A few months ago, Sally Kern, Oklahoma's infamously bigoted state representative, told a John Birch Society conference that a "Great Awakening" was needed to confront the growing homosexual menace. The gays, according to Kern, had a secret plan to convince the world that homosexuality is a "superior lifestyle." (Somehow Kern got her hands on a copy of The Protocols of the Elders of West Hollywood.) Kern warned the Birchers not to be fooled by our nefarious themes:

You know, I've done a lot of reading on this. I wish I could describe to you their behavior. I will not because I would be redder than this suit... This theme of equality and freedom is the approach that the homosexuals are using today—totally perverting the true intention of what our Constitution meant. The homosexuals get it—it's a struggle between our religious freedoms and their right to do what they want to do.

Americans, Kern went on, would be "shocked and repelled" if exposed to the depraved behaviors gay people get up to—behaviors that every American will be obligated to engage in once we've convinced the world of the superiority of the homosexual lifestyle.

My first impulse upon reading Kern's comments—way back in February—was to take a picture of the plate of cookies on my kitchen counter when I got home from work. I made them from scratch. Baking is something I enjoy doing for my family, and you could call it a depraved behavior, at least where carbs are concerned. I was going to post the picture of the cookies—classic peanut butter—on Slog, The Stranger's blog, and say, "Is this the kind of depraved behavior that you meant, Sally? Baking cookies for your family?"

It's the same reaction most homos have when some right-wing bigot drops dark hints about our depraved lifestyles and all the top-secret sex stuff we get down to when no one is watching. (You can see thousands of hours of video of all this top-secret sex stuff on XTube.) It's a knee-jerk, defensive response. Our first impulse when we hear someone like Kern go off is to point at something we do that's wholesome, something we do that's normal—like going to church or baking or taking care of relatives—and say, "We're not so different! We go to work, we pay our taxes, we take care of our families, we bake cookies; what's so depraved about all of that?"

But you know what? We are different. Gay people tend to have more interesting sex lives than straight people, the kinds of sex lives that scare the shit out of dumb bigots who're afraid of their own genitalia. Yes, we bake cookies, we go to work, we take care of our families, we pay taxes. But let's be honest: We're "depraved" at slightly greater rates than straight people are. Because once you've told your mama that you wanna kiss boys, giving yourself or your partner permission to wear full-body latex gear isn't anywhere near as scary. Not even remotely. So long as you're safe and sane about your kinks, and indulge in moderation, where's the harm?

When Mrs. Kern fumes about depraved sex acts, I can't help but think about poor Mr. Kern. He probably doesn't want to get it on with depraved gays—probably (you never know with the 'phobes, do you?)—but odds are good that Mr. Kern, like so many straight men, has "depraved" sexual interests and impulses, fantasies he absolutely, positively can't share with his wife. Because according to her, kinks that turn your face (and other things) red are for homosexuals. Kinks define homosexuality, according to Mrs. Kern.

That's too bad for Mr. Kern, isn't it?

I never got around to posting that picture of those cookies on Slog. It wouldn't be entirely honest, and I knew it. Fact is, my sex life would turn Kern redder than her Nancy-Reagan-red dress. Even in our 15th year together, and our 12th of being parents, my boyfriend and I still enjoy the outré "behaviors" that fascinate and repel decent, God-fearing Americans like Kern. Why should I lie? Why should I hide behind a plate of peanut-butter cookies? Our sex life rocks. It's insane. It just keeps getting better and better.

For instance... well, um, gee. Unlike some of the other writers in this issue, I can't share the details. Long ago, my boyfriend told me that I could keep writing about my sex life or I could keep having sex with him, but not both. He allows me to drop the occasional hint about the bare outlines—we're not technically monogamous, but we're not anywhere near promiscuous; we go in for some run-of-the-mill kink, but we're not doing anything that might endanger our bowel functions over the long-term—but that's it. Okay, okay: just one story. But to protect my boyfriend's privacy, I'm going to print it upside down and backward and in French:

Anyway...

Kern's comments came to mind when I was drinking a vodka and Red Bull in the lobby of a big hotel in downtown Chicago on a recent Saturday night. The boyfriend and I were attending International Mr. Leather, or "IML," an annual contest/beauty pageant/dance party for the gay leather/S&M/fetish crowd. I've always had a soft spot for leather bars, and every year IML takes over a big Chicago hotel and transforms it into the World's Biggest Leather Bar.

Everywhere we went at IML—an event held up by the Kerns of the world as proof that gay people are too depraved for the commitments of marriage and family life—we met couples: guys who had been together for five, ten, and twenty years. Some were there to look, some were there to play, and some (like us) left kids back at home with friends or grandparents. Because despite what Sally Kern would have you believe, there's nothing mutually exclusive about conspicuous displays of wholesomeness (like baking cookies) and conspicuous displays of depravity (like attending IML).

So to my fellow queers, I'd like to say this: Instead of pointing to our homemade peanut-butter cookies when the likes of Sally Kern level charges of sexual "depravity," we should point to our cookies and our occasional wild weekends, to our family values and our sexual adventures. We can have our homemade peanut-butter cookies and our commitments and IML. And in that way we are superior.

And to Sally Kern, I'd like to say this: Eat your fuckin' heart out, bitch.