Hansen: Today’s news hides tough past for gays

On Monday, exactly one week after the Supreme Court helped open the gates for same-sex marriage, gay seniors will walk into the Laguna Beach Susi Q Senior Center seeking help and connection.

A support group is starting for LGBT seniors, hosted by Michele McCormick, a clinical psychologist. It’s the third such group that McCormick has worked with at the center.

Gay seniors are the ones who paved the way for today’s open celebrations. In their day, there were no parades. More often than not, they hid in the closet most of their lives. They remained anonymous out of fear. Being gay simply was not an option.

“This generation was the generation who could not come out,” McCormick said. “And if they did, they would lose their jobs, they would lose their friends, they would lose family, especially in the parts of the United States that were more in the Bible Belt, where homosexuality was considered an abomination.

“There was so much stigma and hatred, so there was even a fear for their lives.”

The confidential meetings run 3:30 to 5 p.m. every second and fourth Monday of the month, until Dec. 8. For more information visit, https://www.lagunabeachseniors.com.

Gay seniors face challenges common to all seniors, such as coping with illness and financial constraints, but what adds to their burden is years of discrimination, isolation and depression. It’s a reality sometimes easily ignored or forgotten by younger generations.

“Young gay kids just don’t understand how hard it’s been for prior generations,” McCormick said. “The younger generation is kind of like, ‘whatever.’ They don’t care. They don’t understand. It’s kind of like young women who really don’t understand the feminist movement. They don’t understand how hard women fought to get where we are today.”

McCormick said the people in the group vary. Usually, it’s split between men and women. Some members came out many years ago. Others, despite their age, did not.

Without divulging too much information, McCormick said one woman in a previous group was about 80 and still had not told many people that she was gay. She was using the support group as a way to cope with the death of her partner. They had kept their relationship private.

“They would just really hide. They would introduce people as their ‘best friend’ or their ‘roommate,’” McCormick said. “They would use neutral pronouns about their partner. If they were traveling, they were very careful about any public displays of affection or anything that would get them caught.”

That type of caution is common, McCormick said.

Only recently have people softened their views, usually because of interpersonal experiences. In other words, it’s easier to oppose something at a national level than to reject a gay family member or friend.

“There’s sort of a prevailing feeling that I’ll only come out to someone if I know they are safe, that they will love me just the way I am, that they won’t reject me as a friend,” she said. “That they won’t out me in my place of work where I could lose my job.”

Laguna Beach has been at the forefront of gay-rights issues for many decades, and for local civic activists, the changes that are taking place across the country are a welcome relief.

Chris Quilter, president emeritus of the senior center, said it has not always been easy, even in the coastal city.

“The thing about Laguna Beach, to our credit, we have always been a town that not just tolerates but accepts and endorses and revels in the gay community that’s been living here for as long as anybody else,” he said. “So the tolerant part of our community has been a godsend.

“That being said, as a guy who is 71 and who’s gay and feels like I suffered relatively little, I am still keenly aware of the generation gap in the gay community in terms of what we experienced when we were young. Nobody was out when I was young. That’s a tough experience to soldier through and make sense of.”

This lifelong perseverance takes its toll, especially when done in isolation. One of the biggest benefits of these types of support groups is the camaraderie, which is why the center also has Club Q Laguna, which is a social outlet for gay seniors. It meets from 3 to 5 p.m. the first and third Friday of every month.

“Club Q has been a huge hit,” Quilter said. “Nobody goes out anymore. The bars have gone back to being social bars.”

McCormick says people need connection, regardless of whether they are gay or straight.

“Single lesbian people in town don’t know where to go to meet other women,” she said. “They are looking for connection. They are lonely. Honestly, they don’t want to go to the bars, and most of the guys in that age group don’t either.”

Having these types of support groups or activities for gay seniors is unusual, said McCormick.

“It’s rare for senior centers to have this type of support group,” she said. “It’s really edgy. You would never find this at the CdM Senior Center. There are a handful of programs around the country like this that are doing really well.”

For Quilter, the goal is to help those who can’t help themselves.

“What we look for are the folks who for one reason or another — and it’s not just because you’re gay — who have gotten old and isolated,” he said. “They’re very hard to find because they won’t come forward. We want to drag them out of their homes and get them connected back into the community.”

Connection, community, affirmation, love … it’s odd this road has been so long and difficult.

DAVID HANSEN is a writer and Laguna Beach resident. He can be reached at [email protected].