I'm just curious.

Keillor is saying, in his supposedly droll way, that marriage and monogamy are good. Oh, what a hoot. Maybe you find this funny, but I don't. My family lived in a small Midwestern community where the virtues of monogamy were supposedly upheld. They lied about premarital sex and sent teens to homes for unwed mothers so no one would know the truth. I'd rather be the childless feminist lesbian spinster that I am than go back to that patriarchal horse hockey.

What's obvious is that a man who has been married three times, fathered children by (at least) two different women, and admittedly cheated on the first two wives (with women other than the subsequent wives)-- has absolutely no business passing judgement on anyone else's relationships. Salon should be ashamed of having published this judgmental hypocritical garbage.

I don't know if we were suppose to read this piece and chuckle but I found myself feeling sad instead. I just kept thinking of the young men who may just be coming out to themselves ... not even sure if they can tell anyone they are gay .... and then reading this piece making fun of gay men.

To a young gay man it is just one more person mocking the idea of marriage for him and taking a stand against equality for the gay community.

Gay marriage is a serious issue for people who are gay and for people who truly love those in the gay community. Please don't make light of it unless you are willing to then work to see the day of equality.

You have had 3 tries at marriage. My gay son deserves at least one.

Randi Reitan

Dear Editor & Mr Keillor,

Would it be too much to ask Dear Editor to have Mr Keillor clarify his opinions on same-sex marriage? He was pretty clear on his magnanimous approval of cultural diversity in the classroom.

Maybe I misunderstood what Mr Keillor meant by "stereotypical gay men -- sardonic fellows with fussy hair who live in over-decorated apartments with a striped sofa and a small weird dog and who worship campy performers and go in for flamboyance now and then themselves."

As a human being I’ll never get used to ignorance-fueled, hypocritical gay bashing from the political right and sometimes from the political center. As a gay man I certainly never expected it from anyone who espouses the political left.

Mr Keillor, perhaps you would like to tell us gay folk and the rest of your readership what was the catalyst of your failed marriages? It wouldn't have anything to do with you being one of those "troubled, angry parents demanding that life be richer and more rewarding for them."? Gosh, it must be all about the children...right?

Homophobic self-proclaimed right-wingers as Mr Keillor are just as hypocritical and disgusting as the political-lefts' share of self-hating gay and lesbian members.

Mr Keillor, you have lost a loyal listener/contributor. I sincerely hope NPR cans your ass.

Have a grand hypocritical day,

Eric

Garrison Keillor should re-read his articles once more before he submits them (or Salon doesn't edit or care). The stereotypical gay man Keillor describes is a stereotype and his appearance and apartment are irrelevant to the article. Keillor apparently felt no need to point out the qualities of the stereotypical older foreign adopting parents or the stereotypical professional couple with 3 nannies or the stereotypical trailer-dwelling single mom. The blog-talk on Keillor's article rightly faults him for singling out the gay male couples for ridicule.

I love A Prairie Home Companion. It will be harder to enjoy after reading the liberal gay blogger parents who have been deeply offended.

Dear Mr. Keillor,

I am about your age and have listened to your radio work for years, as has my son. I have especially enjoyed your political commentary which has seemed to be able to criticize without drawing blood.

However this column about gay parents with fussy hair etc. is beyond the pale. It is insulting and demeaning. You need to do some rethinking about your attitudes here. They are uninformed and dismissive of many fine people who do not deserve your off-handed contempt.

I am dismayed on your behalf.

Irene Gillooly

beanmhor@msn.com

Well, no wonder his radio show is about a fantasy world, because this guy obviously doesn't live in reality. If he did he would know that a heterosexual couple getting married at 18 and staying married for fifty years or more is a modern development and is not the norm for the human species. Why? Simple answer: Low life expectancy.

At minimum, once upon a time we could expect many more women to die in childbirth than do today; in that case, the widower with children would remarry to get another mother for his bereaved children. On the other paw, men often went off to war and were killed there, leaving war widows and orphans behind. (In fact, this was the origin of welfare in the United States: to provide for widows and orphans of wars.) There's a reason you so often read about evil stepmothers in fairy tales. Most readers of those fairy tales were familiar with stepparent families.

Divorce happened back then too. The father got the kids, the mother got kicked out and of course remarriage would happen because what guy back then would stay home and raise his kids? Farmers and maybe the occasional eccentric, but that's it. And where remarriage didn't happen, *some* surrogate for the lost parent would be brought in. Nanny, auntie, grandmother, whoever.

None of this is classified information. Anyone not intellectually lazy or inclined to be a bigot can access this with very little effort.

And while we're on the subject, what Mr. Keillor describes in his cute little essay is child-centered parenting. Once again reality steps in: Studies are showing that children thrive when their parents do *not* absolutely center their lives around the kids. Yes, children need guidance and love. No, they do not need to be "center stage." In fact, it seems to run counter to their very instincts, which drive them to want to learn how to behave like their parents. This requires the adults to act like adults and the children to pay attention to what the adults are doing.

This is how things used to be done, too. And adults used to be a lot more competent than we are now, as a result. And again, not rocket science.

Children don't care about gender nearly as much as we think they do. Children don't care what relationship the adults have in their lives. Children care that they are being treated well, can learn how to become adults, and are loved. No gay-bashing required.