2017 Daring to find our names

Although it's possible that gay cowboys have been in the closet until the recent much heralded movie Brokeback Mountain, gay and lesbian librarians sure haven't been. That's why I was a bit surprised when browsing my honorary's website (Beta Phi Mu) to find that a book had been published, "Daring to find our names" which chronicles their gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender/queer history and careers (their words, not mine). Not that I pried into people's private lives, but I always knew my profession was heavily homosexual. I didn't know much about transgender until one of my staff members changed sexes and thus was part of a legally married female couple, although neither one were lesbians. I knew who the guys' partners were, who had died of AIDS--even went to the memorials and funerals, and who was being unfaithful to whom. My very favorite boss of all times, Jay Ladd, was a very popular librarian at Ohio State. He was a "company man," but knew how to treat his own staff fairly. His research field was a gay writer, and his partner was a gay artist. No big deal. So where's the daring?

Although I wasn't aware of it for a number of years, I worked for several women librarians who not only were lesbians, but were abusive to each other. I never suspected, because of their antipathy, that they were anything but old maid housemates. But I also knew lesbian secretary/professor couples. Hey, we weren't THAT protected in the 1950s and 1960s in academe.

The problem today is not sexism, homophobia, and discrimination, but a sluggish, overarching, stuck-in-the-70s liberal bureaucracy, particularly in ALA, that can't get down to library business. And a coming out book that costs $106.00 for 272 pages.