It is astonishing that gay and lesbian Americans are still treated as second-class citizens. I am confident that, very soon, the laws of this nation will reflect the basic truth that gay and lesbian people - like all human beings - are born equal in dignity and rights.

I think it's too easy to just say that there is a direct and necessary conflict between black identity and gay identity. I think it's more nuanced than that simply because I think black is a color and then people layer on top of it all kinds of socio-cultural elements.

So often, I have seen really, really talented performers never quite relating to material. I mean, there's a lot of gay actors, for example, that are obviously gay. They're not going to be able to do some of the material. Some of them they can, some of them they can't.

The sort of public sex aspects of gay male sexuality did not appeal to me. And it wasn't just a matter of being afraid of them or being too nervous to try them. I did try them and they didn't work for me, they didn't feed me spiritually, they didn't leave me gratified.

I bring quadruple diversity to the Senate: I'm a woman; I'll be the first Asian woman ever to be elected to the U.S. Senate; I am an immigrant; I am a Buddhist. When I said this at one of my gatherings, they said, 'Yes, but are you gay?' and I said, 'Nobody's perfect.'

When women and blacks were let in, the system didn't miss a beat. When gays are given their equality, the system will be as stable/unstable as it was before. And when animals are liberated one day, the world will be a beautiful place and the system will still function.

How about we get rid of separate bathrooms for boys and girls? Gays and straights share the bathroom with zero issues. We need to put an end to the sexist pooping policies of yesterday. The only way to achieve gender equality is to start crapping in front of each other.

People don't think about the fact that when Barack Obama's parents had him it was illegal for them to be married in several states in this country. So if we start making it okay that certain people can marry and other people can't, it's a slippery slope of civil rights.

Gay life in 1970 was very bleak, compartmentalized. You didn't take it to work. You had to really lead a double life. There were bars, but you sort of snuck in and snuck out. Activism and gay pride simply didn't exist. I don't even think the word 'gay' was in existence.

I go wading into the fire fit, but the conservative movement - jeez. Look at Milo [Yiannopoulos]. He's in his twenties. He's flamboyantly gay. We're nowhere near the conservative movement here. Ideologically he's pure. Ideologically he's brave, he's right down the line.

A lot of people assume that New Castrati meant "gay." No, that's why I came up with the term "New Castrati." It has nothing to do with sexual orientation. It has to do with lack of manhood. It has to do with men with no "circular orbs," however you wish to visualize it.

The silence of those in positions of influence in the church who know, or have a strong suspicion, that being gay is a nonpathological minority variant in the human condition drives me crazy, far crazier than I am driven by any loud-mouthed purveyor of hateful nonsense.

Everybody drinks," she said calmly. The Only Rational One. "Your sister doesn't." When rolled her eyes. "Forgive me, but I'm not going to spend my college years sitting soberly in my dorm room, writing about gay magicians." "Objection," Cath said, reaching for a burrito.

I think everyone should be with who they love. I don't want to be controversial or stir up a bunch of trouble but people are going to love who they are going to love. I think gay couples should be allowed to marry. They should suffer just like us heterosexuals. Ha ha ha!

While I do not have a boyfriend, I do have a friend who is homosexual and I once asked him "Do you ever think about having sex with me because you are gay?" to which he replied "Do you ever think about having sex with Rosie O'Donnell because you are straight? Same thing.

Unfortunately, we don't have the option of marriage in our country. We could go to Britain or Spain or Argentina and do something symbolic, but that's not what I want. I want to have the rights of anybody else in my home country. I don't want to be a second-class citizen

Like it or not children are being raised by gay and lesbian parents all over America - as many as 10 million children. And it does nothing to make their lives more stable and secure to attack their families, to attack their parents to prevent us from marrying each other.

If you're gay, that doesn't mean I want to discriminate against you, belittle or bully you, abuse or offend you. Not at all. I don't want to go back to the dark days of criminalisation and the imprisonment of gay men and women; of Section 28 and legalised discrimination.

Part of me also knows that this generation is the least racist and most pro-gay, so that's great. But they have a real lack of gravitas. And they have no taste in music. Vampire Weekend? Can we play some music, please? Can we rock out for a minute? Where's your Metallica?

I had been brought up in an elementary school where, my first few grades, I remember being specifically told that my teachers were gay. I was just that age and that was just how it was, and my parents were very... You know, that's how I was raised. Like super-progressive.

Over the years, I would go to my agents, my manager, and I would say, 'Hey, there's this amazing true story about this gay English mathematician who committed suicide in the 1950s.' And they would be like, 'Please don't ever write that script. That is an unmakeable film.'

I'm not really gay, and I can't sit here and say that I am, because that's not real and that's not genuine. But I also can't sit here and say that I'm straight. This is something I've come to the conclusion through therapy and from being honest with myself. I am bisexual.

Nobody sees the same movie. I'm sure there are people who saw Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and thought "Finally a gay movie about men who really care about each other. Thank God!" That's not what I saw necessarily but I don't think any two people see the same movie.

When in fact we live in a society that makes life hell for gays and lesbians, this community has got to stand up and say, ‘We’re on your side as you struggle for dignity,’ and, ‘Yes, we will defy anybody who says otherwise, even if we have to go to Disneyland to prove it.’

That is just the reality of being a marginalized person in this country: you have to deal with the psychological impact of your oppressor - whether that's being a woman dealing with men or gay people dealing with straight people or trans people dealing with everybody else.

I'll give my jewels for a set of beads, My gorgeous palace for a hermitage, My gay apparel for an almsman's gown, My figured goblets for a dish of wood, My scepter for a palmer's walking staff My subjects for a pair of carved saints and my large kingdom for a little grave.

It became inescapable that as conservatives were wrong about people of color, they were also wrong about women. They were wrong about gay people. The only individual freedoms they seemed to get exercised about were the freedom to make a profit and the freedom to own a gun.

After I quote unquote came out as a Republican, one of my dearest gay friends said to me, 'You've got to go on a T.V. show and tell everyone you like gay people.' I was like, 'Why?' He was like, 'Because you're a Republican.' I was like, 'I'm sorry who's stereotyping who?'

With Russia about to hold the Winter Games in Sochi, the country is open to pressure. American and world leaders must speak out against Mr. Putin's attacks and the violence they foster. The Olympic Committee must demand the retraction of these laws under threat of boycott.

Praise Roxane Gay for her big-hearted self-examining intelligence, for her inclusive and forgiving stance, for her courage and determination . . . for saying out loud the things we were thinking, for guiding us back to ourselves and returning to us what was ours all along.

I was a weird kid. I shouldve been gay because I listened to a lot of Broadway musicals. I dont know why Im not gay. I listen to a lot of jazz and world music, like African or Cuban music. Something that has vitality to it. A lot of the American stuff just feeds on itself.

You know just because you don't like the way it sounds when I say it or you don't like my haircut or you don't like that I'm gay, it does not mean that what we say is not true. If you squint a little bit, it is true I do sometimes look like a dude, and I am definitely gay.

If your neighbor has a completely different view on abortion, gay marriage, stem cell research, all of those things, you still are both Americans. Neither one of you is necessarily more patriotic than the other. Neither loves their country any more than the other one does.

Most people don't know that I am an accomplished dramatic actor... But I've performed in several Shakespeare productions including Hamlet, except in this version, Hamlet lives in an apartment with two women, and has to pretend he's gay so that the landlord won't evict him.

[talking about word "homophobia":] I myself don´t like "gays" - and let me stress that I don't consider that word a synonym for "homosexual" - in the same way that I don't like Communists and Feminists as advocates of a harmful and stupid ideology. But have no fear of them.

If you believe in equality, if you believe in standing up for the rights of all, especially for people most affected by bigotry and discrimination, then you have no choice but to be present and accounted for when it comes to standing up for gays and lesbians in our society.

I think that people are concerned about the breakdown of the family but they also don't want to see discrimination against gays and lesbians who they work with and they want to be able to make sure that gays can visit each other in hospitals and be able to inherit property.

This is a word that is not a scientific term. This is a rhetorical tool of psychological manipulation... Because everyone knows if you dare to say homosexuality is wrong...you are a homophobe, which means you have a mental illness. That's what's built into this terminology.

By seeing a same-sex couple in ordinary situations, that it might make people think twice about if they have, you know, questions about acceptance of LGBT equality, it's one way to just say that, you know, 'We're members of your family and gay people are like anybody else.'

Part of my motivation in the search for a cause of being gay was the need to find "something that has gone wrong that I can put right," and it was good, spiritually fruitful, to discover that the question "What went wrong in where I came from?" is actually not a useful one.

I understand what justice is, and I understand what freedom is, and all of my friends do. It's always been that way. I love freedom of speech. I love freedom of religion. I want my neighbor to be totally fine, for him to be a completely flaming gay guy with his new husband.

The Stonewall riots were a key moment for gay people. Throughout modern history, gays had thought of themselves as something like a mental illness or maybe a sin or a crime. Gay liberation allowed us to make the leap to being a 'minority group,' which made life much easier.

In the 1990s, it's OK to do comedy about the Chernobyl disaster or the Space Shuttle blowing up. It's acceptable to ridicule the Pope or the President of the United States, but God forbid you do a joke... about gays. The gay community is the last sacred cow in this society.

The flagrantly gay Quentin Crisp dealt with homophobic bullying by refusing to bow to its onslaught. His number listed in the phone directory, he responded to derogatory remarks accompanied with a stated intent to kill him by asking, "Would you like to make an appointment?"

The gay movement doesn't care about what you think...they're focused on the young ones because if you can put the ideas into their minds it's just a matter of time before you die off and they take your place and their value system will then allow all the rules to be changed.

For the gay and lesbian community, even though I'm not gay I think its really important to speak out for people that aren't necessarily dealing with the same circumstances you're dealing with and don't have the benefit of the health care system or the government that you do.

In New York City, it's popular. I used to think to myself, 'Man, there's a lot of gay people out here.' And it had me comfortable: it was like, I can be myself! I used to still try to hide it, until it was really overwhelming - there were just too much girls attracted to me!

My own belief is that being gay is a regularly occurring nonpathological minority variant in the human condition, and that an appropriate analogy is left-handedness, which also, as it happens, used to be regarded as some sort of defect in a normatively right-handed humanity.

Girls who put out are tramps. Girls who don't are ladies. This is, however, a rather archaic usage of the word. Should one of you boys happen upon a girl who doesn't put out, do not jump to the conclusion that you have found a lady. What you have probably found is a Lesbian.

I've heard all the things - 'their marriage is not real,' 'he's gay,' 'she's gay,' 'they swing'. But at the end of the day, people have to believe what they have to believe. ... But I'll tell you what, it's too hard to be in a pretend marriage. Life's too short for that one.

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