It makes little sense that people whose desires remained the same after exposure to these themes feared that they would change the desires of others. If people like Helms had different feelings after being exposed to these themes, then they may have good reason to believe that it would change others, as well. The Hindu activists cited in the book as saying that Mehta’s film would “spoil our women” (320) bring sexism into the issue; they suppose that the women are
1. so impressionable and gullible that they would believe and act out anything they see (even if it means facing great difficulty), and
2. free of same-sex desire to begin with, even as Fire portrays a struggle that actually exists.
What makes even less sense is that parents advocate education and exposure to LGBT issues in high school, even middle school, but not in elementary school. If most kids--not just LGBT students--face homophobia in middle school, why shouldn’t children be exposed to these issues sooner? Clearly, they are taught that LGBT individuals exist from somewhere. If they could be taught in a controlled and accepting environment, perhaps the bullying and suicide rates would decline.
In the Afterword to Heather has Two Mommies, Newman writes that “I’m somebody...who knows firsthand what it’s like to grow up without seeing families just like her own in books, in films, or on TV. . . Since I had never read a book or seen a TV show or movie about a young Jewish girl with frizzy brown hair eating matzo ball soup with her bubbe on Friday night, I was convinced there was something wrong with my family. My family didn’t look like any of the families I saw in my picture books or on my television set. My family was different. My family was wrong.” People seem to care much more about maintaining their own version of the way the world should be than about the people who are suffering from keeping it that way--even if the ones suffering are children. Newman explains, “I believe that had I had those images and role models at an early age, the experience would have greatly enhanced my self-esteem. And so I took on the challenge of writing Heather has Two Mommies, my only goal being to create a book that would help children with lesbian mothers feel good about themselves.” Letters from parents (lesbians and heterosexuals) and their children show that the book did help them feel good about themselves. Yet, by taking the focus away from the children who could benefit from the book (really, all children) and focusing on a “militant homosexual agenda” that corrupts children, opponents manage to control the opinions of the majority and ban such messages.
In Sir Biron’s Judgment regarding The Well of Loneliness, he judges the book “obscene libel” in part because “there is not a single word from beginning to end of this book which suggests that anyone with these horrible tendencies is in the least blameworthy or that they should in any way resist them” (328). By this reasoning, The Picture of Dorian Gray should have been judged as proper rather than obscene. It is not only Dorian’s death at the end of the novel that marks the narrative as acceptable; people whose lives are touched by Dorian have their lives ruined, presumably for indulging in the same pleasures themselves. In addition, Dorian goes nearly mad from the guilt over the things he has done. His death is not simply an accident; it is caused by Dorian himself. It is his attempt to escape responsibility and consequences for his actions that ends in his death. Basil Hallward serves as a voice of reason for Dorian, lamenting Dorian’s descent into “sin” and pleading for change. Wilde definitely shows that Dorian and Lord Henry are “blameworthy,” and Hallward is evidence of why they should resist those “horrible tendencies.”
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