Wanted to share this story—a daughter confronts her father on his homophobia—that I found at the bottom of the comments thread on this week's "Savage Love":

When my daughter was two weeks old, my father and I returned from a walk with her to find a thoughtful package of more bibs, onesies, and spit-up cloths on the front porch (oh, she spit up like crazy, that baby!), a gift from the lovely lesbian couple who lived next door. I commented on the wonderfulness—and timeliness—of the gift. My father was unhappy. He said, "I don't know. I just don't want her to grow up and see them and think it is okay to be a lesbian, and maybe become one herself." I gave the baby to my father to hold, and said, "Dad, if she is a lesbian when she grows up, it's because she's a lesbian right now. Would you love her any less?" He stammered something about no, he wouldn't love her less, but he didn't want life to have to be hard for her, and I said that the way to address that would be for society to change its attitudes. He snorted and we ended the discussion.

That was 17+ years ago. To my knowledge, my daughter is straight. My father is never going to be a huge champion for gay rights, but I've seen a change in his attitudes over the years. He's 75, but I hope by the time he's 85, he's seen enough of homosexuality becoming normalized that, were he to have a brand-new great-granddaughter whose lesbian neighbors gave a present to, he wouldn't blink an eye.

Well played, Nocutename, and thanks.