CHRIST, the GAY MARTYR

Trouble The Waters

2010-12-30T09:54:00.000-08:00

My Last Gay Rights Manifesto

When I decided to move "Diary Of A Gay Wage Slave" to my new blog, Ignorance Is Plentiful, it left a hole in Christ, The Gay Martyr that needed filling. I decided to write a new 200th post, and make it a second Gay Rights Manifesto. My first Manifesto still appears at the bottom of this blog, and I recently posted a Transgender Manifesto in my sidebar; both are still valid, and I have no intention of replacing them. However, I have some new thoughts about what needs to happen before LGBT equality can be realized. What follows is the closing statement I want to leave my readership with before making Christ, The Gay Martyr completely and permanently inactive. I won't be posting any more special features here; this is it, folks!

Trolling Google Image for blog photos, as I often do, I stumbled across a stunning piece of art. You can see it yourself over the opening paragraph of this essay. It's a sculpture by the legendary male physique artist George Quaintance, completed in 1936. You're looking at two Art Deco masks fused together to make one: One mask is female, and the other male. I adore Art Deco design, and at first, all I did was admire this beautiful piece of craftsmanship. As I kept looking at it, though, a strange thrill began to course through me.

Suddenly, I realized that this wasn't just a good-looking sculpture. This was a representation of Transgender humanity: Masculinity and femininity occupying the same space, blended so as to form a separate gender all its own. Knowing something about George Quaintance's approach to art, I think that's exactly what he intended it to symbolize. If I'm right, then he did so magnificently; he totally captured the essence of inborn androgyny.

Are you an LGBT person? Then take a good look at that Quaintance sculpture. It's a visualization of your inner self. What do you think? Are you amazed? Are you repelled? Can you handle confronting the truth about what you are? Or can you only see yourself through the eyes of your oppressors?

There's an idea: Let's look at ourselves through their eyes for a moment. Most of the time when LesBiGay people are discriminated against, it isn't because of their sexual orientation. Most Straight people never see us have sex, and most of us aren't in the habit of discussing our sexual exploits with them. We are bullied, threatened, ostracised and assaulted because of our gender expression. Our voices are too high, or too low. Our hair is too long, or too short, or the wrong color. We don't wear clothing that's masculine or feminine enough. We don't have interests that are considered appropriate for "real men" or "real women". We don't carry ourselves in the way "real men" and "real women" are expected to. We don't make sense to anyone whose understanding of gender is binary. We are people who transcend gender(which is why all of us have a right to identify as Transgender), and that makes people who don't transcend it very uncomfortable in our presence.

Fighting anti-Gay bias in this world necessarily involves challenging narrow concepts of gender. Binary gender is like a book that you've only read two-thirds of the way and then put down: The story isn't complete until you've read the final chapters! On those unread pages, there's a world that's populated by more than just male and female life forms. Transgender life forms also exist! We always have, we always will, and it's time for us to insist that the world acknowledge our existence.

Scientists like Simon LeVay have recently uncovered biological markers for Transgender status, but I didn't need their findings to discover who I am. I came to know my true gender from studying the Bible and Gnostic texts. Christian scripture, widely thought to condemn Gay people, gave me the key that unlocked the truth about same-gender sexuality. The Gospel of Philip describes how Jesus Christ gifts a chosen few with "the male and female power" before birth, causing them to be born with the blended gender of God. As I've written before, parallel doctrine exists in the annals of many, if not most of the world's oldest religions.

Carrying both male and female gender in the same body was at one time widely viewed as a blessed state. We should endeavor to reclaim that blessed status, and begin to feel the pride in our uniqueness that we merely pretend to feel now. When Gay Pride becomes more than just a popular concept, I bet we'll feel less of an urge to strip down, booze up, get strung out and/or clown around in the streets under the guise of celebration. We'll no longer need to camouflage our self-hatred that way!

This thing I describe as blended gender is called "Fullness" in Scripture. It exists within all LGBT folk. So, you may ask, why doesn't it make us all Gay, or all Bisexual, or all Transsexual? Why is there variation? I think variation occurs because different people respond to its presence in different ways. Or, it may be a question of degree, with some of us possessing more gender neutrality, and others possessing less. Whatever the case, Fullness is inborn; all this bullsh*t speculating about "environmental factors" and "outside influences" should've ended long ago. You can't "learn" how to become Gay or Transsexual; core identity can't be taught to or imposed on a person! The negative experiences of intersex individuals, forced as children into gender roles that violated their self-concept, tell us as much.

By the way, when I talk about blended gender, I am not referring to intersex genitalia! I'm not talking about genitalia at all. I'm speaking of something that exists on a spiritual level. As gender-transcending human beings, the form our genitalia takes is of very little significance. It matters in our sexual relations, and it matters if we want to produce offspring, but that's about it. The bodies our Transgender souls are born into don't define us like the bodies of binary gender folk define them; one way or another, an LGBT person will always challenge conventional notions about masculinity and femininity. We can't help but do it; it's our nature!

Fullness trumps (s)expectations; it has its own unalterable norms. Cultural pressure can't change them. Punitive laws can't change them. Religious belief can't change them. Psychotherapy can't change them. Surgery and hormone treatments can only create the illusion of changing them. Fullness is a gift from God that can't be returned, no matter how much we may want to.

But why should we want to? The thing to never forget is that Transgender status is completely normal. It's God's balance of nature. The sexual union of men with women is meant to approximate the Fullness that we received as a birthright; that's why the Savior excluded our kind from heterosexual marriage(Matthew 19). To me, it's perfectly logical: If people can be born with blended racial background, why can't they be born with blended gender, too? I see LGBT humanity as just another aspect of the tremendous natural diversity that God loves. Millennia have passed since life began on Earth, but every so often, we still hear about a previously unknown species of plant or animal; the Lord's imagination and creative ability knows no bounds! It makes a skilled artisan like George Quaintance look like a caveman carving stones; and we who possess God's "male and female power" number among His finest creations. Let me say this one last time:

Nothing that God creates is queer!

I call for an end to the lies heterosexual folk tell about us! Enough of these insane accusations of "recruitment"! No more vilification. No more pretending that we prey on Straight people like Dracula preys on virgins. No more pretending that Bible scripture justifies excluding us from church sacraments. No more claims that we contaminate any environment we become part of, like the United States military. No more equating us with pedophiles and polygamists and bestialists. No more falsehoods about our relationships "threatening" the traditional family. No more equating our love to rape and ancient temple prostitution. No more Papal pronouncements that our existence throws nature out of balance. No more demagoguery to the effect that God is punishing humankind because of our presence.

I also call for an end to the many delusions LGBT folk entertain. No more facetious claims of having "chosen" our sexual orientation. No more accepting stereotypes as truth. No more calling sex in public restrooms an expression of "Gay culture". No more pretending that unprotected sexual activity won't result in serious consequences. No more thinking of ourselves as men trapped inside women's bodies, or vice-versa. No more pretending that surgery can remove a person's Transgender status. No more insisting that Transsexual status is an illness while finding no fault with the sick society that rejects its validity.

No more pretending that we're exactly the same as heterosexual folk except for who we sleep with. No more arguments that we don't "need" certain rights that heterosexual folk enjoy. No more lying to LGBT kids about bullying getting "better" when all that happens most of the time is a change in the type of bullying and who's doing it. No more believing that Scripture condemns our unique gender expression(it doesn't). No more accepting religious bigots as doctrinal authorities. And please! No more pretending that heterosexist and transphobic slurs can be "reclaimed" and made empowering.

The word "queer" must go! It connotes defectiveness and perversion. It stigmatizes God's blessing of Fullness. It belongs to an ignorant past that we must break free of. If you're in the habit of dropping this dehumanizing label into casual conversation, wash out your mouth and mind; gargle twice and spit! Starting today, I'm on a crusade to replace "queer" with the term "gender-neutral". If an umbrella term is needed, as many of us seem to believe, then this is a far more accurate one. It defines more precisely who we are and what we have in common as Lesbians, Gay men, Bisexual and Transsexual persons. Most important, it's refreshingly free of denigrating connotations.

We need to stop wearing the oppressor's hand-me-down hate speech! Dignity looks so much better on us. We must force ourselves and others to speak of blended gender with respect, and get used to hearing it spoken of in that way.

Respecting yourself is about more than just the language you use. It also has to do with the way you treat yourself, and how you let others treat you. There's a multitude of Gay activists around; just turn over a rock, and one will crawl out from under it! Yet I find that relatively few of them want to change conditions for LesBiGay people in any substantive way.

Too many of us have made our peace with the demeaning jokes, the ugly slurs, the outrageous stereotypes. We've resigned ourselves to the persecution, the stigmatization, the lack of security in our persons. Most of us just haven't got the stomach for taking the fight against bigotry to the oppressor's door, so in a pinch, phony political posturing suffices! At the end of the day, we're content to stay walled off in a little corner of the world set aside for misfits, a place devoid of dignity that doesn't even provide us with safe harbor.

We crave distractions from the injustices we suffer. We escape into pageants, parties and cliques, campy humor, mindless celebrity worship and reckless sexual excess. Numbing our pain with drink, drugs and booty, we can barely feel that boot on the back of our necks . . . why, our necks could snap and we wouldn't even notice! We'd never admit it, but we've adapted ourselves to a discriminatory status quo. Within our myriad social classes and cultural traditions, we've learned how to accommodate heterosexism, and God forbid we should trouble the waters too much.

Lord knows how much I want to trouble those waters!

I want to trouble them so bad sometimes, I can hardly stand it! I want a Category Five hurricane, global warming crisis, multi-funnel tornado and tsunami all rolled into one! I want to see all the complacency and compromise and corruption swept away. I want to see the cleansing rain come down, and then I want to see the sunshine after the rain. I'm so ready!

I want this social upheaval so passionately because of the way I grew up: An effeminate boy all but crippled by shame, repeatedly beaten down by ignorance, terrified of the world outside his door. It was an intolerable way to grow up, and I can't stand to think about anyone else suffering that way. How can we settle for business as usual when we know a new LGBT generation is falling victim to hate crimes every day(those they commit against themselves as well as those perpetrated by others)?

Oh, we're making a big militant noise right now, but it's still business as usual: Begging politicians for favors; nibbling around the edges of mass protest; letting the religious Right Wing wipe its filthy feet on our backs; talking up revolution whenever we get the chance, but never walking the talk. It's nothing but a lot of pussyfooting around, and I'm sick to death of it!

When we finally get serious about Gay Rights, we'll be waging the fight against discrimination in six key arenas: In religious institutions; in educational institutions; in the courts; in the streets; in the media; and in our own hearts! (Take note that I didn't mention the political arena. That was deliberate! Let's chill out with the Washington lobbying until we have some real power to wield there.)

We'll be turning up the temperature in our churches, mosques and synagogues until they become boiling pools of unrest. We'll be condemning "faith-based" opposition to Gay Rights, and correcting religious doctrine that calls Transgender expression sinful. We'll be banishing "Queer Studies" from the classroom, mandating comprehensive sex education and anti-bullying measures, and promoting genuine scholarship on Transgender identity. We'll be ripping the blindfold off of Lady Justice so that her eyes can perceive the abusive excesses of unchecked religious freedom.

We'll be making mass protest a reality, filling the public square to demand tax relief as compensation for institutional heterosexism and transphobia. We'll be demanding accurate, consistent and respectful media representation(especially in sales and entertainment media), and blowing the damn roof off if we don't see it! We'll finally have realized that a distorted portrayal can be as bad or worse than invisibility; and when it comes to rooting out the entrenched shame that comes between us and our dignity, we'll be as relentless as the Red Chinese rooting out counter-revolutionary influences. That's what serious Gay activism will look like.

I believe what the old Negro spiritual says: God's gonna trouble the waters! And just like the runaway slaves who originally sang that song, we LGBT folk must wade in troubled waters before we can set foot on the dry land of liberation.

This essay is dedicated to the memory of Haitian-American poet, editor and performance artist Assotto Saint, who showed me the path when I was not yet ready to walk it.

My Militant Gay Christian Credo (Part One)

2010-11-01T01:00:00.000-07:00

You punished me for telling you my hopes and dreams/
I'm breakin' all the rules I didn't make/
You took my words and made a trap for silly fools/
You held me down and tried to make me break

Did I say something wrong?/
Oops! I didn't know I couldn't talk about sex/
(I must have been crazy)/
Did I stay too long?/
Oops! I didn't know I couldn't speak my mind/
(What was I thinking?)

And I'm not sorry*

1. I believe that Gay people are as essential to this planet as the rain forests, if not more. For example, if all the LGBT people now working in service occupations . . . all the nurses, technicians, waiters, maintenance people, bus, cab and truck drivers, social workers, translators, morticians, hairdressers, administrative assistants and customer service reps . . . if all of them were to suddenly disappear from the face of the Earth, what would happen? Civilization as we know it would grind to a dead halt and never recover from the loss! To say nothing of what would happen if all the LGBT folk involved in organized religion ever disappeared . . . now, that's a prospect too horrible to even contemplate!

2. I believe there’s no such thing as a minority group whose identity is based on sexual practice. When I hear LGBT folk talk about themselves in that way, I never take them seriously. I know most Straight people don’t, either! If the only reason you call yourself Gay is a habit of getting off with people of the same gender, you’re lying to yourself. Being Gay is not about “the Big O”! Being Gay is about getting beaten up for not acting like other boys. Being Gay is about parents turning away from you in shame. Being Gay is about being led to believe that God despises you. Being Gay is about survival, dammit! It infuriates me to hear ignorant people reduce my identity to an ejaculation scene in a porn film. I was Gay long before I knew what sex was, and I’ll be Gay long after I’ve forgotten what sex is.

3. I believe that LGBT identity is a gift from God. It’s not a curse. It’s not an illness. It’s not a perversion, an aberration, or a “choice”. I believe it constitutes a separate gender, and is a combination of male and female on the spiritual level. The Bible says that God Himself is an androgynous entity, so what greater gift could He give a human being? If you think that's provocative, here's something to really rock your world: Decades ago, LGBT folk adopted the rainbow as their symbol. Centuries ago, the Lord sent down a rainbow to symbolize His Covenant with humankind (Genesis 9: 13-17). Could it be His Covenant rainbow takes two different forms? Maybe it doesn't just appear as color and light in the sky. Maybe it also appears as flesh and blood . . .

4. I believe that a person is born with Gay, Bisexual or Transsexual identity. When you hear actresses like Anne Heche claim they didn’t become Lesbians until they met same-gender partners, do you find them credible? Don’t bet money, honey! These women may be Bisexual, but they aren’t Lesbians, and they never will be. If you are homosexual, you are homosexual from cradle to grave; a birthright is forever! Certain people, especially those who identify themselves as "queer", take strong exception to that understanding, but I really couldn't care less! It’s the right understanding. LGBT identity is not "fluid", it is constant. There's no such thing as a "pregnant man" of binary gender. Elephants don't turn into monkeys, Gay people don't turn into Straight people, and Transsexual children don't grow up to be biological males and females. That's reality! "Ex-Gay” programs and “gender reassignment” surgeries exist to exploit those of us who feel we must conform to human concepts of gender and sexuality. These "corrective" measures may alter appearance and behavior, but they don't and won't ever have the power to alter inborn LGBT status.

5. I believe that Jesus Christ talked approvingly about Gay men. I believe we are the “eunuchs who have been so from birth” that He spoke of in Matthew 19. I also believe we are the “first fruits for God and the Lamb” who serve as His personal attendants in Revelations 14. In addition to those passages, Gay men (and Lesbians) are discussed at length in the Gnostic Gospel of Philip, the Secret Book of John, and the Egyptian Gospel (see my series of posts titled "We Are Family" under the Gay Identity tab). The Messiah described born eunuchs as a separate class from ordinary males. He connected them to the kingdom of Heaven, and stated quite explicitly that they could not follow the teachings He gave to ordinary males. Why, then, would anyone think that Biblical prohibitions directed at ordinary males would apply to them? They do not, and they never have!

6. I believe that there were specific teachings directed at God’s born eunuchs in the early Christian church. The historical record suggests that those teachings were systematically suppressed and destroyed by an ultra-conservative church hierarchy. Fortunately, archaeologists have partially recovered some of those Gnostic writings, such as this one:

THE GOSPEL OF THOMAS 22

(Jesus Christ said) When you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female . . . then you will enter(the kingdom).

These fragments are now widely available in bookstores and libraries. What they reveal is astounding; a radically different picture of LGBT identity as it relates to Christianity emerges from these texts. If only more Christians would study them, a much-needed process of doctrinal correction could begin.

7. I believe that many “welcoming” ministries are led by preachers who see LGBT folk as abominations to God. In their hearts, they doubt that Gay souls can be saved, and they only suffer Gay parishioners out of a sense of obligation. Around 185 BC, a Jewish theologian wrote these wise words:

SIRACH 20:3
Like a eunuch lusting to violate a girl is the person who does right under compulsion.

By nature, a born eunuch has no interest in heterosexual relations, so with this teaching, Sirach indicted people who act contrary to their natural inclinations. That's exactly what these preachers do! What's more, their perception of Gay men and Lesbians as damned people no doubt filters down to LGBT believers, reinforcing feelings of shame and guilt. This makes their churchgoing experience bittersweet at best, and toxic at worst. A toxic ministry yields toxic faith(You will know them by their fruits: Matthew 7:20). How can toxic faith lead to life eternal? It can only lead to death! Before they accept an invitation from a "welcoming" congregation, the LesBiGay Christian must discern whether he is being asked to join a living church or a church of the dead.

8. I believe that Gay and Lesbian couples have the right to legally marry, and not only in a Justice of the Peace’s office. They have the right to perform Holy Union inside a church! Anyone wanting Scriptural justification for same-gender marriage need only read the narrative of David and Jonathan in I and II Samuel. It states that these men’s souls were bound together. As Rev. Rick Bretlinger so eloquently affirms in his flawed but often brilliant book Gay Christian 101, that’s a description of spiritual marriage performed by God! No one but God can bind souls. What He did in Biblical times He still does today; male couples and female couples miraculously fall in love and decide to share their lives, just as David and Jonathan did(again, read the narrative). How dare clergy refuse to recognize covenants which the Lord has sanctioned? And how dare they do so in the Lord’s own house?

"Militant Gay Christian Credo" concludes with Part Two.

My Militant Gay Christian Credo (Part Two)

2010-10-31T10:30:00.000-07:00

You wouldn't let me say the words I longed to say/
You didn't want to see life through my eyes/
You tried to shove me back inside your narrow room/
And silence me with bitterness and lies

Did I say something true?/
Oops! I didn't know I couldn't talk about sex/
(I must've been crazy)/
Did I have a point of view?/
Oops! I didn't know I couldn't talk about you/
(What was I thinking?)

And I'm not sorry*

9. I believe that organized religion owes LGBT folk around the world an official apology! The Pope and other religious leaders should apologize for all the suffering, savagery and discrimination we've had to endure as a direct result of their hatemongering theology; and after they do it, every one of them should fall down prostrate before God and beg His pardon for the capital sin of distorting His Holy Word. Do you think it's disrespectful for me to suggest such a thing? Then you don't understand the meaning of disrespect! Gay people understand its meaning. I understand. Whenever I think about the millions of families that have been torn apart; the millions of victims who've been brutalized and murdered; the scores of innocents who've been jailed and executed; the dozens of livelihoods and reputations that have been destroyed, and especially the countless number of human spirits that have been traumatized and broken, I feel the blood begin to boil within my veins. Reparations are definitely in order here! I would join a class action lawsuit in a heartbeat; wouldn't you?

10. I believe that LGBT children have the right to grow up without being terrorized. Actress Ellen DeGeneres has said that LesBiGay folk aren’t meant to be separated from the general population, and she's right; nobody should ever feel obligated to live in a Gay ghetto. However, before we go out and confront the ignorance of the world, we should be allowed to live a reasonably normal childhood. Living in fear of your grade school classmates isn’t normal! You can’t concentrate on learning mutiplication tables when you have to endure constant threats and beatings; believe me, I know! As long as machismo and religious bigotry are allowed to run rampant in society, LGBT-supportive schools like New York’s Harvey Milk High will be necessary.

11. I believe that the Gay Rights movement should prioritize Gay Rights. I decry the anything-but-Gay-Rights agenda of activist groups like beyondmarriage.com! There's no rule that says individual Lesbians and Gay men can't participate in environmental activism, anti-poverty programs, anti-war demonstrations, lobbying for immigration reform and other important concerns. Who will take our specific concerns seriously, though, if we don't? It's neither necessary nor desirable for Gay Rights organizations to be the hub of all Left Wing causes. Ours should be the kind of movement where Liberals, Moderates and Conservatives can find common ground on such core issues as partnership recognition, employment non-discrimination, access to societal institutions, and personal safety. Our increasing reluctance to stand up for our own interests is appalling and shameful. Sylvia Rivera and other Stonewall rebels who have since passed on must be turning over in their graves!

12. I believe that Gay Pride is, by and large, a myth. Many, perhaps even a majority of us LGBT folk feel deeply ashamed and conflicted about our gender identity and/or sexual orientation. How could we not, when most of the cultures and religions we grow up with openly despise us? We hide our shame under false bravado, but act it out with self-destructive behavior like drug abuse, spousal abuse, derogatory self-labeling, membership in homophobic churches and unsafe sexual practice. There will be no true Gay Pride until LGBT folk reclaim their birthright as blessed people of God! The ability to copulate with persons of the same gender is nothing, in itself, to be proud of. However, knowing that you are closer to the image of God than other human beings is definitely a source of pride.

13. I believe that crude stereotypes and labels limit the aspirations of minority groups and promote falsehoods about them. This is never more true than when minority groups themselves embrace the crude depictions. The rise of Hip-Hop culture is a case in point: Its glorification of Black thuggery and obsession with the words "n*gger" and "b*tch" has distorted the image of African-Americans all over the world. While I do support the right of people to choose their own labels, that support comes with two caveats: 1) The labels they choose must be accurate. 2) The labels they choose mustn’t stigmatize. You may love to play with slurs and stereotypes, but that doesn’t give you the right to spread ignorance about an oppressed people(you got that, Adam Joseph?)!!! Also, don't expect me to suffer silently while you portray my kind as sex perverts just for the thrill of doing so(are you listening, Tristan Taormino?)!

14. I believe Straight allies are absolutely necessary to the struggle. Surely, the heroic actions of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsome on behalf of marriage equality have proven that point! Understand me: when I say Straight allies, I’m not talking about heterosexual folk who pay periodic lip service to Gay Rights; I’m talking about folks who really do “get it”! They feel our pain. Singer Cyndi Lauper all but defines Gay activism with her strident, hands-on advocacy; and Jeanne Phillips, author of the famous "Dear Abby" column, has more Gay militancy in her pinkie finger than most self-described “RadiQueers” have in their entire bodies! A few years ago, Ms. Phillips caused quite a stir when she made this statement to the Associated Press:

If Gay Americans are not allowed to get married and have all the benefits that American citizens are entitled to by the Bill of Rights, they should get one Hell of a tax break!

Wow! When was the last time you heard a Lesbian or Gay man say something so revolutionary? That’s the kind of attitude that drove the Suffragettes into the streets! That’s the kind of attitude LGBT folk need in order to effectively combat their oppressors. Pageants, parades and watching DVD episodes of "Dante's Cove" sure won’t get the job done!

15. I believe that Jesus Christ, in His human form, was an LGBT person: Either Gay, Bisexual or Transsexual. I believe that His constant companion, Mary of Magdala, was an LGBT person as well. I believe there were Gay men among the Savior's Apostles, and Lesbians among the women who traveled with Him. I'm convinced that the Apostle Paul, perhaps the greatest Christian theologian who ever lived, was a Gay man who struggled to accept his own sexuality. I base these perceptions on clues found in both canonical and Gnostic scripture. I acknowledge the possiblity that my perceptions are wrong; I'm certainly not infallible. However, if they're accurate, and I truly believe they are, then the church's rejection of LGBT folk is nothing less than an unpardonable blasphemy.

16. I believe that ignorance is the greatest impediment to the well-being of humankind. It is Satan’s primary tool, more threatening to life on Earth than global warming, pre-emptive war and nuclear proliferation put together. Certainly, there is no greater stumbling block to LBGT equality than ignorance! We must endeavor to root out this pestilence, not only in our enemies, but also in ourselves.

These sixteen declarations summarize what I believe about religion, politics and Gay identity. They're an expression of who I am: Defiantly Christian, proudly androgynous, dangerously outspoken, neither Liberal nor Conservative, not into games, egos or petty politics, not impressed by radicalism, not intimidated by orthodoxy, no respecter of persons, and not one to suffer fools gladly. A Black Gay American with a modicum of dignity, a smidgen of self-respect, an abundance of common sense, and a bushel basketful of Old School values that I’m not ashamed to put on display. So tell me, sugar . . . how do you like me now?

"Credo" was originally posted 19 July 2008.

*excerpts from the song "Human Nature", Copyright ©1994 WB Music Corporation/Webo Girl Publishing (ASCAP). Music and Lyrics written by Madonna Louise Ciccone, Milo Deering, Dave Hall and Kevin and Shawn McKenzie, originally performed by Madonna.

My Final Book of Testimony (Part One)

2010-04-01T11:34:00.000-07:00

Christ, The Gay Martyr contains exactly 200 blogposts. There are 192 original essays and eight pages of "Testimony", which function as a Table of Contents. As I look back over five years of online punditry, I see quality that I wish had been more consistent. Some of my earlier essays really suck! They look like things I might've written during my teens, and it's hard for me to read them now; but quite a few are worth reading. I'm happy to say this final batch of fifty posts doesn't stink; it's pretty good work, especially considering the tremendous workplace pressure I was under when I wrote them. I thank God for giving me fortitude and inspiration; the best things on this blog were all co-authored by Him. If I'm presumptuous enough to consider CTGM an important body of work, that's why! I'm damn proud of it.

Along with hundreds of other American bloggers, I expressed my outrage at the Wall Street bailout of 2008. I poured that outrage into a denunciation of both the Democrat and Republican parties that I titled "Lipstick On A Fascist Pig." If corruption in government has improved one little bit since then, I haven't noticed! At this writing, Congress has yet to impose restrictions on banks that speculate with their clients' money, and a second massive corporate bailout has just been approved, this time for the health insurance industry. What else did you think that so-called health care reform legislation was? You can bet it won't bail out people like you or me when, just like before, we find ourselves overwhelmed by medical bills and exorbitant prescription drug costs.

"Lipstick" was my first attempt to broaden the scope of this blog beyond obviously Gay subject matter. My main focus was always on Gay-related topics, though. In the case of “Defaming Diahann Carroll”, that topic was the Gay media’s increasing fondness for slurs, not just sexual but racial. Seldom have I ever felt more infuriated than when I saw The New York Blade’s profile of a legendary African-American actress in which the author flippantly identified her as a “Black b*tch”. In this essay, I warned Blade staffers that the bad things they did would come back to bite them in the ass. Could it be mere coincidence, then, that the Blade publications went belly-up earlier this year? Oh, I certainly hope not!

When Rev. Jerry Maneker shared with me his joy at officiating his first same-gender wedding, I celebrated him in my two-part essay “Love Makes A Marriage”. This essay is my definitive statement on marriage equality; I’d treated the topic before, but never in such depth. Those who’ve likened me to a preacher certainly found evidence to support that belief in this paragraph: I've got disturbing news for all these "Christian" fundamentalists who believe that homosexual relations are sinful. They can dismiss it at their own peril! They won't walk through the gates of Heaven one second sooner because they persecuted those of us who practice same-gender love. On the contrary, if they become so caught up in sanctioning the perceived sins of others that they ignore their own sinful behavior, they won't walk through those gates at all. Make no mistake: A person's eligibility for Eternal Life doesn't depend on what he stops other people from doing. It depends on what he stops himself from doing! Breaking the Lord's commandment to love your neighbor as yourself is definitely something anybody who calls himself a Christian should stop, and he should stop it right now and not later! I’m not a preacher and have no aspirations to become one, really I don’t. I just get carried away sometimes! Who can help it, though, when the Gospel of Jesus Christ gets so viciously distorted?

“Proving Me Wrong” was my cautious welcoming gesture to Barack Hussein Obama as our nation’s new Chief Executive. His candidacy put a bad taste in my mouth from the very beginning, but I held out hope that he'd be a catalyst for the right kind of change at the Federal level. Soon after I posted this op-ed, President-Elect Obama chose smiley-faced Bible bigot Rick Warren to officiate at his inaugural ceremony. I almost wrote the follow-up confirming my worst fears in January of 2009, but I decided to wait and see what other unfriendly surprises Mr. Obama had in store for us. I had quite a long list to share when I skewered him with my “Proving Me Right” essay in January of 2010. If that list were compiled today, I could add to it a new betrayal: The Obama Justice Department's defense of the US military's "Don't Ask/Don't Tell" policy. The President fights to keep this discriminatory law on the books, even while he calls for its repeal in a State of the Union address! This craven politician has no shame whatsoever. It frightens me that we’re not even halfway through his first term yet; what further outrages will this "Liberal" administration subject LGBT Americans to? Even with Sarah Palin and Mitt Romney eagerly waiting in the wings, I hope there won’t be a second Obama term. Given a choice between a wolf in sheep’s clothing and an undisguised wolf, I’d rather take my chances with the genuine article!

The stubborn insistence of Gay activists to waste their limited resources on anti-Gay ballot measure campaigns prompted me to write a two-part speech called “Save The Country” in December 2008. I’ve never actually presented it as a speech, but who knows? Maybe that can still happen someday. I scheduled a whole day to research legal grounds for marriage equality in the US Constitution. It took me less than twenty minutes to find it in not one, but two places: Article IV, Section 2, and the Fourteenth Amendment. I wanted to focus our attention on those passages, as well as on the Declaration of Independence, so that Gay people could see for themselves the birthright citizenship protections that many of us don’t believe exist. For good measure, I threw in some Southern belle militancy from the late Mrs. Rosa Parks, and closed with a few lines from Laura Nyro’s excellent 1970 song “Save The Country”. My objective was to lessen our feelings of desperation and inspire pride within us; not Gay Pride, but American pride! Drawing direct parallels between the LGBT equality movement and our nation's other historic Civil Rights struggles is something that isn’t nearly done often enough. This is one of those essays that roused me from bed in the dead of night, and frankly, I think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever written.

Odd, how my musical tastes always seem to find their way into my essays! “One Bad Apple”, my two-part op-ed about the homophobia of Donny Osmond, is a typical example. Whenever I see Donny on TV or even hear his name, my mind immediately goes back to Top Forty radio in the 1970s, and the catchy Pop tunes he and his family churned out back then. Did I love me some “Down By The Lazy River”, or what? How sad that such delightful American music is tainted by the fact that its source espouses hateful ignorance. Even sadder is the possibility that said ignorance may have contributed to the recent death of Marie Osmond’s art student son, who committed suicide after writing that he “just couldn’t fit in”. That Michael Blosil may have been the latest victim of anti-Gay persecution in the Mormon church is something quite horrible to contemplate. Let’s all pray that, if Michael really was Gay, his grieving mother will have the courage to use his loss as a tool to reform Mormon doctrine. If she can manage to do that, God will replace the child she lost with thousands of grateful Gay Mormon kids. For sure, she needs to be able to take some comfort away from this tragedy. However, until reform happens, I must agree with guest commentator Jerry Maneker’s advice that Gay Christians treat Mormon churches like the Plague!

Mormons also figure into my next two-parter, “Echoes From A Birmingham Jail” from January of 2009. Judging from the response it generated, this is the most popular essay I've ever posted on Christ, The Gay Martyr. That’s not in small part due to the fact that after I cross-posted it in the diary section of Pam’s House Blend, Pam Spaulding made the surprising decision to feature it on her blog’s front page. (Predictably, its dignified message was lost on some of her Blenders, one of whom remarked that reading it made her feel “proud to be ‘queer’”! Lord, deliver me! What does it take to instill self-esteem in some LGBT folk?) However, what really boosted the popularity of this essay were the stirring, immortal words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, written in 1963 while he cooled his heels in a dirty Alabama jail cell. Just as I had with “Save The Country”, I wanted to remind readers that their equality struggle is squarely in the mainstream of American Civil Rights crusades. How better to do that than with polemic from America’s finest Civil Rights crusader? The masterful way in which Dr. King indicted the “Conservative” church leadership of his day and exposed incrementalism as a tool of oppression has never been surpassed. I admit that I wrote this essay partially as an excuse to shower adoration on Dr. King’s rhetorical skill. I made sure to ladle some much-deserved kudos on Coretta Scott King, too! She wasn’t half the orator her husband was, but when it came to championing Gay Rights, Mrs. King took his moral crusade to a higher level. Her importance to our movement has never been properly acknowledged.

“Anytime You’re Ready” was my four-part follow-up to “Echoes from A Birmingham Jail”, a broadside attack on Gay complacency. It wasn’t anywhere near as popular, but I think it makes an important point. So much of what we do undermines the Gay Rights movement: The “reclaiming” of hateful pejoratives, the shrugging-off of bad treatment by public officials, the absurd statements used to justify our own counter-productive behavior, the attempts to pass off political haplessness as political sophistication. Some of us even feel the need to defend bigots and their bigotry! While I've long believed that the Gay blogosphere is swarming with Right Wing moles, all too often we enable our own oppression and seem eager to do so. In retrospect, I think this essay was too long; it would’ve been a much tighter composition had I edited it down to a handful of succinct statements like this one from Part Two: Anytime we're ready, we can start having a Gay Rights movement that declares zero tolerance for any kind of anti-Gay expression. Anytime we're ready, we can start demanding respect as fully entitled human beings. Anytime we're ready, we can start acting like people worthy of a champion like the late Coretta Scott King. As long as we make excuses for heterosexist hatemongers, adopt the wicked insults they impose on us, "counsel" one another on which Constitutional rights are desirable or not, and rank LGBT equality lower than any other national goal, then I'll know we're not ready! Then again, had I edited it down, I probably wouldn’t have ripped apart those miserable excuses for Christian prayers that were offered at President Obama’s inauguration. Somebody really needed to do that, and I’m glad it was me!

“The Dumb Dora Awards” was begun as an outlet for my increasing frustration at Gay activist idiocy. It was only going to be a sidebar feature, but one day, I had the idea of compiling ten of the award winners into a two-part post. It turned out to be one of my most thoughtful and provocative essays yet, and thoughtful provocation is what this blog specializes in! I quickly decided to make it an ongoing series. My first awards "ceremony" was held in March of 2009, and another followed in July of the same year. This feature is so easy to put together, it almost writes itself; the most difficult thing for me is coming up with novel award categories. Counter-Productive Pranksterism, Make-Believe Activism, Airheaded Editorializing and Impersonation of a House Negro are some of my most memorable. This series with an admittedly sarcastic edge allows me to do what I’m often urged to do: Lighten up a little bit! Yet there's plenty of room for me to make sharp observations about the sorry state of Gay activism nowadays. Little did I suspect when I launched “The Dumb Dora Awards” that it would one day host its own blog (called Ignorance Is Plentiful) and herald the end of Christ, The Gay Martyr as an active online document.

"Shine" was my recurring showcase for exceptional LGBT folk of color. My tough criteria made honorees hard to find, but frankly, I probably didn't look hard enough. I only conferred role model honors on three people. When I heard about Math teacher Chance Nalley, I knew he had to be one of them. Mr. Nalley’s decision to share his same-gender nuptials with the entire seventh grade class of his Progressive high school made him a natural; I could hardly wait to profile this courageous man. It didn’t hurt that his story allowed me to gnaw on one of my long-time pet peeves: The reluctance of Gay activists to combat heterosexism in the most logical of settings, an elementary or secondary school! What could be more desirable than nipping ignorance in the bud as early as possible? Teach ‘em while they’re young, and it’s less likely you’ll have to worry about them voting down your citizenship rights when they grow up! I’m not naïve: I know it's all but impossible for most LesBiGay teachers to do what Chance Nalley did in April of 2009. What’s more, not many teachers would want a high school class present at something so private as their wedding(in this case, a Civil Union), regardless of sexual orientation! However, he saw the ceremony as (dare I say it?) a chance to extend his mandate to educate outside the classroom. He honored his calling in an exceptionally selfless way. Bully for him! (I can’t believe I actually wrote that . . . I must be channeling Teddy Roosevelt!) His community is better for him having done it. We must rid ourselves of the homophobic idea that instruction about LGBT issues doesn’t belong in the schools. Gaining greater access to educational institutions is an all-important goal that we must not shrink from!

I haven’t investigated, but I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that “The Perfect Blend” is one of my least popular postings. It flies in the face of much common wisdom about Transsexual identity. I'd be the first to admit having radical views about Transfolk. I believe that Transgender status is a unique and separate gender. I do not believe in the concept of gender confusion! I do not believe female biology is necessary in order for female identity to be legitimate, or vice-versa. I have never and will never believe that people are born into "the wrong body". I believe, as ancient cultures did, that there are people in this world who share blended gender status with God. I thought about writing this piece for a very long time, and I prayed for the right words. Our Mother/Father in Heaven gave me this to say: Transgender consciousness today is where Gay consciousness was in the 1950s; the consensus is that Transfolk are sick and in need of medical treatment. So long as the pathologizing of Transgender bodies continues, Transgender people will never have society's respect. I remember watching a segment of "In The Life", public television's monthly LGBT newsmagazine, and recoiling from a theatre piece in which pitiable Transsexual women bemoaned not having vaginas. Seldom have I ever seen anything so retrograde! Just as is the case with Lesbians, Gay men and Bisexual folk, there's an urgent need for Transsexual consciousness-raising! It is God's will that male and female sometimes exist within the same body; the various problems Transfolk suffer have everything, and I do mean everything, to do with denial of that fact. If the world ever lets go of that denial, the lives of Transsexual men and women will improve remarkably. Let me send out a virtual high five to everybody who's boycotting the release of Ticked-Off Trannies With Knives, an appalling new "transploitation" flick. Way to go! At least the "T" in LGBT seems to realize that being taken seriously as a people is a big deal. Burlesque show "trannies" brandishing knives will never be any match for real-life Transsexual Americans brandishing self-respect!

"The Final Book of Testimony" concludes with Part Two.

My Final Book Of Testimony (Part Two)

2010-03-31T10:04:00.000-07:00

Media directed at a Gay audience is a fairly recent development, but there have existed Lesbian and Gay characters in mainstream media for many, many years. Just the other night, I was watching a classic movie from 1932 called A Farewell To Arms. I was surprised to see among the supporting characters both a Lesbian and a Gay man, nursing secret same-gender crushes on the leading man (Gary Cooper) and leading lady(Helen Hayes), respectively. Believe it or not, some Gay characters even appeared in popular comic strips! An underlying theme of homo-eroticism existed in the long-running Tintin series from Europe, and has been speculated about for decades. The virulently anti-Gay response generated when I discussed this theme in an online Tintin forum triggered a rage in me that festered for months. I channeled it into exploration of comic strip archive, and the result was "Tintin Uncloseted", surely one of the most controversial three-part essays I'll ever write. I confirmed to my satisfaction that the strip featured both a Gay couple (the notorious Thom(p)son Twins) and an unrequited love affair between the two leading characters, Tintin and Captain Haddock. To my huge delight, I also identified what I believe to be the first Gay love story in graphic novel form, 1960's deliciously nuanced Tintin In Tibet. It gave me great satisfaction to dispel the air of pederasty that hung over Haddock's relationship with Tintin, yet still affirm their mutual love. The strip's chronicler, Belgian cartoonist Hergé, emerged from my research as both a maverick storyteller and a genius of subtly-drawn character motivation. Decades before JK Rowling revealed the homosexual orientation of Dumbledore, Hergé proved that children's literature authors weren't averse to incorporating Gay characters. I am exceedingly proud of having reclaimed this important artifact of Gay history; it's the one bonafide achievement that this blog can boast of. To those bigoted comic strip fans who launched me on this journey of discovery, I've got just one thing to say: WOOOAH!

What's the point in calling your group a Stonewall Democratic Club if your activities don't resemble the Stonewall rebellion at all? What good does it do to make outraged public statements about Peter LaBarbera or Tony Perkins or Fred Phelps when you ignore radical Bible bigots in your own town? How can you justify putting so many resources into Pride celebrations when demonizing doctrine gets taught within a few blocks of your Gay Community Center? What are we so friggin' proud of? The way we let the religious Right shove a boot in our behinds year after year? When I saw bogus Gay activists once again committing movement sabotage with a replay of the ill-conceived Million F*g March, I blew my top! I had to find a release valve for my frustration. It was June 2009, so the idea of writing a Gay Pride Month essay occurred to me. However, I was in no mood to pen a treacly Stonewall commemoration. Nor did I want to do some florid biographical piece on a Gay figure from history. I wanted to write a clarion call to action, and so I did. I linked the necessity of confronting religious bigots directly to the necessity of using religious faith as a weapon in our struggle. The idea of holding “counter-sermons” on the premises of hate-spewing churches had been incubating in my mind for a long time; I fleshed it out on paper and put the concept out there for people to mull over. If anybody mulled it over for even half a minute, I’d be surprised! Writing the three parts of “March Down Babylon” was probably just an exercise in futility, but anybody who reads it has got to know it came directly from my heart. It’s the purest expression of my outrage at being caught between Christian and LGBT worlds that should have never been separated.

Undoubtedly, arrogant leadership is a problem that has plagued American Civil Rights movements since their inception, but Gay Rights seems to have more than its fair share of overbearing people! Groups like HRC, NGLTF, Servicemen United and even individual bloggers like Wayne Besen, Pam Spaulding and John Aravosis often seem to thrive on condescension: We know what’s best for Gay people, so don’t question or criticize us! A recent email I got from Mr. Aravosis was so damn snooty, I’m surprised he could see clearly enough to write it; typing messages with your nose in the air must be awfully hard to do! It was typical of our self-appointed “leadership” to convene an exclusive meeting in Dallas, Texas last May and come up with a list of principles they expect every activist to follow. (Lest I be accused of similar arrogance, let me acknowledge that I recently circulated a self-authored list called The Ten Commandments of Gay Activism. However, my purpose in doing so was to stimulate conversation; I'm not egotistical enough to think I can actually impose Commandments on anyone, nor am I dumb enough to try to!) The Dallas group made no attempt to solicit the input of rank-and-file LGBT folk. How presumptuously top-down can you get? However, I was willing to give their Dallas Principles a fair evaluation, and I found that some were well worth adopting. I feel especially positive about the mandate that LGBT equality not be considered a partisan issue. Other principles are unacceptable, though, like the contention that faith should never play a part in our struggle. I wrote “Democratizing The Dallas Principles” to simultaneously denounce elitist activism and salvage the work of the Dallas activists by suggesting ways to make it more inclusive, representative and effective. These principles are fated to become an ambitious idea that died a-borning unless that happens.

I've always known that individuals who challenge binary gender norms face a high degree of hostility; being an effeminate male, I’m probably more sensitive to it than other Gay men. Yet even I was caught of guard by the degree of disrespect shown to South Africa’s Caster Semenya, a female track star whose masculine appearance and impressive race times prompted the International Association of Athletics Federations to question her gender. Innocently, she submitted to some of their humiliating tests, only to stand by horrified and helpless as the IAAF made a mockery of its own privacy rules. Her test results were maliciously leaked to the media, resulting in her being treated like a modern-day Hottentot Venus; the whole sports world started speculating about her genitalia! Since late last year, a cloud of prurient speculation has hung over Ms. Semenya’s head; she is widely rumored to be an intersex woman, but IAAF doctors have declined to confirm that diagnosis(small wonder, since human gender is difficult to pin down scientifically). Her birth certificate ought to be enough to establish her female gender, but the IAAF prefers to play God! While they’ve allowed Ms. Semenya to keep her past medals, they're evidently not going to allow her to win any more. She currently finds herself barred from track and field competition. I’m encouraged to see that the suicidal feelings she reportedly suffered in September have given way to righteous anger. Recently approached by the Associated Press for an interview, she fumed: “I have been subjected to unwarranted and invasive scrutiny of the most intimate and private details of my being. Why would I want to talk to (the) media? I don’t want to talk to you!” Tragically, her promising career has very likely been cut short. If that's the case, though, she deserves one Hell of a consolation prize in the form of millions of dollars in civil suit damages! What do you bet that attorneys will be competing to represent her? I felt, and continue to feel, such strong solidarity with this wronged woman that I wrote “I Am Caster Semenya” over a single sleepless night. I hope my two-part cry of indignation can raise consciousness about persecuted gender-neutral people.

I just got finished reading a statement from British “queer” activist Peter Tachell in which he defends a Bible bigot’s “right” to loudly condemn Gay people in a public venue. Nothing irritates me more than to see a supposed advocate for Gay Rights bending over backwards to accommodate religious hatemongers! What do they expect to get out of it? Do they really think a world that encourages genocidal speech is safe for them to live in? Mr. Tachell needs to get himself a copy of Dr. John Shelby Spong’s fiery denunciation of religious bigotry, published in October of 2009. Spong lays it out strong: There is no room in a democratic society for heterosexist terrorism! And there’s no room in the Christian faith for those who think getting baptized gives them permission to demonize God’s LGBT creations. There’s nothing to be gained from debating, humoring or in any way encouraging those bent on reviving outdated Levitican law. Dr. Spong finally realized this truth, and he articulated it beautifully. He went even further(as well he should have), rejecting the un-Christian leadership of highly-placed false prophets like the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Pope. Ignorance can’t hide behind fancy ecclesiastical titles! Such a forthright affirmation of the Savior’s Gospel deserved showcasing in a two-part essay, so Christ, The Gay Martyr did the honors. It was a pleasure for me to present John Shelby Spong at his very best, and wholeheartedly agree with him that “You Can’t Go Halfway” . . . you’ve got to go all the way if you want Heaven as your home!

Readers of a blog seldom know what the blogmaster may be going through behind the scenes. The company I worked for was re-organized, and I was sent to a new department. Between March and October of 2009, I suffered persistent sexual orientation harassment at the hands of my new supervisor and some of her staff. It involved open ridicule of my personal appearance, being told that I was "dumb" and unsuited to work in the department, being given bogus work procedures to follow, being pressured to resign, having my personal property stolen and, worst of all, being ordered to take part in Medicare prescription drug fraud. (I refused to do so, and that refusal hastened the end of my employment.) Stuffed Animal may come across like a firebrand on the printed page, but in my true identity of Don Charles, a mild-mannered call center agent, I often felt as helpless as a baby. I’d run into hetero-bigotry on the job a few years before, but compared to the treatment I got at “Hydra” Health Systems, that was just a bad dream! A more horrendous work experience is hard to imagine; I was regularly browbeaten, manipulated and demeaned. It did my ferocious online image no good to share that experience with readers, but I knew I had to do so if anything positive were ever to come of it. The four-part narrative I eventually named “Diary Of A Gay Wage Slave” began as “The Invisible Monster”, an less ambitious piece about the unique forms of workplace harassment that Gay employees face. Up until recently, you could find that essay posted in the diary section of Pam’s House Blend; but for this blog, I decided to make the monster as visible as I could. I worked up scribbled notes into a diary covering my entire one-year-eleven-month tenure as a “Hydra” employee. Names were changed for legal reasons, but anybody who ever worked at this corrupt company will easily recognize it. An update: I've expanded the diary into five parts and moved it to the Special Features section of my new blog, Ignorance Is Plentiful. I've replaced it here with a new Gay Rights manifesto called "Trouble The Waters."

For years, I waited to write a 10th anniversary commemoration of the 2000 Gay film festival favorite Big Eden. Finally, in January of 2010, it was time. I was in a thoroughly dour mood after writing "Diary Of A Gay Wage Slave", but reviewing this wonderful DVD raised my spirits. After watching far too many poorly-acted, semi-pornographic Gay films, to say Thomas Bezucha’s small town romantic comedy was a breath of fresh air is an understatement. There are so many things I love about Big Eden: The fact that Gay and Straight people aren't pitted against each other; the fact that the male couple is intercultural; the fact that elderly people have major roles; the fact that family values are emphasized(real family values, not the fake Tony Perkins kind); the fact that vintage Country tunes feature on the (never-released) soundtrack; and especially the fact that Gay men and Lesbians are fully integrated into this rural community. There are no dimly lit Gay bars to be found anywhere in this film! The closing scene, where Gay and Straight couples share a public dance floor looks so natural, it's disarming. A Gay director dared to visualize the kind of prejudice-free world we’re all supposed to be striving for, but that proved to be more than a lot of folks could handle. They knew how to react to another bad movie about “queers”. They weren’t prepared for an excellent movie about human beings who just happened to be homosexual. To date, nobody has made a finer film about same-gender love, and that fact deserves celebrating. Incidentally, after much behind-the-scenes fireworks on my part, amazon.com has finally removed the word “queers” from its online review of Big Eden. Thank the Lord for small victories! It’s not just that the pejorative was inappropriate, it was false advertising! As the title of my essay confirms, “Nobody’s Queer In Big Eden.”

Previously, I've called attention to the shocking anti-Gay atmosphere found on the island of Jamaica, where bloodthirsty mobs chase LGBT folk through the streets, and hate crimes are all but encouraged by the local government. More recently, I learned that similar barbaric conditions exist all over the continent of Africa. Gay and Transsexual Africans live under constant threat of rape, assault, murder, deportation, punitive fines, imprisonment and even the death penalty! Small wonder that they suffer from depression, anxiety and low self-esteem, and HIV transmission among same-gender-loving African men is off the charts. In “Africa Screams”, I juxtaposed medical data with information about anti-Gay persecution in several African countries. Using this method, I proved that heterosexism is more than just prejudice. It’s a documentable health hazard! This essay probably has the most sexually explicit content of any I’ve ever written, but the graphic descriptions were necessary to get my point across. Rev. Candace Chellew-Hodge, who cross-posted this piece on her Whosoever website, thinks I did.

When I realized the end of this blog was near, I asked God to let me send it off with a “bang”. Over the course of three months, I cobbled together the trio of provocative essays that make up my March 2010 post “Life During Wartime.” Individually, these essays sum up everything I tried to achieve with Christ, The Gay Martyr: Consciousness-raising about the need for dignity, the need to use religion as a liberation tool, and the need to become a more potent force politically. Other than my pal Jerry Maneker, nobody in the Gay blogosphere is treating these issues, at least not in the way I treat them. All too often, Gay blogs are vehicles for gossip, sarcasm, frivolity, rude humor, radical posturing and pornographic content. Posting is done too hastily, and the messages lack substance. Just as often, evidence of a blogmaster’s raging ego is so strong, it practically slaps you upside the head! I've got an ego, too, but with CTGM, I tried not to be the center of attention. I wanted give God the glory and give important issues the priority. I believed in putting the maximum amount of careful thought into what I posted, even if weeks went by between updates; and if I slapped anybody, I did so to wake them up out of a complacent stupor, and never for provocation’s sake alone! I wanted to improve the brand, and with God’s help, I think I was successful.

Corporate encroachment on the United States government continues unabated under the Obama administration. Truth to tell, it's accelerating! That’s alarming enough, but when you see millions of Progressives eager to be led down the garden path, it’s absolutely frightening! HR 3590, signed into law on 21 March 2010, is one of the biggest taxpayer giveaways to Wall Street ever: Mandated private health insurance buy-ins for everyone! Tax penalties for those who refuse to buy in! Weak cost controls! Unsustainable government subsidies! In other words, a disaster! President Obama and the Democrats packaged this legislation, most of it written by AHIP(America's Health Insurance Plans), as a gift to Main Street. Republicans played into their hands by fabricating such wild falsehoods about it, they lost all credibility. Meanwhile, a chorus of Left-leaning pundits and bloggers cheered the bogus reform legislation on, despite its lack of a publicly-funded option and many other red flags. A handful of Progressive activists like Ralph Nader, Taylor Marsh, Marcia Angell and Jane Hamsher were brave enough to put the inconvenient truth out there, but nobody wanted to hear it. Even if they had, I doubt those scattered voices would've been enough to stop the juggernaut gravy train bound for the health insurance industry's bottom line. I was (and still am) disgusted at the Left Wing; for daring to give Democrats permission to serve the fat cats, I nailed it to the wall! Likening their disfunctional relationship to a well-known comic book love triangle, I concluded that “It’s All About Veronica”. It's certainly not about the American taxpayer! More and more, I think political Independents are the only ones who can save our democracy from a Trojan Horse-style corporate takeover.

I've written a bonus essay for you. It's brand new. I call it "Their Worm Never Dies", a phrase taken from the 23rd chapter of Matthew. The sinister title mirrors its sinister subject matter: Child sexual abuse by Catholic priests. Like most CTGM content, it's plain-spoken and controversial, and there's a revelation in it that you may find shocking. "Worm" puts my feelings about Catholicism on record in no uncertain terms. Thank you in advance for reading it, and . . . goodbye! This blog is now inactive. I've appreciated your patronage these past five years. Some Christ, The Gay Martyr essays have been disseminated elsewhere on the Web without my knowledge, but that's fine. Feel free to do that. Just remember to credit me, Don Charles "Stuffed Animal", as author so that you won't be guilty of plagiarism! Visit me at my new blog, Ignorance Is Plentiful, where another Dumb Dora Awards ceremony is liable be held any day now.

Their Worm Never Dies

2010-03-30T09:15:00.000-07:00

Top Vatican officials, including the future Pope Benedict XVI, did not defrock a priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys, even though several American bishops repeatedly warned them that failure to act on the matter could embarrass the Church, according to Church files newly unearthed as part of a lawsuit. The internal correspondence from bishops in Wisconsin directly to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope, shows that while Church officials tussled over whether the priest should be dismissed, their highest priority was protecting the Church from scandal. The documents emerge as Pope Benedict is facing other accusations that he and direct subordinates often did not alert civilian authorities or discipline priests involved in sexual abuse when he served as an archbishop in Germany and as the Vatican’s chief doctrinal enforcer.

-Laurie Goodstein, The New York Times, 24 March 2010

People are talking about a new YouTube video that satirizes the Catholic church's sex abuse scandal. In it, parents treat their children with a canned spray product called Priest-Off, designed to repel pedophile priests. A split screen comparison shows what happens when a child isn’t treated (he is cornered by a group of lustful clergymen) to what happens when he is(perv priests back off, like vampires fleeing from a crucifix). Thanks to Priest-Off, Catholic families live happily ever after . . . The End.

The video is super campy, which means Gay web surfers are a sizable portion of its target audience. "LOL! Funniest thing I ever saw!" is a typical response to this dubious attempt at humor. Sorry, but I don't get the joke! Child predators are not pests; they're monsters! Priest-Off? How about Priest-In-Custody? The topics of pedophilia and pederasty don't tickle my funny bone, and they never will. Mothers who discover that their sons have been sexually abused do not smile, as the actress does in this video. I found the scene where pedophile priests pounce on the “untreated” boy especially disturbing. What profound moral deterioration our society suffers from, to ever consider child victimization a legitimate source of giggles and guffaws!

I was equally disturbed by a telecast of "Larry King Live" last night that featured a panel discussion on the scandal. As often is the case, King overloaded a too-short segment with guests, effectively reducing the conversation to a series of sound bites. His panelists included several male abuse victims, two priests, and for that all-important celebrity appeal, Irish Catholic singer Sinéad O'Connor. Also on hand was an apologist named William Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. If you want to see the ugly face of Catholicism, look no farther than this reactionary bully!

To a man, the abuse victims all called for the Pope's resignation; they believed that, in his previous job of Doctrinal Prefect, he had failed to adequately discipline pedophile priests. The consensus was that there may have been a cover-up on Joseph Ratzinger's part. Some years ago, Sinéad O'Connor sharply criticized the Pope during a notorious “Saturday Night Live” guest spot, but here she adopted a disappointing, overly conciliatory position. She seemed to buy into the idea that there was a conspiracy to smear the Pope, and naïvely recommended that all abusers come forward and turn themselves in. The priests also struck a conciliatory tone, suggesting that a Papal apology should suffice to diffuse the uproar. As if!

Then it was Mr. Donohue's turn to speak. Almost shouting at the top of his lungs, he bellowed "the Pope is being slandered" several times. He defended the Vatican’s actions, denied that there had ever been a cover-up, implied that the victims were exaggerating, and scapegoated Gay Priests for the scandal. He also claimed that the issue at hand was "homosexuality", not pedophilia, since most of the boys molested by priests had been "post-pubescent". Talk about splitting hairs! I was beside myself with fury when he told Larry King that raping youngsters was merely "what Gay men do." This vicious lie has long been a Vatican talking point, but Mr. Donohue added insult to injury with his insolent phrasing.

When King inquired why he wasn't angry about the children who'd been preyed upon, Donohue snarled that he would beat up a pedophile if he ever came in contact with one. Would he, now? Such exemplary Christian behavior! It was all a carefully rehearsed act on his part, a diversionary ploy designed to intimidate Vatican critics and shift the focus of conversation away from child sexual abuse. It worked! By the end of the segment, concern about these crimes had been superceded by concern for the Church, and some of the guests pledged their allegiance to Pope Ratzinger. It was a nauseating spectacle, but for me, not a surprise.

I'm not Catholic. I never have been, but I've worked with Catholics at various times in my life. My observation is that they have better obedience training than most dogs! To be sure, I've met Catholics who dissent from orthodox teachings, but they've been few and far-between. Most that I've known have toed a strict Vatican line. Jesus Christ called his flock "sheep", but I don't think he ever wanted the faithful to be as sheepish as lay Catholics are! One minute they're outraged about clergy victimizing children, and the next minute they're fretting over having possibly offended the Church hierarchy. No wonder so many children were afraid to tell their parents about sexual abuse! With Catholic clergy held in such blinding awe, there was no guarantee of a compassionate reaction.

MATTHEW 18: 10-14
(Jesus Christ said) "Take care that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I tell you, in Heaven their angels continuously see the face of My Father . . . it is not the will of your Father in Heaven that one of these little ones should be lost."

MATTHEW 25: 40
(Jesus Christ said) "And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.'"

Mainstream Catholicism turns the Savior's teaching about caring for the least among us on its head! Instead, the welfare of the rich and powerful Vatican is prioritized. Its reputation must be protected before any other concerns are addressed. Reverence for the Holy See is mandatory for believers. The Pope is infallible, even divine, a supreme authority who must never be doubted or questioned. Lay Catholics have internalized these unwritten rules, and they habitually fall in line like (dare I say it?) docile children. Their behavior is obsequious in the extreme! Whenever I see it, I have to ask myself: Who are they really worshiping? The Pope, or God? Can they not distinguish between the two?

EXODUS 20: 1-5
Then God spoke all these words: "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in Heaven above, or that is on the Earth beneath, or that is in the water under the Earth. You shall not bow down to them or worship them . . ."

I've also had contact with Catholic priests now and then. Sometimes, that has not been a pleasant experience. Once, years ago, I did a poetry reading at a local Gay bookstore. I must have been in my early 30s then, but I've always looked young for my age. In the audience was an elderly priest sporting his clerical collar. After the reading, he came up and put his hands on me in an unseemly manner. Pulling me close, he began caressing my face, head and neck.

I’d have objected to anyone taking such liberties, but a clergyman? It was shocking. My obvious discomfort seemed to panic him, and he left the bookstore very quickly after that. Some other members of the audience witnessed what had happened, and I recall them crowding around, asking if I was all right. I was all right, but what if I'd been one of his parishioners? How much further would he have tried to go with me then? And how much further had he gone with others?

What is it about the Catholic church that sexual harassers (of both children and adults) find so attractive? I think it's the unquestioned authority. If you love to dominate other people, Catholicism is the religion that will support you in doing it! It's very much a top-down faith. The hierarchy demands slavish devotion, best exemplified by the requirement to kneel down and kiss the Pope’s ring. Up until recently, cardinals and priests were also revered in this pompous way. Watching that ritual has always made me flinch; I’ve never seen a more explicit expression of idolatry.

I used to work for Catholic Charities as an administrative assistant. I could tell you stories about that agency fit to make your hair stand on end, but I'll limit myself to this one memory: I'll never forget how priests would storm into the office, ordering everybody around and demanding to be the center of attention. It was typical of what I’ve observed over the years. The Pope and all too many cardinals, bishops, priests and nuns relish lording it over their flock. Their attitude seems to be: I am the equivalent of God, and Catholic converts are my subjects. They must do my bidding! I can even use them as my playthings if I so desire. Add sexual perversion and sexual hypocrisy to these delusions of grandeur, place them in a culture of secrecy, and you’ve got all the necessary ingredients for a predatory atmosphere.

Many times over the past fifty years, we know that the hands which placed Holy Wafers on the tongues of Church members were the same hands that molested innocent children. I’m surprised the touch of those wafers didn’t singe those wicked hands! As if they were playing a game of musical chairs, bishops bounced these monsters from parish to parish where, more often than not, they polished their rape technique. What utter depravity! The Savior teaches forgiveness, but how is it possible to forgive such a hideous thing? How can anyone even think about holding membership in an institution that would commit such horrors? How dare anyone value the Pope's reputation over the safety of a child? What kind of systematic brainwashing gives birth to such a twisted mentality?

MARK 9: 43-48
(Jesus Christ said) "If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off! It is better for you to enter Life maimed than to have two hands and to go to Hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off! It is better for you to enter Life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into Hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out! It is better for you to enter the Kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into Hell, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched."

I'm sending out an urgent message to all Catholics, but especially to Gay priests: Cut off that offensive appendage. Run away from the Church of Babylon! Run for your spiritual lives! Take your precious faith elsewhere before it drowns in a sea of manipulation, cynicism and corruption. For as long as you remain in the rectory, you will be tainted by the pedophilia scandal. It won't be a guilt-by-association thing, either. The Vatican will actively scapegoat you, just like William Donohue did on "Larry King Live", and when your true identity is discovered, you'll be cruelly drummed out of your beloved profession.

Take my advice and quit before that happens! You've been living in sin anyway, hiding your born eunuch status (see Part Two of my essay titled "Life During Wartime") in order to keep your job. Even if colleagues in your immediate circle know that you're Gay, you're still hiding from higher-ups, and living on borrowed time. Repent of this mendacity! Don't our Commandments forbid the bearing of false witness? Come fully out of the closet, and come fully out of that wicked Church! Nothing better could happen to you. Consider becoming a Reform Catholic. Stop idolizing the Vatican and start serving the one true Lord and Savior. It's not just your livelihood you're risking, it's your immortal soul!

I'm sure by now I'm perceived as thoroughly anti-Catholic. That's a reasonable deduction to make, but it's not just mainstream Catholicism that I disapprove of. Anybody who reads this blog regularly knows I feel the same way about other denominations. Flip back through some of my past posts, like "Satan In The Pulpit", “March Down Babylon”, “Spiritual Sadism”, “Anytime You’re Ready”, “You Can’t Go Halfway”, “Loved In The Worst Way”, “The Miseducation of Donnie McClurkin” and “Church Of The Poisoned Mind”. You'll see that Protestants probably get the lion’s share of my scorn!

But the Church of Babylon knows no denomination: It can be Catholic or Protestant, Baptist, Mormon, COGIC, Methodist, Presbyterian, Jehovah's Witness, Scientologist, even Muslim, Jewish, Hindu or Buddhist. It could be a church that worships Groucho Marx . . . whatever! Any church that demonizes God's LGBT children and/or campaigns against their Civil Rights is Babylonian in orientation.

However, the Catholic church deserves special condemnation! It doesn't demonize Gay people to affirm its doctrines, but rather to divert attention from its historical coddling of sex criminals. Beware, Vatican hypocrites! The worm that never dies is hungry for you! Slandering of the Pope is really of little consequence. Slandering of Jesus Christ is what you should be worried about!

God is watching the Vatican. He sees the transgressions that have been committed behind its pious façade. Growing numbers of lay Catholics are starting to see past the deception, too. The Savior never spoke truer than when he prophesied: Nothing is hidden that will not be disclosed, nor is anything secret that will not become known(Luke 8:17). The truth will always come out! Sooner or later, everybody's going to realize that just as you can't draw pure water from a filthy, rusted water pipe, you can't draw pure Christian doctrine from the filthy Church of Babylon. This realization can't happen fast enough for millions of Catholic children.

MATTHEW 23: 23-28
(Jesus Christ said) "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: Justice, and mercy, and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others . . . woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup, so that the outside may also become clean. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and all kinds of filth. So you also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness."

For more revelations about Catholic church complicity in child sexual abuse, follow this link:

http://www.advocate.com//Society/Commentary/Priestly_Sins/

It's All About Veronica

2010-03-21T10:09:00.000-07:00

I am a Left-leaning Independent voter, but I have little respect for the political Left. Strange as it may sound, I feel a stronger connection with the rural Conservative voter who predominates in my home state of Missouri. Mind you, I don't share his narrow-minded views, and I harbor no illusions about him: This voter can be extremely xenophobic, sexist, heterosexist, even racist, and he falls for just about any candidate who comes along waving a flag and brandishing a Bible.

Yet, he is truly passionate about his moral values and the issues that affirm them: Small government, strong national defense, gun rights, frequent tax cuts, and blending of church and state, which dictates his feelings about Gay Rights and abortion. For sure, he's a stone reactionary, but he's for real! Politics is serious business for him. Seldom is he swayed by a photogenic face or a list of made-to-order promises. His loyalty is triggered by slavish fidelity to his core issues, and he’ll kick to the curb any Republican politician who doesn't honor them. He will make a litmus test of a candidate's voting record in order to justify or deny him support at the polls. Presidential nominee John McCain failed to pass the test, and as a result, he never secured the Republican base. The rural Conservative brings a passionate commitment to voting his beliefs. He has unquestionably changed the face of American government, and for that I respect him.

By contrast, the urban Progressive voter (who lives in the suburbs as often as not) isn't terribly passionate about anything! He can make you believe otherwise, though, by the fired-up way he talks(Liberals love to give and listen to stirring speeches; that's one of the main reasons they supported Barack Obama). Yes, there are issues that he somewhat cares about: Unjust war, the environment, corporate greed, immigration reform, minority rights, women's rights, jobs, health care . . . but he will readily brush them all aside so that the "right" candidate can be elected. What makes a candidate the right one for an urban Liberal isn't his position on issues, but merely his opposition to whoever is on the Republican ticket. Often, the Democrat will be almost as Conservative as the Republican! Party affiliation matters most in the end, not ideology.

It's almost a snob thing. My observation has been that urban Progressives look down their noses at Conservative politics; they think of the constituency as "dumbasses", while they dismiss the candidates as "idiots". Never mind that these idiots won the balance of national elections during the last century; the means used to get them elected, like concentration on a single issue, religion-based campaign appeals and unabashed patriotism, are too crude for a Progressive to even consider emulating. Liberals pride themselves on being politically sophisticated. Yes, indeedy! Wanna know just how sophisticated they are? They'll justify returning an ineffective or double-crossing politician to office over and over again by arguing "he's the lesser of two evils" and/or "sometimes, you just have to hold your nose and do what's practical".

Political sophistication notwithstanding, urban Progressive voters are far more gullible than their Conservative counterparts are. Their elected officials hardly need to ply them with jingoistic rhetoric before sneaking off with a corporate lobbyist. Truth be told, they don't have to sneak! Democrat politicians cuckold their constituents fairly openly, confident that their incumbency is secure no matter how often they bed down with Right Wing special interests.

When urban Progressives learn about these illicit affairs, they predictably throw a hissy fit. They bitch and whine for a little while, but eventually they throw hands up in the air and say: "What other choice do we have?" Then they go to the polls, obediently pull the Democrat lever as always, and get far less than what they claim to have wanted . . . as always! With rural Conservative voters, it's a different story. Lobbyist hanky panky doesn't faze them much, but if a Republican incumbent strays from their reactionary platform, they drop him like a hot potato and flock to the local Tea Party! They will cede both local and national races to Democrats rather than elect an unreliable Conservative. Ideological infidelity simply isn’t tolerated among that crowd.

Left Wing voters are doormats. Suckers! They don't care if their candidates' love is untrue. They're like the late Tammy Wynette singing "Stand By Your Man", blindly hanging on to a cheating, contemptuous lover. They're like Hillary Clinton, enduring marriage to a philanderer husband who subjects her to the worst kind of public humiliation. They're like Betty Cooper, a hapless comic book character I've cited before on this blog: Betty pursues Archie Andrews even though he jilts her repeatedly and flirts shamelessly with Veronica Lodge in front of everyone.

Nothing better illustrates the Liberal voter's blind allegiance to Democrats than his unqualified support for President Obama’s idea of health care reform. First, Liberals said they had to have single payer coverage, but that turned out to be a lie. Then they wanted Medicare for all, but they quickly abandoned that goal, too. Finally, all hope for a "public option" evaporated. Even with no public financing option to make the legislation affordable, urban Progressives fell head-over-heels for Democrat Party sweet talk: We'll close the prescription drug "doughnut hole", we'll mandate coverage for pre-existing conditions, we'll get young adults coverage under their parents’ health plans, smack, smooch, slurp!

Drunk with partisan love, Progressives toed the party line and shouted down every cautionary voice, insisting that "it's better for Congress to pass something than nothing at all." (You know, like when you kiss a horny toad instead of that elusive Prince Charming, and you can hardly tell the difference?) They seemed almost eager to have their attention diverted from a most ominous fact: That the Obama plan legally mandates Americans to buy insurance from the private sector, with negligible cost controls.

Ignoring a troublesome truth like that takes some doing! It's quite remarkable, how determined Progressives were this time to once again see a stark naked Emperor sporting fine clothes. On a recent edition of the PBS series "Bill Moyers Journal", Harvard Medical School professor Marcia Angell lay the ugly truth on Moyers' overwhelmingly Liberal audience, and she didn't mince words:

MARCIA ANGELL: What this bill does is not only permit the commercial insurance industry to remain in place, but it actually expands and cements their position as the lynchpin of health care reform. And these companies, they profit by denying health care, not providing health care. And they will be able to charge whatever they like! So if they're regulated in some way, and it cuts into their profits, all they have to do is just raise their premiums, and they'll do that. Not only does (the Obama bill) keep them in place, but it pours about 500 billion dollars of public money into these companies over 10 years. And it mandates that people buy these companies' products for whatever they charge! Now, that's a recipe for the growth in health care costs, not only to continue, but to skyrocket, to grow even faster.

Holy second Wall Street bailout, Batman!

BILL MOYERS: But given that, why have the insurance companies, health insurance companies, been fighting reform so hard?

MARCIA ANGELL: Oh, they haven't fought it very hard, Bill! They really haven't fought it very hard. What they're fighting for is the individual mandate. And if they get that mandate, if everyone does have to buy their commercial products, then they're going to be extremely happy with it.

BILL MOYERS: But this is all about politics now. It's not about pure health care reform. So, given that reality, what would you have the President do?

MARCIA ANGELL: Well, I think you really do have to separate the policy analysis from the political analysis, and I'm looking at it as policy. And it fails as policy . . . there are a lot of people who say, "Look, it's a terrible bill! Even a step in the wrong direction, as policy goes. But we need to get Obama elected again, and we need to continue with the Democratic majority in Congress. And so we need to give Obama and the Democrats a win. If we don't, the Republicans will come in and take over Congress in the fall, and then the White House in 2012.” But the problem with a political analysis is, sometimes you're right and sometimes you're wrong! And Democrats, and particularly Liberals, have a history of outsmarting themselves . . . I'm not so sure that if this bill goes down, it's going to make it any harder for them politically. (There will be) difficult times for the President and for the Democrats, (but) the issue is: Will this bill make (the coverage problem) better or worse? And I believe it will make it worse . . . it will take money out of Medicare and put it into the private sector. Medicare is the source for a lot of the funds that (will) subsidize the private health insurance industry. So that's the first thing, (and) as far as cost-cutting (goes), there are, sort of, promissory notes: “We'll get a committee to look at the cost of effectiveness, of various medical procedures.” (The Congressional Budget Office) has to build in assumptions, (but) those assumptions are arguable, to put it mildly.

Holy Medicare fund raid, Batman!

BILL MOYERS: Well, you remind me 45,000 people . . . die every year for lack of health insurance.

MARCIA ANGELL: It's not lack of health insurance. It's lack of health care! There is a difference between health insurance and health care. You can have insurance offered that is too expensive to buy or too expensive to use. What good does it do? And what happens when this occurs, is that . . . instead of improvements, look at my state of Massachusetts . . . you see (coverage) shredded even further. You see more people denied access anyway. Now (there are) over 60,000 people in my state who are exempted from the (mandatory Massachusetts health) plan for financial hardship, and this is also in the Obama plan. If you're really poor, you don't have to participate, and these are the very people who should be in a plan . . .

BILL MOYERS: But, the very poor do get Medicaid.

MARCIA ANGELL: Yes, yes. And one of the things about the Obama plan that I do like is that it expands Medicaid up to 133% of the Federal poverty level, and that's fine. The problem is that (it) could have been a stand-alone measure. You didn't need to have it incorporated in this massive Rube Goldberg apparatus . . . the bill as a whole, the more I look at it, the worse it gets. It's going to increase (consumer) costs, not decrease them.

Also, read these assessments of President Obama's health care legislation from Huffington Post contributor Taylor Marsh and Jane Hamsher of firedoglake.com:

http://www.taylormarsh.com/2010/03/18/how-a-bad-bill-becomes-historic/

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2010/03/22/fdl-statement-on-the-passage-of-the-health-care-bill/

As Dr. Angell indicated, Democrats have promised to iron the "bugs" out of this bill later on, after it's been signed into law. We've heard that kind of promise before. Remember NAFTA? Even with Democrat majorities in both houses of Congress, the job-destroying directives of that disastrous "free trade" agreement appear to be set in stone. So much for fixing flawed legislation later! Politicians sure don’t have a good record on that score.

I have never bought into the fiction that what’s good for the Democrat or Republican parties is always good for the nation. The urban Progressive voter's blind loyalty to Democrats is an abusive and unfaithful relationship that's going nowhere fast. That's why millions of former Democrats like myself now identify as Independent. We don't want any more Democrat Party kisses because we know where that donkey's puckered lips have been: Planted on the talcum-powdered backsides of Wall Street fat cats and rich Conservative campaign donors! Lips that kiss corporate ass will never touch ours again. Sloppy seconds may be good enough for Betty Cooper, but the American people deserve better.

American government deserves better, too! When a billion-dollar Wall Street bailout zooms though Congress like greased lightning, but health care reform stalls for years and can't pass until after it's been gutted by the insurance industry, how much more obvious can infidelity be? Where’s the logic in hanging on to a boyfriend (or an elected representative) once you know he's fallen for a spoiled rich girl? If it's all about Veronica, nothing’s left for Betty that's worth having. Cynical, sellout career politicians will destroy our democracy sooner than any terrorist bomb!

If they're really serious about their core issues(and I've yet to be convinced that they are), Progressive voters had better put that long-suffering lover act to bed. They need to stop being so damn sophisticated and try being more passionate, like those "dumbass" Right Wingers. When we demand reform of health care, military policy, financial regulations, etcetera, we've got to back up those demands in the voting booth! If we fail to do so, we get exactly the kind of impotent public policy we deserve. Fidelity to issues must determine what we do at the polls, not smug political gamesmanship! Love is not a game, and neither is good government. The American voter should develop a healthy aversion to cuckolding, regardless of party affiliation.

In closing this essay, let me turn the podium over to Dr. Marcia Angell once more. She states her case so articulately, it’s a pleasure to do so. The following quote comes from a 2000 PBS television special titled “Health Care Crisis: Who’s At Risk?”

Our health care system is based on the premise that health care is a commodity like VCRs or computers, and that it should be distributed according to the ability to pay in the same way that consumer goods are. That's not what health care should be! Health care is a need; it's not a commodity, and it should be distributed according to need. If you're very sick, you should have a lot of it. If you're not sick, you shouldn't have a lot of it. But this should be seen as a personal, individual need, not as a commodity to be distributed like other marketplace commodities. That is a fundamental mistake in the way this country, and only this country, looks at health care. And that market ideology is what has made the health care system so dreadful, so bad at what it does.

Preach, doctor, preach! Thanks for indulging me with this one last bit of political punditry. Next time: Christ, The Gay Martyr’s Final Book of Testimony.

Life During Wartime (Part One)

2010-03-03T14:08:00.000-08:00

This Ain't No Party . . .

Christ, The Gay Martyr will cease being an active blog soon. Before that happens, I'd like to put some final thoughts on record.

On Super Bowl Sunday 2010, the CBS network telecast the big game. The commercials that ran between plays are worth taking note of. CBS reversed a long-standing ban on issue-advocacy commercials and aired an explicit anti-abortion message from Focus On The Family. Most Gay people should know Focus On The Family as a vicious anti-Gay propaganda organization which portrays us as child predators and funds "ex-Gay" movements. CBS had worked extensively with the group to refine the ad and finesse its ideological message, At the same time, the network rejected an ad from a Gay couples matchmaking website. In its place ran a highly offensive commercial featuring two effeminate men engaged in "b*tch slaps".

I take three lessons from these facts. 1) That CBS has no respect for its Gay viewers. 2) That CBS respects and wants to court Right Wing viewers. 3) That if I respect myself, I must never watch the CBS network again.

I grew up with the network of "The Evening News with Walter Cronkite," "The Ed Sullivan Show", "Perry Mason" and "I Love Lucy". It is now as much a part of my past as those shows are. Also part of my past is Pacifica Radio's "Democracy Now!", a talk show that I faithfully tuned into for several years. Its host, Amy Goodman, allows her guests to call LGBT people "queers". She has occasion to refer to them that way, too, and she ignores repeated listener complaints. I will never listen to "Democracy Now!" again! These are actions I must take for the sake of maintaining my dignity as a Gay man.

Some would accuse me of overreacting, of being "politically correct." Well, if my politics aren't correct, what's the point of me engaging in the political process? LGBT Americans need to draw a line in the sand, and incidents of brazen disrespect are where we should draw it. I'm not OK with disrespect! Are you? If so, why? Nobody should be OK with disrespect, especially the kind that fuels ignorance, misogyny and heterosexism. We've got to start taking disrespect seriously! When it's intense enough, disrespect can escalate into disturbing problems like vilification, disenfranchisement, violence and genocide. Don't look now, but that's already happened! It's been happening for a long time.

If you're Gay, you can be legally deprived of housing and employment in most parts of the United States. The international picture is even more grave. You can be executed in Iran. You can be murdered in México. You can be flogged in Nigeria. You can be fined in Burundi, banned in Cuba, detained in China, imprisoned in Malawi, denounced in Poland and censored in Lithuania. You can be chased by mobs in Kenya, stoned by mobs in Jamaica, beaten up by police in Russia, and tortured to death by Muslim extremists in Iraq. You're sure to be legislated against in Uganda, rounded up in Egypt, deported from the United Arab Emirates, and sent to a labor camp in North Korea. Your human rights are protested in Spain, Zimbabwe, and India, and your existence is criminalized in more foreign countries than I can count; not to mention escalating rates of anti-Gay violence in the United States. And believe me, horrific things can happen to you anywhere if you're Transsexual! Very few countries in the world are safe for you to live in. Check out this State Department report:

http://gay.americablog.com/2010/03/state-dept-documents-anti-gay-violence.html

Among the many issues important to LGBT folk, there are none that need be prioritized over others. They're all pressing concerns, and they demand acting on simultaneously. Each Gay, Bisexual or Transsexual person prioritizes issues according to his or her own personal needs. That's the way it should be; I've always said so.

However, I do believe there is one overarching issue that unites us all, regardless of ideology, gender, class, color, or national origin: Safety! The right to be secure in your LGBT person. The right to live, work, study and play without being beaten up, raped or killed. Freedom from endless threats and taunts. Freedom from hearing yourself denounced as a menace to society. Freedom from pressure to marry, produce children, identify as male or female, dress in a certain way, or join an "ex-Gay" program. Freedom from the indignity of seeing your citizenship downgraded to second-class! In other words, we need a world in which our basic humanity is respected. In most of the world, even large parts of the United States, such respect does not exist! Everything we do as activists, no matter which issues we prioritize, must somehow be connected to the goal of expanding our safe space.

Knowing how hazardous it usually is to live as a perceptibly LGBT person outside the western world, it infuriates me to see how frivolously and recklessly American Gay people behave! For too many of us, equality goals pale in comparison to the next circuit party, the next steamy porn video, the next over-the-top Pride parade, or the next personal appearance by Lady Gaga. We totally take for granted the relative freedom we enjoy, and seem clueless about how quickly it could be taken away. It happened before, in Weimar Germany during the 1930s. It could easily happen again! All that's necessary is a combination of grave economic times and angry, demoralized masses. Hello! Under such circumstances, citizens are quick to embrace reactionary agendas. We'd better be watching our backs! What do you bet that when our power-hungry Bible bigot enemies see us acting out, they don't also see the word "scapegoat" written across our Pride banners in huge letters?

Some of us believe that humor is the best weapon to use against Right Wingers. The security value of clowning has been greatly exaggerated; Michael Musto can go on cable TV and dress up in Sarah Palin drag as many times as he likes, but she'll never be intimidated by him! Mind you, humor can be a weapon against bigotry, but it's not the best one. The best way to fight any form of ignorance is with education. Behavior that reinforces perceptions of Gay people as celebrity-worshipping, trash-talking, party-hopping, outrageously attired(or barely attired), sex-and-drug-crazed exhibitionists doesn't educate anybody; it leaves ignorance intact.

I've been labeled a "drama queen", and I'm often told to "lighten up" with my criticism of so-called Gay culture. Lighten up, my Black Gay Christian ass! Taking our condition too lightly is precisely the problem. A world where Matthew Shepard, Brandon Teena and Lateisha Green weren't allowed to live and where untold numbers of Gay and Transsexual children are driven to consider suicide isn't a world where LGBT folk can afford to act stereotypically "light in the loafers". David Byrne and Talking Heads said it best on their 1979 cult hit "Life During Wartime": This ain't no party/this ain't no Disco/This ain't no foolin' around!*

At the end of 2009, I listened to TV and radio pundits sum up the year in issues. The only ones who said anything about Gay issues were Gay pundits! We are not taken seriously by the mainstream media. Why should we be, given how the media portrays us? Remember that Gay matchmaking ad I spoke about, the one that CBS rejected? I got a chance to see it online. It played same-gender love for belly laughs, like an outtake from "Saturday Night Live". This kind of burlesque imagery was barely an improvement over the "b*tchy queens" ad that did air. When the Right-leaning Straight media makes LGBT folk out to be freaks and clowns, Left-leaning Gay media should be trying to undo the damage. Instead, it damages us more, eagerly adding its own slanderous, demeaning characterizations to the mix.

It aggressively promotes a lexicon of disrespect. Pundits, journalists and talk show hosts work overtime at "reclaiming" heterosexist insults for casual use: "Queer", "gender queer", "queen", "homo", "f*g", "d*ke", "tranny". Suddenly, you can find this ugly terminology everywhere! Now progressive educators who want to validate LGBT students see nothing wrong with mounting "Queer Day" celebrations on campus. One of these misguided events took place last year in Chico, California. Lord deliver me! How much more difficult does going to school need to be for Gay kids?

And how likely is it that a prominent LesBiGay professional like Anderson Cooper, Robin Roberts or Steve Osunsami would want to come and speak to a "Queer Day" assembly? Why does Gay media want to make it harder for role models to leave the closet? Do they really think popularizing slurs won't have negative consequences? There's a heavy price to be paid for identifying your own minority group with sneering put-downs. That price is credibility.

Let me illustrate the importance of credibility in another way. Mexican-American actor Gilbert Roland, one of the stars of Hollywood's Golden Age, was a Bisexual man. In the late 1940s, he briefly took over the role of the Cisco Kid, and in such films as The Gay Cavalier(1946) and King Of The Bandits(1948), he dared to give the character a subtly Bisexual edge. A scene where Cisco and another man suggestively smoke cigarettes together is amazing. So is another where Cisco kisses his faithful companion, Pancho, full on the lips. The scene is not comedic; the two of them are about to be executed. Gilbert Roland was definitely not your father's Cisco Kid! But his interpretation of the character was more than just sexually groundbreaking. Roland's Cisco was suave, worldly-wise, artistically inclined and smartly dressed in high Mexican charro style. Duncan Renaldo had already played the role, and he would later put a definitive stamp on it; but audiences still respond strongly to Gilbert Roland's rich portrayal. He brought a pride and dignity to Cisco that was impossible to ignore.

Near the end of his life, Roland spoke of his desire to dignify the screen image of Latinos. "I refuse roles that picture Mexicans as ridiculous, quaint, or foolish", he stated firmly. "I (always) wanted to be sure the Mexican was not portrayed as (a) clown." Why would this be a concern to him? It's because early American cinema was rife with various Frito Bandido stereotypes which insulted both Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. At this time, Latinos suffered social discrimination similar to that Black people faced. Like Sidney Poitier and other socially-conscious stars who followed in his wake, Gilbert Roland understood how uplifting positive media representations are for a downtrodden community. Had he ever portrayed an explicitly Gay or bisexual character, I’m sure he would’ve made that role as classy as he made the Cisco Kid. I’m also sure he would find the cartoonish, one-dimensional images of LGBT folk that populate today’s entertainment media repulsive.

Positive media images do more than just lift the spirits of a despised minority group. They help increase that minority group's credibility with the power structure. We tend to forget what being in the minority means: that we aren’t plentiful in number! This is especially true of the LGBT population. While we may actually be more plentiful than other groups, it isn't apparent because so many of us are still closeted. Also, don't forget about the fundie hate machine that cranks out anti-Gay propaganda every Sunday morning! There's still a high number of Straight people who don't know much about us other than the negative stuff they hear in church.

All too often, media images provide heterosexual folk with their only known exposure to openly homosexual folk. The majority’s impression of who and what we are is largely formed by what they see of us on screen. If they see dignified faces, they get the impression that we are a dignified group. On the other hand, if the faces they see are foolish, they get the opposite impression. That’s the difference between what Gilbert Roland did in the 1940s and what Sacha Baron Cohen(Brüno) does today. When are we finally going to move beyond our version of the Frito Bandido stereotype?

"Life During Wartime" continues with Part Two.

Life During Wartime (Part Two)

2010-03-03T13:51:00.000-08:00

This Ain't No Disco . . .

The word "Transgender", as I explained in my essay titled "The Angel Gabriel" has acquired an importance to me that I never could have predicted. I now recognize its meaning, its true meaning, as the key to Gay identity. Transgender refers to people who transcend biological gender. It has nothing to do with the idea of being "born in the wrong body", although people who feel that way do fall under its definition. So do I, a Gay man who has never strongly identified as male.

Ironically, had I been thinking about it back then, I could have gleaned the truth about gender from my high school Spanish books. In Spanish, nouns have gender. Those nouns with the prefix of "la" and that end in "a" are feminine. Those with the prefix of "el" and that end in "o" are masculine. However, there are exceptions to that rule. Some words have blended gender: la mano(the hand), el día(the day), el alma(the soul). Therefore, there are three genders in the Spanish language: Masculine, feminine and neutral. These three genders also exist in nature; LGBT existence is proof of that. It's time for people of binary gender(heterosexual men and women) to stop denying reality. We need to stop denying it, too!

Science has no definitive answer to the question of why some people are homosexual, Bisexual and Transsexual. However, Scripture does provide an answer. Care to join me for some Bible study? I promise you'll be surprised. What I have to say might even rock your world.

Correctly translated, the Book of Genesis tells us that God created humankind in His own image/In the image of God He created him/Male and female He created him. This passage establishes that God is a Transgender entity. The lower case “him" refers to Adam, whose male and female elements were split into separate bodies so that procreation could start. Men and women are two parts of a whole that long to be united; that's the reason for heterosexual attraction. So this teaching doesn't explain homosexual attraction . . . or does it? Jesus Christ revisits the creation story in the Gospel According to Matthew:

MATTHEW 19: 4-6
(Jesus Christ said) "Have you not read that the One who made them at the beginning made them male and female and said, 'for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh?' So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate.

Incorrect translation ("them" substituted for "him") has resulted in a failure of most readers, even Bible scholars, to fully grasp what this Scripture means. Mandated heterosexual marriage isn't the objective here! Men marrying women is the means to reach the objective. The goal is to "become one flesh" as they were "at the beginning". In other words, men and women must become like Adam was in the beginning. Through marriage, they approximate the blended gender that Adam possessed before Eve was created. At that time, he was modeled precisely in God’s transgender image; so the ultimate goal of marriage is to make men and women more like God.

That same chapter in the Gospel of Matthew identifies a special group of people for whom teachings on heterosexual marriage are irrelevant. Jesus Christ calls these people "eunuchs who have been so from birth”(Matthew 19:12). He also mentions eunuchs created by man-made means(castration), but born eunuchs are the ones important to this particular discussion. The word “eunuch” means “castrated man” today, but that was not so in the ancient world! Individuals believed to be of a third gender, a unisex gender, were accorded eunuch status. They also had a reputation for same-gender sexuality (one last time, let me direct readers to Faris Malik's excellent Born Eunuchs web pages for more info):

http://www.well.com/user/aquarius/index.htm

Significantly, the Savior implies that eunuchs have a connection to Heaven. Now, let’s tie all these loose strands together.

Science and religion agree that humanity evolved from a single life form. Christianity calls that life form Adam. In order for binary gender to exist today, wouldn’t that life form had to have combined male and female gender within itself? Scripture says that it did. Here is the point where evolution and creationism converge! Adam is the common denominator; and what do born eunuchs have in common with Adam? The blend of male and female in one body. So what modern day group of people fits the description of born eunuchs? Isn't it obvious?

Here, then, is Scripture's solution to the mystery of LGBT humanity: Lesbians, Gay men, Bisexual and Transsexual persons are genetic echoes of Adam in his original, undivided state. We are to humanity what the Model T was to automobiles: The original template! Didn't I say you were in for a surprise? Has your world been rocked yet? If not, then try some of this:

Transgender status, which Scripture calls Fullness, lies at the very heart of Christian faith. God's Transgender creations are the blood that courses through that pulsing heart! Contrary to common wisdom, we are not heterosexual folk who stray from their natural inclinations. We are not freaks “born in the wrong body”. We aren’t perversions of nature by any stretch of the imagination. We are a snapshot of nature as it once was! We are direct descendants of the first life form, whose gender was blended like ours. (A Gnostic Christian text known as The Egyptian Gospel makes just such a claim. See my essay titled "We Are Family" under the Blended Gender tab.)

Same-gender attraction is nothing but an expression of Fullness. People tend to focus obsessively on homosexuality, but Fullness has never only been about that! Blended gender influences behavior that isn't sexual. Rigid gender roles don’t work well for LGBT folk; we chafe under binary gender conventions, and why wouldn't we? We are as different from ordinary men and women as ordinary men and women are different from each other.

I have come to believe that Transgender or gender-neutral people are linked to God's Covenant with humankind. We’re the human counterpart of those brilliant lights in the sky which signify God's promise not to destroy the Earth. So long as that rainbow of light and the human rainbow both appear, the Covenant will be kept. And you thought our adoption of the rainbow flag was just a coincidence, didn’t you? Of course, it may well be coincidence; this theory of mine is based on an admittedly hazy understanding of Gnostic scripture. When I enter the afterlife, I'll learn whether or not I'm right!

Upon my death, I hope God will also reveal to me the names of all the prominent people in my lifetime who were Gay. If He does, I have no doubt that another theory I hold will be conclusively proven: That civilization could not exist without us! When I see the vast numbers of politicians, scientists, theologians, journalists, philosophers, business tycoons, visual and performing artists, national leaders, war heroes, doctors, lawyers, teachers, social workers, public servants and pioneers of all kinds who were and are secretly homosexual, and I take stock of their many contributions to society, I know they will dwarf those of every other minority group! There won’t be a single social class, discipline or movement that we haven’t penetrated and distinguished ourselves in.

"Queer" is so inaccurate a description of who and what we are, the word would be insulting even if it weren't derogatory. Our presence, our influence, and even our sexuality is normal and essential to the flow of life. Just imagine how much more productive we could be if there was no pressure to hide and deny our true natures. What a curious thing, to be at once so widely disseminated and so widely despised! Curious and tragic, but surely no more tragic than what civilization did to a Man from Galilee ages ago. To me, indeed, to anyone who understands that Man's Gospel, there’s no difference whatsoever between the kind of hatred directed at Him and the kind directed at us.

We haven't always been hated, though! Some cultures like the Hebrews did despise and persecute born eunuchs, but much of the ancient world revered us. Because of our gender neutrality, we were actually regarded as superior to other men and women. We were granted important roles in society, like judge, spiritual healer or chamberlain(the original connotation of the word "eunuch"). Don't get me wrong: I'm not suggesting that we adopt a Master Race theory! All I’m saying is it makes no sense for us to stagger around with crushing inferiority complexes on our backs.

We who identify as Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transsexual are a blessed people! We must reclaim blessed status from the ancient world. Those of us who, for whatever reason, insist that we choose our sexuality must let go of that fantasy. The truth can set us free, so we must begin believing the truth: That there's nothing unnatural about masculine women, effeminate men, transgender bodies or same-gender love. We are not perverts! We are not predators! We are not pedophiles! We are not mistakes. We are an integral part of both nature and religion, and the world needs to know it. We must conquer shame and take our rightful place in the mainstream of society.

Conquering shame requires cutting off the source of shame. For most LesBiGay folk, that source is the Christian Bible. It's safe to say that the Bible is the most hated of documents among Lesbians and Gay men. Nobody hated it more than me; but just a little bit of research exposed the perverse nature of Fundamentalist religion and brought me back to Christianity.

Is it necessary, then, for all LGBT folk to claim Christian faith? No, but it is crucial that we all learn how to expose the "faith-based" lies that feed our oppression. Anybody who presumes to lead our equality movement must recognize the importance of doing this! They're not worthy of leadership if they don't.

"Life During Wartime" continues with Part Three.

Life During Wartime (Part Three)

2010-03-03T13:34:00.000-08:00

This Ain't No Foolin' Around!

What I'm about to say I've said many times before. People haven't paid much attention in the past. Pardon me, then, while I hit the repeat button!

We must develop a sense of outrage at our own persecution. Without it, the equality movement cannot succeed. In particular, we must stop tolerating "faith-based" organizations that siphon our tax money while banning and condemning us! If we cooperate with our enemies when they subject us to injustices, they will do so eagerly. We must own up to our part in this state of affairs, and change our behavior accordingly.

One way to effectively fight back against organized religion would be a Truth Commission. This commission would stage hearings similar to those held in post-apartheid South Africa. We would give public testimony about how demonizing church doctrine has pushed us past the brink of suicide, torn our family bonds apart, vilified us at our own funerals, excluded us from fellowship, and done everything possible to sever our relationships with God. The Truth Commission would travel around the country soliciting testimony from LGBT Americans. In addition, religious leaders of conscience would be invited to offer apologies on behalf of their faith traditions. Naturally, the hearings would be webcast. Putting our collective victimization on record in this way could be enormously compelling! We could deal a crippling blow to the "Ex-Gay" movement, and seriously compromise the undeservedly squeaky clean image of evangelism.

Also, why don't we have a Gay Tea Party movement? Why aren't we targeting Federal and State laws that discriminate against us with the threat of taxpayer revolt? Jeanne Phillips, the advice columnist known as Dear Abby, suggested years ago that hefty tax breaks for LesBiGay citizens was a fair trade-off for discriminatory public policy. It's time to explore her idea in earnest.

Fighting bigotry is both an external and an internal process. We must check our own behavior for evidence of internalized homophobia. For example, a lot of Gay-interest blogs and websites publish photos of professional sportsmen hugging or patting one another's butts after scoring a goal. These photos are accompanied by snarky captions to the effect of that's so Gay, or snide jokes that question the players' sexual orientation.

This is reprehensible! What makes this kind of ridicule any different from the scornful f*g-baiting that heterosexual males engage in? I scolded the staff of gay.americablog.com for doing this, and much to my surprise, they removed an offending post. It's the first(and probably the last) time any Gay activist website listened to me.

Whether I'm listened to or not, facts are facts: Adopting the oppressor's methods of talking and thinking about ourselves empowers nobody but the oppressor! "Reclaiming" the hateful habits of our enemies is a monumentally foolish act, akin to hugging a venomous snake to your breast. The most vicious bite is the one you invite! I've posted this quote from the late Lesbian author Audre Lorde in countless comments sections, but it seems to resonate more strongly every time I use it: "The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." Drop those tools, dammit. Drop them now!

The most alarming effect internalized homophobia has on us comes in the form of lethal sexuality. Millions of young Gay and Bisexual men, especially those of color, risk their health with shame-based sex practices like "fisting", "sounding", "bare-backing", double penetration, auto-erotic asphyxiation and promiscuity. Alcohol and drugs tend to flow freely during these activities, distorting sound judgment. It's fatalistic hedonism, a mindset that Madonna chillingly captures in her song "Revolver": My love's a revolver/My sex is a killer/Do you wanna die happy?/Do you wanna die happy?*

Massive death by orgasm is as effective a way as any to halt the progress of Gay Rights; but would we really die happy, knowing we had rendered the Stonewall riots meaningless? Please think about future generations of LGBT kids. Don't they deserve a better example? We must decline society's invitation to become sexual automatons. An automaton is a mindless life form that doesn't care what it does. Once you stop caring, you stop being human! People who've given up their humanity are neither pleasant nor safe to be around. They make easy targets for scapegoating, too.

As I wrote this essay, Madonna's music was on my stereo. Her hit song "Four Minutes" makes me think of the quickie Gay activism that's become predominant in this era of YouTube and reality TV. Activists today hustle for their four minutes of fame (whittled down from the proverbial fifteen minutes that Andy Warhol spoke of), and it's always about the four minutes, not about advancing equality goals in any substantial way.

I call them the Pig Farmers of Gay Pride. They've learned how to make thousands of Gay people come running at the sound of their hog calls. Squeal! Let's have a kiss-in! Squeal! Let's have a Million F*g March! Squeal! Let's hit workplaces with a Day Without Gay! Squeal! Let's march on Washington for the umpteenth time! Squeal! Let's tape "It Gets Better" videos for Gay bullying victims to watch in-between beatings! Squeal! Let's protest marriage inequality by having Lesbians marry Gay men! Squeal! Let's protest Proposition 8 with a lewd comedy sketch! Squeeeeal! Let's stage a Gay Rights demonstration in the nude! Lipstick on a pig never looked more ludicruous!

These miserable excuses for effective Civil Rights initiative amount to self-promotion for the Pig Farmers, brazen opportunism at the expense of reforms they only pretend to care about. It is cynical and dishonest and appalling! We must learn how to recognize phony political activism. We must think before we act: Think about who we want to reach, what the best way is to reach them, and how reaching them in a given way will advance equality goals. It's never been true that doing anything is better than doing nothing! Spontaneity is no substitute for careful planning. Instead of buying into every new Pop-Up protest strategy, our time is better spent researching how to discredit Fundamentalist religion and use the Tea Party model to become a constituency that elected officials don't dare ignore.

There's growing realization that we are not being well-served by our advocacy organizations. Not only does that have to do with opportunism, it's a (mal)function of those groups' Democrat Party affiliation. Gay Rights leaders long ago hitched our movement’s wagon to Liberal politics, ensuring that our fortunes would rise and fall with that of the Democrats. That is, whenever they feel it’s safe to acknowledge us as a constituency; often, they don’t! It's a miracle that Gay Americans have even the modicum of political recognition we currently enjoy. I'm sure feminist, immigration, poverty, health reform, anti-war and environmental activists feel the same way sometimes. When it comes to progressive issues, the Democrats are weaker than watered-down Gatorade!

Is there anything more impotent than the Progressive movement in this country? It jawbones endlessly about pushing government in a Socialist direction, and then campaigns for Democrat candidates whose policies list toward the Right: Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Kerry, Barack Obama! How much sense does it make that disaffected Republicans would launch a Tea Party movement? They do this after giving George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, the most reactionary President and Vice-President in American history, two consecutive terms! Bush genuflected to the call of his Right Wing constituents, and he's got the Supreme Court nomination record to prove it; but the Limbaugh lobby still isn’t satisfied. So Conservatives get what they want but agitate for an even more extreme agenda, while Liberals rarely get what they want but settle for whatever crumbs the Democratic Party brushes on them. This is smart politics? Compared to what?

Settling for crumbs guarantees that we’ll get nothing but crumbs! We must reject incremental remedies for injustice. We must stop trying to hedge our bets and figure out the surest path to equality. All bets are off when dealing with the high degree of antipathy we face. We must begin acting like full-fledged citizens, instead of like sniveling outcasts, grateful for the tiniest consideration from politicians. Nobody ever gets mad at Aunt Thank-You-Ma'am; she's always so obsequious and agreeable. The other side of the coin is that nobody respects her, either! They know she'll settle for any old piece of garbage that's thrown in her direction.

It is not our responsibility to keep certain candidates or a certain party in power! Rather, it's the responsibility of political leaders to justify us keeping them in power. If they don't, we must withdraw our support from them and seek others more worthy of it. In doing so, we must become blind to party affiliation.

Accordingly, we must stop approaching elections as if they were crap games. We can't continue to support Democrats who are lukewarm or cold on our issues just because we think they have the best chance of winning. Instead, we must be doggedly issue-driven, like our opponents on the Right Wing. Gay Rights platforms must be for us what anti-abortion platforms are to Fundamentalist voters: A make 'em-or-break 'em litmus test for candidates! Progressives frown on single issue voting; as political strategy, they think it’s unsophisticated. If it’s such a lousy idea, then why has it worked so well for the other side?

Unwavering commitment to local and national candidates who consistently champion Gay Rights, for as long as necessary, will ultimately make them viable for office. We'll start out losing more races than we win, but if we hang in there, our winning tallies will increase over time. You don’t have to take my word for it, though: remember a dude named Ronald Reagan? For years, nobody thought he could win Federal office. Oddsmakers counted him out time after time, but he held fast to his Conservative principles, and the tenacity of his supporters finally paid off . . . and how!

More and more Republicans like Ted Olson, Andrew Sullivan, Meghan McCain and (believe it or not) the Cheney family are bucking the Fundamentalist wing of their party and declaring that equality isn't a partisan issue. Libertarians and Independents tend to favor our causes, too. We have a broader range of options now, if we're smart enough to pursue them. We'd better be!

The Democrat Party is like Archie Andrews, burning up the ballroom floor with Betty Cooper but all the while, the redheaded bastard is cheating lustful glances at Veronica Lodge! Bettykins, girlfriend! You'd better learn how to vary your dance card, or you'll always end up going home alone.

"Life During Wartime" concludes with Part Four.

Life During Wartime (Part Four)

2010-03-03T13:17:00.000-08:00

The Revolution Begins At Home

I know all about going home alone. The Gay blogosphere and I have had a most difficult relationship! I've been banned from the comments section of the Ex-Gay Watch website, threatened with banning at Pam's House Blend, and savaged by patrons of Wayne Besen’s blog while the blogmaster remained silent. The last time I spoke to “Ex-Gay” ministry survivor Peterson Toscano, he called my writing "gunk." Blog trolls have threatened me physically. That’s just the negative stuff I can remember; there was lots more! What brought such stinging disapproval down on my head? Nothing but my message that Gay identity should be respected. That it should always be thought of, spoken of and treated with respect, and that the process begins with Gay people themselves.

I really do believe that the revolution begins at home, and I desperately want it to begin. Accordingly, my goal has been to light a fire under the Gay blogosphere. If I felt it was necessary, I wouldn't hesitate to burn bridges. I've criticized the exhibitionism and frivolity that dominates Gay Pride celebrations. I've criticized the consensus idea that Gay = Sex. Repeatedly, I've criticized demeaning portrayals of Gay people in the media. I've criticized activists for not pushing Gay-related instruction in school curricula. I've criticized violent and racist imagery in Gay pornography. I've called out counter-productive and self-promoting Gay activism. I've scolded activists for their reluctance to directly confront the religious Right Wing. I've hammered home the point that Civil Rights struggles are about morality, not politics. Drama for its own sake never interested me, but there’s nothing like it for raising consciousness!

I like to rip the bedclothes off retrograde thinking and expose idiocy in all its shameful nakedness! Gay organizations allying themselves with groups like NAMBLA(which has happened a few times over the years) is wrong, and I've said so. Denouncing marriage equality on Left Wing ideological grounds is wrong, and I've said so. Praising TV shows that treat Gay people like fetishes("Queer As Folk", "Queer Eye For The Straight Guy", "The L Word") is wrong, and I've said so. Marginalizing LGBT history as "Queer Studies" is wrong, and I've said so. Exporting the label "queer" to Gay activists in the developing world is deplorable, and I've said so. Dialoguing with "ex-Gay" propagandists as if their arguments were reasonable is dangerous, and I've been penalized for saying so. I don't give a damn! I'm not afraid to get personal, either. I've laid into extreme butch/femme role playing, the equating of Gay sex with sado-masochism, and public sexual activity.

My take-no-prisoners attitude proved unpopular, and I really shouldn’t have been surprised. Saying things nobody wants to hear or think about will make you unpopular, no doubt about that! However, the alternative is to STFU, go along to get along, and be just another dishonest pundit, pretending that the Emperor parading down the avenue isn't as naked as a jaybird. I find myself temperamentally incapable of being that kind of pundit.

Dig it . . . I'm the guy who'll tell kids that Santa Claus is a myth! I'm the guy who'll tell Sinatra fanatics that their idol didn't sing so great in his later years. I'm the Black guy who'll disagree when Black folks deny skin color was a factor when they voted for President Obama. Lord deliver me . . . I just can't help myself! I've got an automatic bullsh*t detector that won't quit. Not only will I risk going home alone, I won't even dance to music that I don’t like. Guess I took the lyrics of that old Mama Cass song too much to heart:

You're gonna be knowin'/The loneliest kind of lonely/It may be rough goin'/Just to do your thing/The hardest thing to do/But you've gotta make your own kind of music/Sing your own special song/Make your own kind of music/Even if nobody else sings along.*

I still like that song. I like it because the lyrics ring so true. It is hard to do your own thing, and most people don't! They conform to the status quo, even if it's corrupt.

The majority of LGBT folk conform, especially those who fancy themselves the most radical thing since seafood pizza. Society tells them that they're deviant, so they claim deviance. Society tells them that they're promiscuous, so they act promiscuous. Society tells them that they're fringe, so they distance themselves from the mainstream. Society excludes them from marriage, military service, religious faith, etcetera, so they adopt political stances that decry all of those things.

My friend, Rev. Jerry Maneker, has coined a name for them: they're Happy Perverts, willingly buying into the pariah status that cruel heterosexists have created for them. What they get out of it is the right to call themselves culture rebels. In exchange, they give up dignity, integrity and justice. I'll be damned if I ever do a business transaction like that!

The life options that Happy Perverts reject are essential options worth fighting for. That's why I've declared war on the pervert mentality, and there will be no truce declared! My mission is to root saboteurs out of the Gay Rights movement so that its objectives aren't compromised from within. I know the odds are stacked against me; I've come under heavy fire, and I've been wounded a few times; but I'm in this thing for the duration. I've gotten used to life during wartime, so . . . see you on the battlefield, sugar!

Christ, The Gay Martyr has been an incredible learning experience for me, and I hope it's been so for others as well. Now, it's time for me to explore new opportunities. To those few who became followers of my blog, thanks so much for walking this journey with me. Extra special thanks to Jerry and Eileen Maneker, who’ve been my battle buddies for many months. Join me next time, when I open and close my Final Book of Testimony.

*Excerpt from "Life During Wartime" by David Byrne, copyright ©1979 Blue Disque Music/Index Music (ASCAP). Excerpt from "Revolver" by Madonna, Dwayne Carter, Justin Franks, Carlos & Steven Battey and Brandon Kitchen, copyright ©2009 Webo Girl Publishing/Artist Publishing Group West/j. Franks Publishing/Apartment Four Publishing/Mall B Publishing(ASCAP)/Warner-Tamerlane Publishing/Young Money Publishing/Artist 101 Publishing Group (BMI). Excerpt from "Make Your Own Kind Of Music" by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, copyright ©1969 Screen Gems/EMI Music (BMI).

Africa Screams (Part One)

2010-02-18T14:17:00.000-08:00

STEVEN and TIWONGE,
JAILED for LOVING EACH OTHER

Warning: This post contains sexually explicit material that may not be suitable for younger readers.

MATTHEW 5: 11-12
(Jesus Christ said) Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on My account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in Heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Without a doubt, Uganda's pending law to impose the death penalty on homosexual citizens is the worst case of African heterosexism I've heard about lately. Which isn't to say there aren't plenty of other cases! Let me tell you about a few of them. Reuters News Service reported this disturbing incident on 29 December 2009:

Two men who became the first Gay couple to marry in Malawi were arrested and charged with public indecency, the police said Tuesday. The men, Tiwonge Chimbalanga and Steven Monjeza, publicly wed in a symbolic, traditional ceremony on Saturday and were arrested Monday night. Homosexuality is banned in Malawi and carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

The Chimbalanga-Monjezas have since been vilified in the local press, humiliated in the courtroom, beaten up in jail, and threatened with violation of their body cavities. The police want to brutally rape them with anal probes in order to find "evidence" of homosexuality! Can you even imagine the degree of suffering these defenseless men are enduring? If they can survive the cruelties of the Malawian "justice" system, they'll still have to endure unbridled scorn from members of their own community. May God protect them both.

A few days ago, this ugliness was not only repeated but amplified in Kenya, the ancestral homeland of US President Barack Obama. This report comes from the website www.LiveJournal.com:

Kenya has become the latest African nation to generate headlines with anti-Gay actions. After last year’s proposal by a Ugandan lawmaker to put some Gays(sic) to death, and the arrest of a same-sex couple in Malawi for allegedly celebrating their betrothal, Kenyan officials acted to prevent a planned celebration that reportedly would have marked the union of a Gay couple. The ceremony was to have been conducted at a private residence not far from Mombasa, a resort town, reported the BBC in a February 11th article. However, local authorities stepped in following reports of the purported Gay union. Said Chief Hussein Swaleh, "I was shocked." Added the Chief, "I won’t allow it."

In a second incident, an anti-Gay mob organized by politicians and religious leaders in the Kenyan district of Kilifi chased three men, a supposed Gay couple and another individual, through the streets of the town of Mtwapa. Police had to intervene to save the men . . . the vigilante action, called Operation Gays Out, was spearheaded by Sheikh Hussein Ali and Bishop Laurence Chai (who said) "We thank God for saving this town from being turned to Sodom and Gomorrah . . . we may (have been) doomed had (these) criminals managed to conduct their evil exercise within our neighborhood" . . . Chai and Ali publicly called for the government to close any night spots catering to Gays(sic), and Ali swore further violence against (them), urging residents of Mtwapa to attack them.

"Operation Gays Out"? Politicians and preachers leading a mob? Calls for random violence against same-gender-loving Kenyans? What barbarity! Mtwapa sure sounds like a modern Sodom to me, what with predatory townspeople menacing the innocent. If I were Sheikh Ali or "Bishop" Chai, I wouldn't start breathing easy yet; the threat of eternal doom hasn't moved farther away from them, it's drawn much nearer! Their kind of hateful doings never fail to get Satan's attention.

Speaking of that hideous "death to Gay people" bill, it's been roundly denounced by international human rights advocates. The rising chorus of criticism now includes Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama. As a result, the bill's future is somewhat in doubt; thank God for that development! However, some Ugandan clergy are going to bizarre extremes to keep it alive. The following informaton was posted to the blog towleroad.com 17 February 2010:

In January (it was) reported that anti-Gay pastor and Rick Warren buddy Martin Ssempa had held a screening of Gay porn to scare up support from the (Ugandan) public for the pending anti-homosexuality bill. He held another screening today, after police blocked plans for his Million Man "Kill the Gays" March. The screening took place in a packed Kampala church. AFP reports: "The screening was attended by around 300 supporters crammed into an evangelical church in the Ugandan capital after plans for a 'million-man march' were thwarted by police. 'We had planned to have a million-man-and-woman march in Kampala, but unfortunately we were told that we could not . . . because of security concerns,' Martin Ssempa told the crowd. 'The major argument homosexuals have is that what people do in the privacy of their bedrooms is nobody's business, but do you know what they do in their bedrooms?,' the pastor asked. Ssempa then displayed a slide show of Gay pornographic pictures. 'This one is eating another man's penis,' the pastor said, before going into even more graphic descriptions . . . Ssempa is Pastor Rick Warren's right-hand man in Uganda."

That last line refers to the fact that Rick Warren, one of Barack Obama's favorite evangelists, has been in Uganda spreading his "purpose driven" anti-Gay message. The Saddleback mega-church pastor and best-selling author recruited local Bible bigot Martin Ssempa to help him disseminate hatred in Africa; but that certainly can't explain Ssempa's pulpit-profaning, blowjob-narrating, X-rated-movie-screening habits! Warren has issues for sure, but to my knowledge he's never stooped to this kind of sleazy tactic; Ssempa's feeble attempts to camouflage voyeurism would be hilarious if his intentions weren't so evil. Clearly, he is the sickest of sick puppies, and the same goes for anybody who'd willingly attend one of his perverted "church services"!

Reverend Rowland 'Jide Macaulay, an African expatriate now living in London, puts living conditions for African LGBT folk in perspective. The following excerpts come from an essay he wrote titled "Africa and Homosexuality", the full text of which can be found here:

http://www.thewitness.org/agw/macauley121604.html

Lesbians and Gay men of African descent, like myself, today struggle to affirm our identity because we have often been expected to deny our sexuality for the sake of surviving in our spiritual communities . . . not only does legislation prohibit homosexuality in many African countries, but its very existence is also denied . . . there is a continual attempt to deny that Gays(sic) and Lesbians make up a significant part of the population. “Gay culture” virtually does not exist from an African point of view. The subject of homosexuality is a huge taboo. Many Africans are in same-sex relationships, but very few will be open about their sexuality to their families . . . if it were possible to determine homosexuality at birth, many African parents would repudiate their homosexual children before they have the chance to live. It is commonly said in Africa, “It is better to have the corpse of my child, than for me to accept that my child is Gay.”

Have you ever heard anything so tragic?

As far as Africans are concerned, homosexuality is an abuse of traditional values. Homosexuality is seen as a sign of western sexual corruption and immorality. Some families believe that homosexuality is a result of occult activity, and others, that it is a disability. There are many cases where violence is perpetrated against Gays(sic) and Lesbians, and where family relationships break down. Those known to be Gay or Lesbian are seen as outcasts, bringing terrible shame to their family name and harming the families' values and reputation.

Lest you believe this kind of ignorance is just an African cultural trait, Rev. Macaulay fixes blame for widespread anti-Gay prejudice precisely where it belongs:

The Christian churches are among the worst perpetrators of homophobia, using the Bible to support their attitudes and arguments. The issues are preached about in ways that are difficult to challenge, and (they) cannot be openly debated in the pews. Counselling is usually offered to those known or suspected of being homosexual. The experience usually leaves the victim more confused . . . powerful organizations like the church, which could make an enormous difference, (instead) add fuel to the stigma and undermine all efforts to change attitudes. African Gays(sic)and Lesbians therefore go underground, leading to a lack of self-esteem, increased insecurity, loneliness and sometimes suicide.

I don't doubt it! Despite the fact that Gay Africans have taken their own lives, I would call them victims of genocide. Reverend Macaulay speaks to his own experience as a Gay man exiled from Nigeria:

The experience of an African Gay or Lesbian person living in exile in a foreign country is one of lost hope and a lack of representation. There are times when it feels that the entire world is against you. Gay Africans are not accepted by their own . . . African culture and are equally faced with oppression, prejudice, and low self-esteem. I have spoken to over 50 African Gays(sic) and Lesbians in the past two years. The conversations revealed that their lives seem worthless in a society that gives them little protection against the hatred (of) their sexual orientation.

Now that Rev. Macaulay has provided the context, let's look at concerns surrounding HIV transmission on the African continent.

"Africa Screams" concludes with Part Two.

Africa Screams (Part Two)

2010-02-18T14:16:00.000-08:00

STEVEN and TIWONGE,
JAILED for LOVING EACH OTHER

Warning: This post contains sexually explicit material that may not be suitable for younger readers.

In the December 2009 issue of Positively Aware, an HIV treatment and health bi-monthly distributed to hospitals and health centers, columnist Jim Pickett reported on the Fifth International AIDS Society Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention. Held in July 2009, the conference took place in Cape Town, South Africa. One of the main challenges to HIV/AIDS prevention that Mr. Pickett identified was culturally-enforced invisibility of LGBT African people.

Contracy to rampant, pernicious mischaracterizations, fueled by structural homophobia that negates the existence of Gay (men) and completely devalues their lives, Gay men and other MSM (men who love men) exist in Africa! Hello! Despite official HIV/AIDS estimates that mostly ignore this fact, these men constitute a substantial percentage of people living with HIV/AIDS on the continent . . .

After contextualizing the challenges faced by African Gay (men), including criminilization, stigma, discrimination, human rights abuses, lack of access to prevention and care, and limited HIV surveillance, (a colleague) shared some numbers from Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, Mauritania, Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Namibia and Botswana. The data revealed high burdens of HIV among Gay (men) across all these countries, significantly higher than prevalence rates among males from the general population in each country save South Africa, Botswana and Namibia . . .

Let's have a bit more context here. The aforementioned Live Journal article confirms what Rev. Macaulay has said about African law:

. . . in many African nations, homosexuality is illegal; only South Africa has extended marriage equality to Gay and Lesbian families.

In addition, consider this older report which was posted to CCN.com/World on 15 May 2008:

Jackson Irungu is . . . among a tiny minority of openly Gay men in Kenya who face a constant barrage of verbal abuse on the street and even occasional physical attacks. "We live in fear," says Irungu, "There is a perception that being Gay is wrong, so it is a bit tricky . . . when you live in Kenya." Irungu says a friend of his was beaten so badly outside a nightclub in Nairobi that he had to be taken to hospital. There is no way to corroborate such incidents with the police because homosexual Kenyans are just too afraid to report them. (Kenyan) law books help create the ambivalence. Two separate penal codes relate to the Gays in Kenya, and the archaic laws can lead to a 5-to-14 year jail term.

So it's established that criminalization of their existence is a given for most of the subjects in this study group. Let's go back to Jim Pickett's conference report. He elaborated on African HIV statistics:

. . . let's take a look at Kenya, where (my colleague) told us the prevalence rates among Gay (men) is 15.6% in contrast to 7.49% prevalence among (heterosexual) Kenyan men of reproductive age. This means that about one in six or seven Gay Kenyans are HIV-positive. How about Sudan? (Heterosexual) men of reproductive age represent 1.26% prevalence (and) Gay (men) 8.8% in that North African country. Malawi? 21.4% for Gay (men), 11.46% for (heterosexual) men of reproductive age. In Senegal, the prevalence of HIV among Gay (men) is 21 times higher than other men. In Nigeria, seven times higher. Pretty dismal, yes?

Hell, yes! And from those news reports I cited, we know the intensity of heterosexism that exists in Kenya and Malawi. Might there be a connection? Mr. Pickett discussed the sexual practices of Gay Africans:

. . . anal intercourse is common among Gay (men) in Africa, and most of these men are using some sort of lubricant . . . but here is the rub: in a 2008 study of Gay (men) in Namibia, Botswana and Malawi, only one quarter of them used water-based lubricants. Of the men who indicated they always used condoms, 12.9% used a water-based lubricant. Nearly half of the men had used petroleum-based products during their last episode of anal intercourse with another man, and one-fifth used nothing . . . for those of us acquainted with the finer points of anal intercourse, the thought of engaging in this activity without any type of lubrication (brings) a grimace. And the fact that lube-free anal sex hurts and tears and burns creates a perfect storm in the rectum for HIV transmission . . . we all know that oil-based lubes are a big no-no with latex condoms, though using these lubes in the absence of condoms is still much, much better than using nothing.

What's going on here? There are huge barriers (in Africa) to lubricant use, including cost and very limited availability, as well as the stigma attached to buying lubricant (you shouldn't need to buy lube for vaginal sex, right? If you're buying lube, you must be doing bad things.) Many African men who have the ability to travel come back from the West with suitcases packed with lubricant for their friends; the demand is extremely high. But this is not the best distribution system . . .

There are now condom-distribution programs operating in many parts of Africa. After overcoming considerable local and international resistance, they were established in response to the African AIDS pandemic. Given the continental stigma against same-gender love, few if any of these programs are targeted at Gay men. But quiet as it's kept, heterosexual lovers enjoy anal sex, too; the availability of lubricants would be just as much a safeguard for them as for Gay couples. Here's an example of how heterosexism, with its antiquated, restrictive concepts of human sexuality, poses needless danger to the health of all Africans! Even so, the health of Gay and bisexual African men is endangered in a much more devastating way.

Before I elaborate, let me say that I don't believe every African who was interviewed for that 2008 study spoke truthfully about his condom use. It's no secret that men habitually lie about what they do in bed, and that's a cross-cultural fact! Besides, if they were all telling the truth, then the HIV infection stats wouldn't be so high. Let me also say that, just as I don't believe Gay African-Americans are totally ignorant about sexual issues, I don't believe Gay Africans are, either. While some of them may not know about or have access to K-Y jelly, most of them understand that anal penetration without some kind of lubricant is dangerous. You can't avoid the pain and bleeding that results. What could make a man want to endure such trauma?

Everything that human beings do is done for a reason; African men have unprotected sex for a reason. I submit it's the same reason why Gay men who live under hostile conditions all over the world have unprotected sex: Internalized shame! Shame, compounded by the suicidal mindset that Rev. Macaulay describes. Shame, making them devalue both their own lives and the lives of their bedmates. Shame, convincing them that Gay sex must somehow be made less pleasurable. Shame, telling them Gay sex must hurt! Gay sex must maim! Gay sex must be traumatic and potentially lethal. Consciously or subconsciously, these men feel so guilt-ridden that they turn God's gift of same-gender intimacy into a form of punishment. They punish themselves and their lovers! Like other destructive behaviors Gay people indulge in, unprotected sex is a form of self-flagellation.

And where does the concept of self-flagellation come from? You Catholics out there know the answer: It originates with the Oppressor Church, the same church that Rowland 'Jide Macaulay indicts for embedding anti-Gay hatred in African culture. It's the same church that exercises undue influence over American culture, politics, education and media. Now, in the West, we don't usually see Old Testament law enforced by mobs, but we do see rising rates of seroconversion among Gay men(especially those of African descent). There's no doubt in my mind that a connection exists between a minority group's desire to maintain good health and religious persecution of that minority group! The criminalization, the stigmatization, the fear, shame and self-destructiveness: you can trace it all back to the Church, to some fire-breathing dragon of a demagogue preacher damning Gay men to Hell.

Jim Pickett's report implied that the solution to high infection rates is better distribution of water-based lubricants. I wouldn't argue against that course of action, but I disagree that it will solve the problem. The problem will only be solved when Bible bigotry is forcefully attacked; when African churches start valueing the lives and loves of Gay men; when African preachers start condemning mob violence instead of encouraging it; when religious hatemongers like Rick Warren, Martin Ssempa and Laurence Chai are exposed as the false prophets that they are and dealt with accordingly. Once false prophesy has been done away with, Christian churches can fullfill Jesus Christ's mandate to promote compassion. They can start to undo much of the damage they've done over centuries; and they are the only institutions that can do it effectively. Madonna said it best, in her song "Erotica": Only the one that hurts you/Can make you feel better/Only the one that inflicts pain/Can take it away.*

That same issue of Positively Aware contained a letter to the editor slamming home the point that anti-Gay religion is a public health hazard. HIV/AIDS counselor Paulo Presta wrote:

I was a prevention specialist here in Arizona. I approached some church leaders about how we may work together to support our collective efforts in prevention . . . consistently, when it came to addressing HIV prevention with Gays(sic), I was met with judgmental comments . . . I was both angry and saddened that church members would take such a position against those who live, worship and pray with them. One even writes inflammatory pieces against Gays(sic) and then says: "I don't hate (them), I only write what God tells me to." That just doesn't cut it for me . . . his behavior does nothing to fight HIV and only sows seeds of hurt and sorrow.

More important, it sows seeds of shame and self-destructiveness . . . and incidentally, that clergyman lied in his teeth! God never told anybody to be judgmental. Quite the opposite is true:

MATTHEW 7: 1-5
(Jesus Christ said) Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgment that you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor: "Let me take the speck out of your eye" while the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite! First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly . . .

Mr. Presta's anger can be put to good use. It's time for health care professionals like him to come together with equality activists and declare war on bigotry disguised as religious doctrine. Granted, taking on organized religion will require tons more time, energy and money; but if our concern for Gay men's health is sincere, that battle must be joined! HIV counselors have long understood that "faith-based" homophobia is a major obstacle to curbing seroconversion, particularly in Black communities. When will they finally understand that Gay Rights activism is an essential element of AIDS prevention?

Patient advocates like Jim Pickett and Paulo Presta should think of every Gay man as a potential suicide poised on a window ledge. There are cruel onlookers down below, urging the poor guy to jump to his death: genocidal clergy and their thuggish followers! If caregivers can put a lid on these sadistic bastards(shout them down, discredit them, penalize their hateful expression), they'll have a much better chance of talking distraught patients back to safety. Fighting suicidal sexuality with condoms and lube alone simply isn't enough.

The spiritual needs of Africans are different from western needs. African culture embraces a greater intimacy of spiritual growth. We need a new era of Christian faith that can celebrate same-sex unions, so that many more Gay Africans can be proud to celebrate their sexuality in a loving union.

These wise words come from Rowland 'Jide Macaulay, and I agree with them up to a point. I don't think New World spiritual needs are very different from those in the Old World. Western folk just don't acknowledge their spiritual needs as honestly.

However, Rev. Macaulay and I agree 100% that a new era of Christian faith is sorely needed all over the world, especially in Africa where the Devil has seared his wicked brand on entire nations. Satanic hatred is blazing out of control in the cradle of humankind, and in the cries of innocent victims like Tiwonge and Steven Chimbalanga-Monjeza, you can hear Africa scream for deliverance. Lord, when will You lift the massive burden of poverty, corruption and ignorance that’s crushing Mother Africa? How much worse does the situation have to get before it gets better?

*Excerpt from "Erotica" by Madonna, Shep Pettibone and Tony Shimkin, copyright 1990 Webo Girl Publishing/Shepsongs/WB Music Corporation (ASCAP).

Nobody's Queer In Big Eden

2010-01-22T09:14:00.000-08:00

Celebrating the 10th Anniversary of
Big Eden
The Best Gay Film Ever Made

Earlier this year, I mailed the following letter to Judith Martin, the etiquette columnist known as Miss Manners:

Please make a public statement in support of respectful reference to LGBT Americans. I am a Gay Black man who lives in the Bible Belt, and I'm appalled by the derogatory nature of the language I increasingly see and hear in the media.

On a number of cable TV shows (MSNBC's "Keith Olbermann" is one example), I've heard LGBT people called "trannies", "homos" and "faggots" in a "comic" manner. Popular sex columnist Dan Savage routinely peppers his columns and TV interviews with "fag" and "faggot". NPR's "Talk Of The Nation" once gave comedian Scott Thompson several uncensored minutes of airtime to perform a song called "Faggots On Parade."

The community radio hosts of a local Gay lifestyle and newsmagazine love to apply the word "queer" to everything Gay-related. Ironically, Gay media often contains the crudest language imaginable: I've seen magazine covers with lurid headlines ranging from Blood, Sweat And Queers to Roller Derby Dykes to Yeah! I'm A Fag. The last straw for me came when I went online to buy a family-friendly Gay film from amazon.com, and saw a product description describing the movie's characters as "bashful queers".

I've had conversations with a number of people about how offensive I find these labels. I could not get my message across to them. I was told that sexual slurs have been drained of their toxicity by popular usage, and encouraged to use them myself. One guy compared it to casual use of the n-word, and since I'm African-American, he took the infuriating liberty of using the n-word with me!

I've been attacked for supposedly being "politically correct." I've been ridiculed as "thin-skinned" and "immature". In the worst exchange I had, I was told: "You're nothing but a damned queer who thinks he's better than the rest." Of course, this came from someone identifying himself as "queer."

When LGBT Americans are forbidden the right to wed in thirty states; when we're banned from open service in the US military; when we're forbidden to join the Boy Scouts; when we can and often are excommunicated from church membership; when serious films about us still have trouble getting produced in Hollywood, and Gay actors remain closeted out of fear of stigmatization; when we still face imprisonment and/or execution in numerous countries; when LGBT children are still regularly bullied in school; and especially when hundreds of us are still assaulted and murdered in hate crime incidents, atrocities that are usually attended by screams of "faggot", "queer", "dyke", etcetera, I hardly think the time is right to start normalizing hurtful, pejorative labels for sex and gender difference. I doubt the time will ever be right for that.

I regret that the polite terms used to refer to LGBT folk have origins either in popular slang(Gay) or clinical texts(transsexual). I understand the desire for "umbrella terms" that simplify discussion of people like me. However, the ugly, ignorant slurs now gaining currency are unsuitable. "Queer" is not interchangeable with Gay. Hate speech still hurts! Why don't they understand?

I don't know if Miss Manners understood; I don't know if she ever read my letter. However, ten years ago, a man named Thomas Bezucha understood perfectly. In 1999, Bezucha, a writer and director of independent films, decided to make a 1930s-style screwball comedy with Gay men as his main characters(his main inspiration was Bringing Up Baby, the Katherine Hepburn/Cary Grant classic from 1938). He wanted to stay true to the original spirit of the genre, so he decided his film would have no nudity, no explicit sex, no excess of profanity-laced dialogue, and no dearth of older actors. What it would have was a rural setting and a bunch of stock characters: A matchmaker, a town busybody, a wisecracking boss, a hunky ex-boyfriend, a loving parent in fragile health, a gaggle of comical drug store cowboys, and a shy general store manager with a secret yen for the lead character.

Applying this formula to a story about same-gender romance was novel enough, but Thomas Bezucha went farther. He conceived and realized a Gay movie that largely avoids campiness, and that presents Gay identity as neither shocking nor controversial outside of an urban setting. He called his film Big Eden. Starring Louise Fletcher, Ayre Gross, George Coe and Eric Schweig, it was released in the early summer of the year 2000.

"Looking at the subject matter of recent Gay films," Bezucha said in an interview filmed for the DVD version of his movie, "the issues were (always) around sex! I wanted to explore issues of intimacy. I wanted to show that Gay people . . . have real, intimate relationships with family, with friends . . . show that we are (a) whole people. I'm not sure if Big Eden could possibly be a real place. It's just this fantasy I concocted. Big Eden to me is about posing a question: What if? What if any Gay man or Gay woman could live anywhere? What would that be like, if bigotry and (lack of) acceptance weren't a concern?" Later in the interview, he revealed that there was a political motivation behind making this film: "Big Eden (doesn't exist) now, but it's not that far off. (I wanted) to bring it closer."

The synopsis: Henry Hart, a successful artist, returns to his hometown in rural Montana to care for and ultimately bury his ailing grandfather, whom he affectionately calls "Sampa". Things get complicated when he learns that his high school crush, Dean Stewart, is also back in town. The two men try to rekindle an aborted love affair. However, Sampa's friend Grace Cornwell, an Earth Mother type and self-styled matchmaker, has different ideas about who Henry should settle down with. By the climax of the film, the whole town has joined forces to help Grace make the most unlikely love match imaginable.

"Big Eden, which made its local debut at last year's Seattle Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, is not quite like any midlife crisis Gay film we've seen before. What really sets it apart are the setting and the characters, who tend to forget their prejudices when they're dealing with people they care about. And the actors are just low-key enough to pull it off."

-John Hartl, The Seattle Times, June 8, 2001

Big Eden had great difficulty finding a distributor. The Hollywood studios wouldn't touch it! They didn't believe a Gay film without nudity and sex could draw an audience. Much to their surprise, after Wolfe Video picked up distribution rights, Thomas Bezucha's folksy comedy swept up honors on the LGBT film festival circuit. It bagged audience and jury prizes in San Francisco, Seattle, Cleveland, Miami, Toronto and even in Los Angeles, their own back yard. Rarely did the end credits run in a silent theatre; standing ovations became routine. With stronger promotion and wider distribution, Big Eden might've broken big and become another mainstream phenomenon like John Waters' Hairspray; that was not to be, but it quickly developed a cult following that's still strong and growing ten years later.

While the film scored a modest commercial success, it proved to be artistically controversial. A number of LGBT film critics decried the Utopian vista of Big Eden. They all but demanded harsh realism in Gay-themed movies, as well as edgy sexual content, and were unable to let themselves go where Thomas Bezucha wanted to take them. Unfortunately, you could tell the Gay critics from the Straight ones by their tendency to toss sexual slurs into reviews! One of the most disrepectful was amazon.com's Bret Fetzer: in his pointedly back-of-the-hand recommendation, he sneered that the movie centers around "bashful queers" and "old coots in cowboy hats"(the derogatory tone of his review has since been modified).

Fetzer's ageism notwithstanding, for him to call Bezucha's Gay characters "queer" was cruel and cynical. It amounted to thumbing his nose at what the director was trying to achieve: a normalization of Gay people and Gay love within the most familiar of classic film settings, The American West. Toward that end, Bezucha not only cultivated a "Petticoat Junction" ambiance, he also loaded the soundtrack with vintage Country and Western tunes: "Don't Let The Stars Get In Your Eyes"(George Jones), "Welcome To My World"(Jim Reeves), "Take Me In Your Arms And Hold Me"(originally recorded by Eddy Arnold and sung in the film by Louise Fletcher).

Big Eden fairly screams tradition and shamelessly embraces mainstream values. Nobody is "queer" there! Some folks couldn't handle the juxtaposition of "liberal" same-gender desire with "conservative" community values; no doubt they found the politics of Big Eden lacking in revolutionary vision. They must have been blind! Thomas Bezucha's daring approach to screwball comedy was more revolutionary by far than anything his critics could ever hope to achieve with their "reclaimed" pejoratives and obvious preference for pessimistic, semi-pornographic Gay storylines. In fact, the premise of Big Eden is so progressive, it makes Brokeback Mountain look like a tepid remake of The Boys In The Band.

"In his well-crafted film, Bezucha imagines with humor and affection a community so perceptive, caring and enlightened that it's capable of quietly nudging everyone in the right direction. Bezucha also suggests that a man like Henry, while not conventionally handsome, can nonetheless be attractive to others, and that a Straight man can love a Gay man while not being sexually drawn to him. These notions are not so self-evident as they might seem, even in Gay-themed films. With this wonderful ensemble cast, Big Eden is a fine example of the cinema of possibilities."

-Kevin Thomas, The Los Angeles Times, June 1, 2001

Veteran actress Nan Martin, who portrayed the scene-stealing Widow Thayer in Big Eden, put her finger on the film's greatest strength when she observed: "Many of the Gay and Lesbian films are divisive. They (make) the gap between the way (Gay and Straight) people think wider. This film, to me, was bringing that gap together. Three cheers for that!" Indeed.

Three cheers, too, for Thomas Bezucha, a director who challenged conventional ideas about what a Gay film can and should be. Big Eden anticipated the marriage equality era we live in today, and it's as perfect a match for it as Pike Dexter was for Henry Hart. Easily the best Gay film ever made, it deserves a big budget Hollywood remake . . . and what a fabulous Broadway musical it could be! Hopefully, its considerable entertainment potential will be fully realized someday.

"It will always be around, this movie, and people will discover it. There'll be new people seeing it all the time. It's not gonna get lost! It's one of those films that will become part of the lexicon of film history."

-Louise Fletcher, "Grace Cornwell" from Big Eden

Buy the double DVD version of Big Eden at:

http://www.moviesunlimited.com/

Proving Me Right (Part One)

2010-01-02T08:07:00.000-08:00

I'm so glad that I didn't vote for Barack Obama last November! I can't even begin to tell you. Don't take that to mean I'm happy, though. I'm not happy, and I'm not gloating. There's no pleasure in being able to say "I told you so".

From the first time I heard him in a presidential debate, I didn't simply trust the man. I wasn't impressed by his Colgate smile. I wasn't bowled over by his wry sense of humor. His personal charisma didn't do much for me. I thought his much-praised speaking ability was overrated. I didn't give a damn about his best-selling autobiography. I didn't drink his Kool-Aid. I don't like Kool-Aid! I never forgot, as many others did, that Candidate Obama was a politician. I viewed his rosy promises through that crystal-clear lens. Yet, after he was elected, I hoped against hope that my fears about him were misguided(see my November 2008 post titled "Proving Me Wrong").

I no longer have any hope to hope against. My fears have been realized! Where strong, moral leadership is concerned, Barack Obama gets a failing grade.

More and more, Progressive Americans are having their eyes opened to his deficiencies. Progressive LGBT Americans in particular have been opening their eyes. Frankly, we've had no choice in the matter! During his campaign, Barack Obama pledged to be a "fierce advocate" for equality. Before he even set foot in the White House, he betrayed that pledge. Now he's broken it so many times, I've lost count. The activists at gay.americablog.com have kept a tally of his betrayals. Let me share part of their list with you; it's pretty shocking, so you might want to sit down. Our current President is guilty of:

Asking a religious Right activist who claims to have been “cured” of his homosexuality (Donnie McClurkin) to headline campaign events in South Carolina; then letting the anti-Gay bigot spend half an hour on stage, haranguing Gays at the (campaign) event.

Refusing for months to interview with LGBT newspapers during the campaign, while his opponent did (so) repeatedly.

Inviting anti-Gay activist Rick Warren, who helped pass Prop 8 in California, to give the invocation at the Inaugural.

Abolishing the LGBT Outreach position (on) the Democratic National Committee and never re-instating it.

Refusing to re-establish the White House Office of LGBT Outreach and the White House LGBT Liaison(which was a Special Assistant to the President at one point).

Continuing to discharge two Gay service members a day, even though he could stop it immediately by issuing a stop-loss order.

Asking for a study on “whether” repealing DADT would hurt national security, rather than a study on how to repeal it, as promised.

Deleting his Gay Civil Rights promise from the White House Web site.

Changing his commitment to “repeal” Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, to “changing DADT in a sensible manner.”

Repeatedly defending DOMA in court, even though he didn't have to.

Comparing Gay relationships to incest and pedophilia in a Justice Department brief.

Joking about Gay protesters (who were) upset about the DOMA brief.

Refusing to provide health care benefits to the partners of Gay (government) employees, and then claiming that DOMA precludes it, when it does not.

Refusing to meet with Gay legal groups to discuss how to provide such health benefits within the confines of DOMA.

Showing visible discomfort when asked about Gay Civil Rights.

Suggesting he won't get to (repealing) DADT, DOMA or ENDA until his second term, if ever.

Refusing to suspend implementation of anti-Gay laws like DADT and DOMA, while suspending laws that hurt other (groups).

Working against an amendment proposed by Representative Alcee Hastings (D-FL) to defund Don't Ask, Don't Tell investigations.

Saying he won't repeal DADT until (the) wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have finished.

Refusing to issue a statement specifically opposing anti-Gay ballot measures in Maine and Washington state.

Refusing to publicly endorse marriage equality for Gays(sic).

Refusing to this day to interview with the Gay press.

Refusing to apologize for any of these slights.

Do you smell something? I do, and it sure as Hell ain't teen spirit! That stank coming off President Obama is deep-rooted heterosexism, no doubt cultivated by so-called Conservative, so-called Christian beliefs. Why else do you think he was tardy condemning Uganda's proposed death penalty for LGBT citizens(a transgression missing from this list)? Rick Warren actually beat him to the punch!

The odor from his marriage equality stance is especially pungent. For an op-ed dated 30 December 2009, The Advocate's Washington correspondent Kerry Eleveld notes:

In assessing the year in LGBT rights, what is most striking to me is the Obama administration’s unwillingness to engage on almost anything related to (same gender) relationship recognition. Time and again, the administration has had opportunities to lean into the subject, to nudge the nation a little closer to equality for same-sex couples, and it has repeatedly leaned back, seemingly hoping the subject would disappear into the ether . . . by and large, the administration has shown a reticence bordering on negligence for (mandating) full and equal treatment.

Why does this reticence surprise Ms. Eleveld? Has she forgotten Candidate Obama's stated opposition to marriage equality? Add her name to the long list of memory-challenged Gay voters. Yet she makes a valid point when she says:

The administration (falls) far short of advancing the Democratic ideals many progressives believed Barack Obama represented when they cast their vote for him. Obama campaigned on equality . . . while you can make the case that, as President, he is making pragmatic decisions . . . as a guard against letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, not allowing a Federal agency to provide health benefits to a (Lesbian) worker because of an ideology that willfully emphasizes DOMA . . . is essentially a form of reasoned discrimination.

Essentially? There's no need to qualify the statement. It's flat-out bigotry! The awful truth about President Obama's ideological bent is something most Progressives haven't fully grasped yet. How much longer will it take?

“Proving Me Right” concludes with Part Two.

Proving Me Right (Part Two)

2010-01-01T08:07:00.000-08:00

It's no accident that President Obama invited Bible bigots Rick Warren and Joseph Lowery to pray over his inaugural ceremony. Contrary to what you've heard, those invitations had nothing to do with political savvy. It should be obvious by now that President Obama shares those preachers' doctrinal disdain for Gay people! The cliché is valid: Birds of a feather do flock together. The feathers on Obama, Warren and Lowery look the same to me, and that's not all: When I look at them, I see a trio of vultures for whom LGBT Civil Rights are nothing but a form of carrion. Citizenship protections: It's what's for dinner!

In the past, I've written that support for Gay Rights should be, must be, a litmus test for leadership. I said if a politician is bad on equality issues, other aspects of his policy agenda will be bad, too. Obama has proven me right; just look at his actions in regard to the economy. Progressive journalist Naomi Klein, writing for The Huffington Post on 21 December 2009, laid out the evidence. She listed a trio of missed opportunities to reverse the downward economic slide that began under the Bush administration:

Blown Opportunity Number 1: The Stimulus Package

When Obama came to office, he had a free hand and a blank check to design a spending package to stimulate the economy. He could have used that power to fashion what many were calling a "Green New Deal": to build the best public transit systems and smart (power) grids in the world. Instead, he experimented disastrously with reaching across the aisle to Republicans, low-balling the size of the stimulus, and blowing much of it on tax cuts. Sure, he spent some money on weatherization, but public transit was inexplicably short-changed while highways that perpetuate car culture won big.

Blown Opportunity Number 2: The Auto Bailouts

Speaking of the car culture, when Obama took office he also found himself in charge of two of the Big Three automakers, and all of the emissions for which they are responsible. A visionary leader . . . would obviously have used that power to dramatically re-engineer the failing industry so that its factories could build the infrastructure of the Green economy the world desperately needs. Instead, Obama saw his role as uninspiring Down-sizer-in-Chief, leaving the fundamentals of the industry unchanged.

Blown Opportunity Number 3: The Bank Bailouts

Obama, it's worth remembering, also came to office with the big banks on their knees; it took real effort not to nationalize them. Once again, if Obama had dared to use the power that was handed to him by history, he could have mandated the banks to provide the loans for factories to be retro-fitted and new Green infrastructure to be built. Instead, he declared that the government shouldn't tell the failed banks how to run their businesses. Green businesses report that it's harder than ever to get a loan.

In a nutshell, then, George W. Bush's economic policies remain largely intact under the Obama administration. Guess what? So do George W. Bush's military policies, including troop surges and government contracts with war profiteers. So does funding of "faith-based" agencies that discriminate based on religious doctrine. So do "renditions", CIA abductions and transfers of war prisoners to countries that practice torture. So does Executive Branch eagerness to snuggle up with corporate lobbyists(officially a bipartisan habit now). So do those controversial "signing statements" Bush was so fond of, which exempt a President from adherence to new laws. Visit W. E. Messamore's Humble Libertarian website and Amy Goodman's "Democracy Now!" archives to get the lowdown:

http://www.humblelibertarian.com/2009/02/obama-bush-comparisons-10-ways-barack.html

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/1/6/obama_has_kept_the_machine_set

The future of national policies on health care and the environment is no big mystery: Obama won't change those much, either, unless he changes them to benefit corporate America. Disparaging talk about "fat cats" aside, he's a puppet for Wall Street! We've seen him parrot Bush's Chicken Little rhetoric in order to justify the bailouts. We've seen his do-nothing stance on global warming bring the World Climate Change Summit to a screeching halt. Now we see him capitulate to the "fat cats" on publicly-funded health care. If that mandatory private insurance buy-in he's touting (Senate Bill HR 3590) constitutes true reform, then grits ain't groceries, sh*t don't stink, and Mona Lisa was a man! America elected the "change" candidate? Is that what you expect me to believe? I'm not buying it, sugar; what else are you selling today?

In private, I've taken to calling President Obama "Bush in Blackface". The allusion to minstrel shows is quite deliberate. I believe he's putting on an act for the American people. When the performance is over, I predict we're all going to want our money back. I want mine back now!

Whatever happened to the knight in shining Liberal armor? The crusading Democrat who was going to stop the war, bring us universal health coverage, reverse global warming, and eradicate all forms of bigotry? Where is he? Was he just a mirage? Or could it be that while the Obama-worshiping multitudes were basking in their hero's limelight and applauding his glib speeches, they only saw and heard what they wanted to hear and see? Could it be they ignored the signs that he represented anything but change? That his rhetoric was overblown? That the only "fierce advocacy" he'd ever undertake was on behalf of the status quo?

Election Night 2008 turned out to be a fairy tale acted out in real life: The Emperor's New Clothes. A butt-naked monarch parading in public while foolish onlookers raved about his royal finery! Some of those onlookers are still acting like fools. I'm sick to death of Liberal TV pundits apologizing for President Obama, arguing that he's a work-in-progress. "He'll grow into the job," they promise. Dammit! They make me want to drive a fist through my television screen. Do these jokers really hold our nation's highest office in such low regard?

I'm not an attorney, but I do have a bit of experience working in law offices. If I applied for a partner's position at a law firm and told the interviewer "l'll grow into the job", do you think I'd be hired? Hell, no! Nor should I be. Given the dearth of governing experience he had under his belt, Barack Obama shouldn't have been hired, either, not at this stage of his political career. Nominating him as the Democratic Party's presidential candidate was an irresponsible thing to do. Electing him was complete folly! A worthy Chief Executive must bring to the job all necessary qualifications for leadership: Wisdom, courage, strength, stamina, vigilance, resolve, resourcefulness, moral authority and sufficient experience. Gambling that a candidate will acquire these essential skills after he's elected President is nothing less than insane.

You know what else is insane? Voting for a presidential candidate because of his ethnic heritage. Yes, that's what all too many Americans did last November, and it's time somebody said so! The Nobel Committee awarded its Peace Prize to Obama for the same stupid reason. For exhibiting such stupidity, it got the hard slap across the face it deserved: An acceptance speech justifying war. What a travesty! Nobel laureate Martin Luther King, Jr. must have spun 'round in his grave. Didn't Dr. King tell us to look at the content of a man's character, not the color of his skin? Four decades have passed since his tragic death, and humanity still refuses to take those words to heart.

To quote Bette Davis' famous line from the 1950 movie All About Eve: "Fasten your seat belts . . . it's going to be a bumpy night!" I'm afraid we're all in for a rough rollercoaster ride; Uncle Sam's red, white and blue posterior will be black and blue come 2012. That's not the worst of it, either! Oval office coddling of Wall Street, coupled with persistent high unemployment will pave a fast road out of Washington for Democrats. I foresee reactionary Republicans taking control of US government once again. President Obama is certainly setting the stage for it to happen: any more security gaffes on his watch like that "underpants bomber" incident, and Sarah Palin can start shopping for her inaugural ball gown!

Remember his campaign slogan, "Yes, we can?" I heard a Right Wing tea bagger repeating it just the other day. It sure has acquired an ominous sound.

You Can't Go Halfway (Part One)

2009-11-07T08:01:00.000-08:00

DR. JOHN SHELBY SPONG

My dearest friend, Dr. Lester Earl Blue, Jr, recently emailed me an essay he came across while Web surfing. It was penned by noted theologian John Shelby Spong, no doubt in response to the ongoing turmoil over Gay issues in his Episcopal denomination. Reading it, I got the impression that a volcano of emotion has long been stirring inside Dr. Spong. I think he let it simmer below the surface for years, but the time came when only expressing a portion of that rage wasn't enough. Now he's finally let the top blow off, and the lava that's gushing out has taken the form of searing, incisive words. Blazing hot words, hot enough to burn away ambiguity and confusion!

That's the kind of natural phenomenon I both love to see and love to share with my blog patrons. Have you ever seen an exploding Christian? Are you ready to witness an eruption to rival Mount Saint-Helens? Then dare to approach the smoke-filled crater of a soul aflame with fury. Peer over the edge, and train your eyes on these key excerpts from Dr. Spong's Manifesto: The Time Has Come! It was originally posted to the Web on 15 October 2009, and the entire document can be viewed at:

http://secure.agoramedia.com/spong/34674.asp

I have made a decision. I will no longer debate the issue of homosexuality in the church with anyone. I will no longer engage the Biblical ignorance that emanates from so many Right Wing Christians about how the Bible condemns homosexuality, as if that point of view still has any credibility. I will no longer discuss with them or listen to them tell me how homosexuality is "an abomination to God," about how homosexuality is a "chosen lifestyle," or about how, through prayer and "spiritual counseling", homosexual persons can be "cured." Those arguments are no longer worthy of my time or energy.

I stopped spending time and energy on them many years ago! During the height of Anita Bryant-fueled anti-Gay hysteria, I quit my church in protest of the heterosexist sermons my pastor had begun preaching. Believe me, I've never regretted that decision.

I will no longer (listen) to the thoughts of those who advocate "reparative therapy," as if homosexual persons are somehow broken and need to be repaired. I will no longer talk to those who believe that the unity of the Church can or should be achieved . . . at the expense of Gay and Lesbian people. I will no longer take the time to refute the unlearned and undocumentable claims of certain world religious leaders who call homosexuality "deviant."

I wonder if the reparative therapy-tolerant staff of exgaywatch.com will take these words to heart? They should.

I will no longer listen to that pious sentimentality that certain Christian leaders continue to employ, which suggests some version of that strange and overtly dishonest phrase . . . "We love the sinner but hate the sin." That statement is . . . nothing more than a self-serving lie designed to cover the fact that these people hate homosexual persons . . . but (they) know that hatred is incompatible with the Christ they claim to profess, so they adopt this face-saving and absolutely false statement.

How long I've waited for someone of Dr. Spong's stature to make this all-too-true observation! He phrased it just right, too.

I will no longer temper my understanding of truth in order to pretend that I have even a tiny smidgen of respect for the appalling negativity that continues to emanate from religious circles . . . the Church has for centuries conveniently perfumed its ongoing prejudices against Blacks(sic), Jews, women and homosexual persons with what it assumes is "high-sounding, pious rhetoric." The day for that mentality has quite simply come to an end for me. I will personally neither tolerate it nor listen to it any longer.

The stench of perfumed prejudice and pious rhetoric is truly revolting! Millions of people refuse to tolerate it anymore, and it's obvious from the way many if not most LGBT folk view the mainstream Church as anathema.

I will particularly ignore those members of my own Episcopal Church who seek to break away from this body to form a "new church," claiming that this new and bigoted instrument alone now represents the Anglican Communion. Such a new ecclesiastical body is designed to allow these pathetic human beings . . . to form a community in which they can continue to hate Gay people, distort Gay people with their hopeless rhetoric, and to be part of a religious fellowship in which they can continue to feel justified in their homophobic prejudices for the rest of their tortured lives. Church unity can never be a virtue that is preserved by allowing injustice, oppression and psychological tyranny to go unchallenged.

It is, in fact, a false virtue. Jesus Christ said: Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the Earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law(Luke 12: 51-53). It was always inevitable that the Church would be divided against itself!

In my personal life, I will no longer listen to televised debates conducted by "fair-minded" channels that seek to give "both sides" of this issue "equal time." I am aware that these (TV) stations no longer give equal time to the advocates of treating women as if they are the property of men, or to the advocates of reinstating either segregation or slavery, despite the fact that when these evil institutions were coming to an end, the Bible was still being quoted frequently on each of these subjects. It is time for the media to announce that there are no longer two sides to the issue of full humanity for Gay and Lesbian people.

Are you listening, network and cable network news producers? Stop "balancing" LGBT issues with on-air rebuttal from the likes of James Dobson, Tony Perkins and Maggie Gallagher! What you're creating isn't balance, it's distortion.

I will no longer act as if the Papal office is to be respected if the present occupant of that office is either not willing or not able to inform and educate himself on public issues on which he dares to speak with embarrassing ineptitude.

"Embarrassing ineptitude" is too mild a description for Pope Ratzinger's hateful broadsides against LGBT humanity. I prefer to call what comes out of his wicked mouth "verbal genocide"! When he claimed that Transgender life threatens the Earth's ecology, that's when I knew he hadn't truly renounced his Hitler Youth past!

I will no longer be respectful of the leadership of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who seems to believe that rude behavior, intolerance, and even killing prejudice is somehow acceptable, so long as it comes from Third World religious leaders, who . . . reveal in themselves the price that colonial oppression has required of the minds and hearts of so many of our world's population.

Now, this is what I call bonafide fire-and-brimstone preaching . . . Dr. Spong is kickin' ass and takin' names!

"You Can't Go Halfway" concludes with Part Two.

You Can't Go Halfway (Part Two)

2009-11-06T08:01:00.000-08:00

DR. JOHN SHELBY SPONG

I see no way that ignorance and truth can be placed side by side, nor do I believe that evil is somehow less evil if the Bible is quoted to justify it.

Whoa, now! There's a sentence worth repeating.

I see no way that ignorance and truth can be placed side by side, nor do I believe that evil is somehow less evil if the Bible is quoted to justify it. I will dismiss as unworthy of any more of my attention the wild, false and uninformed opinions of such would-be religious leaders as Pat Robertson, James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, Jimmy Swaggart, Albert Mohler, and Robert Duncan. My country and my Church have both already spent too much time, energy and money trying to accommodate these backward points of view when they are no longer even tolerable.

Say amen, somebody!

I make these statements because it is time to move on. The battle is over. The victory has been won.

Ah, if only that were true! I fear that the battle has only begun to engage. LGBT folk are vilified from the pulpit, banned from public and private institutions, cut off from constitutional protections, harassed at school and in the workplace, and randomly beaten and murdered, but there are worse things that could happen to us! I don’t accept the general consensus that a Nazi Germany could never rise again. The intensity of hatred for human beings who don't fit binary gender standards is plenty strong enough to trigger a new Holocaust somewhere in the world. I find the degree of LGBT persecution in Africa and the Caribbean particularly alarming; just look at the unrestrained transphobia recently directed at South African athlete Caster Semenya:

http://christthegaymartyr.blogspot.com/2009/09/i-am-caster-semenya-part-one.html

http://christthegaymartyr.blogspot.com/2009/09/i-am-caster-semenya-part-two.html

There is no reasonable doubt as to what the final outcome of this struggle will be. Homosexual people will be accepted as equal, full human beings, who have a legitimate claim on every right that both church and society have to offer any of us. Homosexual marriages will become legal, recognized by the state and pronounced Holy by the Church. "Don't ask/Don't tell" will be dismantled as the policy of our Armed Forces.

God willing, these predictions will come to pass, and during my lifetime. Excuse me, though, if I don't hold my breath waiting for these happy events to occur under Barack Obama’s administration! We’ll need a chief executive with the moral clarity of a Harry Truman or Lyndon Johnson, and those qualities do not appear to exist within our current President.

We will and we must learn that equality of citizenship is not something that should (never) be submitted to a referendum. Equality under and before the law is a solemn promise conveyed to all our citizens in the Constitution itself. Can any of us imagine having a public referendum on whether slavery should continue, whether segregation should be dismantled, whether voting privileges should be offered to women? The time has come for politicians to . . . abandon that convenient shield of demanding a vote on the rights of full citizenship . . . they do not understand the difference between a Constitutional Democracy, which this nation has, and a "mobocracy," which this nation rejected when it adopted its Constitution. We do not put the Civil Rights of a minority to the vote of a plebiscite.

Will someone please tell me how to get otherwise intelligent Gay activists like John Aravosis, Joe Sudbay and Evan Wolfson to grasp this basic truth? Why do so many of us rush to take part in our own Constitutional disenfranchisement? Like lemmings, we compulsively leap upstream each time our enemies on the religious Right Wing set the anti-Gay ballot measure current flowing. We've been trounced at the polls 31 times to date, yet we persist in believing that a just little more fundraising, just a little more TV time, just a little more door-to-door campaigning can win voters over to marriage equality. Earth to space cadets, can you hear me? We're citizens, not candidates for public office! How is it that we no longer understand the difference? For more on this topic, read my two-part essay “Save The Country”:

http://christthegaymartyr.blogspot.com/2008/12/save-country-part-one.html

http://christthegaymartyr.blogspot.com/2008/12/save-country-part-two.html

I will also no longer act as if I need a majority vote of some ecclesiastical body in order to bless, ordain, recognize and celebrate the lives and gifts of Gay and Lesbian people in the life of the Church. No one should ever again be forced to submit the privilege of citizenship in this nation or membership in the Christian Church to the will of a majority vote.

Clergy who share Dr. Spong’s conviction must be ready to put their jobs on the line. They must be prepared to sacrifice their leadership positions, to quit their denominations, to declare exclusive allegiance to the supremacy of God in Christ at risk of excommunication. They must be willing to forfeit their churches, as did the Reverend Jimmy Creech when he decided to treat his Gay and Straight parishioners equally. Do Progressive preachers really have the courage to follow through?

Inequality for Gay and Lesbian people is no longer a debatable issue in either Church or State. Therefore, I will from this moment on, refuse to dignify the continued public expression of ignorant prejudice by engaging it. I do not tolerate racism or sexism any longer. From this moment on, I will no longer tolerate our culture's various forms of homophobia. I do not care who it is who articulates these attitudes, or who tries to make them sound Holy with religious jargon.

I trust Dr. Spong will be 100% true to this statement. I hope he realizes that some of those forms of homophobia he mentions are articulated by Gay clergy. I hope he's prepared to chastise colleagues like the Metropolitan Community Church's Nancy Wilson, Soulforce's Mel White, and minister/pundit Irene Monroe for their endorsement of the word "queer" to describe LGBT folk. As '70s Pop star Johnny Nash sings in one of my favorite Reggae songs: You can't go halfway/You've got to go all the way!* Ignorance from within is just as corrosive as ignorance from without, and may be more so.

I have been part of this debate for years, but things do get settled, and this issue is now settled for me. I do not debate any longer with members of the "Flat Earth Society", either. I do not debate with people who think we should treat epilepsy by casting demons out of the epileptic person; I do not waste time engaging those medical opinions that suggest that bleeding the patient might release the infection. I do not converse with people who think that Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans as punishment for the sin of being the birthplace of Ellen DeGeneres, or that the terrorists hit the United States on 9/11 because we tolerated homosexual people, abortions, feminism or the American Civil Liberties Union.

This is nothing if not a commentary on how far American pundits have veered outside the realm of credibility. Thirty years ago, we would never have heard such outrageous theories presented in major media outlets. Today, though, it's a matter of routine, and punditry on LGBT topics tends to be the most outrageous of all.

I am tired of being embarrassed by so much of my church's participation in causes that are quite unworthy of the Christ I serve, or the God whose mystery and wonder I appreciate more each day. Indeed, I feel the Christian Church should not only apologize, but do public penance for the way we have treated people of color, women, adherents of other religions, and those we designated heretics, as well as Gay and Lesbian people.

I think the word Dr. Spong is grasping for here is "repentance". It’s a word that should be used forcefully and often whenever we talk about the disgraceful activities of Fundamentalist hatemongers!

This is my manifesto and my creed. I proclaim it today. I invite others to join me in this public declaration. I believe that such a public outpouring will help cleanse both the Church and this nation of its own distorting past. It will restore integrity and honor to both Church and State. It will signal that a new day has dawned, and (that) we are ready not just to embrace it, but also to rejoice in it and to celebrate it.

The state of Maine has just disenfranchised its Lesbian and Gay residents, the viciously bigoted Rev. Bernice King just got elected to head the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, a long-distance friend of mine (famous '60s songwriter Ellie Greenwich) recently died, and I lost my job last month, so a new day sounds awfully good to me right now. Bring it on!

Dr. Spong has discovered what every committed Christian must learn sooner or later: When it comes to loving your neighbor as you love yourself(Mark 12:28-31), you can't go halfway! You've got to go all the way. You've got to affirm both the letter and the spirit of the Savior's teachings, and you can't accommodate anything or anyone that impedes your journey to full salvation.

MARK 9:43-48:
(Jesus Christ said) "If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off! It is better for you to enter life maimed than to have hands and to go to Hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off! It is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into Hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out! It is better for you to enter the Kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into Hell, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.

I fully support Dr. Spong's Manifesto, and I think every decent person should do so as well, regardless of faith tradition. My own Manifesto complements it nicely, if I do say so myself: you can read it by scrolling to the bottom of my blog. If that steamed-up statement still doesn't quench your appetite for flaming lava in word form, then check out Rev. Jerry Maneker's new essay on self-hating Gay Christians:

http://christianglbtrights.blogspot.com/2009/11/leave-plains-of-homophobic-churches-and.html

It's so high-voltage, you dare not read it without a surge protector on your computer!

*excerpt from "You Can't Go Halfway" by Margaret Nash and Jimmy Norman,
copyright 1974 Cissi Music, Incorporated(BMI)

I Am Caster Semenya (Part One)

2009-09-16T11:00:00.000-07:00

By design, God places diverse human beings on Earth . . . diverse in size, shape, color, and gender . . . and invites us to marvel at His boundless creativity. Yet wicked humankind dares to pass judgment on God's creations! It confers pariah status on certain individuals due to physical appearance or manner of expression. In presuming to judge God's work, humankind imagines itself equal to or even superior to God. This is the mother of all abominations!

South Africa's Caster Semenya was a darling baby girl when she made her debut on 7 January 1991. As she grew into a child, she became a sports-loving "tomboy" who disdained wearing dresses and frilly clothes. Her schoolmates jeered at her mannerisms and appearance. They would yell: "She acts like a boy . . . and she looks like a boy, too!" The taunts stung, but she never let hurt feelings show. Her family's unconditional love helped arm the little girl against the rudeness of the world.

Ms. Semenya's love for playing soccer evolved into an avid interest in middle-distance track and field running. As she grew into adolescence, she excelled in this event. She recently started competing at the international level. Last year, she won a Gold Medal at the British Commonwealth Youth Games, and this year she bagged more Gold at the African Junior Championships and the World Championships in Athletics, held in Berlin, Germany.

This muscular 18-year-old girl has developed into a world-class competitor. She dominates the 800 meter dash with an amazing 1:55 time; she's a credit to women's sports, and to South Africa. Caster Semenya's success has much to do with the non-traditional woman's image she crafted for herself. Fortunately, she was brought up in an African community that was progressive enough to let her do so; but unfortunately, the kind of female image she projects doesn't sit well with certain Olympic officials.

Recently, the International Association of Athletics Federations asked her to undergo some tests. Not the kind of tests you'd expect, though. Although suspicious of her record-breaking times, they had no desire to learn whether or not she used performance-enhancing drugs. No, they wanted to know something much more personal . . . much more insulting! The Association asked Caster Semenya to let them "verify" her gender.

"Gender verification" involves submitting to gynecological, hormonal and psychological examinations. Ms. Semenya consented to some of this dubious testing, but other procedures were apparently done without her knowledge. In direct violation of privacy rules, the results were maliciously leaked to the sports press. International media outlets reported sensationally on her apparent lack of uterus and ovaries, and trumpeted the phenomenon of internal testes that give her an unusually high testosterone count. The girl was cruelly "outed" as an intersex person, "outed" simultaneously to the world, to her country, to her family, and to herself as well.

All over print and electronic media, this innocent teenager has been repeatedly slandered with the ugly and inaccurate term "hermaphrodite". Incredibly, she's also been accused of faking female identity! Her Gold medals are in danger of being stripped, and the IAAF may forbid her to compete in future track and field events. All South Africa has responded with justifiable outrage. An IAAF official, track coach Wilfred Daniels, has resigned from the organization in protest of her horrendous treatment.

Caster Semenya identifies as female. She was raised as female. Her birth certificate says she is female. Not to put too fine a point on the matter, but . . . she has a vagina. What fraud did she commit? How dare the sports establishment set itself up as the arbiter of her gender? Are we to believe they would've allowed her to compete as a man with female genitalia?

Ms. Semenya is in no way at fault here. She has done nothing wrong, and despite much talk about her supposed "biological problem", there is nothing wrong with her body. Thus far in her young life, it has served her quite well. If God chooses to give a woman testes instead of ovaries, who are we to cast aspersions on the gift?

The fault lies with the IAAF and with the larger society, which arrogantly tries to second-guess nature and create impossibly rigid definitions of male and female. Worse, society refuses to see blended gender as anything but an aberration of nature. Humanity forces a tyranny of binary gender upon itself, something God never intended(read Jesus Christ's teaching on born eunuchs from Matthew 19: 12). This ignorance obliges Transgender human beings to own identities that negate part of who they are. Under such twisted circumstances as these, all gender identity claims are suspect!

The history of gender-testing in sports reeks of sexism. The Nazis sent a man named Horst Ratjen to masquerade as a woman sprinter in the 1936 Olympics; when the deception was discovered years later, it caused a predictable uproar. Ever since then, women athletes with a pronounced masculine aspect have been subjected to rude speculation. In 1966, the IAAF adopted a crude, unscientific testing process for "verifying" femininity. The process was later modified and is no longer officially mandated, but the Association can and does continue to insist that certain competitors undergo it. Apparently, these humiliating tests have only ever been done on women, and only an athlete's female gender has ever come under suspicion. How much more pronounced can sexism be?

Adding insult to injury, the tests are inconclusive! "There is no simple laboratory test that can tell if you are a man or woman," says Professor Arne Ljungqvist, an expert on human gender and a former IAAF official. In a London Times interview dated 13 September 2009, he stressed that "if a person carries a legal certificate showing that (they are) a man or a woman, then they are a man or a woman!" Yet, according to that same article, numerous women athletes have been judged ineligible for Olympic competition as a result of this flawed procedure. One of them was East Indian track and field runner Santhi Soundarajan; read her story here:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/09/14/Semenya.India.Athlete/index.html

"I Am Caster Semenya" concludes with Part Two.

I Am Caster Semenya (Part Two)

2009-09-16T09:50:00.000-07:00

There hasn't been a lot of good media analysis of this scandal, but one pundit who has the right take on it is sports writer Simon Barnes. In a 24 August 2009 column for The London Times, he stated:

The undeniable fact that there can be physical ambiguity between one gender and (another) is something that profoundly disturbs us. In life, but perhaps even more so in sport, we crave certainties. We have men's tennis and we have women's tennis, and so there was always a squirming discomfort about the Transsexual player, Renée Richards . . . but (Caster Semenya's) physical sexual ambiguity cuts still deeper . . . (Ms.) Semenya must suffer because of the world's taste for certainties. And as for sport, where does that go? Do we say that men's sport is for men, women's sport is for women, and that those who happen to have their being in border country . . . simply can't compete? And is that because it's unfair (or) because it's too upsetting for the rest of us? And we all thought sport was supposed to be accessible to all.

Mr. Barnes went on to observe that "(Ms.) Semenya must feel the weight of the world's punishment for the crime of depriving us of certainties . . . those who challenge our assumptions about gender must suffer." So true! Don't you dare be a man with a switchy walk or a high voice. Don't be a woman with muscles and a low voice. Don't wear clothing that's too dainty/too butch. Don't wear your hair too long/too short. For goodness's sake, don't be openly Transsexual. If you are in any way non-traditional in your expression of gender, society will indeed make you suffer!

Prepare yourself for ridicule. Prepare yourself for ostracism. Prepare to fend off irrational hostility that can escalate into violence against your person. Prepare to be condemned by your school, your church, your family. Prepare for difficulty earning your living, for jobs that you keep or lose based on how tolerant of difference your supervisors and co-workers are(I know this is true from personal experience). Get ready to be banned from the Boy Scouts, from the US military, from the pulpit, from the wedding chapel. This is how they do you when they decide you are "queer"! The wrenching testimony that Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transsexual people could give a fact-finding commission would make South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation hearings of the 1990s look like silly parlor games.

In our wildest imaginings, though, most LGBT folk would never expect to endure what Caster Semenya is enduring now. She's been subjected to the equivalent of a televised gynecological exam with a global hook-up, cameras aimed up her vagina, uterine x-rays on the split screen, and pundits à la Fox News offering crass color commentary. Speaking of which, the General Secretary of the IAAF recently told a reporter: "It's clear that (Ms. Semenya) is a woman, but maybe not 100%." That's actually one of the more restrained quotes I know about. I've seen some disgraceful, dehumanizing press coverage in my time, but this recent batch takes the grand prize for boorishness.

The Times reports that "many medical experts" recommend removal of Caster Semenya's male organs "before they cause her harm." Awareness of her Transgender body has prompted such "experts" to all but demand that she undergo sex change surgery. Now, isn't that special? A second invasive procedure for the poor girl. Maybe it will be just as successful as the first one was! At the very least, it should rate more lurid media coverage.

With every oh-so-concerned observation about her "medical condition", society pressures Ms. Semenya to conform to their gender expectations. The world desperately wants to stamp her masculine body presentation out of existence, lest its tender sensibilities be offended for all eternity. I fear that if people continue to judge the young lady so harshly, it's not just her body presentation that will cease to exist! She might feel compelled to take her own life. Ms. Semenya has gone into seclusion at the University of Pretoria, and is reportedly seeking therapy. Her handlers had the foresight to put her on suicide watch; God forbid that this travesty should turn into a tragedy.

There's another kind of death that Caster Semenya could fall victim to, though: A death of the spirit. A death that compels her to spend the rest of her life wearing a mask of socially-sanctioned gender. A death that leaves her filled with shame at the painstaking work God did when he fashioned her beautiful, powerful body. Apparently, her spirit hasn't died yet: A spiritually dead person would never say, as she did recently to the South African lifestyle magazine You: "God made me the way I am, and I accept myself." However, she allowed the magazine to give her a ludicrous "makeover" to eliminate all traces of masculinity. That's not a good sign.

If Caster Semenya can continue to hold her head up after suffering such utter humiliation, she may well choose to hide behind a gender mask. Her "makeover" suggests that some kind of "sexual reassignment" lay in her future. On the other hand, she might go in the opposite direction and decide to retain her intersex status; that would be extraordinary, and it would send an inspiring message to other masculine girls. But who could fault her choices at this point? They are hers and hers alone to make.

There's one choice I hope she won't fail to make, though: The choice to demand justice! Justice for herself and others like her who've been hurt by binary gender tyranny. She should file the mother of all defamation lawsuits against the IAAF and numerous media outlets. Ms. Semenya should sue not only to reclaim her own dignity, but to put on notice every institution that would destroy someone's human dignity because of non-traditional gender expression. Up against the wall, you dirty mothers . . . . it's payback time!

Are you a butch Lesbian? An effeminate Gay man? A Transsexual person who refuses to hide? An intersex person in body or spirit? If so, then you are one of God’s Transgender children, too. You are Caster Semenya! I am Caster Semenya. We are all Caster Semenya, and we should all be mad as Hell, and we shouldn't . . . we mustn't . . . tolerate this sexist, transphobic oppression anymore!

The same goes for any Christian, regardless of gender identity. The inclusive Gospel of Jesus Christ mandates humankind to repent of transphobia: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength(Mark 12:30). How is it possible to love the Lord but despise His creations?

THE GOSPEL OF THOMAS 22: 1-7
Jesus saw some babies nursing. He said to His disciples: "These nursing babies are like those who enter the kingdom." They said to Him: "Then shall we enter the kingdom as babies?" Jesus said to them: "When you make the two into one, and when you make the inner like the outer and the outer like the inner, and the upper like the lower, and when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female . . . then you will enter (the kingdom)."

The 2nd DUMB DORA Awards (Part One)

2009-07-22T11:00:00.000-07:00

"No matter how cynical you get,
it's impossible to keep up"
- Lily Tomlin

Barely had I cleared away the streamers and confetti from my first Dumb Dora Awards celebration than new nominees started presenting themselves. "No!" I cried. "It's too soon! Shouldn't there be at least six months between awards ceremonies?" I resisted, but it soon became apparent to me that ignorance follows its own timetable.

Over and over again, I was astonished by routine displays of arrested intelligence among Gay activists. I saw idiocy on parade; buffooneries by the dozen; lunacy galore! There were clowns to the left of me and jokers to the right, each new one more embarrassing than the one that came before. Believe me, darlings, I was simply spoiled for choice!

Yet somehow, I did manage to choose, narrowing down ten winners from scores of finalists. Now here we are again, gathered together to honor the dishonorable; my eyes glisten with tears as I watch my presenters line up behind the imbecile's podium, holding the dreaded tin jackass statuettes. These tokens of contempt will all be in the hands of deserving recipients when this evening is over. Conductor, cue the orchestra; stagehands, draw back the curtain! Let the 2nd Dumb Dora Awards begin!

The Dumb Dora Award for Carelessness goes to
Wayne Besen

Wayne Besen is the founder of Truth Wins Out, an organization dedicated to debunking the “ex-Gay” movement. He routinely sends out press releases to announce his lectures. A few months ago, he appeared at an event sponsored by CRANE, a group based out of Charlotte, North Carolina. CRANE promotes itself as an advocate “for Charlotte’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, queer(sic) and intersex” citizens. Besen included this motto verbatim in his latest press release, ignoring the derogatory usage. Such uncharacteristic carelessness puzzled me, so I emailed him with my concerns.

He defended himself by saying he’d merely quoted CRANE’S mission statement. I cautioned Besen against letting sexual slurs slip out in his publicity materials. He was unrepentant, stating: “I don’t like the term (queer). It appears in nothing I write. However, other people have a different view of the word . . . I was not going to come into a town as an outsider and tell people what they can and cannot say. That is the kind of thing that causes unnecessary infighting . . . so, for today, ‘queer' shall survive.”

I was appalled! Later in our email exchange, he accused me of “creating battles (among Gay activists) where none need exist.” If anybody ought to know better, it’s Wayne Besen! Nobody’s more familiar with the tools “ex-Gay” ministries use to advance their ignorance. Their main vehicle is the concept of Gay people as “queer”! The idea that we are abnormal reinforces harmful myths, fuels internalized shame and sabotages our equality struggle. Does it matter whether our enemies or our allies are the ones embracing this false concept? No! The damage is just as great either way.

Wayne Besen has temporarily lost his grip on reality! Nothing could be more absurd than saying you’re against doing something, then doing it while still claiming to be against it! Nothing could be more wrong than ranking unity in the Gay Rights movement higher than the goals of the Gay Rights movement. Gay activists cannot indulge in the casual use of sexual slurs for any reason! What’s more, we must denounce their casual use whenever and wherever it occurs. Besen must do this if he wants his brand of activism to be 100% effective. Then he’s got to walk the damn talk! Until he’s ready to do that, there’ll be a Dumb Dora Award with his name on it.

Here's an excerpt from an email I sent to Wayne Besen, in response to his accusation that I'm divisive:

Future generations of LGBT folk are counting on us. We may not be able to leave them a legacy of full equality, but we can at least leave them a legacy of dignity. I did not grow up with that legacy, and my God, how I missed having it! I was bashed repeatedly as a child, both physically and verbally. I had to endure being called "queer", "f*ggot" and "p*ssy" before I was even ten years old! That's how I was perceived. People felt they had a right to slur me because society failed to promote respect for effeminate boys. I try to promote respect for LGBT folk with everything I write. I don't want to be responsible in any way, shape or form for another child having to endure those hurtful labels . . .

Trying to fight the oppressor while simultaneously inviting him to speak and think of your kind as "queers", "f*ggots" and "d*kes" is both tragically dumb and the biggest waste of time and resources there ever was. We’ve ceded over half the battle to our enemy . . . don't we want future generations of LGBT folk to experience lives that are better than what we live today? That won't happen if we pass down to them a concept of LGBT identity as "queer". We'll only have helped future generations of heterosexists to marginalize them. If it's not about making conditions better for those who succeed us on this planet, Wayne, then what's the (expletive deleted) point?

The labels we use are every bit as important as the lobbying we do and the funds we raise. Hell, they’re more important! We have no damn right calling ourselves Gay Rights crusaders unless we use and promote language that's uplifting. Uplifting language, not only in the judgment of an elite cadre of ghettoized activists, but in the judgment of mainstream society. The language of our oppressors will never meet that standard. Never!

My feelings haven't changed one iota since I sent him this message.

The Dumb Dora Award for Irresponsibility goes to
The Advocate

In an online Advocate feature dated 10 March 2009, "queer comedian" and “Big Gay Sketch Show” cast member Jonny McGovern is showcased. Calling himself "The Gay Pimp", McGovern specializes in “"f*gsploitation” comedy. He shamelessly trades on crude stereotypes (both racial and sexual), ugly sexual slurs and harmful myths in his podcasts and many musical satires. He's known for using the word "f*ggoty" to describe anything Gay-related. His offensive brand of humor is tailor-made for our enemies on the Right Wing, and I'm sure they enjoy it no end!

McGovern and his ilk are to Gay equality aspirations what Depression-era actor Stepin Fetchit was to Black equality aspirations: A ball and chain that drags us backward! They take cheap shots at their own kind and make careers off the worst kind of minority group burlesque. They’re cut from the same cloth as profit-hungry writers and producers in Hollywood who cynically exploit LGBT folk for crass comic relief; these craven opportunists are traitors to the Gay Rights movement. Focus On The Family should consider putting them on salary! Just one of their retrograde routines (like McGovern's “Girl, I F*cked Yo' Boyfriend”) does more to advance that organization's reactionary goals than a whole month of anti-Gay church sermons!

The Advocate is totally irresponsible to publish laudatory puff pieces on Uncle Toms like Jonny McGovern. It's shocking to see this magazine, once a proud vehicle for furthering equality goals, degenerate into a frivolous lifestyle publication that will stoop to any low (nude photo shoots, lead stories on Gay polygamy, male escort profiles, sex toys on the magazine cover, etcetera) in order to pump circulation figures.

To me, "f*gsploitation" humor amounts to a section of the Gay populace raising the white flag of surrender to our oppressors. It sends a message that we're OK with the marginalization, OK with discrimination and brutality, OK with not being taken seriously as human beings. In fact, we're so OK with it, we'll help it along! We'll make the oppressor feel comfortable with his anti-Gay attitudes. We'll serve him up a heaping helping of those "f*g" stereotypes he loves so much.

Lord, deliver me! As if we didn't have enough to do, defending ourselves from the religious Right Wing, from the macho knuckleheads and fascist politicians, we've also got to contend with Fifth Columnists: Sensationalism-courting minstrels like Jonny McGovern and the so-called Gay-friendly media that gleefully promotes their Uncle Tom-foolery and Aunt Jemimah antics. Sometimes, the forces of ignorance seem overwhelming! Only with God's help can we triumph against such daunting odds. This is The Advocate's second trip to the imbecile's podium; how much do you wanna bet it won't be the last?

The Dumb Dora Award for Self-Loathing goes to
Michael Musto

Check out these excerpts from a 30 March 2009 column that gossip guru Michael Musto posted at his Village Voice blog:

There are a lot of differences between the various generations of queers(sic), like how the older ones grew up reading Cosmo while the newer ones only bother with serious financial digests and video games . . . old queens(sic) grew up with very little Gay visibility in the media . . . the younger Gays have grown up with queer(sic) iconography everywhere they turn . . . the younger queers(sic) may have far less sense of history about them, but probably a far greater chance for happiness . . . . these are all gross generalizations, but as an older queen(sic), let me tell you, they are totally true!

Musto was trying to say something about progress here, but his internalized shame and thinly-veiled loathing for Gay identity kept getting in the way! My pal, Rev. Jerry Maneker, posted a response in which he tried to raise consciousness about shame-based usage. For his trouble, a Musto defender accused him of riding a "high horse" and spreading so-called political correctness. Let me get this straight, now: Being thought "politically correct" is the most horrible thing since Nazi Germany, right? So in order to avoid that transgression, we should feel free to slime our Gay brothers and sisters with vicious, misogynist labels like "queer", "d*ke" and "queen"? To be sure, there’s something queer up in here, but it ain’t Gay people; it’s bizarro logic!

There are far worse things in the world than so-called political correctness: bigotry, for example. Michael Musto and his defenders might as well be bigots, since they love the language of bigotry so much! I'd rather ride a "high horse" every damn day of the week than wallow for one second in the filth of ignorance and self-hatred. Jerry's attacker also had the chutzpah to claim that Musto exhibits ”absolutely no shame with his sexuality.” Somebody who identifies as an “old queen”, devoid of shame? Who does he think he's fooling?

The word "pride" means something; you can't just say you have it. You've got to demonstrate pride in the way you talk and act. Nobody with pride ever refers to himself and his kind in such a dehumanizing way! Shame on The Village Voice for letting Michael Musto get away with these slurs. This is another example of mainstream American media showing its contempt for LGBT folk(for yet another example, see Part Two of this post). If an African-American contributor wanted to casually refer to Black people as "n*ggers" and "coons", the editors would never allow it; but obviously, anything goes as far as the Gay population is concerned!

Internalized shame isn't unique to Gay people. Jews suffer from it. Asians and Latinos do, too. There's certainly plenty of internalized shame in the Black community. Women haven't escaped its clutches, either. Yet there's just no comparison to LGBT folk, who wave their shame like a banner for all to see, insist that sexual slurs and stereotypes are expressions of pride, and encourage mainstream media to embrace them. The level of denial is just unprecedented!

However, that denial often amounts to a paper-thin veneer, and Michael Musto's shame-based usage proves as much; his supposedly benign epithets can turn hateful all too quickly. Around the same time he penned the aforementioned post, he appeared on MSNBC's "Keith Olbermann" show and stated that former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani "looks like a tranny". The nasty smirk on his face made it abundantly clear that he was not paying Giuliani a compliment! In the retrograde world Mr. Musto lives in, LGBT identity is freakish and always ripe for ridicule. He's a Gay ghetto anachronism, an embarrassing throwback to the pre-Stonewall, "pansy craze" era; he and his mindset belong in a museum exhibit, not in print and not on TV.

The Dumb Dora Award for Offensive Talk goes to
Station KJHK in Lawrence, Kansas

No low is too low when it comes to the phenomenon of "f*gsploitation" media. The newest purveyors of this pestilence are Gay shock jocks Ryan Campbell and Sara Thompson. They host an envelope-pushing music and talk entry that broadcasts on Kansas University's Station KJHK. Their show has built a reputation for snarky political humor and dirty jokes with a homoerotic spin. "I love being on the air," crows Ms. Thompson, "and I think our ability to turn everything into something sexual is pretty amazing." Pretty adolescent, too!

A reviewer recently described her program as "quirky and sexually-based . . . with raw humor and opinions." One of the rawest things about it is its title: "The Dick 'n' D*ke Show"! This filthy take-off on the name of a classic 1960s sitcom appealed to the twisted sensibility of Ian Hrabe, KJHK's current music director. "KJHK really needed some diversity," Hrabe claims, "and I think Sara and Ryan break up some of the monotony." Nothing says diversity like anti-Gay slurs, huh, Ian? A talk show whose Gay hosts identify themselves with four-letter profanities for penis and vagina fits the bill perfectly!

When not indulging in potty mouth dialogue, Campbell and Thompson feign legitimacy by touting local Gay bars and paying lip service to current events like California's Proposition 8. They also play lots of what they call "queer(sic) music" by "obvious artists" like, uh . . . Madonna? "We're a sassy talk show," brags Campbell, "and queer(sic) people should try to listen, because this is for them." Oh, I agree! Anybody who thinks Gay people are queer will love a fringe talk show like this; it does an excellent job of reinforcing stereotypes, and everybody knows how essential those are to Gay empowerment!

When a college radio station dares to put something so offensive on the air, and a college administration sanctions obscene monikers, somebody should call the FCC! Predictably, I learned about "The Dick 'n' D*ke Show" via a puff piece in The Liberty Press. That's Rev. Fred Phelps' home state Gay newspaper, don't you know? This sexual slur-ridden rag features columnist Sheryl LeSage, a Lesbian who opines that it's no big deal when Rick Warren compares Gay couples to pedophiles. No wonder the Phelps clan feels so at home in Kansas!

Quiet as it's kept, hardcore heterosexism has a home in Hollywood, too. Openly Gay actors continue to be shut out of leading roles, and projects which portray LGBT folk in a serious light still lack for funding; even so, the movie industry jumps at every chance to exploit Gay stereotypes for profit. Case in point: The mockumentary Brüno was released to movie theatres last weekend. Sacha Baron Cohen's festival of "f*gsploitation" humor outperformed every other current release at the box office. Its popularity, just like that of "The Dick 'n' D*ke Show", proves once again that people will crane their necks to gawk at a messy accident. Why, though, must LGBT dignity so often be a casualty in these entertainment media train wrecks?

The Dumb Dora Award for Ironically-Named Organizations goes to
Gay Shame
Beware of an organization known as Gay Shame, which promotes itself as a "radical alternative to Gay Pride." One of its spokespeople, Matt Bernstein Sycamore, articulated the group's political stance in the Summer 2002 edition of Slingshot, a radical rag out of Berkeley, California. "Gay Pride has become little more than a giant opportunity for multi-national corporations to target-market products to Gay consumers," he complained. "Many of the companies in attendance at Pride mask reactionary agendas in order to court the Gay dollar: Right Wing Coors and Phillip Morris, union-busting Budweiser, and the old standbys, drug companies like Bristol-Myers-Squibb and GlaxoWellcome, who always choose profits over people's lives (especially people with AIDS)."

The group's criticism is valid, but its solution is anything but! "Gay Shame is committed to fighting the rabid assimilationist monster of corporate Gay ‘pride’ with a devastating mobilization of queer(sic) brilliance," Sycamore boasted. He went on to describe a typical Gay Shame action that took place in San Francisco: "We turned Tire Beach into our queer(sic) autonomous space for the day . . . we encouraged people to participate in creating their own radical queer(sic) space, and people argued about political issues, created visual art, poured concrete and made a mosaic, dyed hair, mud-wrestled naked and had sex . . . over four hundred people trekked out to Tire Beach to join in the festivities."

Some months later, Gay Shame staged an event in the Castro neighborhood. "Hundreds of queers(sic) dressed to excess and jammed Harvey Milk Plaza and blocked Castro Street for several hours of dangerous glamour." My, what a crippling blow was dealt to corporate encroachment that day! When not devising dubious ways of battling Wall Street corruption or paying lip service to other Progressive concerns, Gay Shame stays busy proclaiming public sex a Civil Right. When lewd acts, burlesque shows and Mardi Gras-style revelry masquerade as serious social activism, you have an excellent example of why Progressive politics lack credibility.

Gay Shame is indeed shameful! It's a group of exhibitionists who respond to the vapidity of Gay Pride celebrations with their own brand of vapidity. Which is worse: Organizations that allow themselves to be co-opted by oppressive corporate interests, or organizations that hijack legitimate social issues to use as vehicles for mindless hedonism? I think it's a toss-up.

If certain people prefer hedonistic revelry to serious social activism, I'm perfectly OK with that. Really, I am! I just don't like it when those people try to convince me that hedonism and activism are the same thing. Please, don't disrespect me by insulting my intelligence. Don't p*ss on my foot and tell me there's a rainstorm coming down!

"The 2nd Dumb Dora Awards" concludes with Part Two.

The 2nd DUMB DORA Awards (Part Two)

2009-07-22T10:33:00.000-07:00

The Dumb Dora Award for Elitism goes to
The New York City Bar Association

If you’ve ever listened to Progressive talk radio and TV, you may, like me, have learned to dread the ritual of Left Wing activists jawboning a topic to death. Not only that, but doing it with such insufferable condescension that you want to smack them! They sound so elitist and out-of-touch with everyday people, you wonder if they might be career politicians in disguise. A case in point: Snobby, “professional” Gay strategists, talking down their noses about marriage equality.

I’ve been wanting to lay a Dumb Dora Award on some of these pompous jackasses real bad! I finally got my chance after reading an 8 May 2009 news item at www.advocate.com. At a recent legal seminar sponsored by The New York City Bar Association, strategist snobbery was on full display: Columbia Law School professor Katherine Franke indicted marriage equality crusaders for casting “a judgmental shadow” on people who don’t want to get married. Really? On what planet? She went on to claim that marriage activism has a “crowding-out effect” on issues of more importance to LGBT folk. Who is she, then, presuming to prioritize issues for others?

Marriage activism isn’t her problem; it’s arrogance! But she’s no worse than New York Law School professor Arthur Leonard, who blamed marriage equality’s newsworthiness on the media’s obsession with “sexy subjects”. Silly me! I thought it was a Civil Rights issue. Sex isn’t what first pops into my mind when I think of marriage, and I seriously doubt it was on the minds of those courageous Gay couples who sued for the right to wed.

Leonard’s biggest complaint is that the media makes Gay people “look like we’re all obsessed with marriage.” Or did he mean to say obsessed with sex, since he doesn’t draw a distinction? The nutty professor went on to opine that “marriage has turned into something like General Motors or AIG! It’s just this enormous thing that nobody knows what to do with, but you can’t let it fail because it’s too big.” I’m sorry the Professor doesn’t know what to do with marriage. It also pains me that credible current events metaphors seem beyond his capability!

Only attorney Roberta Ann Kaplan was able to assess the issue without stumbling over her ego. She observed that with marriage rights, “you’re essentially recognizing very fundamentally the equality of Gay men and Lesbians.” The lady couldn’t be more on the money; too bad she’s wasting her superior intellect hanging around clueless snobs like Katherine Franke and Arthur Leonard. As they say at the United Negro College Fund, a mind is a terrible thing to waste!

Pontificating absurdly about what Civil Rights LGBT folk should and shouldn't want is hardly a constructive way to spend your time, especially if you call yourself an equality advocate. There's far too much of this nonsense going on; last month, I heard the same kind of elitist Gay "strategizing" on a broadcast of Pacifica's "Grit Radio" talk show. Enough, already! As Elvis Presley used to sing: A little less conversation and a little more action! Instead of trying to micromanage equality movement agendas, the Katherine Frankes and Arthur Leonards in our midst should try climbing down from their ivory towers and bearing down on the issues they feel most strongly about. There are always more openings for laborers than supervisors!

The Dumb Dora Award for Tragic Naïveté goes to
Dan Choi, Sandy Tsao and Victor Fehrenbach

First Lieutenant Dan Choi and Second Lieutenant Sandy Tsao are both out of a job. They're in the process of being drummed out of the US military, and it's partially their own fault. The US military's "Don't Ask/Don't Tell" restriction on openly Gay soldiers bit them in the ass, but it didn't have to happen the way it did. They asked for it! They believed Barack Obama's campaign pledge to repeal the discriminatory rule. That was pathetic enough, but it got worse. They were such eager beavers, they couldn't wait until after he'd fulfilled his pledge: They came bursting out of the closet beforehand, foolishly counting on him to block their discharges. What a rude surprise they got when he didn't!

The growing likelihood that our President will renege on this promise makes them look even more foolish. I hate that this happened, but it was entirely predictable. When will Gay people learn to stop putting faith in politicians and their promises? Choi and Tsao are old enough to remember the Clinton era debacle that led to DADT's implementation in 1993. Too bad they didn't take any lessons from it! Their tragic naïveté has cost them their military careers and retirement benefits.

Hopefully, they'll channel the hurt into meaningful activism, but aside from Dan Choi's high-profile appearances at a few Gay Rights demonstrations, I have yet to see that happen. Neither Choi nor Lieutenant Colonel Victor Fehrenbach, another recent DADT casualty, want President Obama to issue an Executive Order suspending the policy; both supported a "go slow" legislative solution when they appeared on MSNBC's "Rachel Maddow Show". Whatever happened to the eager beaver approach? Isn’t it kinda late to start acting timid, guys?

Lt. Col. Fehrenbach attended the controversial Stonewall commemorative cocktail party that was thrown at the White House last month. He was ostensibly there to bring the urgency of repealing DADT home to President Obama. Instead, he stood dumbfounded while Obama politely told him that he had no intention of stopping his impending discharge. Later, Fehrenbach returned to "The Rachel Maddow Show", expressing muted disappointment but overflowing with aw-shucks gratitude for having gotten an audience with the President.

As I sat in front of my TV watching him punk out, I wanted to scream: "You dumb @#%%!!! Don't you have any backbone at all? Where's your outrage?" I'm sorry if that sounds cold-hearted, but it's the truth. Dude hasn't got enough ambition to get angry about the injustice that's being done him, so why should anybody else care? Aren't American soldiers supposed to be famous for their fierce fighting spirit? Maybe Victor Fehrenbach doesn't have what it takes to be one after all?

The Dumb Dora Award for Callous Sensationalism goes to

The Advocate and Tim Dean

On June 6, 2009, The Advocate had a twisted little Pride Month surprise hidden in its online media reviews: A plug for a new book called Unlimited Intimacy. Supposedly, it’s an academic tome, but judging from the description given, and the lurid jacket reproduction featuring nude male buttocks, it’s really something else. I’d call it exploitation of dangerous sexual practice for the sake of sensationalism!

The practice in question is “barebacking”, the act of indulging in anal sex sans protection. According to The Advocate’s reviewer, Unlimited Intimacy is “an academic but insightful look at the evolution and meaning of ‘barebacking’ in Gay culture. (The author) does not make any social arguments about ‘barebacking’, but rather looks at the surrounding subculture from an anthropological standpoint, attempting to unravel the point of view, motivations, and interests of its inhabitants.” He concludes that the book is “a smart, unbiased read for anyone seeking greater understanding of the phenomenon.”

Smart? That’s not a word I’d use to describe anybody who’s “unbiased” about “barebacking”. Unprotected sex can kill! Why is it that some of us still want to ignore that inconvenient truth? Personally, I’d rather have limits on my intimacy than on my life expectancy! I’d also rather read books and book reviews by writers who give a damn about my kind.

It offends me much that Professor Tim Dean, the author of Unlimited Intimacy, would undertake a cold-blooded anthropological study of self-destructive Gay men as if they were some kind of exotic lost tribe. It offends me even more that a Gay publication would promote such a study uncritically. I’m not surprised, though. After all, The Advocate’s writers delight in calling LGBT folk “queers” as often as possible. Did you think that was just innocent mischief on their part? Think again, sugar! If you look closely at the features they publish, you’ll begin to discern what they really think of us “queers”. I’d tell you what I really think of The Advocate, but I’m a Christian . . . I’m not supposed to use that kind of language!

Didn't I predict that The Advocate would be (dis)honored a third time? Who knew it would happen so soon? Eventual induction into my Fool's Hall of Fame looks like a sure thing!

Seriously, I struggled over whether a Dumb Dora Award was appropriate for this particular incident. It's arguably too repugnant to merely be called dumb. In my opinion, Unlimited Intimacy should be sold with a public health warning stamped across the cover! I lived through the 1980s, and I saw HIV/AIDS wipe out a whole generation of Gay and Bisexual men. What's more, hundreds of Black men are still sero-converting; I've seen firsthand how negatively toxic AIDS medications have impacted my friends' quality of life and financial resources. And yes, people still die from the disease.

Safer sex is essential for our survival! No contradictory messages can be tolerated. Behind the decisions to write, publish and publicize this reprehensible book lies a total disregard for our humanity. When I read the blurb, I felt the same way I did many years ago after being beaten up in Math class. My Math teacher stood by silently and watched while a classmate called me "f*ggot" and tried to pound me into a pulp! How to describe that awful feeling? The title of a Top Ten R & B song written by the late Michael Jackson sums it up best: "They Don't Care About Us."

The Dumb Dora Award for Offensive Imagery goes to
Noam Gonick

I thought the "Million F*g March" was the epitome of Gay self-sabotage. I didn't think anything could surpass its level of idiocy. I was wrong!

When I saw the photo of half-naked men with wet underwear on their heads, and the words "Gay Pride" in the caption, I thought: "Lord, no. What now?" Here's what: In a feature dated 11 June 2009, The Huffington Post reported: "A Canadian filmaker has made a movie for Gay Pride week featuring football players getting waterboarded with rainbow-colored underwear covering their noses and mouths." "Waterboarding" is a form of physical torture associated with Iraq's infamous Abu Ghraib Prison.

"Director Noam Gonick . . . intended to make a political point by using the waterboarding imagery," the article went on to say. Can you can figure out what kind of political point? Try to discern it from Gonick's ridiculous explanation! "Conquest is not only about territory, or oil, or puppet dictatorships," claims the creep. "It's sexual, too . . . it's about (how) we're willing to do anything to get the approval of the State."

No, it isn't. It's about how Noam Gonick is willing to do anything to publicize himself! The craven opportunism of some LGBT folk is completely off the chain! There's no Gay myth or stereotype too degrading or disturbing for them to exploit. Shock value-loving visual artists and writers thrive on this kind of "f*gsploitation", so I'm not surprised that a filmmaker is the culprit here; but eroticizing torture? Fetishizing its victims? Drawing parallels between torture and Gay sex? That takes "f*gsploitation" to an all-time low. It's disgusting! Human Rights advocates, torture survivors everywhere and the US Military should all denounce this sick film in the strongest terms possible!

When it comes to distorting Gay identity, nobody does it better than Gay artists, writers and filmmakers on the radical fringe. They've got a grab bag full of bigotry-reinforcing concepts that they're eager to share with the world, all turning on a single theme: Gay = Sex! From that point of departure, it's a short leap to Gay = Kinky Sex; Gay = Promiscuous Sex; Gay = Humiliating Sex; Gay = Coercive, Dangerous Sex; and Gay = Sex Devoid of Love.

Same-gender loving people get slimed but good on this trip to the cutting edge! Why aren't we alarmed by these inaccurate, sensationalist depictions? If they originated from Right Wing sources, we'd surely be up in arms. Ideology isn't the issue here: Whenever and wherever ignorance passes itself off as artistic expression, condemnation is warranted.

The Dumb Dora Award for Offensive Legal Opinions Goes to
Apologist Attorneys

Many Gay activists feigned deafness when, during the presidential campaign, Senator Barack Obama expressed opposition to marriage equality. Now that the Obama Administration is aggressively defending the Defense of Marriage Act in court, many are feigning shock. That's not the worst kind of feigning that's going on, either.

A battery of self-proclaimed law experts (including Liberal icon Laurence Tribe) has emerged to put an implausible Gay-friendly spin on the administration's legal brief. This loathsome document calls same-gender marriage a financial burden on the State, and likens LesBiGay unions to incest and pedophila! It reveals Obama's true colors to be anything but a rainbow stripe.

Yet, apologist lawyers insist otherwise: "When a Federal statute is challenged as being unconstitutional, the policy of the Justice Department, with very few exceptions, is to defend the Federal law, even if there's a new administration that doesn't agree with it," squawks Georgetown Law professor Nan Hunter to The Washington Blade. Supporting her lame-brained logic is former Clinton Administration attorney Robert Raben, who babbles: "(There are) tiny, tiny exceptions . . . when the statute is otherwise unlawful, (but DOMA) doesn't even come close."

Raben scales unprecedented heights of Uncle Tom-ism when he judges some of the brief's incendiary language "really sensitive" and opines that "they've gone out of their way to (argue) Gay marriage can be a great thing." Great like incest and pedophilia?

Conservative pundit Dale Carpenter has a firmer grip on reality. Writing at the Volokh Conspiracy website, he notes that the brief parrots "what same-sex marriage opponents have argued for years" and attacks "just about every single variation of an argument that Gay-Rights scholars and litigants have made over the past 30 years." The best response to apologist lawyers has come from blogger Joe Sudbay. Posting June 13th at americablog.com, he writes: "It's shocking, how many people viewed yesterday's DOMA discussion through their own purely intellectual, legal lens. The condescending tone from some of the legal types, both Straight and Gay, all Democrat, was insulting, demeaning, and horribly out of touch . . . for some, the decision whether to defend or oppose DOMA is purely a legal exercise. For many of us, it's our lives!"

For spinning legal ethics into butter, "friends" in high places like Nan Hunter and Robert Raben deserve a Dumb Dora Award. On the other hand, Joe Sudbay deserves an entirely different kind of honor: A round of applause for displaying backbone, something that's shamefully rare in Gay online commentary.

Ignorance is plentiful, my darlings. Never doubt that fact! In Gay activist circles, we seem to have more than our fair share. If you have examples of idiotic undermining of the Gay Rights movement, please bring them to my attention! Shoot me the disgraceful details via my blog comments section. Stay tuned for the 3rd Dumb Dora Awards, no doubt coming sooner than you expect to this same web address!

Democratizing The Dallas Principles (Part One)

2009-06-23T10:50:00.000-07:00

Gay people are so damn apathetic and unmotivated! That's been true as far back as the time of German Gay Rights pioneer Magnus Hirschfeld, who complained bitterly about it. I expect it to be true through the end of my remaining years on this planet. By eagerly embracing slurs and stereotypes, gobbling up crumbs thrown our way by politicians, and giving the religious Right Wing a free pass to abuse us, we all but invite bigotry and discrimination.

I can't deny though, that since the marriage equality debacle in California, the natives have become a lot more restless! Suddenly, a significant number of us seem to be in the mood for justice. We've finally allowed ourselves to get angry again: Angry at the power structure, angry at our advocacy organizations, angry at a movement pace that too often seems glacial. At least for the moment, we want to march. We want to litigate. We want to speak truth to power. We long for a new, more sharply focused strategy with non-negotiable objectives.

In this spirit of urgency, a motley group of LGBT activists met last month in a Dallas, Texas hotel. Except for former Ambassador to Romania Michael Guest, longtime activist Mandy Carter, Straight ally Reverend Jimmy Creech and blogger Pam Spaulding, the names of the 24 participants were unfamiliar to me. All were distinguished in their respective fields, though, which ranged from science, politics, law and commerce to philanthropy, journalism, religion and the arts. After several days of intense discussion, the group drafted a document consisting of a preamble, a set of Civil Rights goals, a call to action and eight operating principles. Then these two dozen professionals dispersed back to their respective hometowns with a mission to publicize their manifesto.

They called it The Dallas Principles; the title references an AIDS activist manifesto known as The Denver Principles, written in 1983. The preamble reads as follows:

At several junctures in American history, the stars have aligned to deliver the promise of equal protection under the law to those previously denied. At this unique time in history, our nation must once again exercise the great tradition of making its people equal . . . those content with the way things are will be judged harshly by history. Those who do not actively advance these ideals or offer excuses will be judged just as harshly . . . we believe in the inherent human dignity of all people. No longer will we submit our children, our family, our friends and ourselves as a political tool for any Party or ideology. A new day has arrived.

Word about the Dallas Principles is spreading fast. There's now a website, and the manifesto has been heavily promoted at The Huffington Post, Pam's House Blend and many other Progressive blogs. The drafters see their document as the foundation of a revitalized, twenty-first century Gay Rights movement. Their stated goal is "achieving full Civil Rights faster". Unfortunately, their manifesto reads like it was put together too fast!

I must admit, I initially found it underwhelming. The whole enterprise struck me as pompous, and the Principles themselves failed to impress me at first reading. However, after re-reading and discussing them with friends, some are starting to grow on me. Here are all eight declarations; save for my style edits, they’re exactly as they appear at:

http://www.thedallasprinciples.org/The_Dallas_Principles/Principles.html

In order to achieve full Civil Rights now, we avow:

1. Full Civil Rights for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender individuals must be enacted now. Delay and excuses are no longer acceptable.

When I read these sentences, my first impulse was to say: “Neat trick, if you can pull it off! Just try to eliminate all the different kinds of discrimination at once!” That will almost certainly not happen. However, to the extent that this statement discourages prioritizing one issue over another, I do support it. All forms of discrimination against us are unacceptable, and all are worth the resources we spend on combating them. Who's to say that marriage equality is more important than hate crimes legislation? That open military service trumps access to adoption and foster parenting? It depends on individual priorities. We have no choice but to multi-task and tackle these problems simultaneously. What’s more, we can’t let power brokers and policymakers off the hook until every injustice against us has been reversed.

2. We will not leave any part of our community behind.

What does that mean? This declaration is nebulous. Most people will assume that it addresses Transfolk, but that’s just an assumption. Why weren't they identified by name? Who is actually considered part of our community (a term I use advisedly)? We shouldn't have to guess. Guessing can get us in trouble!

Over the years, many fringe groups have claimed membership in the Gay “community”: Hardcore sado-masochists, fetish worshippers, public sex advocates, “bareback” sex advocates, and even NAMBLA members. I don't share the values of those groups, I want no part of their unsavory activities, and I'd never support a Principle that promotes them.

3. Separate is never equal.

True, but they should've fleshed this statement out a bit more. As is, it sounds too much like a cliché.

4. Religious beliefs are not a basis upon which to affirm or deny Civil Rights.

Patently false! This is an argument for a secular Gay Rights movement, which we already have. Our crusade is all the weaker for lacking a prominent religious component. How could Rev. Jimmy Creech sign off on a statement like this? Haven’t all the sacrifices he’s made on behalf of LGBT equality been validations of his Christian beliefs?

Only one part of this statement is correct, the part about religion justifying the denial of Civil Rights; but true faith, especially Christian faith, is an excellent basis upon which to affirm them. Proof is right there in the Gospel of Jesus Christ: Love others as you love yourself(Matthew 19: 19).

The secular world has been buffaloed, tricked into believing that Scripture supports the marginalization of Gay people; that has never been and will never be true, no matter how many times Pope Ratzinger may say otherwise! What could be more powerful than a faith-based Civil Rights crusade? Look at the one Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led, how it inspired the world, and what sweeping changes it brought to our society. Look, too, at how strong the faith component has made our enemies. This ill-conceived Principle reeks of religion-phobia; I find it totally counter-productive. It robs us of Liberationist theology, an essential weapon in our fight!

5. The establishment and guardianship of full Civil Rights is a non-partisan issue.

True, although most Republicans obviously haven’t realized this truth yet. I hope when they say "non-partisan", the Dallas group isn't just thinking about the major political parties. LGBT Rights is an issue that Libertarians, Greens, Independents, et al can conceivably agree on, too. Limiting ourselves to a narrow, inside-the-Washington-beltway, two-party outreach would make no sense.

6. Individual involvement and grass roots action are paramount to success and must be encouraged.

Very true. Keep this Principle in mind, because I intend to reference it later on.

7. Success is measured by the Civil Rights we all achieve, not by words, access or money raised.

True enough, but on the other hand, just try to achieve success without devoting sufficient time to fund-raising! If raising money is as unimportant as this statement implies, the Dallas group better have the ability to mobilize thousands of eager volunteers; otherwise, its agenda won't amount to anything but words on paper. That said, I also take exception to the implication that words don't matter much. If they didn't, what would be the point of writing a manifesto?

8. Those who seek our support are expected to commit to these principles.

In other words, those who can commit to some of these Principles but not to others aren’t worthy allies? How arrogant!

The drafters seem to have forgotten that LGBT folk are a minority group. We’re in no position to dictate that everybody be on exactly the same page as we are! Many of our allies are still educating themselves about our issues: Our own relatives, for example! They don’t all have to be at the top of the learning curve, and we don’t have to compromise our goals to accept what help they have to offer. Granted, #1, #2 (with caveat) and #3 are Principles our allies must share, but insisting on 100% agreement (especially with the more questionable resolutions) is self-defeating.

We can and should seek common ground with somewhat like-minded people; otherwise, implementing Principle #5 will be impossible! This statement is much too haughty for its own good.

"Democratizing the Dallas Principles" concludes with Part Two.

Democratizing The Dallas Principles (Part Two)

2009-06-22T10:58:00.000-07:00

To be sure, some of these Dallas Principles haven't been completely thought out! The list itself isn't complete, either. A few more key concerns appear in the Goals section of the manifesto, a more specific list which hasn't attracted as much attention. Yet even there, some important issues go unaddressed. AIDS activists have criticized the lack of a statement mandating HIV education, prevention and research funding. HIV/AIDS isn't just an issue for Gay men, of course, but we've been so heavily impacted by this epidemic, it makes sense that we might want to address it in this context.

We've got more to worry about than just AIDS, though! What about breast cancer among Lesbians? What about black market silicone and other dangers to Transsexual health? What about the harmful effects of hetero-bigotry on our collective mental health? The Goals section does include a call for "affordable, high quality and culturally-competent health care without discrimination," but that language sounds too generic. I would've preferred more direct wording: There must be a national health care policy tailored to the specific physical and mental health needs of LGBT folk.

While I'm glad the Dallas group addressed education among their Civil Rights Goals, it's far too urgent an issue to have been slotted there. It should've been a Principle! Again, my wording would have been different. It's fine that they stress the need for identity-affirming instruction, free of the bullying atmosphere that exists for most Gay kids. There certainly is a need for that. However, our education-related problems aren't limited to elementary and middle schools. We have them at the college level, too! There's got to be transformative reform in our educational institutions, from kindergarten all the way up to advanced graduate programs.

That transformation necessarily involves overhauling heterosexist school curriculums, mandating sensitivity classes to address fear and superstition about LGBT identity, and demanding our inclusion in required Civics and History texts. The Stonewall rebellion should be taught alongside the Montgomery bus boycotts and the Berkeley free speech protests! What's more, every sex education class should include instruction about same-gender sexuality, and that instruction must be communicated in an unbiased way. When society remains ignorant of the presence, importance and contributions of LGBT people, we suffer for it! We must vigorously oppose religious Right Wing efforts to ban Gay topics from both the public and private school classroom.

However, we can't forget that a true revolution always begins at home: With the oppressed, and the way they think and talk about themselves. At the college level, we must insist that LGBT scholars choose a more respectable name for their discipline than "Queer Studies"; that they rid their discipline of its objectifying tendencies; and that they fully integrate it into mainstream Sociology. Intellectual segregation is just as bad as any other kind! My ideal Education Principle would read something like this: Every school must be transformed into a safe and affirming space for both LGBT students and LGBT curriculum.

What else was left out? A resolution defining the spiritual sadism of "ex-Gay" ministries as torture:

http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid93226.asp

A resolution condemning passivity in response to religious Right Wing attacks. A resolution decrying sexual exploitation of our LGBT incarcerated. A resolution demanding senior living facilities that welcome LGBT elderly. A resolution denouncing media conspiracies of silence around closeted public officials. The proliferation of counter-productive Gay media (i.e. sexual slurs on magazine covers, quasi-pornographic images, and race-baiting headlines like "Gay Is The New Black") should also have been addressed. In my opinion, though, the most glaring omission from The Dallas Principles was this statement: The equality movement must always be conducted with dignity.

Whenever we confront the oppressor, we must do so in such a way that commands respect! That means not giving our enemies permission to speak of us with sexual slurs or think of us as crude stereotypes. It means no nudity or flamboyant costuming, no vulgar displays or self-indulgent behavior. I'm not suggesting we should turn out in business attire, but if the objective is speaking truth to power, it's not helpful if what we wear (or don't wear) gets more attention than what we say! And what we say about LGBT equality should always be serious, not peppered with "f*gsploitation" humor(got that, Max Mutchnick? Are you listening, Tom Ammiano?)!!! Inviting ridicule is not an effective way to deal with bigots.

Our role models should be the Civil Rights demonstrators of the 1960s who, despite their outrage and impatience with injustice, seldom conducted themselves in a less-than-dignified manner. The nobility they displayed turned them into international heroes. Dignity in battle: I believe this principle to be of such importance, the others are all but worthless in its absence!

Crucial omissions notwithstanding, reaction to The Dallas Principles has been mostly positive. Most people seem to think they're a step in the right direction; hundreds have already signed on to the document. The manifesto does have its detractors, though. Veteran activists Michael Petrelis, Jewelle Gomez and others denounce the Principles as an elitist attempt to take control of the Gay Rights movement. This quote taken from Petrelis's blog sums up the latter opinion:

I don't see much new in the so-called Dallas Principles . . . also, I find it somewhat arrogant that twenty-four Gay leaders (mostly from the coasts) can secretly meet in Dallas and come up with something the community is supposed to automatically buy into. Definitely not very transparent, when that's what everyone's complained about (in regard to California's) No on 8 campaign . . .

I don't know how secretive that Dallas meeting was, but its clique-ish approach to strategizing leaves much to be desired. The twenty-four participants didn't just forget to solicit input from rank-and-file LGBT folk. It was intentionally done. "We didn't seek to turn this into a convention," they claim on their FAQ page and add, with more than a hint of hauteur, that their, uh . . . convention "grew out of conversations among like-minded individuals." Of which there could only have been twenty-four? Bullsh*t! The manifesto's popularity suggests otherwise.

What was so odious about making the adoption of Principles a more inclusive effort? Couldn't there have been small-group strategy meetings staged in cities all over the country? International activists might've been invited to take part, too, and their contributions would doubtless have been invaluable. A tad more inclusiveness would've shielded this endeavor from charges of elitism. However, the drafters seem to have almost cultivated an elitist aura around themselves. Despite their lofty rhetoric about uplifting the LGBT "community", they clearly didn't want us involved in mapping out the future of our own struggle. I guess they didn't trust us enough. Or maybe "trust" isn't the correct word to use here . . . maybe I meant to say "respect"?

Yet the Dallas group assumes we trust/respect its membership, enough to let them steer our equality movement. Do we? I certainly don't. However, I do have respect for their agenda. I respect it so much, in fact, I think it should be expanded upon.

What's to stop multiple groups of twenty-four from writing their own manifestos? Why can't there be twenty-four drafting conventions staged across America? What if hundreds of like-minded people got together and brainstormed liberation strategy in every region of these United States? What if they were delegates chosen by ballot to represent each region's concerns? And what if the delegates convened in churches, symbolically reclaiming territory that's been in enemy hands for far too long?

Then, when these multiple manifestos were written, what if we gathered those documents together and merged them? (A conference committee comprised of delegates would perform the task.) What would we see in this blend of diverse voices? I think we'd see what democracy is all about, more forcefully than any Civics text could describe it. We'd see reborn the kind of resolve that produced our nation's Constitution and Declaration of Independence. Most important, we'd see with crystal clarity what it is we all really want and need from our governments, our schools, our news and entertainment media, our religious institutions, our law enforcement agencies, our health care providers, our employers, our families.

When all these LGBT manifestos had been synthesized into one coherent statement, we'd have a phenomenon like the AIDS quilt: An awesome patchwork composition that sends an incredibly compelling, unified message. No doubt the drafters of the Dallas Principles would question the need for such an endeavor; they'd complain that it was a waste of valuable time, that it undermined their efforts. I disagree. It wouldn't invalidate those efforts in any way, only refine them. Whether they realize it or not, their work needs refining! A call for sustained citizen action shouldn't be thrown together so quickly. Let's take enough time to do this job right.

I long for a list of principles that isn't just an expression of the downtown cocktail party fundraiser. It should also reflect the sensibility of the neighborhood drag bar fundraiser! In order to be workable, an LGBT liberation agenda must be truly representative; and in order to be truly representative, it must incorporate as many of our perspectives as possible. With this democratized manifesto, we'd have a grass roots agenda (remember Principle #6?) that many more of us could take personal ownership in. Ownership . . . that's a good thing, you know. If you own something, you're much more likely to maintain it!

March Down Babylon (Part One)

2009-06-10T08:05:00.002-07:00

A Gay Pride Month Feature

Lord, deliver me! There has been another "Million F*g March" in Topeka, Kansas. This second farce, like the first, purported to target that town’s most notorious citizen, the Rev. Fred Phelps. Unlike the first, it didn’t take place at the Phelps family compound. Instead, it was mounted in a park where the crazed clergyman often brandishes his infamous “God Hates F*gs” protest signs.

Chris Love, founder of the millionf*gmarch.com website, crowed to the local media about how he and his “f*gs” had struck another blow against Bible bigot terrorism. Meanwhile, Fred Phelps and his family of extremists were hundreds of miles away in Rhode Island, indulging in one of their favorite pastimes: Picketing the funeral of an American soldier. Learning about the park demonstration later that day, Phelps' daughter Shirley heaped much ridicule on it. “They need to come back when they have a million f*gs,” she sneered.

Touché! Mr. Love has yet to find anything close to a million people dumb enough to attend his marches. Last summer, 500 or so showed up. This time, only about 150 did. I suppose the diminishing numbers are something to be thankful for, but one procession of self-proclaimed perverts was already too many. How many times does he plan to recycle this sick joke?

Chris Love, Fred Phelps and Shirley Phelps-Roper deserve each other. All three are distinctly lacking in class, all three love to stage tacky publicity stunts, and all three embarrass the groups they're supposed to represent. In my opinion, Chris Love may be the worst of the three! Twisted as they are, the Phelps family members actually do believe in what they're doing. I think Love's motives are cynical and opportunistic. Dude just wants his fifteen minutes of fame(over and over, it seems).

If he really had courage and integrity, he wouldn't be wasting resources on a senile hatemonger and his demagogue daughter, fringe elements who long ago lost credibility with the public. Instead, he'd be taking on the ones who still have power to hurt us: The big boys of the Dominionist movement. He'd be marching on Jerry Falwell's Liberty University. He'd be marching on Rick Warren's Saddleback Church. He'd be picketing the Vatican. He'd be targeting any number of popular televangelists, but he wouldn't be compromising the dignity of his marchers with a sexual slur! I think Chris Love is a glory-seeker, an ignorance enabler, and a coward. But he isn’t the only one . . . not by a long shot!

Most of us are cowards. We're so chicken-hearted, in fact, we just might be the New White Meat! What makes us so afraid? Not f*g-bashers in a dark alley. Not police harassment when we go to a bar. Not the possibility of contracting HIV. Gay Americans are terrified of the religious Right Wing!

How do I know this? I know it by the way we fail to overload email boxes when anti-Gay preachers vilify us in the media. I know it by the way we tend to melt like the rain-drenched cake from "MacArthur Park" when we debate Bible bigots. I know it by the way thousands of anti-Gay churches go picket-less every Sunday morning. I know it by the way millions of us flock like zombies to these same churches and willingly suffer psychological torture. LGBT folk have a fear of Fundamentalist religion that makes every other human phobia pale in comparison.

I was overjoyed when, in the aftermath of California's Proposition 8 decision, outraged Gay people and their allies descended in protest on Mormon temples. It was a glorious outpouring of righteous anger, but predictably, it didn't last. The Mormons began squealing about "religious persecution", and all too soon, the protesters backed off. I daresay there may still be a few of us picketing Latter Day Saints property, but a few of us just doesn't cut it!

We should be demonstrating in substantial numbers, outside as many Mormon churches as possible. We should be bearing down on them until they say "mercy"! But this isn't just about Mormons. The Catholics, the Baptists, the Methodists, the Presbyterians, the Jehovah's Witnesses, the COGICs, et al . . . all of them deserve besieging every weekend! Muslim and Orthodox Jewish congregations need to feel some heat, too.

Recent revelations about Prop 8 funding prove once again that Fundamentalist churches are the source of slanderous perceptions about LGBT folk. Make no mistake about it! They are the source of claims that Gay couples defile marriage. They are the source of lies about Gay adults corrupting children. They are the source of rumors that we "recruit" others into a depraved "lifestyle".

It's fundie preachers who liken us to murderers, rapists, thieves, prostitutes and hard drug abusers. Their mendacious doctrine is the core reason why Gay kids are bullied, Gay Boy Scouts are banned, and Gay soldiers are forced to hide their sexual orientation; why LGBT topics can't be discussed in most schools; why Gay adoption and foster-parenting is controversial; why community leaders, athletes and celebrities who are Gay cower in the closet; why Lesbian couples aren't depicted in TV commercials; why movie projects with LGBT characters and non-comedic subject matter lack for funding in Hollywood. It's why efforts to repeal DOMA and pass ENDA repeatedly stall in Congress. Worst of all, it's why hate crimes happen to us. We're being maimed and killed as a result of this demonization!

Our worst troubles can be traced back to some church pulpit or other. These so-called houses of God are anything but! Once upon a time, Babylon was a wicked city. Now, it's a wicked church, filled with twice as much evil than that fabled city ever contained.

There are hundreds of local LGBT organizations all over the United States. Their leaders know as well as you and I do how devastating Fundamentalist church oppression is. You'd expect them to devote much time and energy to protest actions that target anti-Gay clergy. The vast majority do not. Why don't they?

"March Down Babylon" continues with Part Two.

March Down Babylon (Part Two)

2009-06-10T08:05:00.001-07:00

A Gay Pride Month Feature

Our self-appointed "leadership" has failed us miserably! Look at GLAAD, an anti-defamation watchdog so co-opted by the Hollywood establishment that it endorses some of the most offensive media imaginable. Look at HRC, a group more interested in raising its political profile than in advancing equality goals. Look at inept attorneys like Shannon Minter, so afraid to litigate marriage equality at the Federal level that they urge Gay couples to gamble justice at the ballot box. Look at has-been activists like David Mixner, with nothing to offer but limited access to policymakers and warmed-over strategies for getting their attention. Look at clueless Gay clergy like the MCC's Rev. Nancy Wilson, preachers who torpedo their own uplifting messages by stigmatizing LGBT faithful as "queer Christians". It’s a stone heartbreaker!

If I had the power to do so, I'd fire them all! How I wish I could hire new leadership. Who I'd hire may surprise you. I'd hire people who come from a solid faith tradition. People whose faith is in God and not the Bible, and who know there's a difference between the two; yet people well-versed in Scripture, savvy enough to not be intimidated by Apostle Paul-quoting Dominionists. People intelligent enough to know that neither the story of Sodom and Gomorrah nor Paul's prohibitions against sexual perversion have anything to do with those of us Jesus Christ called eunuchs who have been so from birth(Matthew 19:12). People who, unlike our current "leaders", don't hesitate to make a strong moral case for LGBT rights.

I want leadership that knows a Civil Rights struggle is more concerned with morality than with politics. I want leaders who neither address nor refer to me with insulting names! I want leaders who can't be seduced or cowed by power brokers. I want leaders who are as infuriated by anti-Gay religious doctrine as abolitionists were by slavery and freedom marchers were by segregation; and I don't give a damn if these leaders are Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transsexual or heterosexual. All I care about is that they're committed 100% to two objectives: Achieving full equality for God's LGBT children, and reclaiming Christianity from those who've perverted its meaning. These objectives are intimately connected in my mind; I don't believe they can be realized separately.

These leaders of faith must march us into battle against the religious Right Wing. For what it's worth, here's my idea for a battle plan: In every city, we should identify the worst anti-Gay clergy and picket their damn churches on a rotating basis every weekend. We don't want meager turnouts, either: There should be at least 100 people at every protest, LGBT folk and/or allies. We should schedule participants ahead of time, and have alternates who stand in when the regulars can't make it. Only in the most inclement of weather should these protests be postponed.

I'm not talking about the standard kind of protest march, though. I don't feature folks walking in circles with placards on their shoulders, and somebody yelling through a bullhorn. The media isn't much interested in that kind of thing, either. It's become a bore! Action news crews are only too familiar with those played-out tactics by now. They rate a few seconds of coverage, if that much. We've got to offer reporters something more exciting, a real production that piques their interest. We need a fresh approach to picketing. We also need something that will challenge heterosexist clergy in the most direct manner possible.

So why don't we turn every church protest into a church service? Each one could last about two hours, just like regular church services do. Let's have singing! Let's have testifying! Let's have down-home preaching. We could call these actions "counter-sermons", inspirational messages that counter the hateful rhetoric spoken inside the churches we picket. We'd be contrasting that rhetoric with the true Gospel of Jesus Christ, and giving believers a choice of services to attend: Fundamentalist or Liberationist.

To accomplish this goal, we'd want to identify the most charismatic ministers allied to our movement and enlist their aid. When I say charismatic, I don't just mean good speakers. I mean phenomenal speakers! The kind who bring assemblies to their feet shouting and crying. We'd ask them to forfeit one or more weekends preaching at their own churches to come and preside over an anti-Gay church protest. We could pass the collection plate on site and offer them modest payment for their services.

Sermons are just part of the package, though. At these protests, we'd want some of the LGBT attendees to share their discrimination horror stories. Most of us have such stories to tell. They're powerful examples of the harm that's done when religion goes wrong. I daresay much of the Straight public hasn't got a clue about what we go through. This would be our chance to give them a clue. These kinds of personal histories wouldn't be unusual in a church setting: In many African-American congregations, there’s no such thing as worship services where members of the flock don't give testimony.

There's no such thing as worship services without a choir, either. The Mormons may have their massive Tabernacle Choir, but we have our many Gay Men's Choruses! We could really put their talents to use at counter-sermons. However, their repertoire would need to be tailored to the event. No solemn, stately hymns allowed! Nothing stiff-backed and proper. We'd want those choruses singing say-amen-somebody kind of music: Thomas Dorsey Gospel standards, rousing anthems, vintage freedom songs from the Civil Rights era, and Progressive selections from the songbooks of Pete Seeger, Holly Near, Harry Belafonte and the like.

I suspect every Gay Men's Chorus has somebody in it who can wail like Aretha Franklin or Luther Vandross! We'd need those folks out front, leading the choruses and doing occasional solos. In the event nobody in the group was Gospel-trained, the preacher could often substitute, or somebody from the community known for their singing ability. Wherever you find Lesbians, Gay men, Bisexual and Transfolk gathered, there'll always be vocal talent on tap! After all, doesn't the Book of Revelations say we're destined to be singers for the Lord?

REVELATIONS 14: 1-4
Then I looked, and there before me was the Lamb, standing on Mount Zion, and with him 144,000 who had his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads. And I heard a sound from heaven like the roar of rushing waters and like a loud peal of thunder. The sound I heard was like that of harpists playing their harps. And they sang a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and the elders. No one could learn the song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. These are those who did not defile themselves with women, for they remained virgins. They follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They were purchased from among mankind and offered as first fruits to God and the Lamb.

Of course, we'd want musicians on hand; canned music at rallies is verboten! Nothing elaborate, though: An acoustic guitar or two, maybe drums and/or bass, a tambourine, a harmonica or portable keyboard every now and then. In a pinch, musical accompaniment could consist of just a tambourine player and chorus members clapping hands. The chorus and musicians could be paid out of the collection plate as well. What about some inspirational dancers, too? Those are all the rage in churches nowadays. I think counter-sermon protests could potentially accommodate all kinds of creative expression. Lord knows, there are plenty of creative people among us!

Last but not least, our protesters should make a bold visual statement with their mode of dress. The theme is obvious: What's the symbol of LGBT identity? It's the Rainbow flag! Coincidentally(or not), rainbows also happen to be the symbol of God's Holy Covenant with humankind(Genesis 9:15, 16). So rainbow stoles, the kind worn by Rev. Troy Perry and other MCC clergy, should be a wardrobe necessity for all preachers, musicians and chorus members, attendees should sport rainbow bandannas, and a huge rainbow flag should fly over every church protest. The image of Jesus Christ should be on prominent display as well.

"March Down Babylon" concludes with Part Three.

March Down Babylon (Part Three)

2009-06-10T08:04:00.000-07:00

A Gay Pride Month Feature

Do y'all see what I'm getting at here? Faith-based aggression requires a faith-based defense strategy. We can't just show up at the church door and mount a loud demonstration. It's not enough! The fundies will just call us godless heathen and play the victim card like they've done before. We've got to access people's spirituality. We've got to inspire the people. We've got to arouse them! We've got to pit the true God against the false God. In short, we've got to re-invent the protest action; and once we've re-invented it, I predict we'll start drawing supportive crowds. If the public knows you've got something compelling to offer, the public will turn out to experience it. Here's some cautionary advice, though, about how not to sabotage our own church demonstrations:

We should never come dressed in drag or outrageous costumes. A protest rally is not a Pride parade! Granted, some people think drag, fetish wear and partial nudity make a powerful political statement, but let's get real: that's not the only kind of statement it makes! If you want to be taken seriously by your enemies, it's inappropriate. When I say "drag", by the way, I'm not talking about the gender-appropriate clothing of Transsexual folk.

We should never come with signs and/or clothing emblazoned with profane or derogatory language. No banners that scream F*ggots Bash Back or We're Here, We're Queer, etcetera. Likewise, we shouldn't be out there yelling or singing profane words, or engaging in obscene behavior. Fundies would be expecting that kind of presentation, and they know how to effectively use it against us.

We should never engage preachers who insist on referring to us as "d*kes, "f*gs", "trannies" or "queers". In case you didn't know it, "ex-Gay" ministries teach that LGBT folk are queer! Regardless of what these words may mean to some of us, they connote abnormality to the fundie crowd. If our counter-sermons only strengthen their prejudices, we'll have done nothing but waste our time. They'll never have any respect for us. We should also beware of Gay-affirming Fundamentalists (yes, they exist!) who believe Transgender expression is sinful. They don't actually use the slurs, but they preach them all the same!

We should never vandalize church property or engage in any kind of violent protest. I know how tempting it is to do so, especially when the pastors and congregations are viciously anti-Gay. Nevertheless, it's a temptation we must always resist.

We should never enter the churches we picket, not even if invited. Fundamentalist churches have been defiled by Satan! We'd strive to create sacred space outside of them.

We should never disparage religious faith, regardless of how we may feel about it as individuals. Denouncing faith is a losing proposition, not only in this country but in most other parts of the world. It bears noting that no legitimate religion on Earth espouses intolerance and hatred if properly taught. It's fundie hatemongers that church protesters must target, not the doctrines they distort.

Counter-sermons could be one method of fighting back against anti-Gay preachers, but we can't forget that they don't just preach from the pulpit. They also access TV, radio, print publications and the Web. We can't any ignore any of the venues religious Right Wingers use to spread their poison.

A new national anti-defamation group must rise up to replace the ineffectual GLAAD. Its mission must be to monitor all religious hate speech in the media. Local branches would have the most important work to do. They'd keep track of regionally popular televangelists and religious pundits, record instances of hate speech, and publish regular reports in all the local Gay publications. Those reports would necessarily include the email addresses of TV stations, radio networks, newspapers and websites that have become vehicles for offensive speech, as well as contact information for their commercial sponsors.

Everybody would be obligated to email a complaint! It wouldn't have to be lengthy; just a sentence or two to make it clear that you won't tolerate slander. The Jewish community responds to anti-Semitism with the cry "never again", and we should echo that cry(after all, we were in the concentration camps, too)! We should never again allow lies to be disseminated about us without reacting in collective outrage. If you do nothing else, get into the habit of putting your anger at Bible bigots into words; believe me, it's both cathartic and empowering. There are additional methods we can use to strike back at religious hatemongers, but I'll leave those suggestions for others to make.

Recently in Washington, DC, a group called Clergy United for Marriage Equality made news. It held a press conference decrying efforts to ban same-gender marriage in the District. One of the group’s members, Rev. Louise Green, followed up with an op-ed piece for The Washington Blade. It’s fairly typical of the public statements we get from religious allies. She writes:

It is for religious leaders who honor loving same-sex couples to speak against the assertion that "faith" leads to only one conclusion . . . we affirm that our traditions and Scriptures teach us that wherever love is present, God is also present, and that our human capacity to love one another is a great gift. We say that the ability of two people to enter into a relationship and form families of love and care is one expression of this gift, holy and good . . . there will be heartfelt disagreement on this issue, and so we call on all people of DC . . . to engage in respectful and loving dialogue on marriage equality. As always, I am committed to such a conversation, and encourage colleagues on all sides to do the same . . . Clergy United for Marriage Equality asks for the right to perform (same-gender marriage) ceremonies within our own sense of religious integrity, ministering to those who seek our blessing. We want the District of Columbia to recognize our religious choice by offering civil sanction of same-sex unions. In this spirit, we raise our voices in the struggle for the right and freedom to marry.

I do appreciate this kind of advocacy; I'm sure most of us do. However, we need much stronger statements than this from our religious allies. They can't just say they disagree with their colleagues on the far Right Wing; they must denounce those colleagues in no uncertain terms. Fundamentalism is wrong! There can be no “religious choice” for disciples of Jesus Christ; there is only His Gospel. Why do Progressive clergy tolerate false prophecy in their denominations? Why do they value church unity over a Christian message that’s accurate and consistently inclusive?

If termites have invaded your home, does it make sense to accommodate them? Unless you root those termites out, your house will come crashing down around your ears! Fundamentalists have corrupted the foundations of God’s house. Liberationists ignore such corruption at risk of kindling the Lord’s divine wrath. For their own sake as well as ours, they must take up righteous arms against the Rick Warrens of this world. False prophets savage the Savior’s doctrine, just like they savage His LGBT children. Marriage equality is neither the only issue here, nor the most important.

The church of Babylon has been waging all-out war on us for too long: War on our human dignity, our livelihoods, our Civil Liberties, our physical and mental health. We must make the walls of Babylon tumble to the ground, just like the walls of Jericho did. We must become like Christian soldiers, marching as to war. We’ve got to march down Babylon!

We’re not ready, though. We're demoralized, disorganized and weak. We need God’s commanding officers to guide us, arm us, and help us conquer our fear of toxic religion. Our movement cries out for the leadership of Gay-affirming clergy. I pray that they’re willing to give us their leadership. I also pray that we’ll have the good sense to follow it.

"March Down Babylon" was inspired by and is dedicated to
Dr. Jerry Maneker.