A federal appeals court on Tuesday declared California's same-sex marriage ban unconstitutional
Then, the not-so-good news:
[B]ut [the federal appeals court] agreed to give sponsors of the bitterly contested, voter-approved law time to appeal the ruling before ordering the state to resume allowing gay couples to wed.
"Sponsors" and supporters of Prop 8 have had their way/say for virtually all of the rest of California and U.S. history. What do they need more time to rehash their tired, discriminatory "appeals" for??? Their arguments are not going to be any less discriminatory and unconstitutional months from now.
Yet, here you are, contemplating a march backwards. This is wrong for so many reasons, and not solely the ones I mentioned above. As Vanessa pointed out in another forum, the very premise of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, acknowledges that there are already gays in the military. Why do you expect a problem to develop if they are allowed to serve openly? This idea, that gay servicepeople should be segregated, suborns homophobia, particularly, as a colleague of mine wrote, the idea that gays are indiscriminate in their desires and straight people are in danger/in need of rescue. You are insulting your own personnel with suggestions like this which imply they, as a whole, threaten other service people with sexual aggression and potentially, sexual violence.
Though, I suppose you could flip the argument and try to say it was for the protection of gay personnel, especially given the currentpoliticalclimate towards any so-called "progressive" change. In that case, I'd still accuse you of upholding homophobia and some sort of macho-ethic (okay, I'd accuse you of that, anyway).
Why? Because if your solution to addressing the potential danger openly gay servicepeople would face, is to segregate them, rather than address the military culture which allows for that danger, you've totally missed the point.
Sincerely,
elle ___________________ *And I'm not relying on the opinion of one general as sole evidence that the government would consider this. The article says, "The question of whether changes to housing policies would be necessary is being addressed in a study to determine how to allow gays to serve openly."
ETA: My best friend, who taught at our old high school, and my sister corrected me. The school did eventually sponsor off-campus proms, however, “tradition” meant that students quickly left (usually after taking pictures) to gather for their own separate (in terms of race) functions.
Dear Mississippians,
I find it amazing the type of symbolism with which y’all manage to imbue high school rituals like prom. I mean, some of you held on to racially segregated proms well into the 21st century—although some progress has been made there.*
I don’t know if it’s nostalgia for the good ol’school days. I don’t know if you're scared that Anita Bryant's predictions have come true and proponents of the radical homosexual agenda™, have infiltrated the schools and are recruiting your children.
But, really, stop. Time will not stand still. You cannot re-create your youth or what you envision as the glorious past through your children.
Your fellow southerner,
elle _________________________________________ *My own Louisiana high school did not have integrated proms and, only shortly before its closing, did it stop the practice of having a homecoming court with one white and one black representative from each grade.
Are the people in charge of advertising for NOM made of epic fail?
OK, yeah, that's a rhetorical question.
This ad rehashes the tired old lines that people who are gay having rights and living their lives, is immensely threatening to children's well-being. But as Genia pointed out, it has an added message:
The latest* anti-gay marriage commercial uses really young and really cute white kids to spread the organization’s bogus message that gay marriage is a serious threat to society. I’m guessing NOM figured people would worry more about gay marriage if the lives of cute white kids were at stake.
Emphasis mine.
Some other things stood out to me as I transcribed the video. While there are three boys and three girls, only one of the girls speaks, while all of the boys do. Instead, the girls are directed to "look scared," from what I can tell. The boy who gets the most talk time is, not-surprisingly, fair-skinned and blond. And, as Liss noted when I e-mailed her the link,
I just LOVE how the final note is the kid saying, "I'm confused!" as if the world has to be structured so that it's easily comprehensible for children
I suppose this ad is a perfect one for modern-day social conservatism.
Transcript after the break. LB = Little Boy; LG = Little Girl
LB1: Grandma, my teacher says… if grandpa was a girl, that’s ok! You could still be married.
Shifts to image of frightened/confused looking LG1.
Voiceover: If we change the definition of marriage…
LG2: God created Adam and Eve? That was so old-fashioned.
Voiceover: Our kids will be taught a new way of thinking..
Shifts to image of confused looking LG3.
LB2: He should’ve created Anna and Eve!
LB1: If my Dad married a man, who would be my mom?
LB3: I’m confused
Voiceover: Marriage is between a man and a woman. Call Governor Lynch today and ask him to support marriage by not supporting House Bill 436.
(Crossposted) ________________________ *The NOM site dates the commercial to Fall 2007--even before the madness that is the "Gathering Storm" ad. Apparently, they dusted it off, tacked on the stuff about [NH] Governor Lynch, and voila!
Angie Zapata was a transgender woman who was brutally murdered in Colorado last year. Next week, her killer goes to trial, and an online campaign by ProgressNow Colorado is encouraging us to remember Angie’s life and death at this difficult time.
Light a Candle for Angie is a Facebook application designed to draw attention to the issue of hate crimes. If you are a Facebook member, why not join the iniative?
If you are a Twitter member, you can follow all of the activities around the online campaign by adding Justice for Angie, or searching #zapata for other online conversations around anti-hate activism in Angie’s name.
An 11-year-old Massachusetts boy, Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover, hung himself Monday after enduring bullying at school, including daily taunts of being gay, despite his mother’s weekly pleas to the school to address the problem. This is at least the fourth suicide of a middle-school aged child linked to bullying this year.
I am a former elementary school teacher. I am a current parent. Bullying is not just harmless words--that sticks and stones shit is for the birds, and I get pissed every time I hear about teachers and school officials ignoring it.
There are all kinds of excuses, of course. Children who bully are just being kids. There's nothing a teacher can do because it will continue out of our eyesight in the quiet corners of playgrounds and bathrooms. And all too often, teachers' disdain turns toward the victim of bullying: "Toughen up," "Don't be a tattle-tale," or "Get over it, people are always going to talk about you." (Re: that last excuse, I swear I heard this from teachers and parents: "They even talked about Jesus; why are you any different?")
The author notes that Carl did not identify as gay*, an effort to drive home the point that
[Y]ou do not have to identify as gay to be attacked with anti-LGBT language. ... From their earliest years on the school playground, students learn to use anti-LGBT language as the ultimate weapon to degrade their peers.
[snip]
Nearly 9 out of 10 LGBT youth (86.2%) reported being verbally harassed at school in the past year because of their sexual orientation, nearly half (44.1%) reported being physically harassed and about a quarter (22.1%) reported being physically assaulted, according to GLSEN’s 2007 National School Climate Survey of more than 6,000 LGBT students.
Most of the kids who are bullied and harrassed never report.
They've learned that their teachers and administrators will not effectively address the abuse. ______________________________________ *Of course, there are many reasons that he might not have identified as gay--I don't mean to dismiss the possibility that he was. I am struggling with that part of the article. I get that the intent is to show the anti-gay bullying can hurt anyone, but I also get a slight, "This is even more tragic because he might not have even been gay" sense from it--not that I think it was intentional.
And there you have a peek into this meandering mind.
Queer and Trans Demonstrators Confront District Attorney One of the NJ4 Appears in Court Next Week National NJ4 Solidarity Committee Demands and End to All Prosecution Against Renata Hill and Immediate Release of Patreese Johnson from Prison
_________________________________________________ What: RALLY: The National NJ4 Solidarity Committee rally in support Renata Hill and self defense for all marginalized queers, transfolks, women and people of color.
When: 12:00 Noon
Monday, March 2 2009
Where: Office of the District Attorney
1 Hogan Place
Manhattan, NY
Who: The NJ4 Solidarity Committee, comprised of such groups as FIERCE, Gay Shame SF, LAGAI — Queer Insurrection, Bash Back, Resistance in Brooklyn and Queers for Economic Justice.
Why: On August 16, 2006, seven young black lesbians were in New York’s West Village and were accosted by Dwayne Buckle, who eventually grabbed one of them, and a fight ensued. The seven women were arrested and charged with crimes such as “gang assault.” Three of them took plea agreements.
The other four lesbians Terrain Dandridge, Renata Hill, Patreese Johnson, and Venice Brown were put on trial in 2007. In the trial and the surrounding media they were dehumanized, villified, and called a “lesbian wolf-pack.” The prosecution and trial were so biased that in an unprecedented move the First District Appellate Court reversed all of Terrain’s convictions, and dismissed the indictment with prejudice, although by that time she had served almost two years in jail/prison. In October of 2008, a retrial was granted on the felony gang assault charges against Renata and Venice, and they both got out on bail after serving more than two years. Patreese’s sentence was reduced to 8 from 11 years, but not overturned. Assistant District Attorney Lanita K. Hobbs is demanding that Renata be returned to prison, or face another trial.
Many diverse communities have rallied to the case, seeing the DA’s prosecution of the lesbians as a denial of their right to defend themselves and each other. “If we are killed or raped, we are mourned as victims, or supported as survivors. But if we fight back successfully, we are imprisoned. The district attorney is leaving us no options when we are attacked on the street,” said spokesperson Ralowe of the NJ4 Solidarity Committee. “It is time for the district attorney to stop persecuting these lesbians and let them get on with their lives.”
The Committee will be not only be demanding that the D.A. drop the case against Renata, but also to help secure Patreese Johnson’s immediate release.
Duanna Johnson's family needs assistance in paying for her funeral expenses. Background from Memphis Flyer via Lisa
Memphis police identified the body of transgender woman Duanna Johnson lying in the street near Hollywood and Staten Avenue early this morning. Police believe Johnson was shot some time before midnight on Sunday. No suspects are in custody at this time.
Johnson was the victim of a Memphis police brutality case this summer when a video of former officer Bridges McRae beating her in a jail holding area was released to the media. The video led to the eventual firing of McRae and Officer James Swain. It also led to the formation of a Stop Police Brutality Memphis, a coalition of human rights activists who lobbied the city council for more sensitivity training for Memphis Police officers.
A statement from the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center: "Duanna bravely confronted the Memphis Police Department officers who brutalized her while she was in police custody. At great personal cost, Duanna was the public face of our community's campaign against racism, homophobia, and transphobia. There was no justice for Duanna Johnson in life. The Mid-South Peace & Justice Center calls for justice in the investigation and prosecution of Duanna's murder." For more on Johnson's beating, read the Flyer story. --Bianca Phillips
Jack has details on how to donate through the Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition. I've been seeing that the amount needed is around $1200. If we all could just donate a little bit, that shouldn't be too hard to raise. Please help!
ETA: In the comments of Renee's post about the issue, I found this link to Shannika putting it down as to why "The Facts Belie the Scapegoating of Black People for Proposition 8"
Kismet, LaMacha, Pam Spaulding, Kevin and many others have brought my attention to the fact that African Americans are being "blamed" for the passage of the anti-gay marriage propositions on election day. There is a sentiment, from some (and Dan Savage is not alone if the comments on myriad blogs are to be believed), that African Americans betrayed gays (and forgive this simple explanation as if those don't ever intersect) who overwhelmingly supported Obama. As Kevin notes, it is hurtful and troubling that an estimated 70% of African Americans who voted in California supported Prop 8. And, like Kevin, I also point to this quote by La Macha:
Black and Latin@ communities have some big time issues with queer hate.
The huge role of the black church in some black communities--institutions that I believe are largely socially conservative and patriarchal--assures the perpetuation and validation of homophobia.* So, too, does the emphasis on a certain "type" of black manhood, an idolization of "hypermasculinity" that defines black gay men as somehow lacking, less than men. These are but two factors that render black gays, to borrow a quote from Pam, "marginalized within a marginalized community."
But here's the other half of La Macha's quote:
I also think gay organizations have to confront their very real racism within their organizing strategies.
Pam and La Macha both point out that there has not been enough outreach from gay organizations to communities of color. I think we are often written off, as Dark Rose noted at Pam's, as "hopelessly unenlightened" or, in the words of La Macha, "just conservative." From one of Pam's commenters came this anecdote:
One of the groups fighting [Florida's Prop 2] made it very clear that they were going to do no outreach whatsoever to the black community.
And from La Macha's second post:
Gloria Nieto had a sense of those demographic forces, too. When Nieto, a lead organizer for the No on Proposition 8 campaign in San Jose, wanted to distribute campaign signs in Spanish and Vietnamese this fall, she had to get them made herself because the statewide campaign only had signs in English.
I agree with Kevin when he says it's a two way street--and not in the "You owe me because I did A B or C" sense. As Kevin says:
[I]t doesn’t work that way. You vote for, you give aid to, you advocate for other people and causes because it is the right thing to do. If you’re doing it because you expect something in return, your doing it for the wrong reasons. No one wins in this situation because nothing has changed. No fundamental shifting of paradigms has occured. It’s simply, “I’ll throw you a bone if you throw me one back.” And the falling on the convenient (always marginalized, conveniently enough) scapegoat is just plain tired.
This is not the way to build connections and support. And, as many of these bloggers have noted, the simplistic equation of gay = white and the resultant Gays vs. African Americans denies the existence and experiences of black gay people.
Work has to be done, by us, within our communities, too. The last year has brought home to me the privilege and complicity I've shown in ignoring or discounting homophobia. When I was trying to take Alex and Coti's side when so much of our small town and black Baptist church were vehemently against them, I was amazed by the rumors and questions that flew. Was I gay? I must be gay! I must be secretly sleeping with one of them! The pastor of my church announced after a sermon that there was a special place in hell for people who were leading young people astray--though I'm sure I wasn't the only focus of that attack, I know I was a target. I complained aloud one day about being "tired of this shit" and Alex looked right at me said, "You're only going through a little bit of what we've gone through for years."
And then there was the time when Alex, Coti's brother, V (who is gay), and I went to the drive through at Wendy's. I recognized our order-taker as one of my students and said so. V looked at him in response and the guy went off. "Why are you looking at me?" he kept asking. "Don't be all up in my face like that, punk." I pulled up and told V to get out and got talk to the manager. That shook me so badly and V was like, "Oh, I'm used to it. Forget him." But I made him go in and the manager pretty much stated that he didn't believe that because the guy wouldn't act that way.
But the last straw for me, with my town and "my" church? When my sister told me that she had been horrified because the pastor stood and used the word "fags" and "freaks" during service. I vowed that I would not go back. This church that bears my great-great grandfather's name on the cornerstone as a founding deacon. This church where I was baptized at four, went to Sunday School for years, worked in the kitchen, socialized with the youth department, sang in the choir.
It was suddenly no longer "mine." I suppose it hadn't been in a long time, but I'd just reached a point in my life where my brain couldn't support the cognitive dissonance required for me to be one person "in the world" and another "in the church." And still, it was hard to let go.
I've seen black gays and lesbians met with overt hatred--vicious name calling, physical violence, gay men being characterized as all "sneaky," "promiscuous," and "down low" and thus the cause of the truly alarming incidence of HIV/AIDS in black communities. I've seen the less overt resentment and ignorance--my experience in particular is that the personhood and sexuality of lesbians are erased--they are not gay women, they are male impersonators. I've had people tell me Alex didn't really like girls because Coti (who identifies as a stud) is "so much like a boy" and that black women are gay only because of a shortage of men. And I've repeatedly heard that lesbians can be cured by the mythical powers of the almighty penis, literally fucked straight.
But there have been good moments within my intimate community, too. I had my kid watch the Hilary Duff and Wanda Sykes "think before you say that's so gay" commercials sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network and we talked about them. A couple of days ago, he told me his friend Jacob said that it was "gay" that my son was on the jump rope team at their school. My son said he asked Jacob, "What does that mean? Gay is not bad." And then he parrotted the commercials and told Jacob to think before he says stuff.** Now, whether this is how the conversation actually unfolded, I don't know, but he remembers and he got the point of the commercials.
When I was younger, my paternal great uncle M.C. was one of my favorite people in the whole wide world. I wasn't even ten when he died. When I was a little bit older, I was watching a talk show with my mom's mom and, while I don't remember the exact topic, I remember the discussion centered around gays. My grandmother said hesitantly, "You know your uncle M.C. was... like that?" I remember being shocked and shaking my head. And she reached over and patted my hand--my grandmother was not a physically affectionate person, that's why I remember that--and she said, "That's okay. There ain't nothing wrong with it at all." My 60+ year-old, southern grandmother told me that, in awkward language, but with a lovely sentiment.
She knew, having been an unwed mother, what it was like to be talked about and ostracized. I have never forgotten that moment. That and my mom's constant affirmations of people's dignity and right to live their own lives and her reminders, rooted in her Christianity, "to love everyone" and "not mistreat anyone," had more effect on who I am than all the negativity I heard in my church and in the street.
Not everyone had a grandmother like mine or has a mama like mine, though, and that's why I think the work of coalition-building is so vital. When people like Pam and Dark Rose and Alex and Coti and V are disappeared, marginalized, treated as if they don't exist by two of their communities, it's easier for the dehumanization to continue. ____________________________________ *Is every black church like this? Of course not, but that has been my experience.
**My son is growing up and making me so simultaneously proud and frustrated that I see myself morphing into one of those, "My kid is the greatest, most complex person in the world!" parents and I'm not even fighting it.
What the fuck is wrong with us? Have Americans learned nothing about how hateful and wrong it is to deprive people of rights because we label them as "different" or "inferior" or a "threat to our way of life?" Three things that make me want to alternately scream and laugh at the hypocrisy?
1) A southern state pretending that it is "concerned" about the well-being of children who are in foster care--children who are disproportionately poor and of color. These same children's right to exist is routinely attacked in the South via criticisms of poor mothers of color and their child bearing and rearing, stingy systems of social provision, and subpar educational institutions.
Over the past few decades, the number of healthy, Caucasian infants, who are relinquished to DHS/DCFS for adoption has decreased sharply. DHS/DCFS is not taking applications for normal, healthy newborns. DHS/DCFS continues to accept applications to adopt a healthy, African American child from birth to two years.
Emphasis mine. Here's my translation, "We know black kids aren't the most desirable--but, hey, since we're out of NORMAL newborns, take one of 'em." And, Lord, I'm sure "normal" is also posited as the opposite of "children with disabilities"
And now, suddenly, Arkansas is claiming its all concerned about the children!* (A tactic used in California, as well)
For a child, there is nothing more important than having a parent to protect, love, and care for them.
Unless that parent is gay and/or living with a partner to whom s/he is not married, apparently.
Also, how do social conservatives rank "the evils?" Can't imagine how they keep it straight--in all my years of Sunday School, I never got the list that ranked and ordered offenses. I see on the website that you can be a (presumably straight?) single parent and foster/adopt a child (maybe the ban affects that too?). Apparently, being a gay, partnered parent trumps being a single parent in the race to "who will be first to be doomed to hell's fires" or something.
Seriously, I don't understand this. Can you adopt if you're single and gay? What happens if you're single (gay or straight), adopt, then move in with someone--does your child become unadopted?
3) The assertion that gay marriage opponents are protecting traditional marriage. Can someone define traditional marriage? Because I think a lot of people mean that glorified, 1950s creation that was relatively new in that it weakened the traditional role of the extended family, placed the burden of meeting all the members' needs on the nuclear family--and particularly on women who were expected to subordinate their own needs and ambitions to that of their families in a way that men NEVER were.
You know, the good old days when women didn't define themselves but were instead defined by their relations to the people who were more important than they--husbands and children? Those were good times, when Miltown and Valium and alcohol and shock therapy allowed women to float through the wonder of it all!
How will gays marrying damage marriage? If you're a marriage proponent, isn't it a good thing when two people decide that they love each other enough to want to commit to spending their lives together?
Bigots, in making the case for why some people don't deserve the same rights as them, routinely attack and interrupt family units. The history I've taught this semester is full of examples. Enslaved parents who had their children sold away from them. The Chinese Exclusion Act which made it impossible for many Chinese men who came here to work to bring over their families. Indigeneous people whose nomadic family life and communal living were affected by the Dawes Act. Mexican and Mexican Americans who were "repatriated" to Mexico despite the ties and communities they'd built across the Southwest. Interracial couples who were denied the right to marry for so long.
The fact that we are still doing this shit leads me back to the title of this post. __________________________________________________ *Of course, that assumption is based on our beliefs that our children start out as the same little narrow-minded, fragile, I'm-clinging-to-this-point-of-view-or-I'll-die pieces of work that we are. I talk to my kid about a lot of things, try to teach him that the world is an interesting place composed of diverse peoples and he hasn't exploded or melted into a corrupt pool of confusion. Go figure.