My story of “growing up in a Republican family” may differ a bit from that of many others here…
Although I was born in 1949 during the Truman Administration the first President I remember was Dwight D. Eisenhower who, I was sure when I was little, must have been my grandfather. My “Greatest Generation” Depression Era parents were — and still are at 94 (Dad) and 87 (Mom) — staunch Republicans. Our small New England Church was “low” Episcopalian and the center of family life. My Dad (a Pearl Harbor Survivor) and my Mom (a teacher and then Head Teacher and ultimately Director) taught at an independent Christian Elementary School. I was the second of six kids — two brothers and three sisters — except I “slipped” to #3 when another sister was adopted and then to #4 when we fostered another brother. I lost count of the number of temporary foster kids we took in but it was always fun to have new playmates.
Aside from considering the Kennedys nothing more than “Cadillac Liberals” my parents were not ideologues; certainly not in any way that was either harsh or unbending. But they were also products of their time and their generation so as I began to understand that I was gay I hid this from them and even tried to hide it from myself for many years. I was certain that these two otherwise loving parents would instinctively recoil at knowing they had a gay son and that I would be forever an alien to them.
In 1967 after graduating from High School I enlisted in the Army and volunteered for Vietnam duty despite the fact that by my grades and interests everyone assumed I was college bound, the first in our family to do so. I enlisted, not because it was expected of me by my parents, but because I desperately wanted to “become a man” like my Dad and so thought that Vietnam would either “cure me” or kill me — and I really didn’t care which.
After I returned from Vietnam I knew I was still gay so I married a woman friend who, as it happened, was a lesbian and who, like me, had been brought up in a church-going family (Nazarene) She was also trying to become “straight”. We spent many hours in “ex-gay” counseling and prayer in a small Texas church that also operated a Christian house called — surprise! — Straight Street House named for the Damascus Road experience that other Paul had. During the time we were married I enrolled in a Christian College and I earned a degree in Biblical and Theological Studies thinking that I would become a Minister and leave the “gay life” behind forever. It didn’t work and, after a while my wife — more honest with herself than I was with me — filed for legal separation and left to live with another woman. I reenlisted and spent a total of ten years in the Army, becoming a “friend of Dorothy” at night and a STRAC soldier by day. In other words, continuing to live a lie.
By the time ten years were up I was exhausted and tired of trying to hide who I was and so began the process of coming out, first to a few select friends and then to a wider group to include my sisters. Their response? “Ho-hum — it’s about time. What took you so long to tell us what we already knew?” I was stunned, but after this decided it was well past time to confront the parents with two facts: I am gay and would you like to meet Nick, my partner? (This was before Marriage Equality came to our State.) My born-again, lifelong Republican, Kennedy-bashing parents loved Nick like a son to the extent that I joked that they liked him better than they liked me. They agreed, also joking...I hope. My Dad had been a Navy Corpsman in WW2 and Nick had held the same position in the Vietnam War and so they instantly bonded, unified in their dismissal of this Army “dogface”.
Nick died a few years ago just weeks before we could have been legally married. My parents, still Republicans, shared both my loss and my grief fully and without reservation as did my entire family and circle of friends, Republican and Democrats alike.
I am not and have never been a Republican, but I have learned from my own parents that not all Republicans who honor “Family Values” mean it in any way that is either exclusionary or bigoted towards LGBT folks. I learned that from them when I was just a little kid. I wish I had trusted their love more and sooner.