E-Mail This Article to a Friend The Year of the Queer From its string of stunning court victories to its relentless march of surprise TV hits, 2003 has seen soaring gains for gay men and lesbians BY KRISTEN LOMBARDI

HISTORY WILL find it ironic that 2003 neared its end in a fit of anti-gay bigotry. The news on December 2 that Marcus McLaurin, a seven-year-old boy from Lafayette, Louisiana, had been punished for explaining to a classmate that "gay is when a girl likes another girl," called to mind the oppression of the 1950s, when America shunned all talk of homosexuality. After McLaurin’s teacher scolded him for uttering a "bad word," the boy was sent to his elementary school’s "behavioral clinic" — prompting the American Civil Liberties Union to write a letter demanding that school officials apologize and remove the incident from McLaurin’s disciplinary record. Incredibly, on December 11, the school board decided not to apologize to McLaurin, insisting instead that he was disciplined for "behavioral problems."

The intolerant affair marks the antithesis of 2003. The year might not have stamped out gay hatred entirely — as Bostonians were reminded last July, when a group of teens, in a brutal gay-bashing incident, jumped an East Boston lesbian couple enjoying Independence Day fireworks with their two kids — but it did bring unparalleled gains in equality for gay men and lesbians. The past 12 months witnessed one exultant gay-rights win after another in courthouses, churches, and family TV rooms.

Of course, the watershed moment for gay rights didn’t come until close to the year’s end, on November 18, when the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) ruled gay men and lesbians have a constitutional right to marry. In a 4-3 decision, the court, observing that the Massachusetts Constitution "is, if anything, more protective of individual liberty and equality" than the United States Constitution, stated unequivocally that lesbian and gay couples have a right to marry under the state’s Constitution. The SJC decision was a personal victory for the seven same-sex couples who had petitioned the state for the right to wed, as well as for tens of thousands of gay men and lesbians across the nation who joined the Commonwealth’s gay and lesbian citizens in the elation of success. Like the early court rulings striking down segregation, this one had the feel of a legal revolution to it. Openly gay pundit Andrew Sullivan summed up the sentiment when he posted this headline on his Web site: THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, WE ARE FREE AT LAST.

The SJC ruling was only the latest in a series of stunning victories for gay men and lesbians over the past 12 months, in the US and abroad. On June 10, the highest court in Ontario — Canada’s most populous province — moved to legalize same-sex marriage in that region. More specifically, the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled that the federal definition of marriage as "a voluntary union for life of one man and one woman" violates the "equality of rights" of gay and lesbian couples under Canada’s version of the Bill of Rights. At the time, two other senior provincial courts in British Columbia and Quebec had already issued similar decisions. But the Ontario court went further, allowing same-sex marriages to take place immediately. Within hours, dozens of gay and lesbian couples were getting hitched — or, at least, snapping up marriage licenses.

In stark contrast to our own head of state, who has insisted the SJC "overreached its bounds" by permitting gay marriage, then–Canadian prime minister Jean Chrétien responded to the landmark Ontario decision by doing the right thing. Indeed, he threw up his arms and opted not to challenge the ruling. Better still, he introduced legislation to legalize same-sex marriages across Canada. The move hardly appeased Canada’s church crusaders. When Chrétien relinquished the fight, Catholic bishops fumed. Bishop Fred Henry, of Calgary, even predicted that the prime minister’s soul would burn in hell — "His eternal salvation is in jeopardy" is how the bishop put it — for his stance on the issue.

Looking back, this decision to allow gay marriage is only one of many indicators throughout 2003 that Chrétien’s Canada, unlike Bush’s America, has been embracing social change at an astonishing rate. Even as the Canadian government announced last June that it would rewrite the federal definition of marriage so as to include same-sex couples, it was in the midst of transforming its draconian drug policies. Since then, it has decriminalized possession of small amounts of marijuana. And to stem the spread of HIV, it has permitted "safe-injection" clinics for heroin addicts. Last month, while musing about his upcoming retirement, Chrétien joked that he might just kick back and smoke a little bud. As he quipped to the Toronto Globe and Mail, "I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

It’s nearly impossible to imagine the born-again President Bush — or any of his administrative minions — making such a subversive comment, especially given their obsessive and misguided attempts to enforce this country’s marijuana laws and obstruct efforts to reform them. But if Bush had only dared to light a joint and loosen up a bit, you can bet that things would have unfolded differently last summer when the US Supreme Court began to find equal-protection and privacy rights for gay people in the federal Constitution.

On June 26, right on the heels of the Ontario decision, America’s highest court in Lawrence v. Texas struck down a 1973 Texas sodomy law — and with it, all remaining state laws criminalizing oral and anal sex between consenting homosexuals. Six of the nine justices voted to overturn a 1986 decision that had upheld the anti-sodomy laws. This time, the six justices argued, everybody, including gay men and lesbians, has a constitutional right to sexual privacy. Veteran New York Times columnist William Safire, a self-described "libertarian conservative" who values personal freedom above all, captured the sentiment behind the important ruling in a June 30 column. The court, he wrote, "has just slammed America’s bedroom door. Sodomy ... when practiced between consenting adults, straight or gay, is none of the government’s business."

The ruling left gay-rights advocates and their liberal allies drunk with elation. Few had anticipated that the court would rule so broadly in favor of gay rights. Not only had the justices thrown out an odious law effectively labeling gay folks as criminals, they had issued a decision apologizing for past discrimination against homosexuals. Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy stated that it’s unconstitutional to single out gay people for "moral disapproval." Doing so, he asserted, amounts to "state-sponsored condemnation."

The predictable backlash came from the country’s highest corners — indeed, the most dramatic of the sky-is-falling warnings came from the Supreme Court bench itself. In a dissenting opinion, Justice Antonin Scalia accused his colleagues of having "largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda," and described the ruling as "the end of all morals legislation." In many ways, the stinging dissent proved prescient: the Supreme Court decision did pave the way for same-sex marriage. Still, Scalia’s shrill tone called to mind the fear-mongering uttered just two months earlier by another "traditionalist": Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum. In April, Santorum found himself amid controversy after an interview with the Associated Press, during which he had defended the anti-sodomy laws. The senator put his foot in his mouth — and revealed his true colors — when he compared homosexuality to bigamy, polygamy, and incest. Syndicated sex-advice columnist Dan Savage, who is gay, seized on the Santorum scandal in a May 15 "Savage Love" column, challenging his readers to "memorialize" the stuffy senator "by attaching his name to a sex act that would make his big, white teeth fall out of his big, empty head." In response to popular demand, Savage named his winner, as he revealed in a June 12 column: "THAT FROTHY MIXTURE OF LUBE AND FECAL MATTER THAT IS SOMETIMES THE BYPRODUCT OF ANAL SEX!"

Meanwhile, the nation’s largest retailer — Wal-Mart Stores, the discount chain where many conservative-red-state shoppers flock — stunned corporate America by moving toward gay tolerance this year. In early July, just days after the Supreme Court ruling, Wal-Mart announced its decision to include gay men and lesbians in its anti-discrimination policy. As a result, it became the ninth of the Top 10 Fortune 500 companies to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation. The exception? Only ExxonMobil Corporation carries that rather dubious distinction.

Perhaps the Wal-Mart flip was just too much for our corporation-friendly president to take. By late July, as the shock waves from the string of gay-rights successes were still reverberating, Bush finally rode to the rescue. At a Rose Garden press conference, he revealed that his lawyers were working on a plan to stop same-sex marriage. The White House even beat the Vatican to the punch in announcing that Bush is "strongly committed to protecting and defending the sanctity of marriage."

Then again, when the Vatican did offer up its opinion on the matter days later, the toxicity was enough to blow away even the most bigoted Bushie. In early August, the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a statement on same-sex marriage that history is sure to remember for its fear and loathing. It condemned homosexual acts "as a serious depravity" and called upon Catholic politicians worldwide to oppose equal marital rights for gay couples. Worse still, it proclaimed that gay adoption "would actually mean doing violence" to children. This, lest we forget, was uttered only days after Massachusetts attorney general Tom Reilly delivered his encyclopedic report on the epidemic of sexual violence visited upon hundreds of children at the hands of Roman Catholic clergy.

But not every religious denomination did wrong by gay folks this year. The Episcopal Church USA voted in August to recognize that some of its dioceses have been holding blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples. At the same time, it made history by appointing the first openly gay man as an Episcopal bishop. On November 2, the Reverend V. Gene Robinson, a divorced minister who lives with his male partner, was consecrated bishop of New Hampshire. Nearly 4000 people showed up for a solemn yet joyous ceremony in an ice arena at the University of New Hampshire — the only venue large enough to hold the crowd. Robinson’s consecration soon threatened to divide the Episcopal Church. Within 24 hours, overseas bishops at Anglican churches in Africa, Asia, and Latin America declared themselves in a "state of impaired communion" with the American branch, a step short of an all-out schism. And conservative Episcopalians in this country began making plans for a formal separation.

Nevertheless, the consecration served as a vindicating moment for countless Episcopalians who yearned for their Church formally to acknowledge the many gay men and lesbians among its priests, deacons, and lay people. By the time Robinson began his ministry on November 9 — during a mass where he preached about the virtue of bringing God’s love "to those on the margins" — the prospect of an unbridgeable schism had faded. Once the dust settles, many bishops said, parishioners will accept their openly gay prelate and move on.