If Dan White hadn’t loaded his gun that fateful day some 30 years ago, Harvey Milk could have been celebrating his 79th birthday today. Would he be dancing in the streets for all that gays have fought for and won? Or would he be holding his head in shame at all that we’ve yet to accomplish? You probably already know the answer to that question. [Bilerico]
Larry Goldsmith
I remember Harvey Milk as the sort of visionary who would have been a little disappointed that our quest for liberation got so completely sidetracked into wanting to be part of the military-matrimonial complex.
michael
I actually think we would all be having a quiet celebration because we would be saving our energies for the big 80 he would be the next year. I also think we would have even more to celebrate because if he had lived he would have been here during the aids crisis and probably fought like hell for us all in that arena. He probably would have eventually won a seat in congress or the senate. Like Dr. M.L. King jr. we will never know how much more they would have accomplished had their lives not been lost so soon. But they both achieved things in the time they were here that was enough for someone who made it to 100 to be proud of. Lets celebrate Harveys birth as if he was still alive. Because his spirit is still with us and strengthening us.
atdleft
@michael: Beautiful. Just beautiful. And hopefully next year, we’ll have plenty more reasons to celebrate Harvey’s 80th.
Martin Hollick
I’m guessing that if Harvey hadn’t been killed in 1978, he would have died of AIDS sometime between 1983-1993. So, in all truthfulness, we wouldn’t be celebrating his 79th birthday anyway.
Dabq
Its still so sad that he lost his life in such a tragic manner. If he were still alive, I think he would be appalled at how hateful some have become in the fight for equality. He stood on the merits of equality, something few seem to do anymore its always the being gay is a victim now and lets blame anyone else for us not getting our house and act in order.
Rasa
Why even waste one thought in the poverty consciousness of “would have”?
“Would have” is not a reality.
The reality is what Harvey Milk gave and what he did. The reality is his legacy.
And the reality is who we are now because of courageous people like him and so many others— and who we are struggling to become.
Harvey does, indeed, live on in our commitment towards human rights and dignity for all.
It is a very strong and positive and humane and compassionate legacy.
And we are making progress –even in the midst of huge challenges.
Thank you, Harvey!
Happy Birthday!!
Michael @ LeonardMatlovich.com
Birthdays of loved ones who’ve passed are always hard. Does one celebrate their lives or mourn their deaths?
Most gay activists have come and gone without their names even making it into a history book, let alone into biographies, documentaries, biopics, operas, onto posters and t-shirts.
Those who do remain important not just for their specific achievements, but, above all, for what Harvey crystallized so perfectly, so simply: “You’ve got to give them hope.”
I’ve been around quite a while now and the list of things that were different, were worse, for LGBTs when I came out, when I first wrote about gays in my college newspaper, would be pretty long.
And long ago I realized that, though there have been so many advances since then, we never really understood at the time how very far we had to go.
Despite Harvey & Leonard & Elaine Noble & Dave Kopay & Ellen & Elton & “Will & Grace” and name your own tune, I’ve observed one constant. There is a peculiar mental disconnect that applies to countless gay youth who, despite the growing number of gay celebrities, the growing talk of gay equality issues, to them the world around them is so, forgive the academic speak, “hetero normative,” “hetero imperative” that many think that they’re alone, that those famous gays exist in some kind of parallel universe that they can’t get to. I guarantee you that somewhere this minute there’s a gay kid for whom “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”…or some hip hop construct about loneliness and longing…is the secret soundtrack of his or her life.
And so, when the cheers for the latest legislative victory die down, after the last circuit party song plays, after the street sweepers have moved in to clean up Pride parades detritus, after we have danced yet again into dawn, we awake to read of another child killing themselves simply for being called gay.
What would Harvey say about that 31 years after his murder? Can’t you just hear the disbelief and rage in his voice? About all those who, despite his plea, remain in the closet in the best of times for gays ever? About how few have responded to his second plea: Fight!
What would he say to those whose Battle Hymn is “Kumbaya”? To those who confuse standing silently with candles with lighting the fire of change? To those who are content with, celebrate, crumbs from the White House table?
Once upon a time there was a man named Harvey Milk. He stood upon the shoulders of those who had gone before; and others since have stood upon his, and all their stories must be remembered and retold again and again, for that kid in Altoona, Pennsylvania, or the one next door no one would ever suspect.
We can’t bring him back but we can resurrect his passion, and, when necessary, his anger in the face of those who would nakedly deny us our equality or even suggest that it is negotiable; in the presence of those who insult us, and the memory of all of our own who’ve gone before, with meaningless promises, cellophane statements of “support,” inertia, inaction, and entreaties to “wait.”
Dan White may have pulled the trigger, but WE kill Harvey all over again whenever we let anyone get away with continuing to treat us as children.
Dona eis requiem.
http://www.imeem.com/people/7wA3D5L/music/z1JMGy5b/san-francisco-gay-mens-chorus-dr-kathleen-mcguire-i-shal/
Larry
I Just wrote this: http://larsupreme.livejournal.com/64039.html In response, because it obviously wouldn’t fit here.
Bri
Happy birthday, Harvey Milk. Glad to have a birthday close to yours.
Queerky
Is he really gone? The body may have but the essence of Harvey Milk is still here. Only now it’s spread among more people.
Nathan
I’m a contemporary of Harvey’s. I moved to SFO a few months after he was sworn in, but I lived in the Castro and I did meet him every now and again. The last time I saw him was outside the No on 6 campiagn headquarters on election night those three weeks before he was killed. That entire time I had a boyfriend, and I thank my lucky stars I was always taken or I’m sure I would have become infected and most likely have succumbed between fifteen and twenty years ago. Harvey had a boyfriend, too. To presume that Harvey would have died of AIDS by now simply because he was gay is as homophobic a statement as I’ve heard on this site. The purpetrator of this insult, “Martin Hollick,” is either a self loathing bastard, or a troll just stirring up crap. Either way, his mind’s workings are reprehensible. Why can’t some people keep their sickness to themselves?
Alyse
He would without a doubt be proud and inspired.
Happy belated birthday, Harvey!
Martin Hollick
Harvey’s long-time love, Scott Smith, did die of AIDS in 1995. Although impossible to know when he sero-converted, it’s a good guess that Harvey may have already been infected (as was so many out gay men at the time) when he was killed.
I wrote the truth. I’m neither of the things Nathan claims and he owes me an apology.