My friend Leeann left this morning for New York to visit another friend of ours who moved there to pursue her dreams of acting and attending NYU. Unfortunately, Jaclyn's dreams evaporated over the year and a half that she's been there. She is moving back home once her lease ends this spring.
I feel quite badly for her, who wouldn't? Who hasn't pursued a dream only to have it fail miserably. I guess that's better than waking up one day at the end of your life to the bitterness of never having tried. Yet somehow that doesn't quite take all of the sting out of the failure.
I guess that's why I have been becoming increasingly involved with the fight against little King George the Lesser's homophobic regime. I want to at least be able to say I tried. I know the chances are slim to none that his bile-filled rhetoric will spur his Federal Marriage Amendment on to victory--the support for writing hate and discrimination just isn't there--but in the off-chance that it does pass in some parallel hell dimension, I have to know that I tried to fight for my home.
Because that's what this is: a fight for our homes. For what is a home except the place we have built with and for the ones we love. Kind of brings new meaning to the term "Homeland Defense." We must defend our homes vigorously against those enemies both outside and within--even when our enemy is our own president.
This isn't like any other battle in any other war; it is both more insidious and difficult to fight because it is a war of rhetoric and politics. It is a war that divides families, not geography. One's enemies are not always identifiable as posing a "clear and present danger" to our personal and civil security. They can be strangers we meet, our religious leaders, our elected officials, our neighbors, our blood relatives.
Some of them fight out of ignorance--they don't know anyone "that way" so it doesn't affect them, they don't see us as people. Some fight for the wrong-right without even realizing it, because their silence helps ring wing zealot propaganda spread like a firestorm. The greatest evil of all is when good people do nothing in the face of atrocity; when a dream is allowed to die without fighting for it.
Fighting this battle doesn't take violence and smart bombs, but it does take courage and fortitude. It requires something we as Americans are not very good at: talking and listening. Discourse is the only way this fight can be fought and won. The a-bomb of rhetoric can empower and intimidate when wielded with skill; it can win. Logic and reason are its cohorts, without them it can not succeed. We must take these weapons of words and use them to win allies, not just defeat enemies. Only by talking until are voices are horse and ragged will we achieve full and equal treatment by the law and those in power. The GLBT community together with friends and family is a collective voice of several million, we will be heard--if we open our mouths and speak.
Remember the protest campaign of the 1980's: silence=death.
Even if Hell freezes over, the stars fall from the heavens, the Cubs win the World Series, Bushy gets his way by passing his prejudicial amendment, and Tim and I have to seek political asylum in Canada--where we are not considered second class citizens--at least we can look back at the smoldering ruins of the second greatest civil rights movement since the 1960's and take solace in knowing we fought for it, we gave it our all.
Hopefully it won't come to that, so long as we aren't mute.
I feel quite badly for her, who wouldn't? Who hasn't pursued a dream only to have it fail miserably. I guess that's better than waking up one day at the end of your life to the bitterness of never having tried. Yet somehow that doesn't quite take all of the sting out of the failure.
I guess that's why I have been becoming increasingly involved with the fight against little King George the Lesser's homophobic regime. I want to at least be able to say I tried. I know the chances are slim to none that his bile-filled rhetoric will spur his Federal Marriage Amendment on to victory--the support for writing hate and discrimination just isn't there--but in the off-chance that it does pass in some parallel hell dimension, I have to know that I tried to fight for my home.
Because that's what this is: a fight for our homes. For what is a home except the place we have built with and for the ones we love. Kind of brings new meaning to the term "Homeland Defense." We must defend our homes vigorously against those enemies both outside and within--even when our enemy is our own president.
This isn't like any other battle in any other war; it is both more insidious and difficult to fight because it is a war of rhetoric and politics. It is a war that divides families, not geography. One's enemies are not always identifiable as posing a "clear and present danger" to our personal and civil security. They can be strangers we meet, our religious leaders, our elected officials, our neighbors, our blood relatives.
Some of them fight out of ignorance--they don't know anyone "that way" so it doesn't affect them, they don't see us as people. Some fight for the wrong-right without even realizing it, because their silence helps ring wing zealot propaganda spread like a firestorm. The greatest evil of all is when good people do nothing in the face of atrocity; when a dream is allowed to die without fighting for it.
Fighting this battle doesn't take violence and smart bombs, but it does take courage and fortitude. It requires something we as Americans are not very good at: talking and listening. Discourse is the only way this fight can be fought and won. The a-bomb of rhetoric can empower and intimidate when wielded with skill; it can win. Logic and reason are its cohorts, without them it can not succeed. We must take these weapons of words and use them to win allies, not just defeat enemies. Only by talking until are voices are horse and ragged will we achieve full and equal treatment by the law and those in power. The GLBT community together with friends and family is a collective voice of several million, we will be heard--if we open our mouths and speak.
Remember the protest campaign of the 1980's: silence=death.
Even if Hell freezes over, the stars fall from the heavens, the Cubs win the World Series, Bushy gets his way by passing his prejudicial amendment, and Tim and I have to seek political asylum in Canada--where we are not considered second class citizens--at least we can look back at the smoldering ruins of the second greatest civil rights movement since the 1960's and take solace in knowing we fought for it, we gave it our all.
Hopefully it won't come to that, so long as we aren't mute.
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