Whether Hillary Clinton becomes the first woman to sit behind the Oval Office desk or Barack Obama ushers in a return to Camelot, the call for change on the political landscape mirrors the need for evolution in our own industry. By the time this is read, Super Tuesday will be history, the Republican nominee probably will have been chosen, and we will have a Democratic contender who looks like none of his or her predecessors.
The current attorney general has had four stances on waterboarding and refuses an official declaration of the violations of the practice, and the silver-locked keepers of the Grand Old Party are campaigning on a drum beat of another century of the Iran conflict and the overturning of Roe v. Wade, with the cry for a ban on same-sex unions thrown in for extra zeal. As a gay man and an adult entertainment professional, it's not just time to face the change; it's about eight years overdue.
Unlike the electorate, which is polarized to the point of political schizophrenia, straight and gay webmasters have found common ground in embracing the need to adapt our sites to remain relevant in the Web 2.0 world and have discovered a stronger bond as former strange bedfellows finding themselves in bed together on many issues at work and in the voting booth.
Of course, a modern stance on gay rights does not translate into a pro-porn position, and it would be a disservice to any candidate to imply a lifestyle tolerance carries with it an agenda of nefarious permissiveness. And while no candidate is going to appear under a rainbow flag to champion the recurring adult business model, their views on perennially volatile issues - such as abortion, stem-cell research and same-sex marriage - provide a very accurate barometer for their views on preserving rights to make choices in this country.
For those of us who have made the choice to make a living in the adult industry, our choice of a president in November may be one of the pivotal votes we ever cast. Change is on the horizon, and we - whether gay or straight, webmaster, program owner or biller - have a tremendous stake in what changes could happen and those that never will.
Republicans Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee and John McCain are against same-sex marriage, while Democrats Clinton and Obama support civil unions and oppose a constitutional ban on gay unions. The camps are divided along the same lines on stem-cell research and abortion, and while no candidate is likely to be pro-porn, it certainly can be concluded who would be vehemently against it, to the point of resurrecting 2257 and following up with something worse. The abortion issue also shows a great divide that follows party lines. The single most important distinction here is that supporting a woman's right to choose what she does with her body bodes well for everyone being given the freedom to decide what they do in their private lives, and that is something we all can unify around.
As divisive as this political race has been - across party lines and within the parties - the upside is that it has shown how the ties that bind us are far greater than our differences. We can have a hand in what emerges at the end of this political metamorphosis. What is more important than ever, for everyone in the GLBT community and everyone in the adult entertainment industry, is to not simply witness the changes, but pull the lever on election day to make it happen. As we gay folks would say, "Cock the vote!"
-Harlan Yaffe
Harlan Yaffe is a co-owner of PrideBucks.com
This article originally appeared in the April 2008 edition of AVN Online magazine. To subscribe to AVN Online, visit AVNMediaNetwork.com/subscriptions/ .
