I think everyone comes out through a different medium, some through a friend, some through a chance encounter, others because of a supportive family. In this post I want to just pay tribute to the man who made me not so much discover my sexuality, but helped me learn to poclaim and celebrate it. Edward Carpenter (1844-1929), was a talented Victorian gay writer and Socialist, who gave up his clerical fellowship at Cambridge and a comfortable middle-class existence to live with Sheffield manual workers.
In his early life Carpenter had been a Socialist Christian but eventually left the Church to perdue his dream of a new utopian society devoid sexism, inequality or prejudice. Carpenter was truly Brtain's first Gay Rights Activist. His greatest book, The Intermediate Sex was the first generally available book in English that portrayed homosexuality in a positive light rather than as purely a medical or moral problem. In it he wrote that gay people could be vessels of radical political transformation, how right he was! The book was regularly reprinted and remained for decades as the crucial text in English that gave information, hope and support for homosexuals.Through the 'silence' that descended on the subject for more than 60 years after the Oscar Wilde trial, Carpenter's book remained a lifeline for many isolated gay people who found no other public representation or acknowledgement of themselves.
It was this book which first spurred me on to feel glad to be gay and crystalised my political beliefs. Carpenter wanted a better kind of society of sexual democracy, where the love of all human beings dominated social conduct, not the cash-nexus; where we actively seek to tackle the problems social division, inequality and exclusion. He also said that the best kind of life is the simple one, where people are healthy, happy and comfortable with nature. He saw homosexuality as a gift, which could be used to transform societ for the better. For our modern world of money, urban concrete, inequality and, classism Carpenter's vision of society is a very attractive one. It is to that vision which inspires both my sexuality and politics, thanks to that little-known Victorian Gay, (he's my hero!)
