NicholasFBenton

LGBT YOUTH MEET THEIR ELDERS
By Amy Cavanaugh
Washington Blade, June 12, 2009

(Nicholas Benton was one of 10 Washington D.C. area LGBT personalities who participated in a round-table discussion hosted by the Washington Blade in its 40th Anniversary of Stonewall edition. From the transcript of the conversation, Benton’s responses to questions that were reprinted in the Blade are included here).

Q. On coming out.
Benton: One night around the dinner table, my older brother asked my father, “What is a homosexual?” All I know was I was just sitting there and turned about 44 shades of purple. I didn’t say a thing, so that was coming out, I guess. My father found out and he threatened to kill me. Since he eventually killed himself, I know he probably meant it.
Q. Significance of Stonewall.
Benton: I think Stonewall from the West Coast perspective was picked up more as a symbol of gay liberation, than for the significance of the three days of rioting. By its first anniversary it became the thing which was the uniting symbol for the entire movement, but it wasn’t so much so at the very time it happened.
Q. Remembering the Onset of the AIDS Crisis.
Benton: I’ll never forget the day. I was living in Houston at the time, in the summer of ’81, and a woman who worked at the office starting talking about the fact that 14 men in New York City, who were all gay, had this Karposi’s sarcoma, blotches on them, and you know, it just hit me like an electric shock to hear that. I followed the story all the time., and they would try to explain what it was. At first they were convinced the fatality rate was maybe 20 percent, then 35 percent, then – boom – it went to 100 percent. It was a terror, it was a true dark age not knowing whether you were infected or not.
…Sarah Shulman in New York has this whole view that 80,000 New Yorkers, young New Yorkers, died of AIDS in that period of time, and what that’s done for American culture to have most of those people being in the creative fields die before they were able to fully mature with their talent and ability. And that had not only a personal terrific loss and loss of gay community, but American culture as a whole suffers from the loss of that whole creative element that was centered in New York.
…Epidemiologists are going to work every day fearful they’re going to see a result that a much more virulent strand is going to mutate and with all the unprotected sex going on, you’re going to see a second wave that will be even more devastating than the first round.
Q. Advice and Questions.
Benton: What is it that causes us to self identify as a community? Is there something other than sexual orientation that binds the so-called community? I think that a word like empathy might be there: as when you talk about the AIDS crisis and you and others who went to visit and provide comfort for these people. The thing about the AIDS thing which was one of the most awful aspects, was that so many of these people died alone. Their parents would not touch them. Only the gay community would rally and be there for them. I think that there is a quality of empathy that we share in the experience of being LGBT, not just the fact that we have a shared sexual orientation, that overcomes barriers and binds the community.

(In separate boxes, each of the 10 participants was profiled with brief responses to three questions. Benton’s response to those questions is included here).

Nick Benton, declined to give age, owner, Falls Church News-Press.

Q. When did you come out and who was the hardest to tell?
Benton: I came out in 1969 in graduate school. My father was the hardest to tell because he threatened to kill me.
Q. Is Pride still important?
Benton: Absolutely. There are still many places in the world where being gay is not an option and to be able to see people celebrating gives them hope. And it reminds me of San Francisco in the ‘60s, when a generation of young people felt they had a place to go and join in the Summer of Love and could finally identify a place to go. Gay Pride festivals are the same idea.
Q. What is the most significant LGBT event of your lifetime?
Benton: I was the co-founder of the Berkeley Gay Liberation Front and wrote the editorial for the first edition of the Gay Sunshine newspaper. I also produced copies of The Effeminist.
Q. What’s the best gay movie ever made?
Benton: ‘Milk,’ because I knew Harvey Milk and contrary to the film credits, Sean Penn wasn’t in that movie. He did such a good job played Harvey Milk, I knew he was Harvey Milk.