ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the professional lives of gay men in such areas as science, business and industry, and the military, with attention to the perils and profits of being out in these fields. It begins by exploring that element of the gay male workforce that panics our society the most: those who hold jobs that entail close contact with children. A 1989 poll of the gay population, for instance, found that roughly 40 to 70 percent of the respondents had not disclosed their sexual orientations to those with whom they work. Thus, while a substantial number of homosexual men are openly gay in their personal lives, when they are in their workplaces they remain largely closeted, at most coming out to a few other gay employees or perhaps to a handful of trusted heterosexual co-workers. Historically in Western society, the workplace has not embraced, let alone actively recruited, homosexual men into its ranks.
