Is there a gay agenda? The religious, right-wing political extremists think so and they are creating it as a negative image of us and marketing it to the American people. But our community, if it can be called that, is fractured, beset by a plague of AIDS losses and under attack by the political right, causing us to spend precious money and time fighting them to preserve our basic rights and health. Although we appear to be holding our own, and the recent Supreme Court decision of Romer vs. Evans, defeating Colorado's amendment 2, was on our side, the movement seems moribund. Where is our rage and righteous anger? Do we have the energy and resources to keep on fighting?

Other than achieving protection of our basic human rights, do we have a coherent agenda? We seem to be at a standstill over convincing the people that we deserve recognition of minority status, anti-discrimination laws and the right to marry. One thing we have on our side is that a majority of Americans still appear to reject overt discrimination, but they are uncomfortable giving us more than that. Is there something wrong with our approach? Many of our traditional approaches - protests, marches, organizing - arent working well. Where are our new radical ideas? Where is the grassroots support? How do we sell ourselves to the people?

The right-wing extremist Christians have an agenda for America that they don't articulate for obvious reasons. They want to take over America and turn it into a theocracy, gut the Bill of Rights and force their brand of Christianity down the throats of the people. They don't believe in plurality, human rights and individual freedom. Simply, they are fascists. They need scapegoats to demonize and blame, whether gays or some other group. Because queer people are misunderstood and feared we are easy to scapegoat. And the fundamentalists are experts in disinformation and manipulating Americans fears.

The only way to fight the right is to expose their lies and machinations - their agenda for America - to the people. We can't convince the religious extremists to change their views of us, so we must win the battle with the undecided people. Our national organizations - NGLTF, HRC, LLDEF - already know this. We havent always done well with a strictly exclusive gay rights agenda. Maybe it's time to try a broad-based and inclusive human rights approach. The divisivness created when we use the current minority-based model singles out groups for special recognition rather than rights for all.

Our national organizations don't have contact with the grassroots; they seem isolated in the nation's capitol and only concerned with fund-raising from the financially advantaged of our subculture. Still, they do valuable work, but why don't they have state chapters to help involve our people on local levels? Then they might receive more funding. Instead of chastizing and stigmatizing us for not giving to them, but spending on pleasures, why don't they ask what the rank-and-file among us want? Are they working for the freedom we want or have they become too much a part of the establishment? There are issues within our community that are not being addressed; there are questions that are not being asked in public.

At one time in our movement we wanted to change our society. What has happened to that ideal? Now we appear just to want assimilation. But gay/lesbian sexuality may not be assimilable without cultural change. How can we assimilate into an erotophobic society? Even more importantly, how to convince people that cultural change is needed? Should we expose the deeply embedded cultural problems and bring them into a national discourse?

More and more a media image of gays as upscale, pleasure-loving, white men is being portrayed by our media and taken up by the mainstream corporate culture that wants our consumer dollars. This whitewash makes us more palatable to the American people. The rest of us are threatened with invisibility, our diversity denied. Will those who are achieving this new privileged status use it to oppress us to protect it? Then will we have a place at the market table or in the political process?

The mainstream media doesn't understand us and often treats us in sensationalistic terms when it portrays us at all. The gay press isn't read by mainstream Americans, so were only preaching to the converted, even when keeping ourselves informed. We're not reaching the people with our message, or in the few instances that we do, were not in control of it. Were still oppressed by the system and therefore not in full control of our lives.

Although they are a minority, too, the religious extremists have media organizations to make their propaganda heard. Why cant we? If we want our agenda heard undistorted by the American people, then we must take it to them. It cant be a narrow focus on gay rights, but must include rights for all people. To gain allies we need to attack all threats to human rights. We also need to expose the lies of the Christian right-wing and demonstrate their anti-Christian acts. Whom do they support and who supports them? We should question the morality of the Christian political extremists and make clear that we have a better morality to offer. Perhaps we should question whether they are Christians at all. Certainly, they are doing evil.

What form should this media take? We need our own national network. Although there are many gay TV and radio shows, most of these are only available in larger cities. I suggest funding national satellite TV channels and a greater presence on the Internet. That way almost everyone has a chance to receive them. At first, leasing time on a satellite channel, a few hours in primetime every evening, would be a good and inexpensive way to begin. Programming could be created in a leased studio with volunteers and apprentices until enough advertisers are signed up to support salaried personnel. It could offer talk shows and discussion pannels, gay and human rights documentaries, news and political analysis, media criticism and gay/lesbian themed movies. Should it be a non-profit organization or should it have the freedom of profit-making business?

How could we fund a gay outreach media? Take the example from the fundamentalist Christian organizations. They solicit donations in their churches and by TV evangelism. This is their secret that we need to emulate. They have support organizations - the churches - that do more than just preach, but offer all kinds of help to their communities. They offer a feeling of family - concern and support. This is much more than our national political, AIDS and other community organizations offer. And no, we don't need a gay religion to create this structure, but we do need to build a nationwide, grassroots support structure - something like a coordinated series of gay community centers in every city. This support structure would be as important to our well-being as having media equality. We need not agree on everything to create and maintain it, just some basic principles. It should reflect the wide diversity of our community, while creating a better sense of who we are.