THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

The Reader's 'Straight Dope' column (4/2) deals with the question of Abraham Lincoln's alleged gay leanings. The pros: he didn't care for women, he shared a bed for four years with a good (and good-looking) male friend, one Joshua Speed. Both gay activist Larry Kramer and C. A. Tripp, a gay author, claim to have Speed's unpublished diary. (Sample: 'He often kisses me when I tease him, often to shut me up ... he would grab me up by his long arms and hug and hug.') The big con: 19th century folks were no dummies—they had just observed Lincoln's bachelor president, James Buchanan, who roomed with an unmarried U.S. Senator and folks talked. They didn't talk this way about Honest Abe. By the way the Log Cabin Republicans, the gay group with, oh, maybe, 12 members, is named after the Speed and Abe adventure.

The Chicago Tribune (3/28) in its Perspective section has two major articles. One compares the fuss about interracial marriage to the recent 'discussions' on gay marriage. The other article by Dwight A. McBride, department chair of African American Studies at Northwestern University, has the title: Racism Among Homosexuals and Homophobia Among Blacks. McBride, who is Black and gay, starts: 'Shame on you, Jesse Jackson. Shame.' McBride is taking on the Black clergy in the South who've been angry at the prospect of gay marriage. (Jackson has supported them.) Some points McBride makes: the anti-gay constitutional amendment is very close to the three-fifths human standing of slaves; compromising on marriages and civil unions is like 'separate but equal'; and, while there may have been oppressive gay slave owners, just as surely there were (oppressed) gay slaves.

Short stuff: The New Yorker (4/5) praises Anne Heche, Ellen DeG.'s ex in the play Twentieth Century saying her character fits Heche's oversized personal legend (plus she's a good actress—as Ellen may've found out). The Chicago Trib (3/19) gives 3 stars to the Israeli movie about gay soldiers, Yossi and Jagger. The NY Times Book Review (2/15) checks out Civil Wars: A Battle for Gay Marriage by David Moats which details how it all started in Vermont. From the 'Real-Story-of-Why-She-Left-Ken' file, the Chicago Trib (4/2) reports the New York City Board of Ed will pay $30,000 to 15-year-old Natalie Young who wore a T-shirt that said 'Barbie is a Lesbian' (because as opposed to a snarky, campy comment, that legend was a political opinion).