Point by point Underwood disposed of every homophobic myth—beginning with the idea that sexual orientation is chosen—and she struck a gigantic chord. Two other New England papers immediately reprinted her article. Then someone E-mailed it to author and Democratic National Committee treasurer Andrew Tobias, and he posted it on his Web site. The headline read: “The Best Thing I've Read All Year.” Gay activist Larry Kramer E-mailed it to dozens of friends, including playwright Arthur Laurents, and each of them E-mailed it to dozens more. Tobias also listed an E-mail address for Underwood, and within three weeks she had received 1,000 E-mails—every one of them favorable.

“I get home, and every night my answering machine is jammed,” Underwood said. “It's wonderful, but it's exhausting. A Hawaii paper is reprinting it, the Anchorage [Alaska] paper is reprinting it, and I just got an E-mail from an Episcopalian minister in South Africa!" She wrote her piece for “every parent who supports a gay child. It's time this nonsense stops. These religious-right people are like the emperor who has no clothes. Who are they that we have to be afraid of them?”