Audio Interview, Larry Fine, March 21, 1973
- LARRY FINE: At about that time I felt
- that Rochester was not really the place I wanted to live.
- And I had ideas about traveling to some other parts
- of the country.
- BRUCE JEWELL: You took off for Lincoln, Nebraska.
- LARRY FINE: Well, actually I didn't
- know I would end up in Lincoln, Nebraska.
- BRUCE JEWELL: At the time, I remember
- thinking that you had practically exiling yourself.
- LARRY FINE: I decided to go on a vacation
- in the middle of August.
- And I think I had thoughts only in the very back of my mind
- that I might not return.
- I got rid of as many responsibilities as I could
- and I was going to visit a friend in Denver.
- I planned my stopover points at nights
- to coincide with places where there were gay liberation
- groups, so I could find a place to stay at night.
- One of the places was Lincoln, Nebraska.
- The night that I got there they happened
- to have one of their biweekly coffeehouses.
- And I met a lot of really nice people
- there and told them that I would return after I
- visited my friend in Denver.
- And I did and I liked the place a lot.
- And I just decided to do one of those spontaneous and
- ridiculously unpredictable moves and move there.
- And it was one of the best things I ever did.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, now when you're
- involved in gay activities in Lincoln, the heartland,
- that you hardly ever hear about.
- LARRY FINE: Lincoln is very much misunderstood in most places
- in the country, especially in the metropolitan areas.
- People think that it's just a small farm town,
- or that they do nothing but grow corn there, or whatever.
- And Lincoln is actually a fairly good sized town,
- about close to half the size of Rochester I'd say,
- about 150,000 people.
- It's the state capital of the Nebraska
- and it has a large university.
- University of Nebraska has about 20,000 students.
- It's actually more liberal a place than Rochester.
- For instance, it went very heavily
- McGovern in the last election.
- And a lot of alternative lifestyles, long hair,
- and all of those kinds of things are more readily
- accepted there than they were until fairly recently,
- say even in Rochester.
- Now, the rest of Nebraska is very different, of course.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, I have the impression
- that the middle west is perhaps more liberal than given credit
- for, it always has been liberal to certain degree.
- There's a certain type of liberalism
- that has come out of the middle west.
- I know, for example, that some states
- are much closer in the middle west
- to legalizing marijuana use than--
- LARRY FINE: Well, you almost have to.
- BRUCE JEWELL: --liberal New York is here.
- LARRY FINE: In Nebraska, it grows in your backyard.
- There's a limit to how much they could do to you.
- BRUCE JEWELL: I see.
- LARRY FINE: They try, but--
- BRUCE JEWELL: It's ecology.
- LARRY FINE: Really.
- BRUCE JEWELL: So what is happening
- in the way of gay activities in Lincoln?
- LARRY FINE: Well the gay action group in Lincoln
- began just around the time that the University of Rochester GLF
- started in October, November 1970.
- And it started as a university organization.
- Its first event, I guess was to start a coffee house.
- And it's still called the coffee house, but really it's a dance.
- It grew larger and larger.
- And that's the main function of the group.
- Well, I won't say the main purpose,
- but the main function, continuing function
- that's ongoing is the coffee house every other Sunday night.
- And it draws anywhere between one and 200 people,
- this is in Lincoln, Nebraska.
- BRUCE JEWELL: That's better than we do here
- in Rochester, actually.
- LARRY FINE: Really.
- There are no gay bars in Lincoln,
- so it serves a similar purpose to that.
- But lately there's been much more of a feeling of community
- there, less of a cruising feeling.
- And there's some cruising, of course.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, I would hope so.
- LARRY FINE: Yeah.
- There's no reason why there shouldn't be.
- But there's also a feeling of people wanting
- to go there to dance with their friends
- and it's a good feeling.
- There have been a lot of complaints about it
- because the music is very loud and the lights
- tend to be very dim.
- But it certainly serves a purpose.
- Since then, there also been some discussion groups started
- on various evenings.
- And here and there a little bit of political activity
- and talking to some state senators
- about repealing sodomy law, things like that.
- But political activities are not in the forefront.
- BRUCE JEWELL: I understand you now have a bar as well as--
- LARRY FINE: Well, that's very, very recent in Lincoln.
- There's always been the bar in Omaha--
- one gay bar in Omaha, which everyone would go to.
- But Omaha's fifty miles away.
- Under the leadership of the women,
- who had separated themselves from the gay action group
- and really gotten themselves together
- much better than the men ever did,
- it was announced that a particular bar, which
- was a straight redneck bar, but was practically
- going into bankruptcy--
- that this particular bar welcomed new patronage.
- And one of the women happened to know
- someone who worked at the bar and told
- the manager that, well, maybe we should make this into a gay bar
- and the manager might make a little money.
- Well, one night a hundred of us--
- actually I shouldn't say us, I wasn't there.
- I was sick with a very bad chest cold and laryngitis.
- But this happened about a month ago or three weeks ago.
- A hundred people went to the bar and started dancing.
- And there was a little bit of hassle,
- there was one fight that some straight guy picked.
- But the manager clearly let him know
- who's side he was on and bounced them out pretty quickly.
- The band loved us.
- We love to dance.
- The straight people never danced very much
- and when they did it was kind of a very slow, stiff-legged kind
- of dance.
- The band for once didn't just have
- to play country music, country western music.
- They could play some boogie stuff
- and they really got off on us.
- The problem, of course, will be to keep this going.
- This particular bar is not very close to downtown,
- it's a little bit on the outlying areas.
- And it's not easy to get to if you don't have transportation.
- So it'll be a problem keeping enough support,
- so that it can remain a place that we can go, and dance,
- and be ourselves-- without having
- to worry about people kicking us or shoving us around.
- We don't necessarily want it to be
- an exclusively homosexual bar.
- We welcome heterosexuals who want to dance, you know,
- if they can be with us there.
- There's a lot of enthusiasm that's
- been generated out of this and there's
- some people who want to liberate a bar a month in Lincoln,
- but I'm not sure that'll happen.
- BRUCE JEWELL: You periodically come back here to Rochester
- as a student at the Empire State College.
- You didn't entirely lose your interest
- in academic activities.
- LARRY FINE: That's true.
- BRUCE JEWELL: What are you engaged in?
- LARRY FINE: Well, under my parents influence, especially,
- in urging me to get my B.A., I've
- gone back to school under a program
- of the State University of New York called Empire State
- College.
- If you're familiar at all with the concept called
- "University Without Walls," that some colleges have,
- this is similar.
- There is no set curriculum or course of study.
- And you don't have to have a major,
- declare any particular major.
- You can do almost anything from reading ten books to meditating
- in a cave, although they do like you
- to have a program of somewhat cohesive
- and revolves around some kind of central theme.
- You can get a four year degree in this college
- or you can transfer credits from some other place.
- You can do it in conjunction with a job
- or some kind of interest that you have.
- And I decided that if I was going to get my B.A.
- I would do it in the area of gay liberation
- or not get a degree at all.
- And they were very receptive to this.
- I wondered if they might question a lot,
- but they didn't.
- And what I'm particularly involved in doing
- is developing social services in the gay community-- counseling,
- crisis lines, discussion groups, and other kinds
- of social services which I think are very much needed.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, now it has sometimes bothered me that when
- we think of social services, and we do think along
- the lines of, of course, counseling and crisis
- counseling because those meet very realistic needs.
- Have you examined the possibility
- for creating a more positive kind of social service
- to the gay community?
- I mean, currently the places where we can meet
- are very limited within bars and at various functions sponsored
- by gay liberation groups.
- There are not enough gay people out to function as gay people
- in their everyday lives.
- So what kind of alternative institutions are--
- LARRY FINE: Are you thinking in terms of community centers
- and that kind of thing?
- BRUCE JEWELL: Not in particular.
- LARRY FINE: Oh, I wasn't sure what you meant by creative--
- BRUCE JEWELL: I'm just wondering what you're
- thinking along those lines.
- LARRY FINE: Well, I wasn't sure exactly what
- you meant by creative forms of social services.
- But there is a need for community centers.
- And the best thing, of course, would
- be to have gay people just interact
- in the present kinds of institutions as people,
- as gay people, and not have separate institutions
- for themselves.
- But, at least initially, it's an important thing
- to have some separate intuitions to form a sense of community
- and to have people develop a sense of identity.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well in doing so, we're
- really following a very time honored tradition.
- We're forming what amounts to the gay club, which
- is equivalent-- or we call it a community center.
- And it's the same thing as the German
- Club, or the Italian club, or the Scandinavian club,
- or whatever.
- LARRY FINE: In a sense that's true.
- One of the--
- BRUCE JEWELL: An attempt to form institutions
- that for specialized minorities.
- LARRY FINE: One of the things that troubles me about that
- is that it may tend to limit people
- into thinking that one has to have a sexual identity,
- either being homosexual or heterosexual.
- And you have to align yourself with one or the other
- and shut off anything else you might feel.
- It tends to bother me that the gay movement may be doing this,
- in a sense, reinforcing the very norms,
- stereotypes that straight society has already
- placed on us.
- That everyone is either homosexual or heterosexual,
- supposedly.
- It puts people in a box, you might say.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, how do you see people
- as actually functioning?
- LARRY FINE: Well, people have a whole range
- of feelings that are not easy to classify
- as strictly sexual, emotional, social, et cetera.
- Feelings may get themselves felt in many, many different ways.
- Now in a sexually repressive society
- two things tend to happen.
- Many things get felt in an exaggeratedly sexual kind
- of way without maybe having a sensual component to it.
- Just very kind of a very gut level sexual thing
- that might otherwise be felt on more emotional levels.
- BRUCE JEWELL: For example?
- LARRY FINE: Let me see if I can give an example.
- BRUCE JEWELL: You mean just seeing somebody, liking
- that person, and going to bed with them as a kind of--
- LARRY FINE: That may be, the whole cruising thing.
- People tend to, I think, change emotional needs
- into sexual needs.
- So that they often don't realize the other kinds of needs
- that they have.
- They think that just by getting a trick for the night
- they're going to satisfy a lot of their other needs.
- Or, they may think that by doing that they'll be happy
- and they have one trick after another and--
- BRUCE JEWELL: That is your homosexual life.
- Yeah.
- LARRY FINE: Right.
- Of course, with a repressive society
- the opposite happens, that feelings which may be very much
- sexual get felt other ways.
- And the person doesn't realize that they
- may be feeling sexual feelings for someone of the same sex,
- in this case.
- In a less repressive society there
- would be a whole range of feelings
- and there might not be the necessity
- to classify them as being sexual, emotional, et cetera.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, as you mentioned to me
- in another conversation, the women's groups.
- Women are finding that they can relate to one another
- in a manner, for many of them, apparently, that's
- quite unexpected.
- LARRY FINE: Right.
- There are a lot of women who have always defined themselves
- as heterosexuals and that their gut level sexual feelings have
- been toward someone of the opposite sex.
- But they're may be finding that they
- can have a warmth and a quality relationship that
- is more meaningful to them with another woman.
- And which can be expressed sexually,
- even though their original gut kind of sexual feelings
- were not toward women.
- This has happened with some men also,
- but with men there's a much greater problem.
- Men are much more constricted in the kinds of behaviors
- and feelings they're allowed to feel in this society.
- But there's a whole problem in defining sexual identity.
- If someone who thought of themselves as heterosexual
- and still feels gut level sexual feelings for someone
- of the opposite sex, now finds that they
- have emotional kinds of feelings, which
- can be expressed sexually toward someone with the same sex,
- do they think of themselves as homosexual, as a heterosexual,
- or what?
- There's a lot of ambiguity there.
- And in counseling, this is a special problem.
- People want to know where they stand
- and what kind of lifestyle they're expected to live.
- And it's not so easy to say.
- And there are not very clear models or roles
- in society for people who don't fit
- into one or the other category.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, I think it was St. Thomas Aquinas,
- I'm not quite sure that it was he,
- but he was one of the very famous medieval saints who
- pointed out that sexuality had a definite function
- in friendship.
- He wasn't just talking about marriage, but about friendship.
- And so, I suppose, for some people
- a friendship can become a sexual relationship without putting
- particular individuals in a category
- of homosexual or heterosexual for that matter.
- Certainly, homosexual people sometimes
- have sexual relationships with members of the opposite sex
- really based on friendship.
- LARRY FINE: Sure.
- I tend to think that probably the most lasting kinds
- of relationships, sexual relationships,
- are actually with friends--
- people that you have already established
- a friendship with and sexuality is an extension
- of that friendship.
- Traditionally, in heterosexual tradition,
- it's not been especially important
- whether you liked the person you were marrying.
- The parents would marry you off to somebody,
- and it was something you did as a duty and as a tradition.
- And I think, especially in the Western world,
- that kind of tradition is waning.
- I'm not sure whether it'll disappear completely,
- but more and more people are expecting
- to love the person they marry, something
- that used to be unheard of.
- And maybe we're gradually seeing a whole change
- in the nature of the purpose of sex, which
- used to be just as something for reproduction
- and to pass on the, you know, to pass on the heritage.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, officially.
- LARRY FINE: Officially, at least.
- Yeah.
- Well, I've known many men, for instance,
- who just felt that sex was--
- well, women actually-- more women who felt that sex
- was a duty and something to be put up with.
- Because they didn't really enjoy it.
- And even men sometimes who really-- when
- they were able to be open about their feelings,
- would say that sex was something they really
- didn't enjoy all that much.
- It was just the release, the tension release,
- but they did it more as a duty.
- But, I think, more and more sex is
- becoming something which can be for expression of friendship,
- which can be just for the purpose of mutual pleasure--
- taking on many different forms.
- And the kinds of lifestyles which will develop out of that
- may be very different from the traditional kinds
- of monogamous relationships.
- That's, of course, already being felt.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Larry, I know you have
- some personal feelings about tradition
- and some personal events in your life, which
- have changed your attitudes towards traditions and so on.
- Could you share those with us?
- LARRY FINE: I think when I first came out,
- my tendency was to toss tradition to the wind,
- to toss the idea of family to the wind.
- And, I guess, I needed to do that at the time
- in order to feel good about my being gay
- and not be held down by those feelings of tradition.
- And, you know, I'm Jewish.
- And in Jewish culture, tradition and family
- are extremely important.
- Well, now that being gay is not an issue with me
- and I've accepted my gayness as a good and positive thing,
- I can think more freely about tradition.
- And some events in my life have made
- me think about it much more quickly, my mother is not well.
- And, in fact, I came back to New York
- very quickly last week because there was a possibility
- she might be dying.
- She's a little better now, but my sister and I
- talked a great deal.
- And we both have this realization
- that our parents are in the process of disappearing,
- and our neighborhood is changing,
- and all our friends or many of our friends
- are getting married, getting established jobs, et cetera--
- careers.
- And that it's kind of getting time
- for us to carry on the responsibilities of our family,
- you might say.
- And to carry on the tradition.
- And I do have a feeling of needing
- to carry on this tradition.
- Now, for a heterosexual it presents a lot less problem,
- you get married, and have children,
- and everyone says that's the right thing to do.
- For someone who's gay, who knows that they're oriented
- toward someone of the same sex and that a heterosexual
- marriage would not fulfill many of their very important needs,
- this is really a much more serious decision of what kind
- of lifestyle to live.
- And it weighs on my mind, in a sense.
- For instance, there are many gay people
- who would like to have children and we
- have to ask the question, how much should a person be
- limited by their biology?
- Just like there are many women, in the women's liberation
- movement, who are deciding that their biology,
- their being female, should not determine the role that take
- and prevent them from having a career.
- Should not determine that they must have a child.
- I think that people who are homosexually oriented
- would also have a reason to object
- to their being limited biologically
- from having children.
- On the other hand--
- BRUCE JEWELL: In other words, they
- should be able, perhaps, to adopt children.
- LARRY FINE: Well, perhaps to adopt,
- but there are some people who would like
- to have children naturally.
- And who know that the problem, of course,
- is not whether or not they'd be able to have sex with a woman.
- For instance, I'm sure I'd be able to perform
- with a woman who I was comfortable with and liked,
- that's not the question.
- The question is that I would prefer being with a man,
- much prefer.
- So there's a conflict in many people's lives.
- On one hand, they may want to follow a tradition that they
- see many advantages to.
- On the other hand, they feel that their nature
- leads them another way.
- And what kind of lifestyle to choose is a difficult decision.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, I think being cut adrift
- from traditions is something many, if not most, if not all,
- homosexuals experience.
- LARRY FINE: As a matter of fact, I think, in my counseling
- that I've done and even in my personal life,
- I found that the times when one feels not very good about being
- gay, if you analyze those feelings,
- that you find that the major feeling is not one of being
- sick, or of being immoral, or irreligious,
- or whatever, those can easily be refuted.
- It's a feeling of being cut off from tradition,
- a feeling of being cut off from a heritage,
- and that is a serious problem of dealing with that.
- BRUCE JEWELL: I wouldn't deny what
- you're saying that it's a serious problem, at least
- for some people.
- I would say, however, that, I think,
- it can be of positive value, though it's not
- often discussed.
- I don't know why at this point the homosexual movement,
- the gay movement is loath to discuss history.
- Maybe because it's not been explored, but I--
- LARRY FINE: I think there's a tendency
- to put down people who discuss great figures in history who
- were gay because they say that well, this will not
- solve our political needs at the time and all of that.
- I used to say that too, but I'm now changing my mind somewhat.
- BRUCE JEWELL: My own feeling is that if we look at history
- though, we will encounter a number of men
- of outstanding abilities at crucial points,
- crucial historical turning points, many who were--
- giving a clumsy sentence-- but who were homosexual.
- And I think to a certain degree--
- this is not only true, by the way, of the Western world,
- you can also find the same parallels in the East--
- and I think that part of this is because the homosexual being
- cut adrift from tradition, being insofar
- so much is based upon biological roles,
- has been able to take a viewpoint,
- see things slightly different--
- LARRY FINE: From a wider perspective you would say.
- BRUCE JEWELL: From a wider perspective.
- And for that reason, I think, homosexuals,
- at various times in history, have
- been able to offer necessary leadership.
- LARRY FINE: I very much agree.
- That's something I'm very interested in doing
- some reading and maybe even some writing
- about it, at some point, especially in conjunction
- with my Empire State College studies.
- I think that-- what I was going to get into,
- I actually left off at a very negative note.
- And I'm glad that you continued on a more positive level.
- I'm interested in finding, what you might
- call, homosexual traditions.
- Now, we all know there are heterosexual traditions
- of marriage and family.
- But homosexual traditions are not as easy
- to find in literature, unless you look between the lines.
- It's not something that's been written about all that much.
- I think there are homosexual traditions of the type that you
- mentioned, of having a wider perspective,
- and maybe feeling more sympathy for minorities,
- having a greater impetus for social change,
- even if just unconsciously you are aware of your homosexuality
- as being that impetus.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, I would say that probably certain
- historical and social conditions that this occurs in.
- Otherwise, I think there's a good deal of evidence
- that homosexuals tend to be quite conservative.
- LARRY FINE: Well, that's true also.
- Being afraid of having that known
- and even being conservative to make up for what
- they see as something immoral.
- That's been documented recently, too,
- in studies that have been done.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Yeah.
- I wouldn't doubt it.
- LARRY FINE: But there are also, I
- think, homosexual traditions in the types of lifestyles
- that gay people have adopted.
- Coping with being homosexual in a heterosexual society.
- Lifestyles that have included a lot of different kinds
- of, what you might call, family arrangements,
- including living with one other person of the same sex
- or maybe not living with them, but having
- an ongoing relationship.
- There are other types of living arrangements
- that there may have been.
- For instance, somebody attaching themselves
- to a heterosexual couple with children
- and helping to raise those children.
- Or a number of men or women say living together
- in some kind of communal arrangement.
- I think for many, the celibate life,
- or the supposedly celibate life, of the priest--
- there are many gay men I know who
- have gone into the priesthood because this
- is one way of coping with their being gay.
- From what I've heard the priesthood
- is not all that celibate, but a matter for speculation.
- But there are many different kinds of lifestyles
- that people have adopted.
- Some of them were ones that were maybe very oppressive
- and maybe are not lifestyles that
- would have to be adopted now or in the future.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Of course, I can think
- of some heterosexual bachelors I know who's roommates are males
- and this seems to be an appropriate living
- standard-- an appropriate way for them to live,
- but they are heterosexual.
- LARRY FINE: Sure.
- That's not generally considered part
- of the heterosexual tradition because it's much rarer.
- But that's true, there are all these other types
- of traditions that people don't talk about all that much.
- What I'm concerned most with is that, as a counselor,
- people are not aware of the different options that
- are open to them as far as lifestyles.
- And there aren't very good models,
- adequate models that are written about and seen openly.
- Homosexual couples are not generally seen openly
- around town say holding hands or it's
- known that they're gay and living together.
- Or just all the various kinds of things
- that go into relationship.
- And things that are very visible in the heterosexual world
- and not in the homosexual world.
- So there's a lack of models to pattern
- or to give oneself ideas about how it's possible to live.
- And, I think, it's very important
- to unearth a lot of the traditions,
- and a lot of the positive kinds of lifestyles,
- and positive aspects about being gay that can give people
- models to follow.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, I think, without question this
- is a field not only of great value,
- but one which is virtually unexplored.
- It was not permissible to consider
- positive aspects of the gay life on a public level,
- until very recently.
- It would have been considered absolutely outrageous.
- In fact, even now, to say anything
- positive about homosexuality is can often
- lead one to be accused of proselytizing--
- LARRY FINE: Exactly.
- BRUCE JEWELL: --or something.
- And it's completely overlooked that for a lifetime
- one has heterosexual models, mores, standards, beliefs--
- LARRY FINE: Right.
- We've been proselytized by heterosexuals.
- BRUCE JEWELL: --folklore, and so on.
- LARRY FINE: For many years.
- BRUCE JEWELL: And more to the point, it didn't change us.
- So it's dubious that some positive things
- said about homosexuality are really
- going to create homosexuals.
- LARRY FINE: That's true.
- A very valid point in a recent court trial--
- there were some positive things about having homosexual models
- brought up by a psychologist who testified in that trial.
- A teacher who was openly gay in the school was fired
- and it was brought up that the class he was teaching
- was not entirely heterosexual.
- There were some homosexual students in there
- who needed models.
- And that the presence of this teacher would actually help
- them better adjust and probably wouldn't
- have much effect on anybody else,
- except to increase their tolerance.
- So it's true that we need to have many more positive things
- about gay lifestyle brought up.
- It is a very scary thing for a lot of conservative people
- to hear the positive aspects of it, like you said.
- They say you're proselytizing and all that,
- but we need to go ahead and do it anyway.
- BRUCE JEWELL: What kind of counseling
- are you doing, right now?
- LARRY FINE: Most of the counseling
- I do is through the Gay Rap Line at the University of Nebraska
- at Lincoln.
- It's a student organization funded crisis line,
- you might say.
- And we get a lot of calls, I'd say seventy-five to a hundred
- calls a month.
- A lot of them are pranks and hang up calls.
- But a lot of them are very serious.
- And sometimes after speaking for a while on the phone,
- we might make an appointment to meet the person in person
- at some kind of a neutral spot to talk further.
- Sometimes a face to face meeting can be really a very valuable
- thing.
- There are a lot of different types of people that call.
- Some are--
- BRUCE JEWELL: What kinds of problems
- do you most frequently meet?
- LARRY FINE: I'd say one of the most common ones
- is married man who's in his fortiess,
- just to give an example.
- It might be thirties, forties, fifties,
- who has recently, or maybe even long ago,
- but has just recently gotten up the guts
- to call has discovered or admitted to himself that he's
- gay, or has a certain amount of homosexual feelings,
- or bisexual, whatever.
- And doesn't quite know what to do with it.
- Whether this means he should divorce his wife
- and find someone of the same sex, or stay with his wife
- and have encounters on the side, or whatever.
- Now to people who--
- BRUCE JEWELL: I've ran across that.
- It's a very sad problem.
- And there isn't a great deal you can offer sometimes.
- LARRY FINE: Really.
- And so much depends on the particular circumstances.
- You know, these people they call up and they want advice,
- they want us to tell them what they should do.
- And that's not the role of counselor.
- If the person is happily married,
- enjoys their family life, and it may not
- be a practical thing to change the lifestyle at this point.
- And I remember one time when I tried
- to put the person's situation in the perspective of what
- if the person was heterosexually oriented
- and was interested in other women.
- Would he give up his happy home, his good marriage
- to go running after other women?
- I think in that particular circumstance
- that analogy was valid and helped the person a lot.
- In other circumstances it's not so clear.
- There person may not have a very happy marriage.
- The person may very much want to change the lifestyle.
- There's maybe the problem of the person's job at that point.
- If a person is in his forties, say,
- or fifties and has a valid--not a valid--
- has an important job, they may not
- want to change their lifestyle, or be openly gay,
- or be seen with any gay people for fear of losing their job.
- So there's many things to consider
- and like you said, in many cases, it's just very sad.
- And the best the person can do is
- to develop a few friendships, so that they can at least talk
- about their feelings and have some people
- they can talk openly with.
- And that will often relieve enough of the frustration,
- and the tension, and the loneliness
- that they can continue in their heterosexual lifestyle.
- BRUCE JEWELL: I find it very difficult
- that when I run into that situation to encourage people
- in furtive sexual encounters.
- As a homosexual, I am angered by people
- who come out at midnight to get their thrills,
- and do their dirty little thing, and then return home.
- LARRY FINE: Unfortunately, in some people,
- there's no alternative for that.
- That they simply are not willing to risk a career and that's
- about all that they can have.
- But I sometimes feel angry about it too.
- For one thing the fear of coming out publicly,
- or even semi-publicly, is much greater than the actual danger.
- There certainly are dangers.
- But, in most cases, it's not really very likely
- that the employer is the next day
- is going to find out that person is gay,
- and fire them on the spot, especially
- if the person's been a good worker,
- and done their job well, and in a good position,
- the chances of their being fired are not
- all that great actually.
- BRUCE JEWELL: What other kinds of problems
- do you run across, particularly, among younger people?
- LARRY FINE: We have a lot of calls from high school
- students.
- We run the ad for the Gay Rap Line
- in The Lincoln Gazette, which is a local alternative
- or underground paper.
- And several thousand copies are distributed
- at the high schools in Lincoln.
- So we got a lot of calls from high school students.
- And there's an added problem of the legal problems of dealing
- with people under eighteen.
- You have to be especially careful.
- If you meet them to talk with them and the parents find out,
- they could accuse you of all sorts of things.
- Whatever the--I've forgotten the legal terminology,
- but seducing a minor or something of that kind
- of thing.
- And we wanted to set up discussion groups for high
- school students, but again there's this problem that
- if you don't have the parents' permission-- and, of course,
- they're not going to go running to the parents for permission--
- it's a very great problem.
- The university counseling center,
- it has a community counseling center--
- will not see anyone under eighteen,
- so we can't rely on them.
- Many groups have gotten around this
- by having a minister, for instance, have a discussion
- group in the context of a church.
- And the parents are not quite as angered by this
- if they find out.
- They feel they're in better hands at least.
- BRUCE JEWELL: It's very difficult
- to do anything about the isolation
- that high school students suffer--
- LARRY FINE: Really.
- BRUCE JEWELL: --and most of them do.
- Most of the students I've met feel very isolated.
- LARRY FINE: High school is an isolating place,
- even for heterosexuals.
- I think, in many cases, they're just not
- places where you can explore different kinds of friendships,
- lifestyles, et cetera.
- There's so much peer pressure, it's terrible.
- And if all there is a gay bar in the city
- and there isn't even one in Lincoln,
- but there is one in Omaha.
- In Nebraska, if you're under nineteen,
- you can't go into the bar.
- The gay coffee house in Lincoln, we do let people down
- to the age of sixteen.
- And sometimes even under that, if we know them.
- But there is kind of a legal hassle,
- we don't want to put the age up to eighteen
- because we know that high school students have no other place
- to go.
- On the other hand, we're in a very sticky position .
- If we're busted for having underage
- people and or something happens and parents find out--
- and you're right there's very little
- that can be done except to let the high school students find
- other high school students that they can associate with.
- A discussion group would be a very good thing
- where they could meet other high school students.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Larry, do you plan or foresee
- being able to use your degree in social services,
- gay social services, and your experience
- in counseling for some years to come.
- Do you see it perhaps as a full time occupation?
- Or--
- LARRY FINE: I thought of that.
- I thought that if I planned to go on with my education,
- I might get a master's in social work.
- I'm not sure about this because partly the financing
- of my education.
- And partly I just don't like formal academic schooling
- very much.
- But I've had thoughts of starting, with other people
- in Lincoln, a gay community center or social service
- center, as has been started in other places in the country.
- For instance, Los Angeles has a very big and active one
- and gets government grants.
- Now, It may sound like a very romantic idea
- to decide to get one's master's and start a gay social service
- center.
- And I have to keep reminding myself that that will also
- involve writing proposals, and hassling over money,
- and all that kinds of stuff.
- It might be better for me just to start with an existing
- social service agency, having a specialized field
- of gay counseling.
- And after that try to branch out after I have more experience.
- I'm not really sure.
- BRUCE JEWELL: Well, you're certainly
- in a field that's wide open for innovation.
- And I wish you luck.
- LARRY FINE: Thank you very much, Bruce.