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ALL THE RAGE: The Story of Gay Visibility in America Suzanna Danuta Walters Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2003; 338 pp.
Bothered by the corporatization of Pride festivities? Fed up with the we-arejust-like-you approach to political and legal change? Revelling in the proliferation of gay images on television? Openly browsing books in the "gay and lesbian" section at Chapters?
There is no doubt that gays and lesbians have entered public consciousness in unparalleled ways, courted by politicians and represented in mainstream media. In her fast-paced, well-written book, Suzanna Danuta Walters explores the opportunities, shortcomings, and dilemmas of this era of increased visibility. Accessible and sharply written, All the Rage is for everyone - queer or straight, conservative, liberal or radical - as it endeavours to critically examine the tremendous public imagining of gay and lesbian lives occurring in the United States.
Walters carefully locates this era of gay and lesbian visibility alongside an increasingly strident and vocal opposition to gay rights. As a whole, the book inquires into the potential for meaningful social change generated by the explosion of cultural and political visibility of gays and lesbians in the 1990s. Walters offers the reader rich and textured reflections on whether it has reshaped a more inclusive culture or instead has simply refashioned gay as hip but expendable. She asks, "What is the vision of gay life and gay identity being projected from the TV screen, from your local multiplex, as you turn the pages of a magazine? And what kinds of beliefs about gays...