An eventful summer of queer happenings

Finally, we subscribers to the radical homosexual agenda can begin considering new business…. Finally, we subscribers to the radical homosexual agenda can begin considering new business. The summer of queer happenings was nothing less than active. It was bookended by our very own Sen. Rick Santorum; he began the summer by attacking any right to privacy we as citizens have and ended it by rallying the troops to destroy the notion of same-sex marriage.So what happened in the meantime? The immediate backlash against Santorum was amazing. Broad Street in Philadelphia was shut down by local queers and their allies, and my beloved Dan Savage dubbed an anal sex byproduct – lubricant foam with flecks of fecal matter created by friction – “santorum.”

Then, the very matter the senator was addressing was legalized all across the good old U.S. of A – oh, that’s right: anal sex! Land of the free indeed. Now all of us can have sex in any state of this fine union. Lawrence vs. Texas is one of the biggest victories queer people have had in ages. As we all cheered approvingly and began celebrating our newfound right to sodomize – or be sodomized – the Canadians were plotting to crush every patriotic queer’s celebration.

And they did so with brutal force. Canada one-upped America by allowing same-sex marriage. So if you are queer and Canadian – a most delightful combo if I do say so myself – you can get hitched and, for your honeymoon, travel south and have sex in any state of the union. Could it get any better? I wondered, and then Episcopals decided to join the fray.

The church elected an openly gay man to be a bishop. There was overwhelming support for Father Gene Robinson, but the loudest words of dissent came from Pittsburgh’s own Bishop Robert Duncan: “May God have mercy on this church.”

If that appalled him, I truly hope he is praying for the souls of those running NBC and Bravo.

The new show “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” made waves all over. I happened to see my first episode – upper-middle-class, white, gay men taking some unsavory straight men from their tortured existence as masters of tack and slobbery. The fab five swoop down upon the straight man ready to be made over in every aspect of his contemptible life.

If all the news media this summer and “Queer Eye” didn’t satiate your appetite for hearing about the most loathed group in America, Bravo brought us “Boy Meets Boy,” the queer community’s answer to “The Bachelor.” A bunch of mega-hot guys are lined up to meet some dolt who can’t find a husband the way the rest of us do – I’m not sure if they are fleeing to Canada afterwards for the nuptials. The catch is that the show throws a couple of straight boys into the mix.

Will he pick the straight guy? Will our hero, James, be made to look like a fool? Who knows, but the show is definitely testing the gaydar of every gay boy with cable.

But is Bravo tricking us? While all of us queers sit on the couch laughing at the slovenly straight guys or wondering if James will be fooled into picking the straight guy, Santorum – the senator, not the foam – has been rallying the right all summer. He is trying to collect enough support to amend the U.S. Constitution so that he will never have to deal with waiting behind a same-sex couple at the wedding registry at Ikea. Most thought he had no chance, but support has been growing steadily.

While Santorum pleads with his buddies to get them to stop watching “Boy Meets Boy” and come support him in stopping the terror same-sex marriage would release on his world, many of us will wait for the Supreme Court to open up the drive-through chapel doors to the boys at Pegasus.

What did the summer bring? Some big leaps in queer rights, and some lines being drawn on queer issues for the 2004 election.

Josh will be waiting for the impending fury of political conversation queers will bring to 2004 while he watches VH1’s “Totally Gay.”