Just out., July 05, 1996, Page 21, Image 21

j u s t o u t ▼ ju ly 5 . 1 9 0 « ▼ 21
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wo years ago, Kenny Brialsford felt
completely alone in his secret.
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Brialsford, 27. “I decided that what I had been
told was ridiculous. There were other people like
me.
Brialsford’s cyberspace epiphany is not an
isolated event, says Dr. Becky Boone, an Atlanta
psychologist who used to oversee the gay com­
puter chat lines for America Online, the nation’s
largest on-line computer service.
“I’ve seen it hundreds of times. The utter joy
of finding your fellows is exciting,” says Boone.
“For a long line of people, that has been the
vehicle of empowerment.”
After finishing an obligatory stint
as a missionary for the Mormon
Church, he had returned to the pic­
turesque Utah mountain valley where he grew
up. The time had arrived to begin the adult life
scripted by his upbringing, in a sect which
requires heterosexual marriage to get into the
highest reaches of Heaven—and one which rou­
e ’ve all read
tinely excommunicates gay men and lesbians.
the
hype.
By now, though, he knew the script didn’t fit. He
just didn’t know how to go about rewriting it.
Cyberspace,
Provo, an archconservative Mormon town in an
cybersex,
cyber this and
archconservative Mormon state, is not an easy
place to meet other gay men. There are no gay cyber that—cyber ad nause­
bars, no bookstores, no newspapers, no commu­ am. How the Information Su­
does
nity centers. Even if there were, Kenny would perhighway and the Internet
say the forum
have been too afraid to walk through the door. In and the World Wide Web are the
is “extremely popu­
next great leap forward since
the entire world, he knew just one other gay
lar.”
man, his best friend, who was also severely clos­ sliced bread. While only the future
In cyberspace, any gay or
will tell if reality lives up to hype
eted.
lesbian person with access to a computer and
But then Kenny, who handles the computer and cliché, there is little question that
a modem can connect with other gay and lesbian
operations for his family’s business, saw an ad in for gay men and lesbians, connecting
people. The process is relatively easy. When an
the back of a PC magazine, advertising a service electronically holds the potential, at
on-line service sent its software to Sherry
least, for revolutionary change.
where people— straight or gay—could download
Stinson in the mail, the first thing she did after
Because
with
cyberspace,
being
part
of
the
pictures of one another. About six months later,
installing the service was to punch in the key
he discovered an interactive gay chat line, based gay community no longer requires overt action word “gay.” She was instantly transported to gay
that carries risk in a homophobic world. It no and lesbian chat lines and bulletin boards and
in California.
It was the final piece of his puzzle. Kenny longer requires forsaking hometowns for the gay has been enamored ever since.
found himself talking to men who were comfort­ ghettos. A few taps of the keys in the privacy of
When asked what she would do without her
able being gay, in places far removed from his your own home and you’re in. Discretion computer service, Stinson, 32, a graphic artist
assured.
i nere s no way to Know tor sure now 1
small town and its rigid traditions. Men in San
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Francisco, for God’s sake. Within weeks, the -gay T * . O W W W . W ' m W W rVough
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closet was gone.
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“There was someone on the end of that tele­
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on-line services and access
points to the Internet and the World
Wide Web, estimates vary wildly on the number
of users. One recent study by Nielsen Media
Research estimated that 37 million people in
North America have access to the Internet. Using
the old “ 10 percent” chestnut, that would mean
there are 3.7 million gay men and lesbians in
North American cyberspace. By contrast, the
largest gay organization in the United States, the
Human Rights Campaign, has just 150,000
members, and no gay publication has even one-
tenth as many readers.
The scuttlebutt among cyber types is that the
gay and lesbian community forum on America
Online, a service which has nearly 4 million
members, receives more visitors than any other
feature AOL offers. The company won’t confirm
that— it doesn’t release information about its
traffic— but
spokeswoman
Margaret Ryan
In cyberspace,
any gay or lesbian person with
access to a computer and a modem
can connect with other gay and
lesbian people.
The process is relatively
easy.
p e r a t e 1 y
bored,” she says. “It’s
kind of like the world is your play­
ground.”
In this brave new world, living next to a
windswept wheat field in North Dakota— or an
oil derrick in Oklahoma— is not an obstacle to
connecting to the community. Worrying that
someone might see you go into a gay bar or buy
a gay magazine is not an obstacle. Being a
teenager and having to worry what peers or par­
ents might think is not an obstacle.
“There is a teen support group that meets
every other week in my downtown area, but I’ve
never gone,” says Jamey, a 17-year-old lesbian
in Fort Wayne, Ind. “I’m sure this is the same
case of many in my situation— afraid of having
family discover what one is trying to figure out
by going to a gay support group. It would be
hard enough just to think of an excuse to go, then
to actually walk up the stairs of the building and
enter the door? Too much.”
Before going on line, Jamey was depressed
and had intense thoughts of suicide. After
getting in touch with other gay and lesbian
teens, her sense of isolation decreased.
After her mother discovered she was a lesbian
by finding Jamey in bed with another woman,
she posted a frantic request for help and advice
on line, and 15 people responded.
“These people did not even know who I was,
but they took time out of their lives to help
someone going through difficulties. If I didn’t
have this help, I don’t know where I would be,”
she says.
eenagers aren’t the only people looking
for support, for a sense of community, on
line. Stinson, 32, who has been able to
make few lesbian or gay friends in Tulsa, says
she found the courage to leave a destructive rela­
tionship after striking up a friendship with a
woman in Kentucky.
“Before going on line, I had absolutely no one
to
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