Being Gay in a Conservative Environment

“Homo milk.” Brian Bennett points to the abbreviated store label for homogenized milk pinned by a magnet to the refrigerator at his Long Beach home. “I’ve been drinking homo milk all these years. Yeah, that must be the reason.”

Soft chuckles at the scene punctured the silence of the darkened theater--a burst of levity during the otherwise somber screening of “Family Fundamentals,” a documentary that debuted last month at the Sundance Film Festival. Produced by Los Angeles independent filmmaker Arthur Dong, it depicts the trials of three gay children struggling for acceptance from their conservative families.

On screen is Bennett, once chief of staff and surrogate son to former Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove), who condemned the gay “lifestyle” in feverish speeches from the House floor. Bennett’s story is told along with those of a Mormon bishop’s gay son and the lesbian daughter of a Pentecostal minister from San Diego.

Although Bennett’s family supported his decision to go public with his homosexuality in 1997, Dornan accused Bennett of exploiting their relationship for publicity. He broadcasts a daily radio show from his Virginia home and didn’t respond to Dong’s requests to be interviewed for the film.

“We’re not his parents,” declared Dornan’s wife, Sallie, who said they had not seen the documentary. “We just don’t see him. He took a life turn. He’s chosen a lifestyle.”

“I miss him,” said Bennett, a Southern California Edison vice president. “For 20 years, they were my family too. [But] if I didn’t do what I did, I would have been an unhappy, miserable person. My life is so much better now. I don’t think about what my life would have been like if I hadn’t come out but what it could have been like if I’d only come out earlier.”

It was Bennett’s ties to Dornan--and public ostracism by the man Bennett once lovingly called “Poppy”--that led Dong to want to tell their story. The bond challenged the notion of what constitutes a family “and I wanted to broaden the parameters of that definition,” Dong said.

“The other families in the film weren’t directly affecting public policies regarding homosexuality,” he said, although their community activism added to a culture of hostility toward homosexuality.

The filmmaker’s past documentaries explored other aspects of homophobia, including “Coming Out Under Fire,” on the treatment of homosexuals in the military, and “Licensed to Kill,” a frank look at prison inmates convicted of gay-related hate crimes.

“My films are not usually happy endings,” he said.

In the last four years, Bennett has been busy crafting a happier ending to a political life that stopped in mid-gasp with his announcement. In doing so, he has staked a place in politics arguably more enduring than Dornan himself.

Bennett became one of the Austin 12--a group of gay Republicans who met with then-Gov. George W. Bush in Texas in April 2000 to push for tolerance within the party--an unprecedented meeting with a presumptive Republican presidential nominee. Bennett told Bush that his longtime partner, an African American Democrat, had “absolutely no use for the Republican Party” because of its treatment of minorities and gays.

Last year, Bennett helped organize the Republican Unity Coalition, which held an inaugural breakfast in Washington attended by 400 people, including California GOP Chairman Shawn Steel. Co-hosts of the first-of-its-kind event were the Republican National Congressional Committee and its chairman, Rep. Thomas M. Davis (R-Va.).

“I don’t think I would have been involved at this level had I not been an active conservative who happened to be gay,” Bennett said. “Sometimes, when I walk into a room, I feel like there’s an element there who wishes I wasn’t there. Mostly I consider it a challenge.”

The inroads have not gone unnoticed: In October, the conservative Family Research Council criticized the Bush administration for implicitly endorsing the “homosexual political agenda,” through various political appointments and Bush’s signing of an appropriations bill for Washington that funded domestic partner benefits for gay couples.

Still, to many in the left-leaning crowd at Sundance who saw Dong’s film, Bennett remains in denial about one thing: He’s a member of the wrong party.

“I don’t know how he can be gay and still be a Republican, with all that they stand for,” said Billy Baggett, an activist attorney from Lake Charles, La., who is featured in a documentary about the toxic effects of manufacturing polyvinyl chloride.

When told later of the remark, Bennett bristled. “Why should the gay community write off a whole segment of the population?” he said. “Change always comes from within.”

The political disconnect was palpable after one of the film’s many screenings, when Bennett defended his antiabortion views during a question-and-answer session.

Medical technology will advance so far, he contends, that homosexuality soon could be detected before birth and parents could opt to abort rather than raise a gay child.

“I wish I could get as many pro-life groups as possible to view this film,” he said. “Right now, most of my fellow conservatives have created an environment where [no] parent would want to subject their child to the hatred they’d experience because they’re gay or lesbian. You want that parent to say, ‘I want my gay baby.’”

But working from within isn’t enough when basic human rights are at stake, said Bob Mulholland, political director for the California Democratic Party.

“Under Brian’s rationale, blacks would still be in segregated schools in the South waiting for Southern leaders to change,” Mulholland said. “If a dog’s biting you, you don’t stay in the yard hoping that the dog runs out of bites.”

Dong said some leaders within the gay community have criticized Bennett for fighting to stay within the Catholic Church and the Republican Party. Indeed, six months after Bennett’s announcement, he flew with his partner to New York City for a reception honoring those named among the top 50 most influential gays in America. Bennett, who hadn’t seen the Out magazine issue before the reception, was crushed as he read himself described as a sellout.

Among those who viewed the film at Sundance was a longtime Republican political consultant and friend of Bennett’s who also is gay--though not publicly so.

He credited Bennett, a member of the state Republican Party executive committee, for challenging party leadership to meet with established gay GOP groups.

“There has been continual bashing of gays by Republicans,” said the Los Angeles consultant, who asked not to be named. “It’s hard to blame people for defecting [to the Democrats]. It’s been that way for 22 years. Then Bush came along. Things have really moved light years ahead.”

Dong--writer, producer, director and sole publicist on his film--is working on arranging a limited theatrical release for “Family Fundamentals” in Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York this year. The film was selected for the Turin International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, held in April in Italy.

Bennett, ever the optimist, said he’d like to see another film in Dong’s series: “I’d love for Arthur to do a follow-up called ‘Common Ground.’”