Vanity is Godliness

A little something I was working on tonight

Was working on this for Chattarati tonight… We’ll see what I think of it in the morning.

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Come on Chattanooga, Call in Gay

In the days since November 4, there has been a flurry of activity in a newly emboldened gay community. Black lists of people, companies, and organizations that supported California’s Proposition 8, a ballot initiative to strip rights for a minority group, are circulating on the internet. (Feel like Burger King? Well, if you care about someone who is gay or lesbian, consider McDonald’s, please.)

Boycotts are taking place, marchers are taking to the streets, and a nationwide walkout is scheduled for International Human Rights Day, December 10. And you know what, even Arnold is encouraging peaceful civil disobedience.

The campaign to “Call in Gay” encourages all GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bi, and Transgender) individuals to skip work. In addition, gay owned businesses are vowing to close their doors, with all those taking part in the recognition of International Human Rights Day vowing to not buy a single thing on the 10^th. Will it work? Who knows? The point is that for far too long the gay community has ‘turned the other cheek’ and this time they’re vowing to shout in unison, “We will stand for this no more.” It may not be as radical as the Stonewall riots, but it may be more painful for quite a few more wallets.

One of the greatest debates from this year’s elections wasn’t regarding who would rise to the nation’s highest office. It was a question of whether a small group of the nation’s sons and daughters would rise to the status of equal citizens. It was a bitter, protracted, and devastating battle that raged, most notably, in the state of California.

As a gay man, and a native son of the Golden State, it was a fight that captured my unwavering attention. Here, in Chattanooga, the debate seems far removed: the question of whether to strip a minority of equal protections under the law is a distant concern in a city where elected officials refuse to answer questions about their voting record as it pertains to equal rights, where gay owned businesses face greater scrutiny than their un-classed counterparts, and where there remains a real threat of being cast out from one’s circle of family and friends for the way they express their love and human nature.

In the days leading up to November 4, I lost friends by the handful. How could I reconcile a friendship with a person who felt I was somehow less than they? I was, and still am, unwilling to sacrifice for a person who believes in their heart of hearts that I don’t deserve the same opportunities, protections, and liberties they enjoy. For those people, I am happy to remain an acquaintance, but a friend they are not prepared to be.

And so it is for the millions of gay men and women across the country. Tens of thousands of legally married couples in California learned a hard lesson too late: a well-funded and devastatingly adept socio-political-religious machine promoting hate, intolerance, and misinformation can strip a minority population of its basic Human rights. Suddenly, members of California society (who paid the same taxes, held the same citizenship status, and were governed by the same Bill of Rights) were stripped of over 1,000 legal protections afforded to their heterosexual counterparts.

The gay community in California wasn’t just asked to get off the bus; the bus ran them down and then backed over them for good measure.

Now, there are those who stand fast to the religious belief that marriage can only be between a man and a woman. And I do not begrudge them that. But, I do say this: that is a religious belief. The separation of church and state mandates that religion shall have no favor or sway over the actions of the United States government and, yet, the Mormon and Catholic churches have absconded with the US system of democracy.

The State (as the California Supreme Court argued in its ruling allowing gay marriage) should not issue “marriage” licenses if “marriage” is by its very nature religious. If a State chooses to do so, it must then extend the right to marry to all its citizens. That is exactly what happened in California… until the rights of a minority were stolen by a majority populace.

Imagine if the South had been given a vote on whether to abolish slavery. It would have never passed, though it was the right thing to do. Instead, our nation went to war to grant rights to a minority of the population who had been so poorly treated there was a critical mass of people who stood up and said, “We will stand for this no more.”

While I can’t possibly sit here and align the suffering of American gay and lesbian individuals with that of black Americans, there are parallels. Ask any GLBT identifying individual if they have been beat, threatened, or fired for their orientation and prepare to be shocked.

Where a minority once stood nearly equal, they now sit: relegated to the status of second class citizen once again. And this time, they’re not sitting for long.

Change is terrifying; it leads to uncertainty and turbulence, but it is inevitable. There are those who fear the power given to a man of color. There are those who fear allowing men and women of a different nature to share their nation’s same inalienable rights.

There are those who are ruled by fear. Period.

But fear can not be the guiding force of a great nation, or a great people. Those who are ruled by fear may think they are standing tall, but in the end the only thing they stand over is the shadow of their cowering selves. And this nation is too great to be a hollow, withered shell of what it once was. And while the gay men and women of California may be fighting the New Apartheid that prevents them from visiting a sick partner in a hospital, inheritance of common property, or even the right to file taxes jointly, their friends and families may be fighting for something else entirely.

For many, Calling in Gay on December 10^th may be a chance to fight for the basic liberties that should be afforded to every American. Maybe they’re simply standing up for the great nation we are meant to support just as much as it supports us.

And, then again, maybe it is as simple as standing up for a big brother, a big sister— a son or daughter.

Either way, Chattanooga, feel free to stand up for what is right, even if this is a community where you may be the only person on your street saying, “I will stand for this no more,” because all across this great nation, there will be others there to turn your “I” into a “We.”