State of the movement

Drag queens, club kids, and . . . baby strollers

by Susan Ryan-Vollmar

It's the weekend. You're in a crowded public space. You hear an announcement come over a PA system. A child is described, her name is given, and she's asked to return to her mother, who's "very worried."

Where are you? Bread & Circus at Fresh Pond? Copley Place? The Franklin Park Zoo? Try none of the above. You're at Boston's Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, and Allies Pride March. At last Saturday's festivities on the Common, you couldn't take two steps without tripping over a baby stroller.

What a difference a decade or so makes. The first Pride I ever attended was Boston's march in 1987. Michael Dukakis was governor, and he had just issued an order making it nearly impossible for gay men and lesbians to become foster parents. The parade route went by the State House, and by the time I walked passed it, the concrete stairs and walls outside the building had been plastered with bright pink FOSTER EQUALITY stickers. Many of the speakers at the Boston Common rally following the parade blasted the policy. If there were children in attendance, I don't remember them.

Fast-forward to 2000. Dukakis now bakes bread in Brookline, and the Department of Social Services encourages gay men and lesbians to apply as foster parents. Some do. Even more choose to adopt children or to have them on their own. But I have to say, I had no idea just how many gay and lesbian parents there were. And neither did my companions at Pride, one of whom was torn between the words "fabulous" and "twisted" to describe the presence of so many children.

We staked out a small patch of the Common to watch the stage entertainment. On our hill, we were the only group without kids. To our right was a lesbian couple with an infant that couldn't have been more than eight weeks old. When the Sugar Twins took the stage in their matching white mini-dresses and platinum wigs, one of the women breast-fed the baby. Before us sat another couple with older children who played catch with a racquetball, seemingly oblivious to the drag queens, club kids, and motorcycle chicks streaming in from the parade onto the Common. Next to them were two (presumed) moms and one (presumed) dad, who seemed to do most of the caretaking of the toddler with them. Behind us were more kids. Behind them, even more. It some ways it felt a lot more like July Fourth on the Esplanade than Gay Pride on the Common.

What does it mean? Well, I don't know. But if similarly dramatic changes in the way we live our lives -- more openly, with more legal protections for families headed by gay men and lesbians -- can be made between now and Pride 2013, then I'd say it's all fabulous.