The Last Word
Egerton, Brooks
THE LAST WORD , Brooks Egerton Big Brother on Guard Like the telescreen in George Orwell's 1984, the posters are everywhere. Help, they say in large block letters above a small boy's forlorn...
...The combination of public and legal pressure may eventually win out...
...He is happy, proud, when we come as a couple to see him in a school theater production...
...Well, he and I hit it off, and now you can find me Saturdays down at the rollerskating rink, flf...
...That was more than ten years ago...
...For me, there's already been at least a partially happy ending: Two women who are raising a son saw local press coverage of the controversy and asked if I'd be interested in being a Big Brother outside the agency's confines...
...They tell me my experience working with children is no recommendation, since some child molesters have a similar background...
...They don't want to confuse children...
...Homophobia confuses children, I say...
...An unintended but predictable product of the anti-gay policy has been stepped-up political activity...
...But the laws have done me no good...
...he asks...
...My lover's fifteen-year-old brother doesn't seem confused at all by the openness and acceptance his family shows...
...I Need a Big Brother...
...Help, they say in large block letters above a small boy's forlorn face...
...I Need Somebody...
...gay newspaper...
...Children and gay adults alike are denied companionship because some folks who are supposed to know something about child development do not...
...And I'm the former editor...
...Shouldn't they then discriminate against straights...
...They tell me they could have found more devious ways to get rid of me...
...Another pause, then: Well, I should tell you right now that we have a policy of not matching children with known homosexuals or bisexuals...
...Madison, it turns out, is one of the few cities where Big Brother has an explicit anti-gay policy...
...He says he is sorry...
...Is that necessary...
...Ignorance confuses children...
...He gives me the date of the next one, then asks my name and address so he can send me a reminder about the event...
...The vast majority of child molesters are heterosexual, I remind them...
...And Wisconsin is the only state in the union with legislation banning discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation...
...But all I hear are the same lies I've choked on for years about child molestation, mental illness, bad role models...
...Where have I heard of you before...
...Later I talk on the telephone with his boss, the agency's executive director, and days afterward meet with him and the president of the board of directors...
...I am still naive enough, perhaps, to believe I can reason with them...
...I inquire, informing him that I served as a Big Brother in another town during my college years and am well acquainted with what's required: time, a car, a little extra money, a commitment of at least a year and preferably more to the relationship...
...Can't I come in directly for an interview and reference checks and then get matched up with a child...
...When I tell him my name, there is a long pause on the line...
...The expensive next step, unless Big Brother has a miraculous change of heart, is a lawsuit...
...They praise themselves for being upfront with their discrimination...
...Lesbians and gay men I know live openly and are parents, foster parents, schoolteachers—but they can't be Big Brothers or Big Sisters without dissimulating...
...I write sometimes for one of the daily papers here, I say...
...Newspaper articles repeatedly detail the woeful shortage of Big Brother and Big Sister volunteers...
...I call the agency's office one bright afternoon and inquire about volunteering...
...In most locales the organization follows guidelines recommended by national headquarters: Learn the sexual orientation of the prospective volunteer, pass the information along to the child's parents, and let them have the final say...
...OUT!, I say, giving him the publication's name...
...The assumption, sad to say, is still a fairly safe one: Few non-gay people care enough, or are secure enough, to take a public stand even in behalf of basic civil liberties for gays and lesbians...
...It's been a year now since all this happened, but the pain and irony of it are as sharp as ever...
...They begin to talk past me...
...Aren't you the editor of that...
...The man is playing by the rules and insists I attend an orientation session...
...InBrooks Egerton is a free-lance writer in Madison, Wisconsin...
...I decide to do my part, and the adventure begins...
...Even if I don't fit the stereotype, I'm told, they have to consider what the public would think...
...They say they are sorry...
...For the moment I am too taken aback to challenge his assumption about my sexual orientation...
...complaints I've filed with both state and local equal-opportunity agencies have been dismissed on technicalities...
...Oh, he says...
...uh...
...Why, after all, should the agency prevent a parent from having the choice of accepting a lesbian or gay person...
...The man on the other end of the line sounds glad to hear from me and asks if I'll come to an orientation session for prospective Big Brothers and Sisters...
...So far, twenty-two mainstream religious leaders have signed a letter urging Big Brothers/Big Sisters to change their ways...
...A local lesbian/gay advocacy group is mobilizing pressure against the agency and its principal funder, the United Way, which has its own antidiscrimination policy but hasn't seen fit to apply it...
...No, he says, that's not it...
...All over town, billboards and broadcast public-service announcements reinforce the message, exhorting adults to spend a few hours a week with a child in a single-parent family...
...stead, I repeat that I've been a Big Brother before, then reel off other qualifications: former day-care teacher, camp staffer, YMCA after-school recreation program leader...
...I say miraculous because so far the organization seems determined to play for keeps, having hired what is probably the state's best-known union-busting law firm just to respond to my agency complaints...
...There's a particular irony in this drama's setting: Madison, Wisconsin, was one of the first municipalities in the nation to enact a gay-rights ordinance...
...I agree...
Vol. 50 • March 1986 • No. 3
