Stonewall: Our past and our future

Today is the 36th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. Due to some combination of sweltering summer temperatures, anger at constant raids and abuse by the authorities, and possibly Judy Garland's death, gay men, lesbians, and transvestites began fighting back against the local police. Rock-throwing and obscenities quickly turned into a small-scale riot, and a legend was born.

Many will tell you that the Stonewall Riot was pretty meaningless in the battle for gay rights. Organizations like Mattachine Society and Daughters of Billitis had been quietly working for years on changing minds and hearts (Del Lyon and Phyllis Martin, who helped found Daughters of Billitis, were the first gay couple married in San Francisco last February), and they played a big part in getting various psychiatric organizations to take homosexuality off the books as mental illness.

Stonewall was a symbolic victory. Something to look back on as a life-changing, nation-shifting moment. Something that builds and builds in the memory and can be referenced whether or not you were at the event or know the full details of the event. Aside from a few high-profile marches on Washington (and some people are trying to plan another, which just seems like a waste of money to me), the gay community's most symbolic moments have often happened by accident, by a twist of fate and timing.

The assassination of Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone. The Supreme Court overturning sodomy laws. Gavin Newsom marrying gay couples in San Francisco.

Most of the flashpoints of the gay community, whether in our own mind or the public mind, seem to be tragedy and horror. Matthew Shephard's murder. Harvey Milk. AIDS. Shame. Guilt. Pain.

The gay community, as far as I'm concerned, will not progress until we have true leaders. We have some people who do very hard work, but we have no Martin Luther Kings or Gloria Steinems. I think part of this is due to infighting, which stems from shame. From our first moments on this planet we sense that homosexuality is something sick, perverse, and dirty. The media leers at us. Major politicians plot our destruction for partisan gain. Other politicians tolerate us, take our money, pat us on the head, and then shove us off a cliff as soon as they need a scapegoat for why they lost yet another election. There is very little genuine acceptance. And that makes many of us turn against each other. You have seemingly dozens of little classifications and subcultures based on everything from age to how "butch" you are.  It's very hard to remember who the real enemy is when you feel so alienated in your own community. And that class warfare, the idea that if you are gay you should live in a big blue city or act a certain way or not enjoy certain things or wear the right outfits or take certain party drugs, is a big reason why gays are so unable to unite. So many of us berate ourselves for not living up to the standards set not only by straight society but even those in the gay community who always expect more. We are unable to mobilize, to band together. We take any little glimmer of support from straight people and we cower in fear at the idea of ever stepping out of place. We allow people to blame us for every ill in the world, all because we want to have equal rights, all because we want to be equal to everyone else. We are supposed to be walking laugh tracks. The rotten fruit of society. When we try to be "normal", straight America lashes out, and we blame ourselves for ever making the effort. It's a vicious cycle, as most recently evidenced in the 2004 elections.

That's why Stonewall is so important. Many of the people at Stonewall were living in shadows. They were considered outcasts and freaks even by many in the gay community. But they were sick of being beaten, and threatened, and spit on. They fought back because they had no choice. They were tired of staying in their place.

Gays today have far more rights yet we are far more endangered of losing those rights, because so many of us take them for granted. We think that because we might be able to invite our partner to a company picnic or because our relatives don't openly call us names or because there are a few "gay" shows on TV, things have improved. That leads to complacency. We just sit in our homes or in bars or clubs wanting to be left alone with the few rights we have, even though those rights are being whittled away one by one, until we are left with nothing but judgment, persecution, and oblivion.

We don't need to show straight America lots of violence. We can't expect to push and push on equal marriage rights and assume America will go along. But Stonewall serves as a lesson that we need to stand up for ourselves, and most of all, find ourselves worthy and important. We need to stop waiting and waiting for the right words and the right deeds to force America to love us when all of America will never love us. Many straight Americans do support us, but we are so ready to believe the media hype and the political spin that America hates gays and is ashamed of gays. We do this because it's easier to play the martyr and feel sorry for ourselves and say that gay rights are dead and we're all heading to the death camps. That doesn't involve taking a risk. That doesn't involve working with people we may have issues with. That doesn't involve accepting ourselves, flaws and all.

Of all the Stonewall lessons, the key lesson is that local outcry can become a global rallying cry. You don't have to join Human Rights Campaign or give money to various pandering politicians to make a difference in how America views the gay community. You have to join organizations in your own city, your own state. You have to make new friends and take risks and come out to people, if it is safe to do so. You have to change minds and hearts one at a time. Throwing rocks may not be the answer today, but fucking black tie dinners aren't a big help either.

Find the stone wall inside yourself, and shatter it to pieces. Take a good look at everything the gay community has earned and how close we are to losing all that so many of us have died for. Stop asking yourself what you can do to make some generic Joe Sixpack Bigot stop hating you. Stop hating yourself. Work together. We've already made tremendous progress. There was a time when many straight people, even progressives, would not work with the gay community. There was a time when gay men could not deal with lesbians, when gays could not deal with transvestites, and on and on. That's changed dramatically, but it's only a start. We need to heal ourselves and we need to work together to help change America. We can't just stay quiet and wait for any political party to help us. We have to make politicians support us, if we can, because otherwise they will vote against us and blame us for their failures time and time again.

Most of all please remember the many gay men and women, and our straight allies, who have died since Stonewall. We have lost so many voices and faces and lives, and I think that's another reason the gay community has no real leader. Hopefully someday that will change, if we make it change.

OK, lecture over. Have a nice night. 

 

Comments

[Paul Rosenberg]

I'm sorry, but this:

"The gay community, as far as I'm concerned, will not progress until we have true leaders. We have some people who do very hard work, but we have no Martin Luther Kings or Gloria Steinems. I think part of this is due to infighting, which stems from shame."

is absolutely ludicrous. There was monumental infighting in both the civil rights movement as well as the feminist movement. And shame, most certainly, was part of the reason why. But powerlessness, I believe was equally to blame.

Be that as it may, I think it's utterly false to say the gay community has no leaders. I may be straight, but I know leadership in the form of politicians like Harvey Milk (who could easily have been a US Senator had he not been assasinated) and Sheila Kuehl (who could yet be a US Senator), just to name two top examples from here in California, author/activists like Urvashi Vaid and Larry Kramer, artist/activist/community builders like performance artist Tim Miller, playwrights like Tony Kushner, this is just a few names of the top of my head, the list just goes on and on and on.

Now is any of these people comparable in stature to Martin Luther King? Do you realize what an absurd question that is? How long had African Americans been struggling for their freedom before Martin Luther King arrived on the scene? And they had many, many great leaders along the way. King was arguably not even the greatest of them. But he stood at a crossroads in history that others had been leading the way towards, and he did what had to be done there, and became a symbolic embodiment of all those who came before him as well.

There is no single comparable figure for the women's movement. Or for most other movements. King was the exception. And to use him as the standard (rather than the inspiration) is sheer foolishness. But if you insist, well, then take another look at "The Life and Times of Harvey Milk," and compare him to King in the 1950s, and I think you'll see the gay rights movement has already produced at least one leader who could well have become such a figure. King, too, was nearly killed before he reached true national stature.

What I'm trying to say under all of this, is that I think you're a bit infected by what you're writing about. And those feelings plague all movements, all ostracized communities, even, dare I say it, all us featherless bipeds that ever lived on this earth.

And Stonewall? Hey, I recognized it right away for the earth-shattering event it was. I just thought it was soooo cooool! And like I said, I'm straight. Didn't even like Judy Garland. Still don't, truth be told. But I deeply respect what she meant to so many. And I thought it was a fitting tribute to her that her death gave birth to that watershed moment.

[Meteor Blades]

Whatever your separate views on gay leadership, cheers to you both for remembering Stonewall, a milestone just about forgotten in straight blogworld today.

[CathiefromCanada]

And on a more positive note, today is the day that the Canadian parliament voted to approve gay marriage -- as my daughter said, "I feel like I'm not sitting at the back of the bus anymore."
Canada does not have any particularly outstanding gay rights leaders as such -- instead we have a number of politicians who know it is their job to lead and unite -- our Prime Minister, Paul Martin, led a large number of people in our country to support this legislation. He was very honest about it -- he said he had not been a supporter of gay marriage until the Canadian courts defined it as a civil rights issue. In that context, he said, he then viewed it as a question of equal rights, and he was completely committed to the requirement that the Canadian government had to ensure equal rights for all Canadian citizens. I thought it was remarkable that he was able to provide a frame within which so many people could support gay marriage.

[James]

I guess I didn't make it clear enough in my comments - Harvey Milk was a leader, but he was gunned down before he could become the major force that the gay community needed. MLK was well-known nationwide for several years before he died, he had a major national movement. Milk did not. He may have had the potential, but there has been no one since him who comes close to filling that void. Sheila Kuehl is a great legislator but I doubt she will ever be a US senator. I don't even know if she could win an election to Congress when there are so many other Democrats waiting for that rare chance to get a seat (I can't remember if she is the one who ran for Congress a few years ago and lost; I think that may have been another CA lesbian). As for Larry Kramer, his idea of "leadership" is ranting about Ron Reagan Jr and telling gays that gay rights are dead in America and we are heading for the guilottine. Oh, and he tells gay men that they spend all their time taking drugs and getting AIDS. What a leader. I haven't seen or heard anything from Vaid in years. Most of these people seem to vanish when their 15 minutes runs out, or unless they have a book to plug.

The feminist movement and the civil rights movement may have splintered over time but I think they still have more power today than most gay rights organizations because there just seems to be so much apathy, particularly among gay men my age and younger. We have so much to lose, we're losing so much already, and yet when I talk to people about this I usually hear things like "it's just marriage" or "I don't want to get married anyway." I wish that marriage was all that was at stake here.

[Paul Rosenberg]

I can only say that as someone who's neither black, female, nor gay, the differences between the movements seem to be much more about their historical situations than anything else.

Over time, for example, both feminist and black liberation leaders have slipped from sight, turned bitter and despairing, grown fixated on a particular tree while losing sight of the forest, etc. And others have taken their place. If you read histories of 19th Century feminism you'll find plenty of incidents that will make you wince--or even cringe, along with ones that move you to tears.

No matter what failings gay activism may have, there is no parallel for the racism and nativism that seeped into suffragist ranks at different turns in the late 1800s. This is not an argument that gay & lesbian leaders are morally superior to 19th century feminists. Rather, it's a reflection of a different historical context. Both that which makes gay leaders look worse (your glass half empty) and what makes them look better (the above-described glass half full) is primarily a matter of historical context (which I mean to include sociological forces, political climate and all the rest). To blame it on individuals or even group dynamics it to take (or at least play into) the same sort of blame-the-victim viewpoint that's espoused by conservative homophobes.

This is not to excuse shortcomings of leadership. It is merely to say that if you want to effectively address such shortcommings, you need to place them in a wider context in order to not become part of the problem you're railing against. Otherwise, the hair you tear out will be your own.

p.s. Keuhl is a helluva lot more than just an effective legislator. My point is that whether or not she ever makes it to the US Senate depends much more on other factors--such as the congested nature of California Democratic politics--than it does on her being a lesbian, simply because of how she carries herself and how she connects with people. And the Milk/MLK comparison is significant because the potential to be that kind of leader is incredibly rare in any population. For all the great feminist leaders America's seen since 1848, there really isn't one who stands out like that. But that's hardly an indictment of feminism.