It's hard to take veteran gay activist Larry Kramer seriously when he says things like, "I believe that Ronald Reagan is responsible for more deaths than Adolf Hitler." Or when he luxuriates in victimhood by proclaiming, "I wish I could make all gay people everywhere accept this one fact I know to be an undisputed truth. We are hated."
The gay enragee has re-emerged into the spotlight with a highly publicized "open letter" in the Los Angeles Times and a speech at New York's LGBT Center (here's a video).
Kramer has accomplished much good, often despite himself, co-founding Gay Men's Health Crisis and even ACT UP (which, in the early days, brought much needed attention to the AIDS crisis despite some woefully wrongheaded attacks). But he has never understood that a case has to be made for changing society, that the need to make radical alterations cannot simply be assumed, with all who oppose such transformations labeled "haters" or "murderers."
More Kramer:
"We must cease our never-ending docile cooperation with a status quo that never changes in its relationship to us. We are cutting our own throats raising money for Hillary or Obama or Kerry or, God forbid, Giuliani, or anyone until they come out in full support of all the things I am talking about..."
While it's refreshing (and somewhat rare) to see Democrats held to the same standard that their party's gay activists routinely hold Republicans to, the idea that it must all be Now, that there can be no forward if incremental steps toward progress, is in its own way frighteningly totalitarian.
If society readily accepted fundamental transformations without struggle, we'd be in a constant state of revolution, and revolutionary terror. That sort of upheaval and the tyranny that (not always, but often) follows, would be our daily fare. Resistance to demands to alter the social fabric, even to the over-reaching and often counter-productive social engineering of the welfare state, is a societal self-defense mechanism.
This is especially true of demands for change made by those who think that the purity of their rage is testament to the rightness of their cause.
Of course we must fight for gay equality, and often that requires expressions of great passion. And some of our opponents are, in fact, motivated by an ugly animus (while others shamelessly see gay-baiting as their path to power). But demonifying all who oppose gay equality based on conservative impulses is not a successful strategy. Rather, working to enlighten a majority- demonstrating, over and over again until the message gets through, that gay equality is not destabilizing toward families and society, but actually makes both stronger-is a painstaking but necessary requirement.
It is just not enough to base our identity on victimhood and expect that this will move us toward our goals, no matter how much we "act up."
More. It's not about Larry Kramer, but George Will writes today on how political rage has become pandemic. "Today, many people preen about their anger as a badge of authenticity: I snarl therefore I am. Such people make one's blood boil."
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Northdallass said “The irony is, Pat, that people like yourself don’t need it. You make it clear that your sexual orientation is not the driving force in your life and that you have no difficulty criticizing other gays for bad behavior.”.
In other words,if you’re gay and criticize other gays no one’s going to fire you from your job for being gay. Absolutely absurd and directly contradicted by his acknowledgement that Thom’s boyfriend can be fired from the military merely for being gay.
Northdallass said “Oh, this is just too sweet.”.
But of course you failed to identify a single national Christian organization that condemned the murder of that transwoman, once again, your attention is highly selective and discriminatory. This shows you that just as national gay organizations don’t criticize every wrongdoing by a gay person national christian organizations don’t criticize every wrongdoing by a straight person.
Northdallass said “You are saying that employers should refuse reasonable accomodation to people who make requests on religious grounds. That is illegal and it is a direct violation of the law, both nationally AND specifically in Minnesota.”.
Allowing the bus driver to refuse to do her job as assigned is not a resonable accomodation, its discrimination against gays which is against Minnesota law as you pointed out.
Northdallass said “Second, the presence or absence of ENDA would have nothing at all to do with thom’s boyfriend losing his job — as I previously outlined and linked.”.
LOL, as is typical Northdallass, the link you posted doesn’t make that point at all. And the point is that you were telling Pat that as long as gays criticize other gays and don’t make their orientation the driving force in their lives they don’t have to worry about being fired for being gay, while previously you acknowledged in regards to Thom’s boyfriend that gays do risk being fired for being gay. You want it both ways and you can’t have it both ways. You were lying then, or you are lying now.
Example A, Randi, of why we need not bother.
Your first statement:
And not a single national christian organization condemned the murder of a transwoman near San Francisco or the murder of Andrew Anthos.
Then, when confronted with clear evidence to the contrary for Anthos, your attempt to save face:
But of course you failed to identify a single national Christian organization that condemned the murder of that transwoman, once again, your attention is highly selective and discriminatory.
Mhm; I’m having trouble finding a national GAY organization that has condemned it. It’s not in any of the NGLTF or HRC.
The only thing I could find was GenderPAC; however, I would encourage them, as I encouraged you, to go to the San Francisco police, because you both claim to know how and why it was done — which means you evidently know who did it. The police don’t.
In short, why bother? Even when given direct evidence of a national Christian organization condemning the murder of a gay person, directly contrary to what you previously stated, you ignore it — and try to change your request in order to “condemn” Christian organizations for not weighing in on a matter that national GAY organizations haven’t even weighed in on yet, mainly because no one really knows the circumstances surrounding the crime.
But I don’t recall persons like Gene Robinson or Mel White specifically responding against antireligious activities of straight people. If they do, but ignore the antireligious activities of gay persons, then I agree with you.
Key difference, Pat; antireligious straight people generally do not blame their antireligious activity on their sexual orientation.
Gay people like Kramer do.
And even without that, I could make my employers lose lots of money trying to get rid of me, and I would, if it was solely based on my sexual orientation, so it probably wouldn’t be worth it for them.
Then what’s the worry?
Northdallass said “Mhm; I’m having trouble finding a national GAY organization that has condemned it.”
But, you did find one. And once again, this proves my point. Not every national organization, Christian or gay, criticizes every wrongdoing by every person – your whining about Blekachek is irrelevant.
Northdallass said “antireligious straight people generally do not blame their antireligious activity on their sexual orientation.”.
You lie again. Gay people do not blame their being anti-religious on their sexual orientation, they’re anti-religious because most religions are anti-gay. If there were religions that were anti-heterosexual you most certainly would see heterosexuals being anti-religious for that reason.
And once again, you told Pat that as long as gays criticize other gays and don’t make their orientation the driving force in their lives they don’t have to worry about being fired for being gay, while previously you acknowledged in regards to Thom’s boyfriend that gays do risk being fired for being gay. You want it both ways and you can’t have it both ways. You were lying then, or you are lying now.
And once again, this proves my point.
Or, more precisely, whatever you changed your point to be.
You see, this was your first “point”:
And not a single national christian organization condemned the murder of a transwoman near San Francisco or the murder of Andrew Anthos.
which changed to this when I produced evidence concerning Anthos:
But of course you failed to identify a single national Christian organization that condemned the murder of that transwoman, once again, your attention is highly selective and discriminatory. This shows you that just as national gay organizations don’t criticize every wrongdoing by a gay person national christian organizations don’t criticize every wrongdoing by a straight person.
which changed to this when I pointed out that national GAY organizations weren’t condemning the murder and I challenged you to provide proof that a straight person had committed the murder, since both you and GenderPAC claimed that you knew who the suspect was and why they committed the murder:
Not every national organization, Christian or gay, criticizes every wrongdoing by every person
Again, the “point” changes with every piece of evidence brought forward. So why bother?
I agree with Stephen over Kramer. But then who exactly is Kramer’s constituency these days? Anyone else notice that ACT UP doesn’t seem to be all the rage.
My alternative to Kramer’s ideology of victimhood and Miller’s “conservativism is not evil” response is developmental. I say identifying with the victim is a stage in a larger developmental drama, the whole of which must be appreciated and every healthy stage of which must not be degated. See this column here:
http://gayspirituality.typepad.com/blog/2007/03/does_god_approv.html
Key difference, Pat; antireligious straight people generally do not blame their antireligious activity on their sexual orientation.
Gay people like Kramer do.
Regardless of the chicken and egg argument here, I don’t see why it’s a “key” difference. I’m not sure why these people need to be specifically singled out if the antireligious behavior is due to their blaming it on sexual orientation, as opposed to whatever straight people blame it on.
Then what’s the worry?,
Funny, I was thinking about that too, and it got me thinking of one of the other problems that seems to occur in the gay community for some. So let me go off on a tangent first.
I’ve noticed on blogs and elsewhere, when it comes to any gay equality issue, many basically have the attitude, “Well, I had a tough childhood (or I was able to spend tens of thousands of dollars to have legal arrangements, or I was beaten up when I was a kid), but I made it and I got what I want, and tough on the rest of you.”
A couple of things here. Yes, we need to play with the cards we have, and not play the victim if you want to get the best out of life. But that doesn’t mean that we should just stop at anything less than equality and have gay people continually being dealt sh&t cards, even if many of us have been able to make it (like I have with job security). I would like to see a fair and equal playing field regarding sexual orientation, so that it is NEVER the reason for someone to not achieve or maintain what they have.
I’m doing fine, but there are others who weren’t as fortunate growing up or as an adult. If I had to go through what many other gay persons had to go through, I honestly don’t know if I wouldn’t have been able to make it. I didn’t have parents throw me out when they found out I was gay. I didn’t have to go to a church every Sunday listening how evil homosexuality is. I never got beaten up or harassed from others, because I guess I was butch enough, or knew how to play the game. I don’t have to worry about losing my job because of my sexual orientation. And I live in a state that is fairly accepting to homosexuals, and aside from a couple of right wing sicko idiots, our politicians are fairly gay accepting (although corrupt, but that’s another issue). I never felt pressured* to have to marry a woman to hide the fact I was gay (although I was asked frequently when I was getting married). Unfortunately, this is not the case for many gay people.
So getting to your question, personally, I don’t have to worry. But the fact that many gay people still have to worry, and that we even have reverse discrimination a la Bleskachek, means that more work needs to be done. And I hear too frequently in the news that transgendered persons have been subject to discrimination in the workplace.
*Yes, I know gay persons were not forced by gunpoint to marry a person of the opposite sex. Not my point here. I don’t know of any straight person who was pressured to enter a long term relationship with a person of the same sex. Just pointing out an obstacle that some gay people have to face, and shouldn’t have to.
OK, some here think that vomiting or urinating on homophobes is a tad extreme. Why? Do you have a better way to make the point that this is hateful behavior? That gay people will no longer put up with it. And it is behavior that no organization should accept from any employee. So, I am open to hearing suggestions and plans of action from people who don’t like my thoughts. What do you propose to educate this employee?
We could always use the example provided by right wing evangelical religious icon Ann Coulter. The baseball bat! As born again Ann has said, the only way you can speak to some people is with a baseball bat. Would this be preferable to my plan? If not, why.
Regarding the fecal matter that posts as ND whatever, ignore him. Do not feed the trolls.
I’m not sure why these people need to be specifically singled out if the antireligious behavior is due to their blaming it on sexual orientation, as opposed to whatever straight people blame it on.
Because, Pat, your sexual orientation has nothing to do with your choice of whether or not to be antireligious.
But that doesn’t mean that we should just stop at anything less than equality and have gay people continually being dealt sh&t cards, even if many of us have been able to make it (like I have with job security)
But the simple fact of the matter is we aren’t. And, even more so, no law is going to bring about a fair and equal playing field — especially when Democrat gays like Bleskachek openly abuse said laws to protect their own hate and bigotry.
Why do you think you don’t have to worry about your job, Pat? Is it because of nondiscrimination laws preventing your employer from firing you, or is it because you’re a valuable employee?
The former is the victim mentality. The latter is the empowered individual.
NDT ~ Can you provide a link that demonstrates that Bleskachek is a Democrat? I didn’t see that in the articles I read. Thanks.
Because, Pat, your sexual orientation has nothing to do with your choice of whether or not to be antireligious.
Probably not, but it did have a part in my choice to be nonreligious. I mentioned in some other thread a while back that I am troubled that the Catholic Church, which I originally belonged to, has maintained it’s anti-gay stances. I have thought about joining another (gay-friendly) Christian religion, but have opted not to at this point. Another reasons for me being nonreligious, is that as I got older, I did question matters of faith personally, and applied Occam’s Razor, and concluded that it is more likely that certain things didn’t happen but was written that it happened, than those certain things actually happening. But I respect those who applied Occam’s Razor or whatever and came up with a different conclusion. So I guess that makes me nonreligious, but not antireligious.
But getting to the original point, which was whether Bishop Robinson or Mel White should speak out against anti-religious behavior. My point is why should they specifically speak out against gay anti-religious people (who use or do not use sexual orientation as their excuse) as opposed to straight people who are anti-religious? What difference does it make for the motivations of these anti-religious people?
Why do you think you don’t have to worry about your job, Pat? Is it because of nondiscrimination laws preventing your employer from firing you, or is it because you’re a valuable employee?
Both. It is mostly because my employers find me valuable enough, and would not like me to leave. So that’s nice. However, we are kinda sorta under the jurisdiction of the archdiocese here, and the current archbishop, to my understanding, is a petty jerk and fairly anti-gay. A couple of years ago, the archdiocese did try to implement some silly policy that nobody here wanted, and thankfully it went nowhere. I don’t know if he would want to implement discrimination against gay employees, and I’m thankful I don’t ever have to find out, because he can’t do it legally in NJ.
But again, others aren’t so lucky. Being a valuable employee may not be enough. Yes, it may be victim mentality, and I would suggest that for such an employee, if there is no recourse for the discriminatory action, to jump back in to the job market and find another job. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t fight against this type of discrimination.
Dalea, personally, I don’t think returning hateful behavior with the type of behavior which you describe and is more than hateful. First of all, I think it’s classless. Further, I don’t think it helps. Maybe it has helped in the past, and I can’t disprove it. But I don’t think one can prove it either. Things may have changed for the better in a particular instance, but it’s seems difficult to pin it down as a result of a classless action such as vomit targetting.
People like Ann Coulter, James Dobson, and Pat Robertson are now being seen for the type of people they are. Yes, some still like hateful people like her. And more and more people are starting to see them as clowns in a freak show. Now when gay persons start throwing urine at them, it makes those individuals look bad. And if it keeps happening, fair or unfair, it will make the rest of us look bad.
So the answer is to condemn the hate of your opponent, and not precipate actions that are even worse than what your opponent has done.
Northdallass said “Again, the “point” changes with every piece of evidence brought forward. So why bother?”.
No, the point was that not every national gay organization criticizes every wrongdoing just as not every national Christian organization criticizes every wrongdoing – you’re harping on gay organzations for doing (or not) the same thing Christian organizations do (or not).
Northdallass said “Because, Pat, your sexual orientation has nothing to do with your choice of whether or not to be antireligious.”.
And no gay hates religion because they’re gay, they’re anti-religious or non-religious because religion is anti-gay – just as Pat said “I am troubled that the Catholic Church, which I originally belonged to, has maintained it’s anti-gay stances”. Once again Northdallass falsely tries to blame gays for disliking religion’s being anti-gay.
Northdallass said “But the simple fact of the matter is we aren’t [dealt sh&t cards]“.
And of course that lie is directly contradicted by Northdallass ranting that Thom’s boyfriend was in danger of losing his career if Thom was outed. Fact of the matter is Northdallass, no true gay is stupid enough to believe your insane insistance that everything is fine in terms of gay equality and LGBTs should just sit back, like it, and vote Republican. Its positions of yours like that that make it clear you’re lying about being gay as part of your ploy to demonize and hurt gays.
And of course that lie is directly contradicted by Northdallass ranting that Thom’s boyfriend was in danger of losing his career if Thom was outed.
And who outed thom and created this danger, Randi?
It wasn’t me.
It wasn’t straight people.
It wasn’t the Navy.
It was you.
You attacked thom by outing him publicly.
You made the decision to jeopardize thom’s boyfriend.
And now you are attempting to blame others for a problem that you created and you perpetuated because of your utter lack of self-restraint and your hatred.
And that really is the problem here. Bigots like Randi, dalea, and Bleskachek use homosexuality as an excuse for their antisocial behavior and inability to control themselves or function normally in society — and demand that laws be created to give them immunity from ever being held accountable for their behavior because they are glbt.
The reason you, dalea, and Bleskachek receive “sh&t cards”, Randi, has nothing to do with your sexual orientation. It is because you can’t control your mouth or your emotions. It is because dalea believes it’s right to assault people. It is because Bleskachek believes it’s right to discriminate and demand sex from people as the price of career advancement.
Gays like Pat and I, who do not do all of these things, who respect their straight and religious neighbors and coworkers, and who feel no need to use our homosexuality as an excuse for lack of education, social skills, or work ethic, have a remarkable lack of “sh&t cards”.
Dalea asked “OK, some here think that vomiting or urinating on homophobes is a tad extreme. Why? Do you have a better way to make the point that this is hateful behavior?…What do you propose to educate this employee?”
Dalea, one can never justify responding to a non-physical attack with a physical attack – that’s a glaring boundary we should never cross as moral people. Crossing such boundaries is an escalation which encourages greater escalations in retaliation and takes us to a path of violence we should choose to avoid not for the least reason of which is that as a minority we can’t win a physical war. If we overrespond to hate that makes the victimizer look like the victim and we lose the battle over public opinion.
I would propose picketing the employee’s workplace with signs that say this is hateful and unacceptable behavior, organizing sit-ins on the bus-driver’s route where groups get on her bus and chant “Gay is OK, homophobe serve all or go away” or some such thing.
Northdallass said “And who outed thom and created this danger, Randi?”.
Well, contrary to your lies, it is the army that threatens gays jobs, not me.
And once again you change sides on whether gays are discriminated against or not. Well, which is it scumbag? Are gays discriminated against or not?! You keep trying to have it both ways on this thread – when you want to attack me, you claim gays are in grave danger of being mistreated for being gay. When you want to attack gays in general you claim gays aren’t in any danger of being mistreated for being gay, you then claim “But the simple fact of the matter is we aren’t [dealt sh&t cards]“. Your characterization of the mistreatment of gays changes 180 degrees depending what you think best helps you attack others – you are a sadistic liar.
Northdallass said “The reason you, dalea, and Bleskachek receive “sh&t cards”, Randi, has nothing to do with your sexual orientation.”.
LOL, Northdallass, I never claimed to receive “sh&t” cards, I live in Canada where all are equal, I don’t get any sh&t cards here. Unlike you, my concern is for others such as my American LGBT neighbours to the south who are discriminated against while sacks of sh&t like you tell disingenously them “don’t worry, be happy”.
Well, contrary to your lies, it is the army that threatens gays jobs, not me.
yup, I figured you wouldn’t take responsibility for it. You never do.
LOL, Northdallass, I never claimed to receive “sh&t” cards, I live in Canada where all are equal, I don’t get any sh&t cards here.
And here you were complaining several threads ago that you had been repeatedly verbally and physically assaulted because of your glbt status.
Or was it because you, like Bleskachek and dalea, thought you could hurt other people and then try to use nondiscrimination laws to protect yourself?
Your vicious attack on thom, your deliberate attempt to hurt him by outing his boyfriend, and your refusal to take responsibility prove well how you treat your “neighbours”.
And quite frankly, we can do without.
It figures, Northdallass tries to dodge the issue by telling more lies about me. On one hand you want to claim gays are in danger if its known that they are gay and on the other hand you want to claim there is no danger in being identified as gay and no need for things such as ENDA.
Northdallass said “And here you were complaining several threads ago that you had been repeatedly verbally and physically assaulted because of your glbt status.”.
You lie, I never claimed I was assaulted because I’m LGBT.
Northdallass said “Your vicious attack on thom, your deliberate attempt to hurt him by outing his boyfriend, and your refusal to take responsibility prove well how you treat your “neighbours”.
You lie. I never deliberately attempted to hurt Thom and I never outed his boyfriend. And according to your claims earlier in this thread Thom and his boyfriend had nothing to fear from being known as gay and revealing his name was anything but vicious or an attack – funny how quickly you change your lies when you think it better suits your attacks on someone. The fact is you consider the truth disposable in your insane war on LGBTs.
Hmmmm, as I recall, Stonewall was a riot. That is when our movement started to gain ground. And beyond that, the early actions against the psychiatric inquisition involved a lot of pushing, shoving, yelling and being disrespectful. All through the early years of gay liberation there were actions of this type throughout the developed world. Things settled down in the mid 70′s. In large part because our pushy aggressive actions, which you probably would have opposed, did work. People began to see that sitting down with us, getting to know us, responding to our issues was preferable to being our target.
In the 80′s as the health crisis worsened, once again we had to turn to being confrontational and aggressive again. ACT-UP did many things on the order of what I suggested. Guess what, it worked. I can remember staging a screaming rant in an emergency room to get someone to care for my friend. After a few years of this, the medical profession decided it was easier to work with gay people than to ignore us.
I suspect both Randi and Pat are considerably younger than me. And do not have a first hand knowledge of the 70′s and 80′s and early 90′s . Nor have a very clear idea of gay history. It used to be that two men dancing together would be arrested. The undercover cop would call in the cops and haul people off to jail. Until one night there was a riot when this happened. The cops fled in terror. And soon appointed a liaison to the gay and lesbian community. And began sensitivity training for cops. One little blow up ended decades of arrests.
So, my answer is to say that to rule this out automatically, simply empowers homophobes. Which I regard as foolish. Read up on gay history sometime. See the huge number of actions and riots. This actually happened. And it seems that just letting your opponent know the lengths you are willing to go, inspires them to reasoned discussion. But you gotta show it sometime or it isn’t real.
Stonewall was in 1969, right? Well if it was such a pivotal event one would expect its influence to have been growing and growing ever since the event, culminating in the era of confrontational belligerence that did so little good in advancing our equality. Nothing like telling people you hate them, nothing like mocking peoples’ most precious institutions, to make them pause and reflect on how unjustly they’ve been treating you.
Anyway, go look through newspaper records, look through gay activism publications from 1969-79 and let me know if you find and reference to Stonewall. You probably won’t; it was more than anything else a scuffle that attracted a crowd, not hard in 1969, and the photos from the arrests look a lot more like anti-Vietnam protesters than drag queens.
Stonewall was a non-event pulled from the trash can and promoted to pivotal status by a bunch of self-annointed activists who were waaaaay too far “out of the closet” to ever enjoy acceptance in any society and to whom belligerence was the only option and personal catharsis the only reward.
We shouldn’t need myths.
(1) Larry is certainly pretty far out their in terms of his politics. But he does say many truthful things.
(2) Reagan-Bush 1 era polices on gay rights and AIDS were generally poor to embarassing. For the record, I was a Republican during this time.
(3) You have to remember that prior to the mid/late 1990′s gay rights were pretty much seen as fringe left-wing issue and people did not think twice about saying and doing really cruel things to gay people.
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