Thursday, June 18, 2009

Don't get discouraged, lgbt community

I really really really (yes I said really three times) hate this melee between the Obama Administration and the lgbt community for so many reasons.

Right now, a few friends of mine are very discouraged. Many of them worked their asses off to get Obama elected and they feel betrayed over the situation.

There is a lot of people with credible concerns over the DOMA brief and other things.

Then there are the ones I wish would just go away.

You know them - the ones who are always talking about some psuedo intellectual bullshit about revolution and taking to the streets.

Or the ones who are always quick to cite what black folks did during the civil rights movement even though their knowledge of such things obviously from television movies and pieces of simple lessons they learned in elementary school.

Never mind the intricate details or Machiavellian plans that went behind every march, the fights, and the disagreements between major African-American civil rights groups that exist even until this day. All they know is Rosa Parks refused to move from her seat, Martin Luther King Jr. said his "I Have A Dream" speech, black people marched en masse, and presto, they got their rights.

Then there are the ones who will talk about the glorious past history of the outsider street politics of Stonewall, Queer Nation, and Act-Up while forgetting the fact that those situations took place when the lgbt community had no political power to speak of.

I know what you are thinking. Obama's actions proves that we don't have any political power now. Well that's not true.

One thing that always irks me when people like to cite the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s is the fact that they tend to skirt over details, like the fact that even though African-Americans helped Kennedy to be elected, he had to be pushed to support civil rights.

Just like Obama has to be pushed to do the right thing. Of course in this case, it looks like Obama has to be pulled, yanked, or tied down and carried.

But the fact of the matter is that I'm a cynical, pragmatic person so I never viewed Obama's election as a huge breakthrough for lgbts.

Don't get me wrong. I like President Obama, but I have never viewed his election as nothing more than a chess move that would get lgbts closer to where we need to be.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't be angry at President Obama. What I am saying is that we need to sit back, take a view of where we are as opposed to where we would be if McCain had been elected, and then use our anger in an intelligent manner that will get us closer to equality.

You see that's the good thing about the anger that many of us are feeling now. We are in the driver's seat, a place where we wouldn't have been had it been a Republican Administration.

We do have political power right now. And that power has the potential to yield positive results. That is if we don't allow our anger to lead us rather than us leading it.

Editor's note - Another reason why I hate this melee is that it is distracting me from the mission of this blog (exposing religious right lies) as well as taking the shine off of SC Black Pride week. But I will soldier on and hope to have pictures of events in the coming days.


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Thursday midday news briefs

Campaign to save Maine's marriage law is launched. Opponents hired Yes on Prop. 8 campaign manager to kill our rights again. - The rematch!

Anti-bullying bill in jeopardy - Paul Cameronesque bullcrap rears its ugly head.

NOM threatens GOP primary challenges in New York - They are threatening to spend $500,00 to unseat any Republican who supports marriage equality. Where is this pathetic group getting all of that money?

Big city mayors pushing homosexual agenda - Because we all need fiber in our diets, a bit from One News Now complete with a quote from Peter LaBarbera who has YET to talk about his recent so-called press conference against President Obama supposedly pro-gay agenda. Was it that bad, Peter?

Presidential Memorandum: "A Very Small Step in the Right Direction" Presidential Action Highlights Need For DOMA Repeal - Sign the petition to DUMP DOMA!

And now for something completely different and campy. Can you spot the Oscar winners in this following clip:







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Obama, Family Research Council, SC Black Pride and various other sh!*&

Today is the day that chaos will begin to reign. Lgbts of color in South Carolina will be celebrating our fourth annual black pride.

Continue to pray for me that I don't overdo things.

Since I am up early working on a couple of things for the function, allow me to briefly hit on a couple of things:



That's nice but lgbts didn't help to elect President Obama to receive crumbs. This had better be the appeitizer to a huge meal and not the meal itself.

Next - the Family Research Council tries to pull another fast one. This is the headline for one of its blog posts:

Two Parents = Fewer Run-ins with Police

It's not necessarily a correct headline. The post actually says:

In the latest Mapping America, the General Social Surveys show that adults who lived with both biological parents as adolescents are less likely ever to be picked up or charged by police.

So its adults who as adolescents lived with "their biological parents" are less likely to ever be picked up or charged by police, not necessarily folks who lived in two-parent households in general.

Gotta love that religious right bait and switch.

Finally is it just me or did no one give a damn about that press conference yesterday led by Peter LaBarbera, Matt Barber, and Sally Kern?

I have yet to see or hear anything from it.

Anyway, I'm outta here until lunch. Like I said before, pray for me and Black Pride.



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