ONE OF the many accomplishments of the stunning new movie "Carol" is its evocation of New York City in the early 1950s: the big-boat automobiles, the men in hats, the incessant smoking of cigarettes — and the unquestioned bigotry toward homosexual behavior. The movie, based on Patricia Highsmith's 1952 novel "The Price of Salt," tells the story of a love between two women and of the price society expects them to pay for that love. "In the eyes of the world, it's an abomination," Carol tells the younger Therese in the novel. Therese's ex-boyfriend confirms this in a letter to her later in the story: "This relationship," he tells her, "disgusts me."
We bring this up now to begin fulfilling our New Year’s resolution, which is to take note of good news a bit more often than we did during the dreary year just passed. Not that we will stop decrying, deploring, denouncing and expressing dismay. That is what editorial pages do, after all, and certainly as long as Donald Trump is hanging around, what choice do we have?
But good things do happen — and maybe none more cheering than the dramatic shift in attitudes toward what is now known as the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) community, since Carol’s era and with accelerating velocity over the past few years. Of course, there are still people who view relationships like that of Carol and Therese as an abomination and are prepared to exact a price. But how many more now accept and even celebrate human diversity, and the diversity of human love, in all its variations? The Supreme Court’s 5-to-4 decision six months ago affirming a same-sex right to marry both affirmed and propelled the shift.
That doesn't mean all is well, of course. (We warned you.) Thirty-one states lack comprehensive laws to protect LGBT people from discrimination. That means, as the advocacy group Human Rights Campaign says, that "a couple who gets married at 10 a.m. remains at risk of being fired from their jobs by noon and evicted from their home by 2 p.m. simply for posting their wedding photos on Facebook." Worse, in many countries hostility and unthinking prejudice still force gay men and lesbians to live in fear or isolation, as they did in the United States for so long. Unscrupulous leaders such as Russia's Vladimir Putin fan the bigotry to cement their own holds on power.
Still, the momentum is in the right direction. Advocates are pushing for the Equality Act, introduced in Congress, which would bar discrimination in housing and employment. And the Supreme Court decision generated far less backlash than many people feared, even in the Republican presidential campaign, which otherwise has hardly been a model of tolerance. If you haven’t yet seen “Carol,” go see it, because it’s a good movie — and because it will remind you that, at least sometimes and in some areas, things do get better.
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