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| Colorado Governor Hickenlooper |
My graduate thesis was on the then radical idea that homosexuality was not a deviance or mental illness but a variance. I first got involved in 1969 right after the Stonewall Rebellion. I worked as a consultant to the Seattle Gay Liberation Front. When I came to Denver in 1977 and started my private practice as a psychotherapist I had a specialization with the GLBT community because all the gay therapists were not yet "out". I have watched as Gay Pride has grown from a few thousand to over 100,000. Now the parade is filled with politicians and commercial interests vying for the favor of this large group. We are seeing gays in the military, and the Supreme Court on the verge of reviewing the legitimacy of gay marriage. The cultural change has been amazing, but I have watched it evolve over forty years. Although gay rights remains an issue, the Gay Pride parade is now more a celebration than a civil rights march.
