Grandpa Joe

This week many lgbt students will be participating in a Day of Silence (www.dayofsilence.org). This is an attempt by students to bring awareness to other students about the silence that surrounds many of their issues. Today I talked with my students (I've been the advisor to our lgbtq group for 18 years) about their participation. They will carry the following cards tomorrow:

"Please understand my reason for not speaking today. I am participating in the Day of Silence (DOS), a national youth movement bringing attention to the silence faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender people and their allies. My deliberate silence echoes that silence, which is caused by anti-LGBT bullying, name-calling and harassment. I believe that ending that silence is the first step toward building awareness and making a commitment to address these injustices. Think abot the voices you are not hearing today."

When we talked about this I brought up the silencing of lgbt authors by Amazon as an example of how silence around our issues sometimes happens. No one's fault, no one's blame. But the silence is there. We talked about what is worse yet is the second kind of silence by Amazon. The silence that refuses to admit that anyone has been hurt. The refusal to apologize for what clearly had an effect on lgbt folks. While Amazon is busy righting the wrong, they have remained silence toward our community and such silence can not be tolerated. I asked the students to join me in a boycott of Amazon until they aopologize to our community, admitting that they have offended many of us by their silence.

I hope Amazon can hear our silence, but their corporate culture seems to say, "We don't care that you've been hurt. It wasn't our fault. It was a glitch. It wasn't purposeful homophobia." But the thing they don't get is that discrimination is even more insideous when it's not acknowledged by those who participate in it, who remain silent in the face of our anger! The students understood something that Amazon seems incapable of understanding. Silence shows culpability!

I thought this was especially good!

 

It's been over 40 years since the signing of the civil rights bill. Last night was the kind of culmination that grows from that commitment and the civil rights struggle in Montgomery, Greensboro, Selma, and thru out the land...a struggle that cost a great deal of sacrifice and heartache. Can we lgbtq folks be any less strong? Can we say, as they did, "We shall over come!" and know in our heart of hearts, to the depth of our souls, that it is only a matter of time and we, too, will get our civil rights.

I think it's time for another March on Washington, to say to the country, "We will not be bowed!" and to say to our new President Obama, "No one has civil rights until everyone has them! Join our struggle!"

I got up this morning depressed and took the day off from work, but David and I went out to lunch this afternoon and I realized how much I love this man and how much I am willing to struggle until that love is honored. It's about respect, for ourselves. It's about respect, from others. It's about respecting the rights and freedoms of all in our society, for none of us are free until all are free.

The struggle will be long and difficult, but I'm up to it. The wounds will be deep and hard to endure, but I will endure them. The fight will be non-violent, but fight I will. Touching David reminds me of what this struggle is all about and I vow not to forget that!

What a wonderful thing that Obama won and what an awful thing that Proposition 8 is still too close to call. The religious bigots in Mormonism and Catholicism appear to have won the day, though they have to still count the provision ballots. Make no mistake, though, that we'll continue to fight for equal rights. When will folks learn, as they needed to learn years ago regarding race, that SEPARATE IS NOT EQUAL! It took African-Americans almost 60 years from the Civil Rights Act to get to this point. I probably won't see the law change for gays and lesbians, but it will happen. It's a matter of civil rights, but more importantly, it's a moral imperative that we'll grow into as we grow away from bigotry and ignorance.

 

Lots have been said on television about how Obama's election indicates how we've grown as a country. Proposition 8 shows us how far we have left to go!