#radical faeries

A CALL TO GAY BROTHERS

a coming out poem

by Adam R K

I’ve been silent.

I’ve been silent too long,

but can you blame me?

when my very existence is met

with hatred, violence, and death

throughout the world?

I am a minority,

yet I pass for the most privileged majority.

You probably can’t tell

who I really am.

If others welcomed you, accepted you,

embraced you,

without knowing the full scope of you,

would you keep that hidden part of you

a secret?

Would you?

when you know that they may

lynch you

when they hear your whole truth?

Well I have.

I’ve been silent.

But no more.

No more will I deny

that precious part

of who I am

for your comfort

(or mine).

Because being comfortable

and being alive

are not the same.

I’d live more freely

dying from your hatred

than I would by

staying silent.

Silence is Death.

I get that now.

So no more silence

anymore.

I am what you see,

but also so much more.

The question is,

when you do know,

will you still see me?

or instead, will you see a monster?

a false perception

in the happy place I once inhabited

in your mind?

No matter.

Not my problem.

How you see me is none

of my concern.

My own liberty is what I

chase now—

the liberty to love how I love,

to express love in the way

I desire,

without harm to any other.

How can that be wrong?

Do you still want to discard me?

No more

will I be silent.

That’s right.

For I am among a phenomenal

community of outcasts,

which stretches far into

every corner of the globe,

every race,

every nation,

every profession,

because we are

an essential part

of human nature,

the Natural Order,

“God’s plan.”

Oh yes.

Nothing can stop us.

Not even death.

So,

you might as well

embrace us.

There’s nothing to fear.

We are 

L oving 

G ood 

B rave 

T ruthful and 

Q uintessentially

QUEER.

Damn right we’re proud

when no longer do we choose

to harbor a secret.

Ah, what relief!

Coming out

from the shadows I’ve cast

upon myself,

I breathe the first

clean breath of air

in my life.

Yes, I am proud,

because now, I am free,

because now, I am whole,

because now I release myself

from the shackles of your judgment... because now,

no longer

am I silent.

Because queer people aren’t born into queer families, and our history generally isn’t taught at school, most queer people grow up not knowing the history of the fight for queer rights. We have many amazingly brave people we should know.

Henry Gerber - Henry was born on June 29, 1892 in Bavaria (now Germany). He adopted the name "Henry Gerber" when he emigrated to the United States in 1913. 

When the US joined World War I, Gerber went into the Army. While in Germany during the war, he learned about Magnus Hirschfeld and the work he and his Scientific-Humanitarian Committee were doing to reform anti-homosexual German law (especially Paragraph 175, which criminalized sex between men). 

When back home in Chicago, he established The Society for Human Rights (SHR) in 1924, the first gay rights organization in the United States. Membership was limited to gay men and excluded bisexuals. Gerber created a newsletter for the Society called Friendship and Freedom, making it the first known American gay-interest publication. Few SHR members were willing to receive the newsletter by mail, fearing postal inspectors would deem it obscene under the Comstock Act (all gay-interest publications were labeled as obscene until 1958). Friendship and Freedom only lasted two issues.

Unfortunately a few months later, the group ceased to exist. Unknown to Gerber, one of the vice-presidents of the Society was married with children, and his wife reported the group to a social worker, calling them “degenerates.” In 1924, sodomy was illegal in every state, even advocacy of sex with other men was a violation of the law. Police arrested Gerber and several of the Society’s members.

Gerber was tried 3 times, and charges were eventually dismissed, but defending himself cost him his life savings, and he lost his job with the post office for “conduct unbecoming a postal worker.” Gerber was upset that none of the wealthy gays of Chicago came to his aid.

In 1927 Gerber travelled to New York City where a friend introduced him to a colonel in the Army who encouraged Gerber to re-enlist. Gerber’s time in the Army was spent as a proofreader and editor, this was low-profile enough that he was able to continue being employed by the Army, with occasional harassment, until 1945, when he received an honorable discharge. During these years he wrote articles for a variety of magazines, including some where he made the case for gay rights

After leaving the Army, Gerber moved to Washington, D.C. where he was active in the gay scene. He also was published in ONE magazine, the first nationally-syndicated homophile periodical in the U.S. Gerber was an early member of the Washington chapter of the Mattachine Society, though he resigned after clashing with chapter president B. Dwight Huggins.

Gerber spent the last decades of his life as a resident of the Soldiers' and Airmen's Home. Gerber was 80 years old when he died at the home on December 31, 1972 and was buried in the adjoining United States Soldiers' and Airmen's Home National Cemetery .

Harry Hay - He was born in England in 1912. His father was a mining engineer and the family lived in South Africa, Ghana, & Chile before settling in California. Harry was active in the underground gay scene. 

A psychiatrist "misled" him into believing that through marriage to a woman, he could become heterosexual, and in 1938 he married. He began having sex with men again a year later, but remained with his wife as she was a good match politically (Communist). 

Influenced by the publication in 1948 of the Kinsey Reports, Harry was inspired to start a gay support organization. He heard a brief history of The Society for Human Rights from a former lover of Henry Gerber, and in 1950 he, along with a few other men, founded a gay men's political and social group called the Mattachine Society, the first enduring LGBT rights organization in the United States. The Mattachine Society was probably the 2nd gay rights organization in the United States, after The Society for Human Rights. 

In 1950, Hay entered a relationship with a man. In 1951, Hay informed his wife about his continuing homosexuality and his work with the Mattachine Society. She was angry and the couple got divorced. Hay informed the Community Party which expelled him because the Party forbade homosexuals from being members, but they also declared him a “Lifelong Friend of the People” in recognition of his many years of service. 

Mattachine's membership grew slowly at first but received a major boost in February 1952 when one of the founding members was arrested in a Los Angeles park and charged with lewd behavior. He fought the charges in court as police entrapment of homosexual men. The jury deadlocked & charges were dismissed, Mattachine declared victory.

Following the trial, the group expanded rapidly, with estimates that membership in California was over 2,000, and as many around 100 people typically joining discussion groups. In February 1952, a Los Angeles newspaper published an article exposing Hay as a Marxist, not wanting the Mattachine Society to be seen as a Communist group, Hay stepped down from his position.

Hay spent his time studying the role of gay people in society, particularly in Native American communities. He published articles on many of his findings in the gay press, namely ONE Institute Quarterly and ONE Confidential. 

The 1969 Stonewall riot led to the emergence of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF), Hay was involved in the early development of the GLF Los Angeles chapter and was elected its first chairperson. He organized pickets of homophobic establishments, holding a one-day "Gay-In" in Griffith Park and "funky dances" at Troupers Hall to challenge the legal restrictions on same-sex dancing.

In 1971, Hay and his life partner moved to New Mexico. He took a leading role in a water rights campaign to prevent the federal government from damming the Rio Grande. He helped found a local LGBT rights group designed to fight homophobic violence in northern New Mexico. The group sponsored a gay ball and in June 1977 held Albuquerque's first Gay Pride Parade.

In 1978 they moved back to Los Angeles, interested in “gay consciousness” which explored ideas for merging spirituality into gay liberation, he helped found Radical Faeries. Influenced by the legacy of the counterculture of the 1960s, Faeries tend to be fiercely independent, anti-establishment, and community-focused. The movement is still around today. They have rural land or urban buildings where Faeries come together to live a communal life, and those locations host gatherings from time to time.

During the 1980s, Hay involved himself in a variety of causes, campaigning against South African apartheid, Nicaragua's Contras, and the death penalty, while also joining the nuclear disarmament and pro-choice movements. By this time he was recognized as an important pioneer in the pursuit of gay rights, but was seen as too controversial due to his support for North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) to be allowed to march in Pride parades.