Side by Side: On Having a Gay or Lesbian Sibling
by Andrew R. Gottlieb
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  Side by Sideby Andrew R. gottlieb Southern Tier Editions I. Introduction The Haworth Press (Binghamton, NY) and its imprints Harrington Park Press and Southern Tier Editions is rapidly publishing a remarkably significant library of GLBT works that provide both lay and academic readers with vast choices. The Haworth fare includes erudite works of research such as Southern Tier Editions’ Brothers and Others in Arms: The Making of Love and War in Israeli Combat Units (see IGW-V2-Issue 7) by Danny Kaplan (2004); Whistling Women: A Study of the Lives of Older Lesbians (Haworth Press, 2005) by Cheryl Claassen, and the brand new research periodical, edited by Dr. Jerry J. Bigner, Journal of GLBT Family Studies: Innovation in Theory, Research, and Practice (Harrington Press, 2005). In addition to the wide array of both qualitative and quantitative research studies, Haworth and its imprints publish works of fiction for lay readers representing every genre from erotica to the brilliant science fiction writing by renown GLBT authors such as Felice Picano’s massive Dryland’s End (Southern Tier Editions, 2004) thrilling mysteries, and comedic novels of unique categorical gay groups celebrated as in such fine fiction as Jonathan Cohen’s exuberant exploration of the world of gay bears, Bears Like Me (Southern Tier Editions, 2003). Nor, are the Haworth editions limited to parochial United States studies. Dr. Todd G. Morrison, editor of the research tome Eclectic Views of Gay Male Pornography (Harrington Park Press, 2004) is from Galway, Ireland and the alternating quantitative and qualitative research articles in his text represent the scholarship of GLBT studies from around the globe. Haworth also has impressive publishing house addresses: New York, London, and Oxford. The line up of Haworth-Harrington-Southern Tier Editions titles is so comprehensive that no college or university can argue that there is insufficient scholarship to bolster either MA or PhD degree programs in GLBT Studies. If they do, they are either demonstrating their bigotry, ignorance, or both. Moreover, in addition to the comprehensive scholarship, biography, and fiction from Haworth, there is an ever-increasing body of scholarship flowing forth from other publishers of GLBT works such as Alyson Publications, Kensington Books, and the Stonewall Inn Editions of St. Martin’s Press. Two of Haworth’s titles are highlighted in the following reviews and additional Haworth titles will be highlighted in forthcoming issues of The Independent Gay Writer. II. The Review Gottlieb, Andrew R. Side by Side: On Having a Gay or Lesbian Sibling. New York: Harrington Park Press, Haworth Press, 2004. Following up on his previous learned explorations of two familial-related Haworth Press books, Out of the Twilight: Fathers of Gay Men Speak (2000) and Sons Talk About Their Gay Fathers: Life Curves (2003), Dr. Gottlieb now turns his attention to sibling relationship between straight and GLBT brothers and sisters with 18 distinct and enlightening accounts in Side by Side that features three topical sections: “On Having a Gay Brother,” “On Having a Lesbian Sister,” and “On Having a Gay Brother and a Lesbian Sister.” Gottlieb’s scholarship is first rate, but that description should not frighten away readers who simply want to read highly insightful, illuminating, and often entertaining case studies of children who came into this world from the same womb but turned out to have very different adult lives. Each profile is short enough to be read independently, say one or two heartfelt stories for an evening’s bedside reading. Virtually none of the accounts are homophobic or disturbing. Indeed, the vast majority of the sibling narratives have upbeat endings and there are both pleasant revelations and epiphanies to be found in these pages. One of the best things about Side by Side is that Gottlieb’s multiple contributors provide a distinctly humane perspective to an issue that is nearly as old as Cain and Abel and just as important. “How much am I my brother’s (or sister’s) keeper if he or she is different from me in sexual orientation?” Important generalizations may be drawn from these 18 sibling accounts that may provide valuable insights to GLBT family members who remain still in the closet, chiefly for fear of losing familial love. The overwhelming response found in Side by Side from straight siblings (and parents, when their words and actions are reported by siblings) goes something like this: “Why did you wait so long to tell me? I wish you would have told me sooner. You are my brother and nothing else matters.” It is a shame that this book will most likely be read by adults when the real target audience should be teenagers struggling with the perhaps the greatest decision of their lives – whether to “come out” or remain in the closet with their own families. Another generalization of equal importance is that in most cases, it is the gay or lesbian siblings who educate their straight siblings relative to GLBT feelings, issues, and facts. Previously clueless straight siblings admit they lived in a world of darkness and misunderstanding prior to the coming out of their beloved siblings. Now they understand prejudices they never even realized existed. Virtually all profilers admit that they consider themselves better people than they were prior to the wide opening of the closet door within their family homes. As Colorado State University professor Jerry J. Bigner states in the introduction, sibling communications, the greatest virtue of Side by Side, is “Most important, these stories put a face on sexual orientation issues as well as provide excellent examples of the possibilities that exist in the context of this special relationship.” A few examples hopefully will suffice to provide insights into this wonderful, life-affirming book. One of the most instructive accounts of having a gay brother is Tom Nelson’s “A Lesson Learned.” There was nothing transparently gay about his extremely close brother, Dan. The family with a great mother and father and two responsible young men personified the All-American Family ideal, save for the fact that even at 19, Dan was not yet out of the closet. The brothers shared a bed room and after a night of good-natured partying and banter, Dan came out to his older brother and closest friend, Kevin. Surprised, but accepting, Kevin, a month or so later showed his gay brother the knife he was going to use to slash the tires of a co-worker’s truck because the homophobe had used “faggot” and other derogatory terms about a sports hero whom he blamed for a defeat that cost the homophobe money he had bet on the game’s outcome. “Don’t be stupid,” Dan told his straight brother who was prepared to defend his gay brother’s honor at any cost, including the loss of his job and possible arrest. The younger but wiser gay brother said to his closest friend and brother, “Dude. You think that’s the only way to stop homophobes?” A gay brother convinced a straight brother that revenge is not the only or even best answer to hatred and ignorance. Later, in college, Kevin simply tells another straight guy in a poker game who utters the statement while laying down a winning hand, “Read ‘em and weep, fags” that his slur is offensive because he has a gay brother of whom he is very proud. Tom concludes his account: “Dan taught me that I can’t change people through violence, but I can tell others what I think and let them know I love and support my brother, a lesson I have learned well. Preserving my relationship with Dan and my family is the most important thing – always was, always will be.” (p. 48) |
“Step-by-Step” by Luke Markert is perhaps the best story of how a family comes together to fully support a gay son and brother. Raised in a conservative Lutheran family where the father was a strict disciplinarian, Luke was shocked when his brother John came out to his brother and parents simultaneously at a family dinner table conference. Instead of the stereotypical angry response the author anticipated from his conservative father, Luke was amazed when his father, without skipping a heartbeat, lovingly responded to his brother John’s bombshell announcement both an immediate affectionate affirmation and a sincere invitation to John to tell his straight mother, father, and brother what they might do to make his life better and happier. When the family was no longer welcome in the church they had attended all their lives, they joined a more open and accepting one. John’s parent founded the first PFLAG organization, and finally Luke and John’s family all joined together to march as a family of solidarity in New York City’s Gay Pride Parade. An especially poignant moment comes at the end of this otherwise very positive and uplifting family story. At the end of the parade route, Luke eloquently remembers: “As the pace slowed we stopped to talk with others. One young man, who said it was nice to see us marching together as a family, went on to tell us how his own family had disowned him after he came out. That moment was an epiphany. I finally understood what acceptance was all about.” (p. 62) Meg Weber’s story about having a gay older brother truly becomes more her own story about her own coming out and her surprise that she did not initially receive the empathy she expected from her elder gay brother. It is also a revelation to even gays that there remains both tremendous diversity and even conflict within not just the GLBT community but among gays even in the same family. In “Like My Brother” Meg explains that she is the youngest child in a conservative Catholic family with seven additional siblings, the oldest of whom is her gay brother, Jeff. She relates telling her brother that she was bisexual and expected instant empathy from him. “The problem was that we had no common ground. He was a closeted, highly conservative, Republican gay man, and I was a young, vocal, political, radical dyke. I had more common ground with my progressive straight friends than I did with my gay brother.” She reveals the disappointment her brother’s lack of support cost her emotionally. “The deafening indifference of my other siblings didn’t bother mean as much as the lack of support I felt from my gay brother.” (p. 39) Happily, time has both healed disappointments as well as opened up new channels of communication between two gay siblings, the eldest and the youngest members of a large family. Proudly, she concludes their mutual story, “Together we are finding ways to bridge the chasms of our age difference and disparate experiences of being queer.” (p. 40) The best personal and familial story in the book is the sole entry in Gottlieb’s third category, “On Having a Gay Brother and a Lesbian Sister.” Brian Watts’ “The Puzzle” is a beautiful and touching story of family love as it should be. Moreover, because it involves a Mormon family, it is a perfect counterpoint to readers and viewers who have read or watched in horror the treatment of missionary Elder Aaron Davis in the immensely popular film and its novelization, Latter Days (2004). “The Puzzle,” written with a loving voice, recalls the annual Watts’ family Christmas tradition of every member working together during the Christmas holidays putting up a card table and communally working to solving of a jigsaw puzzle, once piece at a time. The family Christmas puzzle activity becomes a beautiful metaphor for how a family unit fits together, if there is real love to be found there, like a magnificent humanly-solved jigsaw puzzle. Every member is representative of a different piece but every piece is critical to the wholeness of the enterprise in order to appreciate the final beauty of the whole work of art. Watts’ states that growing up Mormon he had been bombarded with the message of love of family: When confronted with the information of his oldest brother Craig’s homosexuality, he states: “Even now I’m surprised at how instantaneously I discarded the old notion ‘Love the sinner. Hate the sin.’ As far as I was concerned, I was in a position where a choice had to be made, and I chose my brother.” (p.126). Even before his elder brother was excommunicated from the Mormon church, Craig’s father declared to anyone in the community and the family that if “Craig wanted me to march in a gay pride parade, I would walk right along side him.” (p. 127). The excommunication of Craig is not perceived as any shame but as an outrage plus an attack on not just Craig but the entire sixth-generation Mormon family. Craig’s and Brian’s parents began to be the center of their conservative community’s growing Family Fellowship, a support group for Mormon families dealing with homosexuality. Two years after Brian, the sixth and youngest member of his loving and accepting family, learned that his oldest brother was gay, his closest sibling and the fifth youngest member of his family, his sister Lori, came out to him as a lesbian. He ends his moving account of himself and his family with an incredible tribute to his gay brother and lesbian sister: “I no longer hope that they will settle down in Provo, be straight, and have 2.5 kids. I now sincerely hope that they will find and maintain happiness in a loving relationship. Perhaps it took finding that happiness myself before I realized what a cruel thing it is to deny another human being of that rare opportunity.” (p. 133). If Aaron Davis’ life in Latter Days represents a particular picture of Hell on Earth, then Brian Watts’ portrait shows readers that a Mormon family filled with mutual and unending love, respect, and compassion for one another can come very close to a portrait, even one made of cardboard jigsaw pieces fitted together, is both a work of art and as close to Heaven as possible. With few exceptions Andrew R. Gottlieb in Side by Side has defined with his collection of empathic accounts the definition of a FRIEND (Noun). 1. One attached to another by affection. 2. An ally in a cause. 3. One who believes in and supports a person or group. The siblings in Side by Side are more than blood brothers and sisters; they are FRIENDS in the most loving, reverent, and truest meaning of the word. This is a book all GLBT persons should read to enhance their own self-esteem, especially if it has been trampled upon by family, but it is also a gift book all gay brothers and sisters should give – complete with inscriptions of love, friendship, and family loyalty -- to their straight brothers and sisters. Jerry Flack Denver, Colorado |