L.G.B.T.Q. in America: ‘We Are Never Going Back to the Closet Darkness’

To the Editor:

Re “The Number of L.G.B.T.Q. People Is Rising. So?,” by Jane Coaston (Opinion, July 24):

Ms. Coaston’s report reveals both a fearsome and an exciting new world for the L.G.B.T. community. A world where we are seen and, mostly, accepted. This world could not be more different than most older gay Americans’ experience growing up.

I recall the very day and hour, at age 6, that I knew I was gay, although I wouldn’t know what that meant for many years. On my first day of kindergarten, at recess, as I was running around the schoolyard with all the other students in my class, I stopped suddenly and said: “Wow! Boys are cool!”

Seeing another gay person, or hearing any speck of validation for gay people, would seemingly never come to me in my more-conservative-than-Mississippi community in South Jersey.

But we are a community now with many, many straight allies, and no matter what the Marjorie Taylor Greenes of the world have to say about it, we are never going back to the closet darkness.

I will never again be as rare as a five-legged unicorn.

We’ve come a long way, baby!

Ted Gallagher
New York

To the Editor:

Re “They Checked Out Books to ‘Hide the Pride.’ It Did the Opposite” (news article, July 23):

This article, about an anti-L.G.B.T.Q. protest at a San Diego library that backfired, once again emphasizes the difference between “born” and “made.” Reading about the gay “lifestyle” does not make one gay any more than reading about cowboys makes one a cowboy.

Little boys as young as 4 know that they are different from their friends. As they grow older, they try to figure out why, and it finally dawns on them as they struggle to find the answer.

Once they realize that girls don’t hold the same fascination for them that they do for their buddies, they must then work out what they do with this knowledge. For many it takes a lifetime.

Many Americans are finally moving from condemnation to acceptance.

Elizabeth Keranen
Bakersfield, Calif.

How No Labels Can Help Fix U.S. Politics

To the Editor:

Re “Joe Manchin Is Dreaming,” by Jamelle Bouie (column, nytimes.com, July 25):

I am a longtime supporter of the No Labels mission. The point of No Labels is to support members of Congress who would have the audacity to sit with members of the opposing party and attempt to find common ground, to craft nuanced legislation that can pass, and to find acceptable solutions to the issues that the parties would rather campaign on than solve.

The parties have been dominated in recent years by their more extreme members, with the concept of bipartisanship and compromise seen as an evil that must be banished. The Problem Solvers Caucus in the House is an outgrowth of No Labels’ efforts. It is composed of staunch Democrats and Republicans who hold their ideology precious, but realize that in a pluralistic world, a common-sense compromise to move the ball even slightly down the field is better than the vitriolic stagnation we have witnessed over the past decades.

No one is pretending that partisanship is not a part of the human condition. Joe Manchin and the rest of us who support No Labels merely see a better way forward. And for that we get pilloried.

Bruce Goren
Los Angeles

To the Editor:

Re “There’s No Escaping Trump,” by Gail Collins and Bret Stephens (The Conversation, July 25):

I agree with Ms. Collins about No Labels running a presidential candidate, as any step taken that risks putting Donald Trump back in power is an existential risk for our democracy.

However, as a longtime Democrat, I also agree with Mr. Stephens and feel as if I don’t have a political home anymore.

I would love to see a socially liberal, economically moderate candidate, and nobody fits that bill these days.

I think No Labels needs to do more at the grass-roots level. Put up candidates for county commissioner, school boards, state legislatures, etc., and build long-term support for congressional or presidential candidates.

If No Labels plays spoiler in these races, the impacts will not be as catastrophic as electing Donald Trump.

John Butler
Broomfield, Colo.

Radioactive Fallout From the Trinity Test

To the Editor:

“Analysis Finds Fallout Spread Much Farther Than Experts Thought” (news article, July 22), about fallout from the test of the first atomic bomb in New Mexico in 1945, is timely and very important. The article describes significant new findings about the extent and severity of the fallout but overlooks a few key issues.

A 2019 article in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists presents evidence of a dramatic increase in infant mortality in areas of New Mexico in the months after the Trinity test, although infant mortality in the state had otherwise declined steadily from 1940 to 1960.

My own research documents scores of investigations into the Trinity fallout (perhaps 40 studies) over the decades by various U.S. agencies and groups. Many were classified as secret and others were simply quietly buried and received little acknowledgment, but they document scientists’ concerns about residual radioactivity from the Trinity test in the soil, plants and trees in New Mexico.

Let us hope that this renewed publicity will help refocus attention on the long overlooked Trinity downwinders.

Janet Farrell Brodie
Pacific Palisades, Calif.
The writer is emerita professor of history at Claremont Graduate University and the author of “The First Atomic Bomb: The Trinity Site in New Mexico.”

The Damage Caused by Climate Deniers

To the Editor:

As we all witness the massive destruction to our planet and the hundreds of billions of dollars of damage done each year as a result of climate change, and the regularity of “once in a hundred years” climate disasters, one cannot help but point the finger at those in power who either deny the truth of climate change science, such as Ted Cruz and many others, or who argue that the costs to our economy of taking necessary measures outweigh the benefits (most of the rest of the Republican Party).

As to the first group, there are no words other than tell them to look at the science. As to the second group, why don’t you give some thought to the hundreds of billions of dollars of damage that are resulting each year from climate change? That, too, is a “cost” to our economy that should be part of your equation of “costs” and “benefits.”

These groups are proving themselves to be little more than lap dogs for right-wing interests, political ideologues who peddle dogma and propaganda over truth, and members of a climate-denying cult who seek to prove their allegiance to the cult by promoting their grotesquely misplaced ideas.

These groups are doing more damage to our country, to the world, to citizens of all states (red and blue), races and economic groups than many of the common criminals who spend decades in prison for committing crimes that cause far less damage.

David S. Elkind
Greenwich, Conn.