From Walt Whitman to Boy George, gay culture has profoundly shaped American society. Culture Clash looks at gay male culture in everything from drag shows to the Marlboro man to pornography; from the cults surroundings stars like Mae West and Judy Garland to the avant garde gay theaters that have revolutionized Broadway productions. Mainstream America has experienced a siginificant cultural confrontation and integration-- between gay liberation and the heterosexual dictatorship-- and each has permanently changed the other. Culture Clash explores the dynamics of gay liberation and homophobia, of change and backlash, and reveals the radicalism of the challenge that gay men and lesbians, as cultural adventurers, have offered to American society.