Sometimes it takes a couple decades
Conversation on same-sex marriage started in 2002 with a brave reporter
By Ken Tingley
Our attitudes and beliefs often take years to formulate, especially when those beliefs are long-held and called into question. But we do evolve in our thinking.
When I was a high school student in the 1970s, I heard the terms “homo” and “fag” derogatorily used as I walked the high school hallways. Certain people were targeted. I did not know what those terms meant. I did not know what homosexuality was. It wouldn’t be until college that I understood.
For me, the news that the U.S. Senate had passed legislation this week to mandate federal recognition for same-sex marriage was not so much a breakthrough moment, but a long slow slog that has been decades in the making, especially here in upstate New York. And we aren’t really there yet.
After all, 157 Republicans in the House of Representatives voted against a version of this proposed law back in July. Thirty-six U.S. senators voted against it this week.
There is nothing terribly earth-shattering about this new law. It provides the authority for same-sex and interracial marriage. Previous statutes had defined a marriage as between a man and a woman and that your spouse was someone of the opposite sex. Under that definition, same sex couples were often denied rights afforded heterosexual couples.
Correcting the legal definition seems fair and long overdue.
But back in 2001 when the state of Vermont became the first state to grant civil unions, many still considered it a lifestyle choice.
That raucous and controversial discussion seeped across the border into New York where a brave 25-year-old reporter for The Post-Star, Matt Sturdevant, decided to explore what it was like for young gays to grow up in rural communities around Glens Falls.
This was the emotional opening on July 14, 2002 to Sturdevant’s story Growing Up Gay:
“During his high school years, John Cozzens III said he spent a lot of nights crying into a pillow and thinking he was a freak.”
Sturdevant took on an issue that polarized our community in 2002 even as national norms were changing. His reporting and interviews with men and women who had grown up here was the beginning of the discussion as far as I’m concerned. Sturdevant’s article was a heartbreaking story of men and women who had been ostracized in their communities. Some contemplated suicide. All knew they were different.
It was like nothing anyone had ever read in their local newspaper. Within days, it was the talk of the region in diners, at dinner tables and in the letters to the editor.
Walter Lape, a homosexual school teacher in Queensbury, told Sturdevant this:
“Little by little people change their point of view and their perspective on things and the more they know someone who is different, the more they realize they are not different. Sexual orientation should be a non-issue. It isn’t, but gradually it’s becoming less and less important.”
Walter Lape was a wise men.
It only took 20 years to get there.
It’s all chronicled in Chapter 5 of “The Last American Newspaper” where I describe the attacks and criticism from outraged readers. It was some of the most vile criticism we saw during my 21 years at the newspaper.
“I think without a doubt I expected a (negative) reaction,” Sturdevant told me in 2020. “At least 20 or 30 emails came in that either wished me dead, or worse, I was going to go to hell. Many invoked religion, calling me amoral for giving voice and highlighting the experience growing up gay. There was a lot of vitriol.”
What writing the book allowed me to do was connect the dots from that original conversation to the same-sex marriage debate nine years later and now the the events of the past week. Attitudes have changed, not completely, but gradually.
It is another reminder of one of the roles that newspapers play.
After Andrew Cuomo was elected the new governor in 2008, he made it clear one of his goals was to make same-sex marriage the law of the state
This time it was not a news reporter in the crosshairs, but a local conservative Republican senator who set off a firestorm with this simple statement, “I will be doing what I think is right.”
To pass the same-sex marriage statute in New York, Cuomo needed Republican votes in the state Senate.
I don’t know if Roy McDonald had read the “Growing Up Gay” story in 2002. I don’t know if it made him think about twice voting against the law in the state Assembly, but by 2011 McDonald’s attitudes had changed like many of his constituents.
But of course, not all.
Roy McDonald’s journey and experience because of his decision in 2011 is chronicled in my story “Roy McDonald: Profile in Courage” that will be published in a couple weeks.
What started with “Growing Up Gay” nine years later continued the conversation in the spring of 2011.
The Post-Star editorial board - I was one of the three members - endorsed the new same-sex marriage law May. And a month later, McDonald voted for it in the Senate. There was immediate backlash from the local Republican establishment that he had turned on his base and their beliefs.
The next year, the Saratoga County clerk announced she would primary McDonald.
“I’m in the party of Abraham Lincoln - I’m proud of that,” McDonald said before the primary vote. “I’m not in the party of a bunch of right-wing nitwits. It’s Abraham Lincoln. It’s everybody included. And I feel that’s very important.”
McDonald lost the primary by 100 votes and dropped out of the race.
Over nine years, local residents were getting closer, but they were not there yet. Roy McDonald did what he thought was right and was driven out of politics. I wondered how many people have total McDonald they were wrong.
Eleven years later - just this past week - U.S. senators voted 61-35 to make same-sex marriage the law of the land.
Back in July, Rep. Elise Stefanik - another conservative Republican - also voted for the law. It is unlikely that anyone will primary her because of opposition to that vote.
We’re making progress.
Profile in Courage
The complete story of Roy McDonald’s courageous vote in the New York state Senate is now available as part of an anthology of short stories published by Something or Other Publishing.
“Roy McDonald: Profile in Courage” was developed from a series of columns I wrote about Roy McDonald when I was editor of The Post-Star and later over lunches we had together after we both retired. It was then chosen by Something or Other Publishing for publication.
Roy McDonald was the consummate conservative Republican politician, but when he chose to do the right thing and vote for same-sex marriage in 2011, he paid the price. Local Republicans turned on him and forced him into a primary for re-election. He lost that primary by 100 votes. He could have taken his case to the people in the fall election, but instead walked away from politics and eventually the Republican Party.
I wish we had more politicians willing to do the right thing before their political career.
The anthology is now available online for pre-order at $18.95.
Roy McDonald’s story is among dozens of other stories in the anthology.
Next up
I will be speaking about newspapers, journalism and “The Last American Newspaper: at the Queensbury Senior Center on Monday at 2 p.m.
To register for the event, call 518 761-8224.
I think it is so important to give voice to folks on the margin, it's true when it is people we know, the conversation changes. My Dad's favorite brother, my Uncle Bob, was in the closet his whole life. My Uncle Bob struggled with alcohol and became estranged from his family for many years. My Dad tracked him down in a homeless shelter, and then he lived with Mom and Dad off and on until his death. My Dad thought Uncle Bob was damaged because their mother abandoned them and they grew up in orphanages. I said, "gee, Dad, do you think maybe the real harm was that Uncle Bob was a closeted gay kid, then a man, growing up in a homophobic culture?" I can't imagine how hard it was for him. My Dad , while very much live and let live, had his own biases, but I do know for sure that if Uncle Bob had found a nice man to settle down with, Dad would have been very happy for his brother who he loved very much.
“The arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice.”