| Thank you to the Lambda Literary Foundation.
And thank you to my publisher, Alyson Books of Los Angeles, especially my editor the sensible Angela Brown. Thanks, Angela.
And my deepest thanks—for everything—go to my beloved partner, Marcia Burrows.
We’re in a peculiar genre, gay-bi-trans writers. Many of us feel a responsibility not only to our art, but to our cause. What’s our cause? I guess the cause of gaining more respect and legitimacy from our fellow citizens, from the straight world, and gaining civil rights.
I'm glad to see that, more and more, we are giving up identifying ourselves as victims by definition.
Because when we identify ourselves as victims, we’re saying, "We can’t look out for ourselves. It has to be done for us." That is the best way to ensure subordinate status.
It’s also past time for us to be preachy in our writing. And I'm seeing less and less of THAT. Trying to manipulate readers into seeing things our way is always transparent, and always diminishes our power as writers. The truth, as best we can get at it, is plenty good enough.
As writers we do have a responsibility. It’s to writing. Let us bear that responsibility lightly and honestly and with good cheer. Thank you very much.
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