Trump is appointing young judges who believe in the Bible over the Constitution and who believe we are spawn of the devil and they will have a lifetime to force us back into the closet.
But we need a lot more LGBT people to become active in politics… I know… it’s politics… ugh… I don’t get involved in politics. Well my dear unless you want your healthcare stripped from you (right now the VA is requesting comments on their repeal of trans healthcare for veterans), your rights to go out in public (Massachusetts has a ballot question this November to repeal “Public Accommodation”), your right to get married (numerous courts cases to give special rights to religious bigots to refuse to services for us) you better think about being active in politics. Do you want to go back to the days of police raids to check you are wearing three items of clothing from your birth gender?
How many of you have gone to a “Women’s March on Washington” rally or have gone to a another rally for human rights?
I am always thinking of the poem written by the German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller, “First they came for…”
If we don’t stand up for others, who will stand up for us?
The is going to be another ctEQUALITY community town hall meeting in Waterbury sometime in the coming months. We need you to attend and let us know what you think we should do moving forward.
For Gays, the Worst Is Yet to Come. Again.That is a question I also ask, why don’t more trans people speak out against discrimination and bigotry? As I wrote this morning we have a very of high level of activism but still it is only a small fraction of the trans population who will pick up a phone and call their legislator.
Mr. Kramer, a writer and activist, is a founder of both Gay Men’s Health Crisis and Act Up. Volume Two of his “The American People” is forthcoming.
New York Times
By Larry Kramer
July 11, 2018
I was recently honored for my birthday with an all-star reading of my play “The Destiny of Me.” It was obviously a very emotional experience for me. I’m supposed to be dead by now. Most of the guys who got infected with H.I.V. in the 1980s are long dead.
[…]
But by the time a modicum of acceptance by the outside world starts to arrive, we are visited with a plague. It is a plague of disease, and with our new president it continues to be a plague of hate. There is not one cabinet member who has supportive or welcoming words for us. Every week, it seems, Mr. Trump appoints another judge who is on record as hating us. They will serve for many years. A new Supreme Court will further echo this disdain.
[…]
I have never been able to answer one question: Why have relatively few of us — out of so many millions — been willing to fight for their lives? I still can’t answer it and I continue to be very sad because of it. And the biggest fight for our lives is ahead of us.
I still can’t see enough of us, in all our numbers and our splendor and our magnificence. Our activist organizations are a diminished presence. We still have no respected and accepted leaders who can speak for us as a people. And what little power we do have, lobbying or otherwise, in Washington or anywhere else, is woefully inadequate. Our billionaires are funding concert halls and public parks and retirement homes for primates, but not gay rights. If it weren’t for such stalwart defenders as Lambda Legal Defense and the A.C.L.U., we’d probably be jailed by our enemies.I was heartened with the turn-out at a LGBT community forum at a ctEQUALITY town hall meeting. I realize that for many LGBT people it might be dangerous in coming out but there are so many ways to help that doesn’t require coming out LGBT.
But we need a lot more LGBT people to become active in politics… I know… it’s politics… ugh… I don’t get involved in politics. Well my dear unless you want your healthcare stripped from you (right now the VA is requesting comments on their repeal of trans healthcare for veterans), your rights to go out in public (Massachusetts has a ballot question this November to repeal “Public Accommodation”), your right to get married (numerous courts cases to give special rights to religious bigots to refuse to services for us) you better think about being active in politics. Do you want to go back to the days of police raids to check you are wearing three items of clothing from your birth gender?
How many of you have gone to a “Women’s March on Washington” rally or have gone to a another rally for human rights?
Millions of women and straight people are marching on Washington and in other cities and towns and protesting in the offices of elected officials every week of the year. Where are the millions of gay people being angry and vocal and visibly fighting back?And I don’t think so either.
Are we prepared to fight the many fights piling up against us?
Right now, I don’t think so. The worst is yet to come. Again. Yes, it makes me very sad.
And still imploringly angry.
I am always thinking of the poem written by the German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller, “First they came for…”
If we don’t stand up for others, who will stand up for us?
The is going to be another ctEQUALITY community town hall meeting in Waterbury sometime in the coming months. We need you to attend and let us know what you think we should do moving forward.
When ctEQUALITY stands with all of the other oppressed in amerikkka then perhaps I will see that their town hall meetings are and will be beneficial in fighting off the dreadful monsters in this country today. When they stand up and out against the neo-Nazis marching in the streets, when they stand with the Black liberation movements, with the immigrants, and with all others who are targeted by the right then perhaps I will take the time to attend one of their meetings. When they give more than lip service and when they move out from under the thumb of "OUR Issues only" then maybe. The LGBT movement needs to grow out or they will stand alone. Point in history: throughout the LGBT movement long rise in Germany and its swift fall under the Nazis the movement remained limited to a strategy of single-issue reform. Strong ideological and organizational ties were never cemented between the lgbt movement and the feminist or labor movement. Socially vulnerable and relatively isolated lgbt folks were easy pry for the Nazis.
ReplyDeleteAs a Socialist I condemn single issue reform which is a form of separatism. I reject movements that champion single-issue, exclusively "gay" reform politics ignoring the integral links between working class issues, minority rights, police violence against women and men of color, women's rights, immigrants rights all the rights of all others who are trying to scratch out a living in dignity, respect, and working for a new world.
It is hard to look back and work back. It is hard to wait for so many others to come to these conclusions and harder still to bow to the reformists among us. When we can all sit down and say the system needs changing and that we all realize if we do not change the system then we will be fighting the same old battles over and over again. (RING THAT BELL DOES ANYONE HEAR IT) Just like we are doing now. Isn't anyone else tired of that nonsense?