Putting more minstrels in the show doesn't make the un-free any freer

[HillWilliam]

There have been quite a few threads lately preaching to LGBTs why we should be grateful for the mega-advances we've lately had. I do not claim to speak for any monolithic LGBTQ community. First of all, no such thing exists. But I have been silent on the preach-threads, have not responded to posters, have stayed out of the flame-wars, and have thought very deeply on how to explain the disappointment that many of us feel. Many posters have tried to explain that we're not pissed because we haven't gotten "everything we asked for".

I don't know if we'll find peace, but I'm hoping we can explain and find understanding at least. I'm not preaching here. I'm trying to explain why we feel hurt. The "you should be more grateful" threads only add to the sense of betrayal. I'm asking you "please" don't. Here's why:

We're not even pissed because we haven't gotten a single, solitary thing we were promised. We're pissed because we have repeatedly been told one thing and have been demonstrated the diametric opposite. Actions always speak louder than words.

Let me repost a response (with edits) from yesterday that got several positive responses:

REPEATED instances of making pretty speeches before the A-Gay, big-dollar-donor crowd (like HRC who do nothing for the millions of walking-around LGBTQ's they claim to represent) then within three days defending DOMA in the most insulting of terms; actively lobbying Congress to go slow on DADT; actively refusing to obey a court order multiple times in granting spousal coverage to a federal employee, ... the list goes on and on. It's "say one thing then within hours or less than a week get busted doing the exact opposite" that has us upset.

All of these came after McClurkin where we were told to shut up, suck it up, walk it off and help get him elected. We did.

Despite this initial insult, we took the candidate Obama at his word, that he was a "fierce advocate" for our equality. We believed that he would remain true to his word that we would assist us in our struggle for dignity and recognition. We worked our asses off to see a Democrat in the White House, regardless of his stance on LGBT equality.

These came after Warren where we were told to shut up, suck it up, walk it off and support him. We did.

We promised to support him even though his insistence on having this most offensive of individuals -- who since has been revealed to have had a hand in the "Kill the Gays" bill in Africa -- was a direct, right-up-front stab in the heart to a large community who had worked so hard to get him elected. A large enough community, may I remind some folks, to make a difference in his election -- or re-election. Yet, he chose to shit on us anyway. But we walked it off anyway, even to the tune of many DU threads berating us for having cried out at the deep pain at the insult.

Why are we always so wrong to say "We believed you when you promised. We believed you when you said, 'Make me.' We worked HARD for you. We supported you even after we caught you in lie after lie. We can no longer be the abused spouse, crawling back for more. We're separating and re-evaluating this relationship. When you amend your ways, we may consider coming back, but not one moment before."

We have every right to correct ill behavior. That is not unreasonable of us.

He said he was a fierce advocate for us and supported our rights, but his actions and his staffers' actions repeatedly -- repeatedly -- put the lie to the flowery words.

He said he would push to repeal DADT, but he sent his staffers to the Hill to insist that Congress delay any action on it.

He said he had a committee to push for repeal, then we found out that was a lie.

DOMA has been another disaster for us altogether.

This is the thanks we get for our money, time, effort, support, and votes. Repeated slaps in the face and insults.

There have been many threads reminding how much he's done, how many LGBT's are now in government positions. While we applaud that, the rest of us are still living in fear, degradation, inequality, threats of being fired, the very real possibility of eviction just for being gay, and daily threats of bodily harm with little to no backup from law enforcement or justice.

I still can't get married. My beloved of 15 years can't inherit if my family decides he can't -- wills, contracts, trusts mean absolutely not one goddamned thing without marriage. Don't tell me they do. I've been the beneficiary of a will and been screwed before. If a greedy family and a reich-wing judge decide to overturn a will, it's overturned. Period. Wills aren't worth the paper they're written on if good enough lawyers are involved. I've seen the same thing happen over and over and over to many gay couples. Don't tell me it doesn't happen -- it happened to me. It's not just anecdotal, "I heard it happened to a friend of a friend of a friend" kind of thing. I bet before this thread sinks out of sight, there'll be several more just like me. "Just make a will" is one of the more intelligence-insulting things a straight person can say to a gay couple.

I'm sick and tired of "butbutbutbut look at more clowns in the circus act!! Don't you feel freer!!" bullshit. Making pets out of a few of the lucky ones doesn't improve the lot for the millions of the rest of us one iota. Do NOT stand before me and tell me the diametric opposite of direct observation. We might be gay, but we're not fucking stupid.

There is a wide, wide, wide gulf between what the President says and what he does. Defending the indefensible is in and of itself indefensible.

There have been a lot of good and thoughtful rejoinders to my original response. I would invite those posters to collect those under this thread. Maybe we can get across why the pain is so great and why the "you should be so grateful" threads are hurtful and are NOT helping.

[HillWilliam]

1. I realized I left out

ENDA and total lack of WH support on that. There is no arithmetic in the world that adds up any accomplishment so far against the take-aways to come up with "lukewarm advocacy", or any sort of advocacy at all, let alone a "fierce" one.

[Starry Messenger]

2. k & r

[NMMNG]

3. Thank you for saying this

Perhaps your poignant words will reach at least a few people who refuse to see us as anything but whiny brats screaming for baubles. If they understood half the agony many of us have been through, and are persistently going through, perhaps they wouldn't be so dismissive.

But perhaps I have too much faith in my fellow human beings.

[VMI Dem]

4. I cannot rec this enough.

Excellent post.

[foxfeet]

5. Thanks, HillWilliam. This deserved its own OP.

K&R

[xchrom]

6. recommend

[Prism]

7. It's that gratitude and happiness for other people is deemed adequate

Take anything to do with gay federal employees. I am very, very happy that they are receiving benefits. It also improves my life and the lives of millions of other gay people not at all.

I'm very happy when an LGBT individual gets a job in the executive branch. I am happy for them, but not necessarily for us, because someone being LGBT is no guarantee that they won't promote and defend their boss's policies at the expense of millions of other LGBTers. We've already seen some crazy statements and defenses coming out of the mouths of LGBTers who work for the administration.

I enjoy being happy for people, but I do not enjoy it so much that I'm willing to quell the discontent I feel at the inequality of millions of others.

"Why aren't you happy some random gay person was appointed to a mid-level post?!"

Well, I am happy. I just don't think it deserves the weight in the scales some people seem to be assigning it. Let's see, the President coming out on the day Prop 8 was overturned to declare he still opposes our equality vs. Phil at Interior getting a cushy job.

Yeah, those are about equivalent. It's ungrateful of me not to think so.

I mean, who on earth thinks that way but people who aren't really all that concerned about our issues?

Awesome OP, HW.

[HillWilliam]

10. And there it is, Prism

Indeed, we are very happy that any of us is achieving visibility. It IS a cause for joy.

It is a long way from a "break out the hats and noisemakers" party.

I agonized a lot before I put anything into electrons. It hurt like hell to write the original response and it hurt even worse to make an OP of it. As another poster said downthread, it shouldn't have been necessary.

It felt like we were being told en masse to STFU and that the directive we received from the Oval -- "Make me" -- was just more unimportant campaign rhetoric. Well, if we can't take the promises AND the directive to impel the one we worked so hard to put into office to do his job, we're damned if we do and damned if we don't.

I was fully prepared to be banned and worried to death that I might be. My intent was never, ever to call out any one or any group. My intent was and still is to explain how I feel.

YMMV.

After having S'd the FU for months about it, I couldn't S the FU any longer. We have been backed into a corner with zero options; exactly the same marginalization we have come to expect from the right, but coming from within our own party. Did our fellow DUer's not realize how much that surprised, disappointed, and pained us?

We do not have to take that lying down. We LGBTQs are much more than a vehicle for money, votes, effort, GOTV, power, and access for the few and the lucky. If we don't speak up and empower ourselves, nobody but nobody will do it for us.

The right will kill us. That has amply been demonstrated. We did not expect much of the center and left to turn their backs and abandon us before the Oath of Office was administered and we would be told that (1) promises didn't matter and (2) truth mattered even less by those who erstwhile professed to be our allies.

[mtnester]

8. Thank you

it should be easier than this I know, but stated very nicely.

I am still stunned today that on a Democratic board, that people need convincing, or explanations, or ANYYTHING to understand and support this 200%

[truedelphi]

16. I'm upset by many here too. Some people on this board think that elderly deaf people should be

Tasered for not responding to verbal commands issued by police.

This board is no longer what it once was.

[HillWilliam]

19. I love your tagline -- it is totally the truth

I also wish I'd had a chance to get my cert in Florida. I walked into an agency soon after I moved down to take care of my dad and the lady I had a conversation with was one of the state certifiers. Based on what she saw right then, she said I could easily walk into Level I. If I could come right back during the day, I could probably make Level II without a problem and begin working.

Dad got worse and that ended that. In NC I'd have to go back to school for two more years (I need a lot of catch-up by now) and, well, I'm paycheck to paycheck like everyone else... when I could be useful.

And no, a lot of heart has gone out. We need to put our feet back on the Good Red Road.

One hopes for teachable moments. I believe all actions are reflexive: one doesn't just swim in the water, the water also swims in you. You don't just walk on the road; the road also rises to meet you.

This thread is an experiment. We shall also know something more when it sinks out of sight.

[truedelphi]

20. Trying so hard to walk the good red road.

In fact, a "neighbor" might be having me hauled away for "trespassing" today as I got caught slipping a ten pound block of ice into his yard for his dawggies. It is 103 degrees today in the shade and this numbskull doesn't have his dogs inside. (Everyone else in a three block radius has their pets inside.)

if it is elder care cert you are talking about -- I hassled the County of Marin until they paid for me to go through the Red Cross program for my certified Nursing Assistant status.

Hardest thing I ever did -really was harder even than electronics school where I excelled at upper level math and physics.

The Red Cross allowed only one sick day, and only two "tardies." In a ten week program.

Sorry to hear about your Dad getting worse. Is he still on the planet? And thank you for looking out for him.

[HillWilliam]

21. I had finished a gob of courses and immersion in Texas

in ASL and was functioning easily as Level II, but the board only met in Austin and only rarely. Texas is one bigass state.

Florida, fortunately is reciprocal with Texas in every respect to ASL training and certification. The levels are different, but at least at the time they were reciprocal in certification acceptance. I gave up my job and went to FL to take care of Dad. On a whim, I stopped in at an agency to see if I could be certified and had a conversation with the boss who happened to be available. When I say "conversation", I mean in sign. She said because of my education and because I had functioned, lived, and partied in the Deaf community in TX, she was willing to administer all the required tests in a row if I could take a morning or afternoon at a whack.

Things took a turn and I never got to go back. Dad transitioned, life got very strange indeed, I met my partner, we moved to NC, the rules changed, the economy changed, we adapted.

I believe there is a Great Truth in that a society or a nation will be known for how it treats its most vulnerable: the very young, the very old, its animals, the sick or hungry among it. It is true that there will always be suffering in the world. That is the price for living in a blue and green paradise. Gaia is beautiful but dangerous. A truly good people wouldn't willing add to the suffering; rather, a truly good people would move to ease suffering when it befalls us.

Pictures. I hope you got pictures before and while you were there. Documentation is 90% of making your case.

B/B

[truedelphi]

28. Why a person will not support the gay community, and their need

For rights most of us take for granted, also the disabled community, the struggling workers, the returning veterans, the elderly, the unemployed, students facing high school costs, and yet the person will still say they are a Democrat, I just don't know.

[Mimosa]

9. Wow.

You've said it all, William. Hope it does some good around here.

[HillWilliam]

11. Shameless kick.

[HillbillyBob]

12. I was there when William went through the crap

with his low life brother over Dads house. Bill and Aunt Di were the ones that made sure the mortgage was paid off and the house hold bills were settled up while taking care of Dad in his final days with throat cancer.

Brother John told the judge that since Bill was gay that he did not deserve anything from the estate..and had handwritten a will and coerced Dad to sign it..when there was a proper will in place to leave the house to the family as a family home, but greedy john dragged it through court so when settle up time came the lawyers got almost all and the house had to be sold (at a large loss) to satisfy the lawyers and a pittance to Di, Bill and John..who promptly drank himself to death while running up very very large phone bills to psychic hotlines.

I was not there the whole time, but I was there for enough of it to see what was going on. I had been very sick prior to this so was not much help.

I had also seen gay couples go through this kind of crap from 'real' family when on partner died the rest of the family would descend like locust stealing everything and getting assistance from law enforcement to do it . Can you imagine what it would be like if your spouse died and you are just hanging on then a whole lot of thieves take over your home, bank accounts, taking your furniture and clothes and dishes and shoving you aside while they rumage through your life and a sheriff has evicted you?

Some asshole on here made a snarky remark 'that its all about money' yes in a way, but its also about the life you have built with your partner.

[HillWilliam]

14. Actually, luv, I was talking about another will

but, yeah, let's throw that one in there, too, as an example of how gayfolks get screwed just for being alive.

Thank you for sticking by my side through that meshugaz, especially when we were a new couple and all. You're still here almost 15 years later. I love you so. You're the love of my life and my very bestest friend.

Gawd, the amount of shit LGBT's have to put up with on a daily basis that's just shit, let alone physical danger, the threat of being homeless or jobless at any second notwithstanding. The point of the OP is when our President said repeatedly he would stand in our defense we had every reason to expect him at least to try.

We have every right to be offended when not only did he fail to try, he actively helped those who are against us. Those were offensive actions.

Once is a misstep. Twice could be a mistake and an aide should have been fired.

We're talking about a couple-year-long repetitive pattern of underhandedness and premeditated skulduggery.

[walldude]

13. K&R great post....

[QC]

15. kick

[jonnyblitz]

17. thank you! K + R.

:hi:

[Starry Messenger]

18. kick for the evening crowd.

[chill_wind]

22. K & R.

[theHandpuppet]

23. If only I could recommend your post 100 times!

I'm with you!

:applause:

[QC]

24. KICK!

[cate94]

25. kick

I'm just sorry it is to late to rec.

[Ignis]

26. Too late to R, but here's a K.

:kick:

Can you believe that Americans are still fighting for equal rights in 2010?

[mitchtv]

27. great post

too late to R/