What Gays Can Do For Civil Rights

There has been so much energy surrounding this new direction for equal rights for us gays, and I have found it, well, exhilirating. I have felt a little bad, though, for not being able to join in unequivocally. I've been saying that we need to examine ourselves and our leaders for our failures. And I've been saying that we were too focused on blaming Mormons. And I've been saying that racism has played its part in the gay community for too long now. I've brought these issues up because I really do believe that now is the time to fix these problems (let's just call them that because that's what they are), but, honestly, I've felt a little like I've been somehow betraying my own community for pointing out its flaws. I've felt a little alone in thinking these things.

But, today, there two opinions in The Gay City News that make me feel a little less . . . isolated in this thinking. Herndon L. Davis writes:

My advice to the LGBT community, the organizers of No on Prop 8, the many different LGBT funders, and the remaining members of the Gay Mafia is that they take seriously the racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors of black and people of color communities as they endeavor further in the marriage equality quest.

. . . In some corners of our diverse LGBT community, there is a blatant disregard for culture, religion, and the oppression of other racial and ethnic groups. Many working class blacks and Latinos are struggling to pay rent, put food on the table, and, yes, dodge bullets; their first instinct is not to lift their eyes up from their burdens to see the connection to the white- faced, seemingly privileged LGBT leadership that would move them to support marriage equality.

These are big chunks of truth that the LGBT community seems ill-prepared to accept, never mind tackle. In this new age of Obama, a much deeper conversation concerning LGBT race relations lies ahead, one that for now the community seems eager to shy away from.

And Eliyanna Kaiser and Gary Parker write:

Like everyone else in our community, we are upset about the passage of Proposition 8 in California. At a time when the country is celebrating the election of the first African-American president, the LGBT community suffered one of its biggest civil rights setbacks in recent history. And make no mistake about it, we are angry.

Unfortunately, some of the anger our community feels is being directed in unproductive and questionable ways, like the protest being held on Wednesday, November 12, outside the Manhattan Mormon Temple on Columbus Avenue.

There have been numerous media reports about how individual Mormons gave mega millions to the Yes to Prop 8 campaign at the encouragement of Church leadership. Unfortunately, many Orthodox rabbis, Catholic priests, Pentecostal ministers, and Baptist preachers have done the same, not just in California but in other states' anti-gay ballot initiatives, or to help elect anti-gay candidates here in New York.

This is why I really liked the call to action by Dustin Lance Black and Cleve Jones -- it asks each of us what we can do to advance all civil rights:"There are rare moments in human history when, suddenly and unexpectedly, the opportunity for great change and progress becomes possible. Barack Obama has shown us the power of hope and the urgency of seizing that moment. Harvey Milk has shown us the power we possess when we make our voices heard."