't be able to get over, but then somehow, sometime later, I always find myself on the other side and moving forward again. And I feel like I'm not doing it alone. There's my friends and family, of course, but there's something more. Something like a higher power. It's got lots of names but I'll stick with the description. A holy spirit. A guide. Then there's destiny. In my mind, a path is laid out for us and different points in our life, and different people and events run along the path which comes to forks and continues in the way we choose to go. We make the choice without knowing where exactly the new path goes. It's like taking a step off a cliff into deep and total darkness. But I somehow feel o.k. in the darkness be- cause there is something else now and it extinguishes the dark like water puts out a fire. There is some kind of light like dawn shattering night into a new day. I wonder if that's what's making the colors look different. What do you think? What do you think? Who are you, out there? Whoever you are, take care 'til next month. I bid you peace 'til then. . The NLGJA-changing the newsroom and the news The National Lesbian and Gay Journalists' Association (NLGJA) was apparently a good idea just waiting to happen. In only 2-1/2 years of existence, the association has grown from a handful of people meeting in a living room to approximately 600 members. The group was founded by Leroy Aarons, who was, at the time, the editor of the Oakland Tribune, after a survey taken by the Ameri- can Society of Newspaper Editors asked lesbian and gay journal- ists if they wanted a professional organization. Seattle Times reporter Lily Eng, who is the national secretary of the association and the Seattle chapter's vice-president says that the rapid growth of the organization may have come, in part, because there is "an incredible number of lesbian and gay jour- nalists who are tired of being closeted for so long." Q The NLGJA has already impacted newsrooms around the country. Because of their efforts, coverage of our community has increased in quantity and quality. Coverage in the New York Times increased 150% within about a year after the association was formed. The NLGJA held a national convention in June of 1992 and will be holding another this September in New York. Eng says the first convention "put the mainstream media on notice that there is a professional journalists organization that is a watchdog on les- bian and gay issues." Being inside the newsrooms gives the association members an ex- pertise in dealing with media that other organizations may not have. Eng feels that that expertise, combined with the fact that it is a professional organization, with dues-paying membersQmakes the NLGJA hard for editors and news directors to ignore. Most of the association's members work in the mainstream media because that is where most of the problems are, but Eng notes that members from the alternative press "often are our ears, our eyes. They know the heartbeat of the lesbian/gay community be- cause they spend more time in the community. They are also our conscience many timesQa reality check." In addition to organizing two enormously successful and well- attended "Gays Meet the Media" forums, the Seattle chapter had an information booth at Pride and is working on a media guide the NGLJA is putting together nationally. Eng sees the organization as an educational vehicle. They are teaching journalists about the lesbian and gay community, and helping the lesbian and gay community learn how to effectively deal with the media. They provide a link between those two spheres that hasn't really existed before. . Swimming in the Mainstream: Lesbians and gay men gain ground in the fight for fair coverage by Terri L. Smith If 1992 was the media-declared Year of the Woman, '93 must un- doubtedly be the Year of the Queer. From gays in the military to Roberta Achtenberg's confirmation hearings, from the latest "scientific study" to the March on Washington, we are in the news endlessly. So, we've got their attention, but how is the mainstream media doing in their coverage of our community and our issues? Certainly the coverage is, overall, better than it has ever been. We are treated with less contempt (except, of course, by right- wing media like the 700 Club, Rush Limbaugh's show, and others) than in the past. Though less reliant on all the old stereotypes, the straight media still presents a limited segment of our communityQmostly white, mostly male, mostly young, and often affluent. And the media isn't always taken to task for this because what they are doing is a significant improvement over what they were doing. There are a few signs, however, that they're beginning to realize there's a whole community out there, none more than the much- ballyhooed media discovery of . . . lesbians. Last fall, ABC's 20/20 did a segment on lesbians in Northampton, Mass. More recently, Rolling Stone declared lesbians to be the hot subculture (though they didn't actually write anything about lesbians until the recent article on k.d. lang), New York maga- zine did "Lesbian Chic," and Newsweek did a cover feature on lesbians.I Interestingly, the media's standard explana"tion for why it took them so long to begin talking about lesbians is that we have been hiding. It's our fault. We were just nowhere to be seen until now. As Lynn Scherr said during the 20/20 piece, "Compared with gay men, who have been vocal, political, and very visible, gay women have generally chosen to stay hidden . . . " So, the media has finally realized that lesbians exist, but por- tray us as just beginning to peek our heads out of a deep, deep closet, where we have been living our hidden and unpolitical lives (Lesbians not political? Oh, please!). Our invisibility isn't all the media is blaming us for. Listening to them, you'd think we had been asking that they only show images of us which are stereotypical. Listening to them, you'd think those images were all that we actually were, and only recently have we become other things as well. On an episode of NBC's first person early this year, Maria Shriver said, "In the 1970s, gays defined themselves and their movement with an in-your-face sexuality that frightened straight America . . . (but in the 90s) they changed their habits, they changed their image, they changed their tactics." Two broad but competing themes emerge in mainstream media cover- age of the lesbian/gay community: either we are strange, unfami- liar, uncharted territory or we are (gasp) so normal. "In many ways, they are just like you and me," Scherr said in the introduction of her piece.Given that the media will always over- simplify anything complex to make it fit neatly into a half-hour segment, 10 column inches, or 30-second sound bite, as needed, it is important that the lesbian/gay community be able to influence the terms of the discussion. In the past, the right-wing has been allowed to choose the voca- bulary with phrases like "militant homosexual," "family values," and "special rights." By not requiring a definition or explana- tion of the terms, the media is tacitly saying that the words are self-evident, that their meaning and their correctness is so ob- vious that no explanation is necessary. So, even seemingly small details like word usage are significant weapons in the battle for fair coverage. The National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA) knows this well. Members of the NLGJA were quick to point out to an Oregon paper why the headline "Gay rights vs. family values" which it ran during the Measure 9 battle was unacceptable. The association is currently working on a media guide which will talk about specific language usage, such as lesbian or gay versus homosexual, or orientation versus preference. The guide will ex- plain which terms are preferable and why. Already, the NLGJA has gotten the New York Times to abandon its steadfast use of the term homosexual in favor of gay and lesbian. After the media gets these basics down, we can work on their use of "butch/femme" and the like. Some media stories are overly re- liant on butch/femme in talking about lesbians or are grossly un- sophisticated in their understanding of those terms. The Newsweek article, for instance, provides a handy little glos- sary, where Butch is defined as "Wears suit, motorcycle jacket or other "manly' gear," and Vanilla is "Likes kissing, holding hands, no rough stuff" (though in the article "Vanilla' is used to refer to lesbians who are homebodies raising kids rather than avid partiers). The 20/20 episode talks about butch and femme strictly in terms of appearance. Butch means short hair, men's clothes, and no make-up. Femmes are women with make-up, wearing dresses and skirts. Simple as that. That little crash-course in butch/femme is part of a tone that pops up frequently in mainstream pieces on lesbians and gay men, and is epitomized in the 20/20 episode. It is the Wild Kingdom Effect. Lesbians and gay men (in this case, just lesbians) are regarded, in a way, like wildlifeQstrange, a little scary, not completely understandable, but fascinating. "Lesbians." Hugh Downs began, "They are our daughters, our sis- ters, sometimes even our mothers. Still most of us know very lit- tle about them. Why do they prefer other women? Can they help it or not? What goes on in the privacy of their homes? Well, tonight hear Lynn Scherr's extraordinary report with answers to these very personal questions." Scherr, in explaining why 20/20 had journeyed to Northampton for the report (capturing lesbians in their natural habitat as it were), said that Northampton, "provided us such unusual access to a community generally shrouded in secrecy that we came here to begin to understand who they really are." The intentions were good, but it seemed at any moment Marlon Per- kins might intone with a voice over, "Here we watch Jim as he wrestles one to the ground to tag it. We'll be able to track the migration patterns, mating habits and reproduction cycles. Whoa, be careful, Jim, those teeth can bite." The media has taken it upon itself, then, to explain (albeit simplisticly) this mysterious, baffling world to straight Ameri- ca, assuming that America will be shocked, horrified and bewil- dered by it all. In addition to probing the burning "who are they and why are they like that" questions, the media has ventured into coverage of is- sues surrounding our community. Aside from AIDS issues, gays in the military has received the most attention, but other topics like lesbian/gay parenting, various anti-gay initiatives, gay- bashing, etc. have also been broached. Two trends wend their way through most, or at least much, of this issue-oriented discussion. First, the lack of a diverse portrayal of our community comes through even more prominently here than in the "who are they" articles and programs. For instance, most of the gays in the military discussion has centered on menQgay men who have been thrown out, what straight men think about having gay men in the service, etc. But, guess what, women in the military are several times more likely to be thrown out for being gay than men are. Second is the media's obvious reluctance to ask The Hard Ques- tions to those who attack us. When we are accused of being child molesters, how often does the media point out the statistics which show very clearly that the sexual predators of our society are straight men? When the Bible is being used against us, how often does the media question why certain (comparatively insignificant) passages carry more weight than recurring themes of love and tolerance? When people are saying that lesbians and gay men should not be allowed to serve openly in the military because it will hamper discipline and morale, how often does the media ask whether the real problem in discipline is not homosexuality but homophobia? Most often, lesbians and gay are presumed guilty by the media. We must defend our lives, our identities and our views, while those who attack us are not often required to defend theirs. A Compton Report on KING5 earlier this year took on the issue of lesbians and gay men adopting children. (Interestingly, it talked to several gay male s but only one lesbian couple.) A few Hard Questions were asked of Goeff Swindler, an attorney who is on something of a crusade against lesbians and gay men having children or marrying. But the show concluded with Compton's assertion that, while studies have so far not indicated that having lesbian or gay parents damages a child, not enough studies have been done, that society has a right to be concerned and demand more studies before ultimately concluding that lesbi- ans and gay men are fit to be parents. We can be pleased that the show did not dismiss us as parents, out-of-hand. But it does indicate that, in the media courtroom, the burden of proof is on us. We are asked to prove our fitness as parents, we are required to defend our selves, to justify our existence to America. On the whole, the local Seattle media provides better coverage of our community than media in most other placesQwith notable varia- tions, of course, between each of the papers and stations. Typi- cally, but not always, KING does a better job with our community than KIRO. The Seattle Times coverage tends to be more extensive and more thoughtful than the P-I coverage. This better coverage does not happen by accident. The Seattle chapter of the NLGJA has worked extensively with the local media. Last November, they organized a phenomenally successful "Gays Meet the Media" forum. Panelists included the top editors and news directors in Seattle, and people came from as far away as Port Townsend to attend. At the request of Seattle Times editor, Micheal Fancher, the as- sociation held a similar forum in February specifically for Times editors, which was attended by about 100 people. Lily Eng, who is the vice-president of the Seattle NLGJA and secretary of the national chapter, believes that forum was par- tially responsible for the Times extensive coverage of the March on Washington. Fancher agrees. "We had planned to cover aspects of the March on Washington," he says, "but I don't think we really realized how important the March was to the people there." The significance of the MOW was made abundantly clear at the forum, according to Eng. "One editor asked who was going and I would say about 95 hands shot up," she says. "It's hard for edi- tors to ignore something like that. After that meeting, the Times started running articles on the March and I think the other media followed suit." Fancher recognizes that there are ways in which the Times cover- age of the lesbian/gay community could still be improved. "One point that was raised at the forum, was the tendency, for whatev- er reason, to focus on gay men rather than lesbians when talking about issues that apply to both," he notes, adding that it's necessary to be aware of who is interviewed for articles and how the article is framed, to ensure that coverage does speak to both gay male and lesbian experience. Eng, who is also a reporter for the Times, urges people to con- tact media organizations with feedback on coverage. "If newspa- pers or TV stations do a good job, call them. If they do a horri- ble job, call them," she says. With continued pushing, mainstream media can be expected to con- tinue improving their coverage of our community, to deal with our issues more fairly, to represent the diversity of our community more accurately, and, ultimately, to fully integrate us into all of their articles and pieces instead of compartmentalizing and segregating us away from coverage of "mainstream" issues. With continued pushing, mainstream media will begin to realize and reflect that we have whole lives (aside from our sexual orientation) and that those lives are as varied as the "heterosexual lifestyle." alonWith continued pushing, mainstream media will recognize that the media is already gay, that we work in the mainstream media and are consumers of mainstream media, that we are already part of the "America' they address each day or week or month, and that, in fact, we have been there all along. .