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Same-Sex Marriage? Must Be the Fiery End Times. (But I Don’t Even Have A Sunburn.)

My brain is still a gelatinous blob of nothingness when Andy calls.

“Isn’t the news exciting?!”

With my mental hourglass still turning, waiting for my responses to load, my mind thumbs through options.

Did we have a baby?

Have we adopted another geriatric dog?

Did we win the lottery?

He senses my uncertainty – probably tipped off by the prolonged “Durrrrrr…uhhhh…”

“GAY MARRIAGE IS LEGAL!”

Toby smells himself. I awaken.

“HOLYFUCK…SHIT!”

Of course this would be the morning when I’d convinced myself not to immediately open Facebook. No, cut the cord a little bit. Give yourself some mental space to think. And so I’d stared at the morning light filtering through the windows, thought about my impending phone interview, and watched Toby drag his ass across the floor – ending at his food bowl where he waited expectantly.

So the SCOTUS ruling had been mentally supplanted a bit by my concern that Toby’s anal glands needed to be expressed again.

But now I know. And Andy gives me a minute to collect my thoughts, cry, and call him later.

Online, a giant rainbow cloaks every news page, and I can’t believe this day is actually here. We’d been on pins and needles before with DOMA, and every other time something idiotic was passed down from on high – on both federal and local levels. But now, we were equal in the eyes of the law.

And, most certainly, conservatives are soon to be calling this the END TIMES, what with “post-racial society” statements being tragically disproven, Confederate flags being removed, and LGBTQIAers being able to marry. Surely, society is caving in on itself like a dying star. Only rapture will save the righteous. But we’ve been through the End Times a couple times before, and I don’t even have a sunburn.

The enormity of this decision can’t be overstated. Not only is this a legal victory, it’s a moral victory. Now, rather than being demonized and dehumanized by legislation – by talks from hyper-conservative pundits, by stupid business owners given airtime – we FINALLY have something more substantial than DOMA being stricken down a year ago today. Today, we have the beginnings of a delicately balanced playing field – a harbinger of societal change and restructuration. Now is the time to celebrate, but also to remember there’re so many more fights to wage for fair housing, benefits, and everything in between.

It’s time to reach out and promote peace and understanding across the spectrum of humanity – while there’s this victory, there’s still a long way for this country to go on minority rights, and acknowledging racial tensions, climate change, a living wage, on and on ad nauseum.

We still have a long way to go as a country, but at least now our national whole is a little more colorful.

YASSSSSSSSSSSS.

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The Social Construct Wars

Between the news from Baltimore and the Supreme Court, social media consumers are undoubtedly gorged with tragedy, violence, and anxiety. All in all, it’s a horribly normal state of being.

We want answers. We want resolution. We want peace and security.

But above all, we want a quick sound bite that we can use to wave away all of these issues – freeing their cobweb-like hold on our minds and congratulating ourselves that we’ve donated $10 to Nepal relief – so we can go about our day as if nothing has happened. Again, it’s all sadly status quo.

And I’m just as guilty of it as anyone. But today something just snapped. I’m tired of reading all of the erroneously overwrought statements about how “certain people” should act. You know, black people.

Sorry, I should’ve whispered “black” or, at the very least, put it in smaller font. Because that’s how we talk about others, in hushed tones, looking over our shoulder for added emphasis. Just like with “gay” people, or “brown” people or, you know, “the handicapped.” Like the people “over there.”

It’s all about distance, even if what’s happening – who it’s happening to – is writing itself into history right outside your door. Because as long as there’s a mental gulf in place, you don’t really have to think about it.

***

A few weeks ago, on a longer than usual trek up the 405, my stop-and-go journey came to an abrupt stop on La Cienega, just before the Beverly Center.

Goddamn traffic. It’s Friday. I just want to go home.

I leered at the base of the hills, the apartment complexes taunting me like desert mirages. But horrible traffic is par for the course. So I prepared to wait.

And as I turned up a random song from Brand New, I noticed a crowd gathering on one of the intersection’s corners.

Something’s happen…

I didn’t even finish my thought before a tall woman with a long, curly wig cut across the crosswalk and fell prostrate in the middle of the intersection. Then the chants started, and protesters began moving into the street waving handmade posters. I cringed.

Of course this has to fucking happen right now. 

And then I heard it.

“TRANS LIVES MATTER! TRANS LIVES MATTER!”

It was like someone threw a bucket of cold water over my brain. I was immediately incensed by my former thoughts. Of course this matters.

But pretty much everyone around me, save a few taking photos, leaned on their horns and yelled unintelligible gibberish out of their partially cracked windows. I inched up as car after car made a U-turn, adding to the vehicular welter around us. Just a few car lengths from the intersection, I kept my gaze fixed on the woman in the street – she’d draped herself across the intersection like a speed bump; she wasn’t moving anytime soon.

Just then, my phone rang. Andy’s voice came through the car speakers before I realized I’d hit “Answer.”

“Hey, what the fuck is going on? I’m stuck on La Cienega.”

“I must be just ahead of you. It’s a protest – a Trans Lives Matter crowd. We’re not getting through.”

“Goddammit! Why do they have to do this today?”

He quieted, and then, like me, realized what he’d said. “I mean, it’s just inconvenient. They have to know that being this close to WeHo, they’ve got plenty of support.”

We decided to turn around about the time the helicopters started circling, and the fire engines pulled up. But even over the sirens, I could faintly make out the chanting.

***

Weeks later, Andy was trying to counteract a case of insomnia at 3:00 AM, but nothing settled him.

“I’m going on a walk.”

I grumbled something unintelligible about not doing it because it was so early. But I heard the lock click over before I finished, and dozed back off. Twenty minutes later, the phone rang.

“I JUST GOT DETAINED BY THE POLICE!”

I bolted upright. Toby snorted awake beside me.

“Wait, WHAT? Where are you?!”

“I’m on my way home. They thought I was a robber or something and put be in the back of their patrol car and asked me all of these questions.”

Now I was completely awake.

“WHY IN THE HELL WOULD THEY THINK THAT?”

“I’ll tell you when I get back. Apparently, there was a break-in somewhere around here.”

“Did you at least have your license?”

He paused.

“No.”

I facepalmed in the dark. This is something that Andy and I always sparred about – always taking some form of ID with us, even when we’re going out front with Toby.

“Just get home safely.”

A few minutes later, Andy came in and relayed the whole story – clearly shaken, and more awake than ever. Long story short, there was a robbery and apparently someone saw Andy walking around the block in his hoodie, and misidentified him as the suspect.

“Are you fucking KIDDING ME?”

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, “Thank the gods you’re the epitome of a WASP.”

It was horribly true. In that moment, all I could replay was the scenario going wrong, not being able to be in touch with Andy, not knowing where or how he was. And all I kept thinking about was how things would’ve been different if Andy were a racial minority. Had he been black, would the police have suspected him more? Would he have even been able to call me? Would he have been hurt?

This isn’t an illogical jump. West Hollywood is about as racially diverse as Orange County. Had Andy been black or Latino or Indian, he most likely would’ve been detained much longer than he was, and possibly arrested. As much as we’d like to think our police officers are above racial profiling, they’re biased people just like you and me.

But through that uniform, those biases can morph into disturbing behavioral practices if left unchecked.

Now, I’m not saying every law enforcement official is a racist, classist, homophobe, or any of the other horrible things people can be. What I’m saying is that officers are people, and everyone needs to be educated and re-educated on a routine basis. I’m just saying that everyone in a position of power may would benefit from an Anthropology 101 primer. Because by page 10, the differences we use on a daily basis to pigeon-hole and judge people are brought into sharp relief for what they really are: social constructs perpetuated by us, oftentimes through state-sanctioned violence.

Gender? Race? Labels for constructs we’ve developed to try and isolate and explain difference and constrain people.

And while we keep perpetuating these constructed differences, we neglect to see or address the root cause of social upheaval – social fissions and fractures that signal that something in this crazy-ass social structure we’ve developed just isn’t working. Instead, we throw a hashtag on it and dust off our hands.

#blacklivesmatter

#translivesmatter

#alllivesmatter

#lovemustwin

We reduce the work that needs to be done to a few characters on our smartphones. And then we disengage completely.

But you know who can’t disengage? People fighting for their lives – black, white, brown, trans, gay, straight, queer, differently-abled. People who take to the streets because their brains can’t handle another damn hashtag; they crave resolution and demand immediate answers from those in power. And their emotions bubble over. I can’t fault people who’ve had enough – who march and demonstrate and do what they must to be heard. Many of us have been there.

Ides of Love

What I can’t stand is the person who piggybacks on tragedy to satisfy their own endgame, to line their pockets, to cast someone’s livelihood asunder, to divert attention away from the real problem.

We’re fallible beings. We make mistakes. But sometimes those mistakes coalesce into a flashpoint for change. Had the Stonewall Riots and so many protests and marches and non-peaceful demonstrations not happened, would the SCOTUS be hearing Obergefell v. Hodges today? Probably not. So who can say that the protests and volatile confrontations in Baltimore aren’t going to translate into something positive?

It’s certainly (unfortunately) true that violence often begets violence. Or at least that’s what we’ve conditioned ourselves into thinking. But what we often let our minds gloss over is that the same unbridled anger that’s been channeled through violence has also helped propel us forward – through the breaking glass, bloodied fists, and smoking wreckage to today.

And tomorrow.

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A Strange New Nation

With pundits on both sides firing off on yesterday’s SCOTUS rulings on DOMA and Prop 8, my Facebook thread rightfully aflutter with glad tidings and celebratory photos, my phone buzzing with calls and texts from family and friends, and my heart pounding with exhilaration, I kept repeating something–a new mantra of sorts–I learned from Dame Judi Dench as her on-screen character Evelyn navigates a new life in India.

“Initially you’re overwhelmed. But gradually you realize it’s like a wave. Resist, and you’ll be knocked over. Dive into it, and you’ll swim out the other side.”

And while Rachel Maddow likely won’t reference The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel anytime during her discussions about national LGBT rights versus state-centric LGBT rights, I find many of the characters’ quips about starting anew incredibly empowering. Because, like the retirees in their new environment, LGBT people have a new landscape opening up before their eyes.

It’s difficult to articulate the absolute importance of yesterday’s rulings, and the unexpected nature of it all–especially given the way the SCOTUS took a step back with their ruling on the Voting Rights Act. For many of us, it seems like a dream, while its reality leaves us in shock. So many activists–especially of the Stonewall-era–never thought they’d see such a day, experience this wave of change first-hand.

But as Evelyn so rightly alludes, resistance to the tide will only ensure a swift fall from grace. And I think Republicans are soaking wet and floundering. Because the rulings not only illustrate how grossly ineffective the Republicans’ egregious DOMA-defense expenditures have been, but they also reveal how archaic and anachronistic their conservative 1950’s-era perspectives of the sociopolitical and economic landscapes are today.

And while there is still plenty of work to do before the dissonance between the national and state definitions of marriage are reconciled and marriage equality spreads–including greater vigilance in southern states hard-hit by the Voting Rights Act ruling–it is a new day in this strange new nation.

With a legislative body whose anti-LGBT head has been lopped off–a welcomed decapitation.

Whose body is riding the wave into a brighter future.

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A Welcomed Palimpsest

The past year has taught me a lot about dealing with indescribable stress and frustration.

But in many ways, I’m grateful for it.

I’m not going to lie and write that I didn’t think that ye olde SCOTUS wouldn’t follow yesterday’s ruling on the Voting Rights Act with more driveling, archaic, nonsensical rulings today. I hoped I’d be able to strike through all of this. But that’s not the way things will go. Because today isn’t about the rulings or the SCOTUS or the White House or Congress.

Today is about the people you see every single day, and what they’re feeling. It’s about empathizing and cutting people a break, about letting them mourn in their own way, so that they can process everything that’s happened. Plenty of conservative pundits will say that liberals are bleeding out their little hearts. But this was a slight of epic proportions; one that’ll take some time to overcome. Because there’s a lot to bemoan, and not just the gutting of a crucial piece of civil rights legislation and the continued relegation of LGBT citizens to second-class status.

What’s most disturbing to me about all of this is that such critical issues were left up to nine people to decide. Not nine justices; nine people as fallible and biased as you and I, each of whom is charged with determining the course of American political history. And yet, some of them wield the power of their position to make a point–to cross the “T” and dot the “I” on their legacy, rather than the legacy of our country.

Thirteen other countries have recognized the importance of acknowledging each of their citizens, and extending to them the rights and privileges we in the US desire: Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, South Africa, and Sweden. And, quite courageously, same-sex marriage is recognized by twelve states in the US–Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington–the District of Columbia, and five Native American tribes: Coquille Tribe of Oregon, the Suquamish tribe of Washington, the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians of Michigan, the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians of Michigan, and the Santa Ysabel Tribe of California. Do I believe it is only a matter of time before same-sex marriage and LGBT rights issues are no longer viewed in such a…

We win!We win. America wins.

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Right Side Up, Upside Down

We’re all in Monday mode. Some of us just need coffee to snap out of it. Or something stronger. Really, though, most just need a wake up call.

And I got mine this morning, when I read this article about the anniversary of a horrific event I had no knowledge of.

Forty years ago today, the UpStairs Lounge fire in New Orleans claimed the lives of 32 people who gathered to celebrate the anniversary of the Stonewall riots.

Thirty-two people.

Each of whom died brutally and, in death, was a punchline of bigoted disc jokey jokes. Out of hatred and embarrassment, some of their bodies were never claimed. Their lives were relegated to historical obscurity, their charred bodies to a potter’s field.

***

The murder of a single person is horrific, yet there’s the promise of justice, of some promise for balance–that the guilty party will be made to answer for their crime. But the “otherness” of those who perished in the UpStairs Lounge didn’t justify a thorough investigation. Their lives, their stories, their families, their friends, their contributions meant nothing to the law enforcement personnel who waded through the wreckage, who left the body of Rev. Bill Larson fused to iron window bars overnight.

Very little separates people who view those different from themselves in such a casual, dismissive way from people in swastika-adorned uniforms surveying a barbed wire enclosed camp. In the same disturbing ways, they justify their behavior. Because there has to be a scapegoat, right? And it can’t be us. So it has to be them.

But the alarming point is that many people choose to think this way–whether it’s some perverse malignancy of thought or contorted survival mechanism, they embrace it. They don’t ever think that the microscope can ever be turned on them–that they will one day find themselves the target, not the eye through the scope. Regardless of upbringing and education, nationality or creed, there’s always a tipping-point at which a person has to take a deep, hard look in the mirror and either register their reflection as that monster lurking within their consciousness, or an empathetic advocate.

And if you’re brave enough to become an advocate, to speak your mind, to defend those who ask for help, then you’re stronger than any adversary. Because strength isn’t measured by how many Molotov cocktails one can throw from afar, but by how many people you can help, to whom you can lend a hand.

By the number of people you can educate.

Because what can be said of us when we can go about our days unfazed by such horrific images? How can we buy clothes from retailers whose problematic, unethical employment practices force Bangladeshi garment factory workers to choose between their safety and their paychecks? Why has our moral compass become so terribly confused by cheap polyester and the “more is better” mentality?

Where has our goodness gone?

Goodness resides in education. It’s there, waiting to be unlocked and shared.

And has been, and will continue to be.

By Inez Warren, the mother of Eddie and Jim Warren–two gay brothers–who died in the blaze with her sons.

By pastors of the Metropolitan Community Church, one of whom died trying to rescue his partner, their bodies found clinging to one another.

By Rev. William Richardson, who held a prayer service for the dead and received a formal rebuke from the Episcopalian bishop and a flood of hate mail.

By my parents, whose strides to build and support an LGBT ministry with other advocates in the heart of the Deep South are awe-inspiring.

By my sister, who has always been my fiercest advocate.

By my friends and chosen family at the LGBT Center of Raleigh and across the country.

***

So as manifold reforms hinge upon the Supreme Court’s decisions this week, I cannot help but cast a retrospective glance, acknowledging the inherent strength and power that we possess to effect change.

Regardless of the outcome, let’s not couch our efforts in whether we “win” or “lose.” Because the world is a topsy-turvy place.

And, right side up or upside down, we’ll always have to clear a hurdle or two.

But it’s always easier when you have a team cheering for you.

A team you can count on.