sundries

[rm]

help_haiti is a fandom auction to raise money for Haiti.

jonquil takes apart David Brooks's version of "blame the victim" re: Haiti.

hakaber reminds us that we don't know what they mean, but there are currently a number of somewhat worrying earthquake swarms happening and not all of them can be strictly classified as aftershocks of the Haiti earthquake.

Meanwhile, rufus alerts us to a seminar for female lawyers from male lawyers on how they can be better! Check it out and be furious.

Six minutes til midnight: the Doomsday Clock has been moved back one minute

Does anyone have any advice about the needy neurotic cat? Patty was away, then Little died, then Patty and I were on vacation and now the cat's agitated and worried all the time. We don't let her in the bedroom, but she's still screaming by the door and scratching it at night. How do we reassure the cat and get a good night's sleep?

My tuxedo is here. I'm at the office, eying the box suspiciously, periodically. It's been a strange adventure, and I've not even seen the thing yet.

A note under our door from the building receiver says we're finally getting an intercom system in a few weeks. Sweet!

Tonight involves unpacking, cleaning, organizing, maybe even laundry. Probably cleaning out the refrigerator too. I really hate coming home from vacation.

I've got the camera cord in my pocket, so hopefully Patty and/or I will start uploading some pictures tonight.

Senate to hold hearings on DADT. Be prepared to find that unpleasant. ETA: as the NYTimes notes there is discussion of allowing queer soldiers into only some sorts of units as well as discussion of whether there needs to be changes to designs of barracks and bathrooms due to privacy concerns (because, apparently, we still believe that us gays will fuck anything we see). It's not a pleasant read.

Newsweek's cover this week is the Conservative Case for Gay Marriage. It's an important article, not just because of the minds it might sway (critical if we want queer families to be treated with compassion, especially regarding end of life issues), but because it offers a lot of assertions about marriage as the one true way that just aren't true (i.e., you can care about you community without doing the marriage thing, thanks), and really speak to (if only through the implication of counter argument) the impact the marriage debate is having on gay culture (it is, in my opinion, the second half of the narrative of required normalization that began with the AIDS crisis).

Newsweek also brings us a story about male-on-male sexual harassment. This isn't about gay men in the workplace, but it sure is about homophobia at its core: it's about presumably straight men using sexuality to humiliate each other.

Notre Dame school paper prints cartoon advocating gay-bashing. It notes that "the easiest way to turn a fruit into a vegetable is with a baseball bat." via gwailowrite.

So now there's a rumor going around that some of the yet-to-be-confirmed Torchwood S4 will be filmed in Washington DC. Please no. You know, I have a list of three directors I would crawl over broken glass to work with. One of those, Sam Mendes, I've already gotten to work with (hey, is this weird rumor I heard about him directing the next Bond film even possibly true?) in Revolutionary Road, where yes, haters, I have a credit, thank you. Beyond my little list of three -- I don't really get worked up about this shit. Jobs are good; good jobs are better, but I don't expend emotional energy on wanting to be on certain shows or work with certain people beyond "wouldn't that be rad" outside of my list, which is personal, complicated and predictable. But you see, if Torchwood shoots some episodes here, I may have to care in a way that's not fun, and so I hope the rumour is false, as I'm far more content to have my agonizing start and stop with whatever Baz Luhrmann and Todd Haynes are working on at any given moment.

First there was Torchwood Babies... now there's Torchwood Heroes.

Guess who got a banquet ticket for Gally? Sweet.

Just ordered the Kign's crown buttons to replace those on the coat (again, ugh) in time for the con.

Yorkville. Most of the stuff I remember from my childhood is gone, including both the original Elk Candy Company and its later reinvention (the store is now Internet-only), as well as an Austrian restaurant I used to go to with my parents that had a weird little train set in the window that went up fake little mountains year round.

Clingwrap. Cats. Win.

Comments

[rm.livejournal.com]

Short version:

While gay activism certainly existed before AIDS, AIDS put gay issues, or at least gay people, in the news -- finally, finally, finally and constantly, constantly, constantly.

But the context (disease) "confirmed" the worst of people's homophobia (i.e., "gay sex is gross" and "sex defines gay people") all of which forced us (and particularly gay men) to begin a narrative of "we're just like you" which, of course, included "we are subject to the same sexual hang-ups as you" -- we spent years convincing people that gay people really can be monogamous (instead of reminding people that monogamy is a choice, not an inherently moral/required/normal value), that not all gay men have anal sex ("see, we're not gross, really!"), that "we're just nice little middle-class people like you."

Of course, for many gay people some or all of this mantra was true, but for many of us, and as a community as a whole, it was just an expediency -- one that very much started the LGBTQ community down a path of selling each other out for whatever rights we can get (hello, we are a persecuted people with PTSD, of course we did this) -- to my mind it's partially responsible for the perceived splits between gay male and lesbian communities, the way that HRC and some other organizations only support trans people when it's convenient (which is rarely), and the marginalization of queers of color in "mainstream" gay activism, because hi, everyone's generally even more than a little bit racist.

I'm not dangerous. But I'm sick of having to make myself safe.

Gay marriage is about a lot of things. For gay people, it's about the right to choose marriage and its legal protections. For the straight audience and many allies it can be about the need to de-fang us. We become a safe cause for liberals who may or may not be personally invested while suspected of being wolves in sheep clothing ("they say they're normal, but....") for those who continue to oppose gay marriage.

It can be argued that gay culture came about (and therefore isn't ultimately fundamental to gay identity in the post-oppression long-term future) because of oppression and so we can leave it behind as we claim our equality, but that's an argument that makes me uncomfortable, because very unique aspects of gay culture (that are now sort of fringe-y, but were much less so at the time) have been so fundamental in who I've become, even if they are in many cases less and less relevant to younger LGBTQ people.

I don't want to trade in who I am for someone else's life. That shouldn't be what the gay marriage debate it about. But I think for some allies and some enemies it is. And I think many gay people, even those who actively support the marriage fight (as I do), are very wary that that's what is either ultimately be asked of us, or, worse, is ultimately what we're asking of ourselves.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much for that, it's definitely cleared things up for me and I pretty much knew all that you've said, but it helps having it spoon fed to someone who hasn't lived through that time and doesn't live in the States.

I can see parallels of the "normative and normal" narrative going on in my country - last year there was a huge debate about the fact that the gay youth group had army educators come to the LGBTQ community centre and talk about the draft - something many of the organisers weren't aware was happening and they very much resented and opposed.
As an example

Marriage is a finicky thing here. One of our more PM has been trying to introduce a bill for civil marriage for citizens who can't get married via the religious institutes (which is the only way you can get married in Israel - whether you are Jewish or not), but was adamant about not including same-sex couples which pretty much screw us over.
So there's a very loud opposition is a civil marriage bill of that kind, seeing as it doesn't include everyone.

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

*raises hand* I agree with much of this, but wasn't the gay men/lesbian split at its most dichotomous in the 1970s? For me, the 1980s was when gay men and women found they had much more in common than they had previously thought. Also, because so many of the men in key positions were no longer living, a lot of opportunities opened up for women in previously male-run gay organizations which had been more lesbian-unfriendly in the past.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Well, the 80s is what I have from experience, so that skews my perception, which is also probably also skewed by:

- my experience of the gay community as a teen was mostly amongst gay men
- being bisexual (for lack of a better term)
- having to listen to my father go on and on about how LESBIANS prevented him from being a feminist activist.

Which is to say, you're probably right, but I can't really comment in a meaningful way, because I'm too young and yet to find an identity from which I can clearly say "I am of and representative of _(group)_" in these discussions.