No more Mr. Nice Gay

No more Mr. Nice Gay


Nice op ed piece in today's Washington Post about the fallout from Prop 8. The writer talks about hearing a local bus driver in Santa Monica refer to gay demonstrators as "sodomites.'

I realized that in a post-Proposition 8 world, it is not okay for me to enable anyone's bigotry with my silence. If he had said the "n" word or the "k" word or something else offensive regarding someone's race, gender or religion, there would have been no question about whether to report him. But gay men and lesbians are no longer willing to be doormats. It is no longer acceptable for people to say bigoted and hateful things about gays or anyone else in front of me. This behavior has to stop now.

If the bigots thought they would slap down gay men and lesbians by passing Proposition 8, or if they thought it would end the gay civil rights movement, they were mistaken. I haven't seen the gay community this galvanized in a long time. The passage of Proposition 8 might be this generation's "Stonewall," the 1969 riot that began after an unprovoked police raid on a gay bar in Greenwich Village and that marked the start of the gay rights movement. If we can somehow harness the energy unleashed by California's Proposition 8 vote, we can achieve tremendous gains for us and for future generations of gay men and lesbians.

One of the most gratifying aspects of attending "No on 8" rallies was the number of straight demonstrators who showed up -- people who see this not just as an issue for gay men and lesbians but as a matter of everyone's civil rights.

He's right, we need to somehow harness the energy unleashed by Prop 8, but it's not happening, or at least isn't happening well. The protests around the country are great, tremendous, brilliant even, and amazing in their number.

But.

What comes after the protests? Postcard campaigns won't cut it. Nor will having a day without gays. We need a real campaign, a real war, real strategies - mean, nasty, vicious and, above all else, effective strategies targeted at achieving a concrete goal that moves our movement, moves our rights, forward. This is why I've talked endlessly about the role the Mormons had in making Prop 8 a reality. They are willing to be hate's banker, and we need to make sure that their moral bankruptcy becomes a fiscal one as well. Whether that means targeting key Mormon donors, targeting the entire state of Utah, or finding another means to make the price far too high for anyone willing to finance hate.

I'm not sure what the answer is. But we need one. We are a people without leadership at the moment. The California groups who got us into this mess seem downright terrified that gay people are finally rising up and demanding their rights, and the national groups, rightfully, to a degree, are butting out of what is California's own business (for all the criticism of HRC, are they really supposed to parachute into the middle of California and, Al Haig style, declare "we're in charge"?)

Gay people want change. But politics, like war, best achieves its goals when someone with experience and vision is at the helm. And for whatever reason, no one is stepping up.

John Aravosis (DC)