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How Blanche clutched her pearls when she first read the suggestion that in the future there will be no gay identity. That's the argument of the British gay rights activist Peter Tatchell. He recently stirred up a controversy with a column about this idea in the left-of-center newspaper The Guardian. In his column he wrote: "Given that homophobia still exists, we need to challenge prejudice and defend our right to be gay. But in the long-term, lesbian and gay identity is doomed. And a good thing, too."

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Tatchell is clearly no homophobe. He's headed a major British gay rights group (OutRage!) and attempted to make a citizen's arrest of President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe on the basis of his government's persecution of gay people. OutRage! has taken other direct actions on topics such as equalization of the age-of-consent in the UK, homophobic reggae, and religious bigotry. Clearly Tatchell has balls and his balls are on our side. So it's worth thinking carefully about what he says.

Tatchell argues that defining oneself as gay is a relatively recent development in Western societies and that it is not likely to persist in the future. He acknowledges that people have always engaged in same-sex behavior and always will. But Tatchell thinks that when homophobia and oppression disappear, people will no longer identify themselves or others by the gender of their sex partners.

So for example, some of us are left-handed and some are right-handed. But it is unlikely that you know the handedness preference of most of the people you interact with. It is not that it is a secret, but it is of no particular interest to anyone other than the person involved. No one pays very much attention to it, and we are all free to occasionally switch from the favored hand to the other hand if circumstances demand.

Could (homo-)sexuality end up being like that? Blanche thinks this is about as likely as a utopia where money has been abolished and we all freely work together doing the things we love and having everything we need. That sounds good, but it's just about impossible to imagine getting from here to there.

In the case of the sexual utopia, there are some formidable barriers to consider. Are Christianity, Islam, and Judaism going to melt away in this future? Or will they completely revise their views on sexuality? Tatchell in his column says almost nothing about how we might arrive at this ideal future.

Fight's still on

Blanche does not say that progress is hopeless. Many Christians and Jews have moved away from fundamentalism, and oppose discrimination against gay people. A few brave Muslims have also publicly denounced Islamic homophobia. But we are at the beginning of a very long struggle on a worldwide basis to gain basic rights and freedoms for gay and lesbian people.

It is less than two years since the execution of two Iranian teenagers for homosexuality. This is the real world in which we now live now. It seems to Blanche that it doesn't make much sense to focus on an ideal world in which no one notices or cares about our choice of sexual partner. Far more important is looking at what we need to do to stop the legal and social oppression of gay and lesbian people. On the legal front, we've got to work to repeal or invalidate sodomy laws, enact antidiscrimination measures, and fight for marriage and family equality. On the social front, we need to work to educate people and overcome prejudice.

Even in the few countries where we have achieved legal equality (e.g., Canada, the Netherlands), gay and lesbian people still encounter ostracism and bigotry from some segments of society. When we think of the larger world-- including nearly all of Africa and Asia-- where gay people have almost no legal rights, it is clear that we have a very, very long way to go.

There is nothing wrong with imagining a world where being gay doesn't matter. In that world, there will be no need for us to stand up, fight for our rights, and identify ourselves as gay. But if that world ever arrives, it will be a long time coming. Blanche suspects that homophobia will be with us as long as taxes and cockroaches. Until bias fades, it will be important for us to be visible in order to achieve a world in which gay people are free from oppression.