Here is everything you need to know about your Mormon gay marriage war: Utahans have been seriously fretting for weeks now that the gay marriage backlash would come home to roost–in the form of composer/lyricist Stephen Schwartz taking away their precious, precious musicals. The panic’s so widespread that the composer behind Wicked, Pocahantas, Godspell, The Prince of Egypt and Pippin’ had to issue a statement to assure the state he wouldn’t take away their precious, precious musical theatre rights.
The Salt Lake Tribune reports:
“Stephen Schwartz finds Mormon organizational zeal on behalf of California’s Proposition 8 to be “reprehensible,” but the award-winning composer of hits such as “Wicked” has no plans to withhold his works from Utah or LDS-related singing groups.
For more than a week, Mormons in show business have whispered rumors that Schwartz might punish Mormons for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ involvement in passing an initiative establishing marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman.
On Dec. 10, KTVX Channel 4 news reported that Jon Powell, a former Mormon and a gay activist, called on the music industry to refuse to license certain material to LDS musical groups. In the piece, Powell specifically targeted Brigham Young University’s Young Ambassadors, a group of which he was once a member.
Powell said he received an e-mail from Schwartz that read in part, “I’m looking into it. If it truly is a ‘promotional’ group, rather than just student singers, I will try to do something about it.”
Worried Mormons can now breathe a little easier.
“I have not withdrawn the use of my songs by the BYU Young Ambassadors and do not intend to do so,” Schwartz said Monday in an e-mail. “They are a student singing group.”
We’re reminded that despite its anti-gay stance, the Mormon Church is pretty big on the business called show. From the Mormon Tabernacle singers to rockin’ A/V presentations about locust-eating seagulls, Salt Lake’s Temple Square is just like Broadway, if Broadway were really boring and the cast kept showing up at your door for months after the show offering you a copy of the script.
Wolf
Well I have one thing to say to Mr. Schwatrz and actually what seems to be a large part of the Theatrical and Movie Community.
Thnak you and F**K YOU for your NON-SUPPORT and INVISIBILITY during this crisis. YES CRISIS. as we BATTLE for our rights it seems that all Hollywood and Broardway is interested in is the almighty dollar. Considering the ration of Gays and Lesbians in the show business community. (And you yourself Mr. Schwartz you leather queen you) Your PV stance and money grubbing attitude is an afront to all of us who are Gay and Lesbian and fighting for our rights.
Wotht the exception of a notable few who have stood up and with us. The rest of you weather you be in Movies, Broardway, or Televvision who are doing NOTHING to further our cause or standing with us should be ashamed of yourself.
If this affected the African American Community, the Jews or Women you could be samn sure that they would be VERY VOCAL and doing everything in their power to fight for them.
I am so disgusted and angry I can hardly take it.
Email:
Stephen Schwartz’s office
[email protected]
Michael Cole, Assistant to Mr. Schwartz
[email protected]
Wolf
Oh and by the way “Wicked”‘s Second Act ending is weak and sucks.
theo
Here’s the thing Wolf. Not everyone believes that attacking the livelihood of people is an appropriate response to their legal actions based on their beliefs. I’m heartbroken and angry about prop 8, and I have more than a little anger at the Mormon church, and all the people who voted for prop 8, but I don’t support petty punishment tactics. These tactics are beneath us and further the mindset of war and violence. Education and understanding are the tools we should be employing here.
Wolf
@theo:
Oh please. I’m sorry. I’ll just sit here and quietly chant to myself and wait for my rights.
Women FOUGHT their rights.
African Americans FOUGHT for thier rights.
We have been using “education and understanding” for thre past 20 Years. It DOESN”T WORK and WILL NEVER WORK in this instance.
The people who fight us do not do so out of personal belief but they do so out of a RELIGIOUS BELIEF. We will NEVER be able to change the minds of organized religious institutions who are against us by Education and Understanding. The Hate and Bigotry is the WRITTEN WORD to them and not a PERSONAL belief.
The Gay Rights Moviement started because we were ANGRY, Angry of being Harrassed and having no rights and acceptance. And we fought and then we won some. But then we got this “Lets show them we are better” attotude that just doesn;t work because THEY DON;T CARE IF WE ARE BETTER. They will always have MORE MONEY and BE MORE ORGANIZED. What we have to fight with is our PASSION, our KNOWLEDGE of whats RIGHT and our ANGER.
I’m sorry. I have said it many times. Its been 40 Years since STONEWALL. Many people who originally fought for our rights have passed away because of AIDS. At the rate we are going and taking the MORAL High road it will be another 40 before we have FULL RIGHTS.
Max
This is the same man who walked around with a mouth full of sour grapes after loosing the Tony to Avenue Q. He didn’t speak to half of the theatre community for years and I am sure he is still holding a grudge. When given the opportunity to “do good” and stand up for the civil liberties of the thousands who lost something more valuable than a Tony he took a very safe road.
Until their is marriage equality for everyone you will never win a Tony Steve. This is my holiday wish.
adzomelk
im with wolf 100% schwartz should be tarred & feathered i know that sounds drastic but its how i feel the byu young ambassadors are exactly that a front for the lds church & their homophobia queers aught to be rioting in the streets wherever the young ambassadors perform
Wolf
@adzomelk:
Well lets not go as far as Rioting in the Streets. Picketing perhaps. Boycotting definately. As far as Schartz I am wring every Theatre company I know to let them know this news.
DairyQueen
@ WOLF: Honey please re-read your posts before posting them. Your grammar and typos are killing me.
I agree with Wolf too. I guess the royalty money from the LDS was more important than our rights. I find it disturbing because Steve made a HUGE stink about it and then a of the sudden changed his mind. I know it’s his music and he can do anything he wants with it, but have some balls and stand by your statements.
Wolf
@DairyQueen:
Sorry Dairy.
I wish we had spellcheck. I get a bee in my bonnet and just type away.
I’ll watch the typos and grammar.
Symonds
@Wolf:
Jeez, man.
If that ‘patience and understanding’ you hate so much haven’t been working for the last 20 years, then I invite you to go live in 1988 again. You really think 48% of California would have supported gay marriage back then?
And, of course, in many ways, marriage is the *most* divisive issue. Well over half the country supports civil unions, ENDA, and the repeal of DADT. And the dirty secret everyone knows is that anti-gay legislation of any kind is only going to last as the baby boomers, which is frankly the last generation in the US that actually thinks we’re another species. I understand your impatience, but all things considered, things ARE better than they were, and they’re getting better.
Do I *really* have to remind you that coming out to our friends, coworkers, and relatives is, without a doubt, the thing that’s really been pushing public opinion our way? What is that, if not patience and understanding?
adzomelk
@Wolf: may i @least stop traffic nonviolently
Wolf
@Symonds:
In answer to your question. No I don;t believe that gay Marriage would have been supported back then.
BUT I DO BELIEVE that the route we have taken in the last 20 Years has been the wrong one. We fight for rights piecemeal. One at a time taking the moral highground instead of banding together and DEMANDING EQUAL RIGHTS NOW. One at a time will not work. It has never worked. because as soon as you make that small step forward and move onto the next issue your foe comes up behind you to undo what you did just like with Prop 8
Wolf
@adzomelk:
Oh yeah.
Brief Episode
Hi,
Schwartz is drawing a distinction, which is that he doesn’t want to punish a student group just because the church they belong to supported Proposition 8.
He’s also saying he doesn’t want to punish all of Utah just because some people in Utah just because Utah is the home of the LDS Church.
These both make sense to me.
Angers as a motivation is fine but lashing out at anyone remotely connected seems really wasteful to me.
Now, as for the matter of whether the Young Ambassadors is just a student singing group or something more, there seems to be a disagreement.
Jon Powell, who was a member and knows the dynamics of being a member, thinks it’s more than just a student group. Stephen Schwartz, who is probably looking at how the shows are presented to the outside world, thinks it’s just a student group.
I think it’s possible for reasonable people to disagree on how to classify the group.
But there are other ways to protest, and there are other people to approach. Schwartz is simply the first to publicly respond.
Steven Grey Romande
Dear Stephen and Michael,
Regarding the rights of Mormon BYU groups to perform your numbers….
I was a member of the BYU Young Ambassadors. I was the president of the group I choreographed for the group. It is very much a promotional group, and a missionary group, and is very anti-gay. They use your music to make people feel emotional, and then tell them that is the holy spirit telling them to join the church. Active mormons will refute this, but EVERY former member will attest to this fact.
I, and many others, were kicked out of the group when we found out we were gay, although we were not acting on it sexually.
Please remove the performance rights from them. It is used to manipulate people.
Wolf
Bravo Steven Grey Romande!!
Brief Episode
It is a STUDENT GROUP a STUDENT GROUP at the PRIVATE MORMON OWNED Brigham Young University that urged Students to Volunteer and Donate to the YES on 8 Campaign.
D.B.
“Wolf” is right on this — the time for “education and understanding” is over. It’s time to make people very uncomfortable with their misguided choices, to be angry and vocal about it, and to hit people where it hurts — most often in their wallets.
The alternative is to sit back, remain non-confrontational, perhaps wait for a “generational change” that may or may not happen, and remain second class citizens.
BobP
I think just the name “Young Ambassadors” is very telling. Let’s not be naive, here.
Schwartz missed a good opportunity to make a statement with some effect. I’m sure he enjoys many benefits that gay folk worked long and hard for…for free.
Symonds
@Wolf:
Stand up and demand our rights, eh?
And what happens when they say no? We glory in our smug sense of self-satisfaction and bitch on the internet?
The difference between the eighties and now is that to most people in this country, we’ve gone from being a ‘them’ to being an ‘us.’ When we frame the issue as one of human rights, the people to whom we have to make our case speak the same language, and we have a change to make true progress within the system. When social conservatives have to start inventing bullshit lines like ‘the right to belief’ as if they meant something, you know the whole edifice is crumbling. And the reason this is happening is because we held our noses and we taught the people around us that our lives and our relationships have the same weight as theirs. And that is taking time, but we already know it’s paying off. Passion applied without patience, no matter how justified, will only give Rush another story.
Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m angry in ways that defy expression. The very idea of what I’m doing- coming to those around me with my hat in my hand, ASKING for the rights they took from me, slowly making my case as if these assholes hadn’t abdicated any expectation of compassion with their willful destruction of lives…
But being right doesn’t mean you win. Fighting back doesn’t mean you win. Winning means you compromise; you wade through sewage to work within the system, you endure the bigotry and do not respond in kind, you pretend to be some god damned saint when you have to just so that the good in you is still visible when it’s reduced to a sound bite, you sacrifice your time and your money and even your values just to convince one more person that you’re not a cartoon villain. And we will do this so that those who come after us do not have to.
adzomelk
when they say no we fuck them up end of discussion im ready for the revolution ive got cigarettes & ive got glitter enough to share who wants to join me stopping traffic @major intersections all across amerika
Wolf
@Symonds:
Stand up and demand our rights, eh?
And what happens when they say no? We glory in our smug sense of self-satisfaction and bitch on the internet?
NO. WE KEEP TRYING AND KEEP FIGHTING.
WE FlashMob
WE Boycott
WE Only spend out Money at Gay Owned and Gay Friendly Businesses
WE Picket
WE March
WE take it to a FEDERAL LEVEL
WE STOP Paying Taxes (NO Taxation WITHOUT Representation!)
WE ORGANIZE
But most of all WE NEED RECOGOGNIZE AND TRUSTED LEADERS.
These are the things we NEED to do. Not light candels and walk quietly.
Wolf
@Symonds:
What you wrote:
“But being right doesn’t mean you win. Fighting back doesn’t mean you win. Winning means you compromise; you wade through sewage to work within the system, you endure the bigotry and do not respond in kind, you pretend to be some god damned saint when you have to just so that the good in you is still visible when it’s reduced to a sound bite, you sacrifice your time and your money and even your values just to convince one more person that you’re not a cartoon villain. And we will do this so that those who come after us do not have to.”
I AM SORRY BUT THAT IS JUST SOOOOOOOO WRONG.
theo
@Wolf: you said: “I AM SORRY BUT THAT IS JUST SOOOOOOOO WRONG.”
The world isn’t fair. It doesn’t conform to your concepts of Right and wrong, or your dreams. Change takes time. Violence and aggression do not help our case.
On a side note, to my knowledge there is no level of state or federal government that bars the presence of homosexuals from their ranks. The concept of “taxation without representation” doesn’t even begin to apply here. Withholding taxes may or may not be a good approach to getting the governments attention, but do not parrot a meaningless phrase in order to give yourself moral high ground or righteousness.
You can not force change. When you do, the people who have been forced will resent you for generations. While I believe that the civil-rights movement for African Americans was necessary, we still have a great deal of hatred and bigotry going around in many parts of the US. There are lots of reasons for this, but one of them is the simple fact that people still resent being forced to change their behavior, forced to allow things they don’t like.
There are always going to be challenges with social change and the evolution of civil rights, but the more violent the movement the more the conservative forces push back. Real lasting change happens slowly, at a cultural level, transforming the viewpoints of people and societies until the old way seems out-dated and silly.
Wolf
@theo:
You are just SO WRONG I am speechless. The only thing I have to say to both you and Sydons rigt now is another parroted message as you put it.
“If you are not part of the solution. You are part of the problem”