Slim pickings.

The mainstream media seem more comfortable promoting gay writers who disagree with the gay movement than those who support it.

It might seem strange for me to argue that the mainstream media are biased in favor of conservative gay writers who bash the gay movement. After all, as a columnist for New York Newsday in the 1990s, I was accused of gay "neocon"-ing and movement bashing myself, especially when I called for the closing of sex clubs that didn't strictly enforce safer sex. Critics argued that I (along with a small media cabal) shut out gay writers on the left, those more in sync with traditional gay positions.

Well, here's a man-bites-dog argument: The critics were right. Sort of.

I don't mean they were right about me, since I started out attacking homophobia and only later committed the narrow heresy of making unpopular arguments about AIDS prevention. But the critics were right in their larger argument: The mainstream media do seem more comfortable promoting gay writers who disagree with the gay movement than those who support it. On today's newsstands, gay neocons rule. And that's something to worry about.

A key case in point is Andrew Sullivan, who regularly savages traditional gay political views, attacks sacred cows like hate-crimes legislation, bashes "gay lefties," drop-kicks the gay press, and disses movement leaders. Despite his contrarian positions, Sullivan is arguably the most prominent gay opinionmeister in the business. But he's not alone.

Jonathan Ranch of the National Journal made his initial splash as an openly gay writer in 1991 by criticizing hate-crimes legislation in The New Republic. Conservative Log Cabin Republicans leader Rich Tafel is a frequent guest on popular talk shows. Norah Vincent, an unabashed righty whose writings once so offended transsexuals that they picketed her newspaper's office, is now a contributor to the op-ed pages of the Los Angeles Times (as well as a writer on this page). Camille Paglia is everywhere.

Don't get me wrong: These are all interesting thinkers and good writers who have worthwhile points to make about the foibles of gay culture and politics. Most are staunch supporters of same-sex marriage, and they all consider themselves to be--and, I believe, are--advancing gay rights.

Gay conservatives and movement critics have--and ought to have--a place at any liberationist's table. The problem isn't them or what they say or think. The problem is that their voices are rapidly becoming practically the only flavor of gay opinion in the mainstream media. With the exception of syndicated columnist Deb Price, one has to look to the alternative press and gay press to find gay writers who actually wholeheartedly support the main platforms of the lesbian, gay, bi, and transgender movement.

One might argue that this is natural: that the traditional gay lib views on topics ranging from transsexual visibility to sexual liberation are old hat and the fireworks can come only from gay thinkers who attack these tired shibboleths. But that's not what you see in other movements.

The most prominent feminist columnists are people like Maureen

Dowd and Ellen Goodman, staunch defenders of the core values of feminism. In the civil rights field, leaders like Jesse Jackson and journalists like Bob Herbert have long held sway from the podiums of important columns. As gay writer Richard Goldstein recently pointed out in The Village Voice, it's hard to imagine The New York Times promoting antifeminist Katie Roiphe as its "women's" columnist or anti-affirmative action crusader Ward Connerly as its "black" voice. Goldstein's analysis seems far more likely: that gay critics of the gay movement affirm "the biases that straights dare not admit they hold."

Members of the newspaper-reading and TV talk show-watching public are certainly entitled to hear conservative and contrarian gay voices. But unless they also hear from those who promote traditional gay causes, something's out of whack.

Mainstream editors and publishers need to examine why they are so keen on ignoring those who represent the gay majority. And they need to start promoting interesting gay and lesbian writers from the center and the left rather than just the right. You can't have a cross fire of opinion if one side isn't even on the field.