'America's Queerest County'

OC Weekly coverThat would be Orange County, the OC Weekly proclaims in a not-entirely-serious cover story that stretches the data a bit. Evidence presented for the claim of superlative gayness includes the presence of Disneyland, the Crystal Cathedral and Karen Carpenter's grave, but also the city of Irvine's early ban on gay discrimination and the Register's printing of gay union announcements in 1996.

A schizophrenic queer history, sure—back in the ’60s, the Reg used to print the names, ages, home addresses and occupations of "suspected homosexuals" who had been arrested for propositioning undercover cops—and these men had only been arrested, not convicted, mind you. But for every printed gay-bashing—a weekly occurrence, if you’ve ever perused the paper’s Letters to the Editor page—there have also been surprises, like an excellent, generally positive three-part series on OC queer life that ran in 1979 (typical for the era, most of the people interviewed for the stories didn’t want their real names used). And how’s this? The Reg has been endorsing gay marriage since at least 1996, when they ran an announcement of the engagement of Eddie Miller and H. "Mac" McCarthy on its Celebrations page, complete with a photo of the happy couple.

Crowds at Angels games signing along to the Village People's "YMCA" also made the list: ...a tune that—do we really have to keep reminding you people?—is all about cruising for hot man-on-man action in health-club locker rooms!


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