In a session of the recent Harry Hay conference here in New York on “Queer Characters” (Sept. 29) we discussed the question of whether a certain amount of craziness was not in fact a prerequisite for active participation in the gay-emancipation movement prior to Stonewall, and even after. A good example was Donnie the Punk (Stephen Donaldson aka Robert A. Martin), who was examined in an excellent presentation by Tavia Nyong-o. I knew Donnie very well. In 1967 while a student at Columbia University he started the first gay student group (as far as we know) in the history of the world: the Student Homophlle League. In later life he was the leading figure in the Stop Prison Rape organization. As far as I could tell Donnie never held a full-time job, and spent a total of six years in federal prisons (he had fired a gun on federal property). He adopted odd hair styles and sometimes wore the robes of a Hindu priest. Those of a more conventional cast criticized him for his “self-damaging” tendency.

The overall pattern is one of disdain for the conventions of bourgeois normalcy; voluntary poverty; and a tendency to burn one’s bridges so that return to everyday respectability becomes impossible. This pattern recurred with many of the early leaders, including preeminently Harry Hay, but also Don Slater, Dorr Legg, and Morris Kight in Los Angeles.  In Boston there were Prescott Townsend and Charley Shively; in DC, Frank Kameny and Jack Nichols.  The pattern is less common with lesbian leaders, though Barbara Gittings and Karla Jay (two very different figures) come to mind.

It seems that, paradoxically enough, a "happy medium" of craziness is needed.  Too little produces timidity and clinging to the closet; too much and one flirts with genuine insanity.  I would say that Donnie (mentioned above) was a borderline instance of the latter extreme. Another is Marsha P. Johnson, the New York trans activist who died in 1992 and is currently being honored in the documentary film "Don't Pay No Mind."