Will We Be Ruled Equal?

Well, the US Supreme Court be ruling on our rights again. I am deeply tired of worrying about my legal status in this country. I know that if I, or my partner of 14 years, should die unexpectedly we would be considered nothing more than strangers under the law. Huge taxes would be levied on the surviving partner, taxes from which married couples are exempt. Her family, from which she is estranged, could try to sweep in and grab up all her assets.

Not to formally become partners is our own decision but it is also the result of oppression. Opting for this "domestic partners" contract is a poor substitute for the protections marriage offers.It comes with a  sock-it-to-you bill tax preparers receive for making up two separate returns: one for the federal government and the other for the state. This unjust financial burden has not been one we have wanted to shoulder. My partner and I do not live together either so, although it's no problem for Bill and Hillary, domestic partners must share the same address.

It seems like a no-brainer to me, and to most LGBT folks, that, as citizens we are entitled to equal protection under the law. But what tune will the Supremes sing? They are also going to be issuing a decision on DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act) which has prevented the partners of federal employees from recieving medical benefits of their legally married spouses in the states where same-gender marriage is legal. The range of decisions the court could arrive at are not necessarily all or nothing. They are everywhere along a continuum where the worst-case scenario is that marriage is not a fundamental right for gays and uphold DOMA or they could declare that marriage bans are unconstitutional, marriage is a federal civil right and should be universally applied. In between, and most likely, are a million shades of gray, worth reading about but better left to the lawyers to itemize.

But whatever happens next, I do believe that time is on our side. We are finally seeing a bit of the bend in that long arc of the moral universe. Transgenders and people of indeterminate gender identity already help speed the struggle for equal rights because as people transition from one gender to another, it becomes harder to determine the composition of couples desiring marriage anyway. Confusion is a good thing in this case and, ultimately, gender is none of anyone else's business unless they are planning to engage in physical intimacy. In that situation, hopefully, it can be privately discussed.

The War on Queers

More and more crazy pastors, ministers, even Louis Farrakhan are no longer satisfied with simple ostracism and condemnation of LGBTs and are now advocating internment in concentration camps and even the death penalty for non-gender conforming people in the USA. Like the war on women, the war on queers has been, of late, consumed with renewed vehemence and vigor. So much so that even prominent progressive theorists like Chris Hedges, are writing about that war.

It is a relatively new and welcome development to have heterosexuals write seriously about the Queer Struggle. One that signifies we are finally making it into the main stream of civil rights ideology. Bullying, suicide, gay parenting issues and all kinds of job discrimination cases are more in the news spotlight than ever before. They are not happening more often than before but are now receiving more critical attention.

Obama's "evolution" on same-sex marriage is part of the reason for both the push for civil rights and the backlash against it. But the biggest reason for this outbreak of culture war vituperation is the same one we saw in Germany in the thirties. The tanking economy along with rising prices (food, gas, sales tax) is a pressure-cooker for hatred of all sorts. When folks in desperation turn to their twisted notion God, he tends to tell them lies about who the real enemy is. The more "Christian" our country becomes, the more fear and hate its citizens seem to want to perpetrate.

As harassment of LGBT folks in small town and rural USA becomes more open and explicit, ordinary life becomes more difficult. Yes, there are places like New York City and San Francisco and other urban centers where things are relatively unchanged. As Reverend Otis Moss III does quite eloquently in this sermon, it is imperative that we expose and fight against what is happening to our people and get the word out that non-gender conforming and gay people are neither the enemy nor the ones who have brought our country to the brink of financial ruin.

In My Mind I'm Shunning Carolina

I hate to admit it but my partner and I just missed having summer vacation plans to visit North Carolina. We had heard from many friends that Asheville is an oasis of progressive thought in a vast desert of a mindless, self-righteous brand of hate-mongering Christianity that scares the crap out of me.

Now, with the overwhelming passage of unnecessary and repetitively anti-gay Amendment 1, North Carolina has proven itself to be a place worth avoiding. Because of it, not only will queers be unable to obtain rights connected with marriage or civil unions, unmarried heterosexuals will likewise face discrimination and the inability to be legally recognized in any way whatsoever. A couple of commie-jew-dykes like us have no business spending our precious money and time in this environment.

The last time the state of North Carolina amended its constitution was to ban interracial marriage! So the precedent is as clear as their desired result. I often wonder what this country would be like if only the South had seceded.

As far as summer vacation goes, Deborah and I will be visiting one of our favorite countries, Mexico. Many expatriate Americans of all stripes reside there. Perhaps the new wave of immigration will be in the opposite direction. Anyway, like so many Jews of our generation who are referred to as paranoid and neurotic, we are always on the lookout for a place to go, just in case of exile. I would term this kind of sensibility practical and realistic rather than cynical and far-fetched!

Hate Crimes and LGBT Equality

The Dharun Ravi case of webcam spying on a gay roommate's sexual activiity at Rutgers University is only the latest salvo in the debate over what constitutes a hate crime against an LGBT person. It is a sad commentary on our society that a simple web search of the words gay and hate crime will bring up loads of material that spans a broad reach of time and life experience. From name-calling and bullying to torture and murder, there is ample evidence that being perceived as having a non-heterosexual or gender-nonconforming demeanor is enough to place an individual in mortal danger.

Hatred-spewing politicians have done much to exacerbate this climate of harassment and intimidation. The prohibitions against same-sex marriage are now actively used as a wedge to divide citizens but this issue is only the tip of a very-deep iceberg. Ultimately these political attacks have created a climate where it is always open season on queers. With the added stress of economic recession everyone seems to need a scapegoat and, in our community, they have found it.

As disgusted as I am by the Republican contenders, I have to admit that I find the rationalizations of Democrats like Obama, the most nauseating of all. Little wishy-washy, frightened Barack is still "evolving" on the subject of marriage equality, an evolution that doesn't even keeps pace with geologic time. Speaking to an LGBT audience, he sang the praises of his administration, stressing that LGBT folks can now openly "serve their country." Oh yes, how wonderful! Now only if we had healthcare rights, job protection and protection against housing discrimination, not to mention that old bugaboo about 'till death due us part. These civil rights would certainly be a start, if the dude truly wanted to show that his heart was in the right place.

Unfortunately, Democrats have sold out LGBT rights at every step of the struggle as Frank Rich eloquently outlines in his article, "Whitewashing Gay History" which describes the many ways that self-proclaimed liberals have actively and willingly helped to keep a part of the population subjugated and oppressed.

Long-time activists like myself have real time memories of the ways that this oppression has reared its ugly head among leftists. Advocating open support of queer rights has always been an issue fraught with scary undertones for the heterosexually inclined. I remember the days when, if a straight person dared to express support for gay rights, their proclamation would more often than not begin with, "I'm straight but..." Well now it's past time to get off that straight butt and do something constructive for a segment of the population that does not enjoy equal protection under the law.

Free Speech, Civil Rights and Transparency

It Seems Obvious to Me...

The day following the arrest of filmmaker Josh Fox for attempting to videotape a "public hearing" on the environmentally toxic practice of  hydraulic fracturing (fracking), combined with the arrest and detention of at least six credentialed journalists at the Occupy Oakland protest on January 28th, It is evident that our first amendment right to free speech is a relic of days gone by.

Another nail in its coffin was provided yesterday, February 2nd, when the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco overturned a previous ruling to release the tapes of the Proposition 8 hearings of 2010, presided over by Justice Vaughn Walker.

It was unprecedented that the videos were held back from public view in the first place and the obscenity is only compounded by this decision. The whole affair begs the obvious question as to why the constitutional right to equal protection is being withheld from LGBTs in the first place. The long stalemate since the hearing a year and a half ago illustrates the reticence of the powers that be to grant full rights of citizenship to all of its citizens.

Although Proposition 8 a just a statewide, California issue, providing full and equal rights for all is a federal issue that must be addressed nationally. Instead we must wait for the lens of history to look back upon this era of open discrimination with shame. Perhaps hindsight is always 20/20, but our present vision is myopic as hell!

Ten Years Later--September 11th, 2001

Mark Bingham-
Gay Hero of Flight 93

It's hard to believe that it's been ten long years since September 11th 2001, a fateful day that forever altered the political landscape of this country. Early that Tuesday morning I was awoken by a telephone call from a friend who said, "They just attacked the World Trade Center turn on your TV." This was an incomprehensible statement to me then. First of all I had no concept of a "they" that would fit into this scenario and the idea of attack seemed foreign as well.

But I did turn on my television. My automatic response was to get dressed and head in to work. This was because I was used to working for the Chronicle and that's what we did when something momentous, like an earthquake, happened. We went in to work. But by then, I was working at a public library and librarians, as helpful as we may be, are not considered "first-responders." But my place of work was closed for the day and I wound up returning home.

Like many people, I remained glued to my television for days. Taking in the personal accounts. Reveling in the heroic story of Mark Bingham, an openly gay man who initiated a passenger rebellion on flight 93, preventing it from hitting the Pentagon, but losing his own life (and the lives of everyone aboard) in the process.

It is undeniable that this country was permanently altered as a result of that horrific event. Yes, the loss of life on such a large scale was a terrible tragedy. But sadder still is the fact that this event has been and is repeatedly used as an excuse to justify the elimination of democratic and civil rights on a wide variety of fronts from the "Patriot Act" to Guantanamo. All things considered, it is a day to mourn.

The tragic bombing in Oklahoma City did not make the world afraid of crazed, white-male right wing fanatics as well it should have considering what transpired in January of this year in Tucson Arizona where Gabrielle Giffords was wounded along with 19 others. Only six people died in that incident but the profile of Jared Loughner is strikingly similar to that of Timothy McVeigh. Compare that to the fear of the American Muslim Community that has become a firestorm of hatred in the USA today.

Many friends of mine believe that right-wing elements had a hand in what transpired that Tuesday morning in New York City.I can't claim any inside knowledge of this but I will say that considering the liberties they have taken with our civil rights since, I wouldn't put it past them.

However it came to pass, it is a fact that this event has been and will continue to be used to undermine our rights and freedoms on all fronts. This reality combined with the grief over lives lost that day, deserve our deepest grief as well as our incisive, compassionate and rational attention.