In an unprecedented nationwide report, the August 6 issue of Rolling Stone magazine—in an article by David Lipsky-- tells in an artfully matter-of-fact manner how hordes of gay and lesbian youths are currently emerging from the closet. The article also captures large scale nuances in coming out stories and a distinct change taking place through the emerging generation.

After making a nine-month trek around the country talking to gay and lesbian youths, Lipsky found parents more concerned that their children smoke than that they are gay. He also found inexcusable cases of parental misbehaviors. But still, older gays told him, today's youth represent a sea-change in attitude from the experiences of gay teens in earlier times.

A distinct awareness among some of teens interviewed, found that they saw the world less in terms of people being either gay or straight, but, instead, being open or closed.

Massachusetts is singled out as "one of the friendliest places on the planet" for gay and lesbian teens. The political climate there—in what is called "the liberal Northeast" is credited for the non-hostile environment.

Who are some of these young people? "They speak," according to this milestone Rolling Stone piece, the "language of Starbucks, the Gap MTV, and Barnes and Noble. There are Gay-Straight Alliances in Massachusetts high schools, with meetings that run smoothly, and that do good as support mechanisms in an otherwise support-free culture. The author says he found it hard to imagine that "none of this existed a half decade ago."

The startling statistic about teen suicides and the gay reasons for a third of them are effectively showcased in this superb expose. In one case the readers is taken to the very door of a suicide's funeral. The difficulties many teens have coming to terms with themselves in a society which actively—as many of them know—hates them, are explained in detail.