Ginsberg Was An Early Proponent Of Freedom For Gay People

Ginsberg met Peter Orlovsky, a teenage model for paintings, in the middle of the 1950s. Robert La Vigne hired Orlovsky as a model, and the two fell profoundly in love. Ginsberg encouraged his young partner in his efforts to teach poetry at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics in Colorado, and tried to inspire him to write poetry.

His candor about homosexuality is one accomplishment that is frequently regarded as both his most important and most contentious. Ginsberg was an early proponent of freedom for gay people. He discovered “mountains of homosexuality” within himself in 1943. In his poetry, he openly and vividly articulated this longing. By declaring his lifelong partner Peter Orlovsky as his spouse in his Who's Who entry, he also made a statement in support of gay marriage. His candid discussion of homosexuality was viewed by later gay writers as a chance to communicate more honestly and freely about a subject that was before commonly only alluded to or metaphorically discussed.

He questioned and finally modified obscenity laws by writing about sexuality in graphic detail and using language that was frequently regarded as offensive. He was a fervent advocate for anyone whose speech disobeyed obscenity laws (William S. Burroughs and Lenny Bruce, for example).