It is serious as it is symptomatic of the gross and extended lack of dignity and self-esteem rampant throughout the so-called community. And the worst part about it is that if WE can’t treat each other like the human beings we are, what fucken hope do we have of garnering any rights from the general majority?

And you idiotic Mary’s running around with your eugenically honed hatred thinking this is a non-issue – of FAG please!

I am soo over is as well … and don’t blame myself in the least.

So that’s what this little tantrum was about. Wow.

By the way, the Equality march was a joke at a bunch of different levels, starting with the fact that they drew no more than about 20,000 people and probably less.

Thanks to television, I have witnessed a lot of history in the making — and often that history came “OUT” of Washington, D.C!

One of those historic events was the inaugural address of a young President, John F. Kennedy, back in 1961. He was the first Roman Catholic ever elected President! This was something I had been told would never happen in myh lifetime — I was then 24 years old.

Among his many ideas and challenges was his statement, “Ask not what your country can do for you — as what you can do for your country.” Another phrase caught my attention and I thought it was aimed directly at me when he said, “The torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans” — this was made clear after 8 years of the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower. In another speech, he talked about landing of a man on the moon and returning him and his team safely back to earth by the end of the 1960s — truly an event that, when promised, seemed a million light years away!

But there is a great gap between dreams and reality — I began the 1970s in San Francisco a year after JFK’s prediction of a man on the moon. Even with this stunning prediction of space conquest, it seemed that my dreams as a gay man were even farther away than the sun!!

The only exercise I had back then, was walking from one gay bar to another — and hoping I would not be arrested! There were laws on the books of many cities saying that it was unlawful for two adults of the same sex to hold hands, dance, or kiss each other in public. And if these things happened, patrons would be arrested and the gay bars raided or have their licenses taken away.

By the mid 70s, changes began to happen: we had gay newspapers and magazines; there were gay-sponsored softball leagues and a new kind of sport: gay politics! A transplanted New Yorker named Harvey Milk, began to wake up our senses and pride. He spoke about coming “OUT” of our closets and talked about gay rights. Yet, at the same time,there were still right-wing bigots who were trying equally hard to get us back into our closets, and have the doors sealed shut. They even tried to get new laws passed which would ban gays from public teaching jobs. Once Harvey was elected as the first openly gay politician in the country in 1977, many cities had “Pride Parades” and a few token rights were granted. However, the politics of assassination which took John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy on a national scale also found its way into San Francisco when Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone were gunned down by a hate monger, Dan White. I knew them both as friends but they did not live to see the fulfillment of all the changes they had started.

Since that time, there has been progress in the field of Gay Rights– however, often at a snail’s during the past 30 years. In recent time, especially after the release of the Award-winning movie,”Milk”, which introduced Harvey, and that era of gay rights to millions of people, young and old, gay and straight, here in America and around the world.

I marvel at some of the many instances of progress made here in Washington…after 8 years of “Bush”, we now have a new young black president — again something that was not supposed to happen in my lifetime– and I am now 72 years of age!

Once again, I am getting the feeling that the “torch” is passing to a new generation of gay and straight equal rights fighters in America — there’s good news coming OUT OF WASHINGTON, D.C. However, this time, I am going to be there(before the bus broke down)… to witness the passing of the torch — and I will be accompanied by thousands and thousands of gay AND straight Americans from small towns and large cities, from all across this country. Today, October 11, 2009, it is my hope that they will bring us equal rights for all my lifetime, and yours, EQUAL RIGHTS AND JUSTICE FOR ALL AMERICANS!
My fellow gay Americans, this is OUR country,too.

And as is typical many white gays remain willfully ignorant of their racism, misogyny, and internalized heterosexism ( “No Fats, No Fems!” – hatred of effeminacy).

Although much has changed and amazing things have happened since I graduated from high school in 1984, things that i never thought would happen, some things never change.

Calling the racist segment of the gay community on their racism on a blog is a pointless exercise, like all racists, they celebrate it. such is life…

No. 292 · nakhone
All – I want to set the record straight that I NOW SUPPORT the National Equality March as a result of the co-organizers decision to allow Mario Nguyen to speak at the March. Now, if only I can hitch a ride across the country or if a generous soul would donate a plane ticket so I can go. I’m a poor screenwriter-turned-activist struggling to pay my bills. :=)

Posted: Oct 5, 2009 at 2:34 pm

(Is there anyone a little more stable who can get this conversation going?)

Mormon and Baptist are easy – the others are a mixture of good and bad, I suppose. I believe the good ones would want to separate themselves from the bad ones. I would.

Dude — I agree with you 100 percent. They are all related. But a gay rights activist who wants to only be a gay rights activist is not a racist. However, gay social service organizations — different from civil legal rights — have an obligation to open up to the idea that gay people of color may face more violence and discrimination, and need special attention. Just as an anecdote, it seems to me that trans people of color get bashed a lot. Whether it is a statistical thing, I don’t know.

A religion founded, in part, on the incompleteness of black and Native American souls and the inherent superiority of the white man.

Just because they had a new revelation and no longer teah doesn’t mean that Mormons (or even the Church, itself) aren’t racist.

And can we discuss the historical racism of the Catholic Church. Pope Nazi is still at it

Why do you think American fundies (that are against us gays) fomenting homophobia in Africa?

“There is a reason, after all, that the Mormon Church campaigned against the ERA in the 70′s and considered black people to have incomplete souls and, were therefore, inherently inferior.”

Mormon is a religion, right?

Why did you leave that out of your first statement:

“Like ignorant-ass black homophobes you don’t see or understand the linkages between racism, sexism, and homophobia.”

Religion is the linkage. It is the only institution that teaches homosexuality is wrong. They did end their teachings about racism, slavery and women’s rights. Do you suppose we’re next?

Dude, do you know that I could really lob the rhetorical equivalent of 10 Death Stars at you.

But I won’t…assuming that you are the same Brian.

Like ignorant-ass black homophobes you don’t see or understand the linkages between racism, sexism, and homophobia.

There is a reason, after all, that the Mormon Church campaigned against the ERA in the 70′s and considered black people to have incomplete souls and, were therefore, inherently inferior.

Adolf Hitler and the Nazis were also racists and sexists as well as homophobes.

http://kwelos.tripod.com/metap.....ialism.htm

What is really bothering Nakone, is that he feels he and gay people of color are of a higher status than white gays. He may not identify with white gays in a social or organizational setting. When he is around whites, his own racial feelings kick in, and he craves be recognized as an asian, and more worthy of rights activism in general. Because the white gays are white, he feels, their lives are better, and their suffering is less. So he resents the idea that he is equal to the white gays – he feels he should have additional attention. In other words, Nakone is a brat, who demands other people should engage in activism that he has assumed. I heard of a black president of a gay rights organization who constantly wanted more attention on the gay people of color. But the racism is their own racism. When she resigned, she wrote in a letter that the only reason she joined the organization was to help “her people.” She simply wanted people of color to have a greater status in the organization, than the people who were merely gay.

I thing people and organizations should be permitted to be activists on issues that are important to them. It is wrong to call them racists. They are not motivated by racism, but rather are motivated by the gay issue, and may want to keep the focus on that issue.

I am an gay south asian and live in canada. A lot of people assume that Canada is different than the States. however I must tell u that racisim is rampant here probably more within the gay community.

The comments by many of the witches is just shocking. I work with a volunteer ministry with pedophilles in canada in a and was shocked when i came to know that the pedophilles had complained earlier when an asian perosn became a volutneer!!!! Vomit Vomit Vomit. All this only points to the extent of the problem.

I salute your courage in refusing to be part of the racist white agenda which is being potrayed as a gay agenda. it took courageous people to end slavery and apartheid and consciousness that racisim is an evil is the first step towards ending race phobia. People have been ignoring your comments simply because they want to continue to discriminate against gay people of colour and pretend that its okay.oh, and also accuse us of being responsible for the abuse!

“I don’t call myself a white supremacist.I’m a civil rights activist concerned about European-American rights.”
[Statement by White Supremacist, David Duke]

Just because white gays have started calling themselves civil right activist doesn’t mean that they are or that they have given up their white supremacy attitudes or agenda.

I think it is time that coloured gays start a gay rights movement which actively fights against homophobia and white supremacy both within and outside of the community.

I know, I’m banned again!

Or we are gonna hear a lot more people saying, “F*CK IT!” on their way out the door.

Robin Equality McGehee October 5 at 1:17am
“Hey – we voted to allow both the Winner and runner-up speak at the March and the winner and runner-up sing at the March – thought you’d like to know that Mario is going to have his day to impress the masses – I am SOOOO excited.”

Oh, sure sweetie–I had actually shared that a while back when the “flame wars” were starting on Queerty, every time the topic of “people of color and people of non-color (as one of my colleague, a white guy from the south, used to say…and he wasn’t being ironic or sarcastic…which rather sums up a lot of the Queerty posts) interacting within the GLBTQ community came up. I’m sure my comment was buried in the hundreds of posts on the threads. I never noticed a response to it.

My SigO at the time (on and off relationship for well over a decade…currently on again) told me he wanted to experience the MM, and when I got the call from the organizers, I told him to pack his bags. Frankly, I hadn’t planned on going before I was invited to speak. I had been Director of Training for a National CDC funded Minority AIDS project and had been working with a national people of color HIV advisory group. I coughed up the cash for our two plane tickets and booked a nice hotel in Georgetown.

After the crash and burn of my participation with the MM, my SigO’s favorite moment was holding my hand as we walked past the Rev. Fred Phelps and his family shaking their protest signs at all of us.

At one point on Queerty, I had added a comment that having served as a “Human Relations Specialist” dealing with racism and discrimination for Seattle Public Schools, I was taught that racism is a combination of power plus prejudice, and I felt the term “racist” was being used inappropriately in many cases. I was then attacked as out of touch with reality and living in the 1980′s, because of course, “people of color were racist.” I tried to respond in an educational manner, by linking current academic references to the subject, which was then dismissed out of hand.

To be frank, my response was similar to yours. I’ve spent literally years trying to make a difference. I’m now at the point of wondering if my investment is worth the effort. I’ve had a rather rude awakening to the fact that when I’ve worked for the NEA and school districts across the United States and Canada as a consultant and trainer, my audiences were required to be there, often because of infractions regarding various “isms.” My participation was predicated on the reality staff had screwed up to the extent they required someone like me (and I often wasn’t alone as a trainer) under threats of lawsuits and dismissals. People who post nasty comments on places like Queerty aren’t part of my “regular” audience.

When I first started reading Queerty on a regular basis, I was amazed at how snarky the staff writers were, let alone the readers in their comments. I think my regular reading of Dlisted.com dulled my sensitivity to the snark factor to the extent I just accepted it as part of Queerty’s reality. In related “conversations” with others in my WWW-social circle, I’ve wondered if the different social “mores” for interaction that have developed through reliance on the internet are responsible for this. However, watching the video clips of face to face interactions over the current health care reform makes me wonder if the lack of civil behavior is influenced by the internet or is reflecting a wider social failure. (In other conversations in the GLBTQ community, we “discussed” how different it is for younger people who didn’t grow up in a “gay bar” culture (or in the words of another commentator–”even in an adult bookstore environment”) where you were forced to develop some level of social skills–being instead shaped by the www, where there are potentially an unlimited number of possible partners/responders, and if you don’t like what the other person says, you just click off without any comment or explanation, and breeze on to another board/group/chatroom. It’s rather frightening to think what the logical outcome for this sort of behavior might be when people do interact face to face. I currently live in Arizona, where I was “blown away” (hopefully that is still a metaphor) by the fact the recent political debate here was not about being able to carry concealed weapons without a permit–that’s a given–but authorizing a customer’s right to carry a concealed weapon into a bar and/or restaurant where liquor is being served. Just so, I got to watch our local tv broadcasts interviewing citizens carrying rifles and guns openly to where President Obama was speaking.

Frankly, I’m also concerned with some responders (and certainly this isn’t limited to Queerty) who seem to only focus on attacking others, while offering little if any contribution to the thread or concerns, As a therapist, it makes me wonder about their personal lives and how they acquired these types of coping skills. “If I yell and bully you enough, I’ll eventually get my way, even if it means you just want to get rid of me as soon as possible.”

I was living in San Francisco when one of the bar owners in the Castro was picketed because of overt discrimination against Black customers.

Ah well, one of the things I used to tell my audiences–there’s an inverse correlation regarding economics and racism. When the local economy is good, overt racism tends to go down. When the local economy is poor, overt racism tends to rise. The economy has tanked. Guess I shouldn’t be too surprised at the level of racism…

Smooches–
Ty

Just read your recent post shared by Queerty.com.

I’m American Indian. When the Millennium March happened, I was invited to speak. When my significant other and I arrived at our hotel, I got a call from a young representative from the March explaining they were pressed for time, so my invitation to speak was rescinded, but they wanted me to stand on stage so the audience could see me.

I started to explain to him what “token” meant when I was good enough to visually integrate the mostly White stage, but not good enough to speak.

Like you, I didn’t feel I was getting through.

We have a saying back home: “Like peeing on stone to wear it out.”

lol–what will you do with all your free time, now that you don’t have to waste it?

Please keep in touch.

Best

Ty

======

On Sun, Oct 4, 2009 at 5:40 PM, Nakhone Keodara wrote:

Hi Ty,

Thanks for reaching out to support me. I really appreciate it as it’s gone a long way. I want permission from you to post the bit about your experience at the Millenium march as part of the comments on my Queerty article. I think it will lend my article one more anecdote that I am not alone in experiencing this. Please, please, please? Or, you could simply go on their and relate that experience to the readers as yourself. I would really appreciate it.

The fact that it happened to you in 1993 and you were actually invited to the march and treated as a token speaks volume and people needs to hear it.

I know I’m asking for a huge favor but it will take all of us who’ve gone similar experiences speaking up for people to start to listen and hear our message.

Yours affectionately,
-Nakhone
P.S. I will get back to my creative work of rewriting my screenplay and this is giving me something to rewrite about.

On Sat, Oct 3, 2009 at 12:46 PM, ty nolan wrote:

Just read your recent post shared by Queerty.com.

I’m American Indian. When the Millennium March happened, I was invited to speak. When my significant other and I arrived at our hotel, I got a call from a young representative from the March explaining they were pressed for time, so my invitation to speak was rescinded, but they wanted me to stand on stage so the audience could see me.

I started to explain to him what “token” meant when I was good enough to visually integrate the mostly White stage, but not good enough to speak.

Like you, I didn’t feel I was getting through.

We have a saying back home: “Like peeing on stone to wear it out.”

lol–what will you do with all your free time, now that you don’t have to waste it?

Please keep in touch.

Best

Ty

And would you believe that I worked in an editorial department for 2 years?

Can’t do Me, my resources and time are limited. I’ll be in Maine.

Hmmmm. now I would disagree with this slightly.

To the extent that LGBT folks were in the closet I would say that we were permitted acess to those institutions (e.g. Roy Cohn). Those in those positions dedn’t use it to help the community.

I would say that as a community that we actually have very, very little political power and, to some extent, we are in a lot of denial about that fact. (I do try and explain this to folks in the black straight churched community, by the way, the the LGBT community can’t really bust a grape, politically. The perception and the reality are 2 two different things.)

Eh, I’m ready to leave this latest edition of Queerty’s race riot alone other than that how insulted can I be that some white folks here seem to know the black community sooooooo well that you can diagnose the problems of said community.

I’ll be in Maine on Saturday. Not that I’m going to Maine to sdave the day or anything like that…

Nakhone, nothing and I mean NOTHING is more important than your sobriety. If you need to take some time away then do so.

You’re puking? Wow, I’m arguing with Shannen Doherty in Heathers.

When you get off of your egotistical masturbatory marathon, pining away like a cheap Wagnerian drama, you might find plenty of people of all colors already at the table.

You can keep playing that sanctimonious victimization card, but it’s going to be a lonely road, because people just generally don’t spend time reasoning with a petulant adolescent. I know I’m wondering why I even tried to break through your steaming heap of crap…

I’m puking. Enough said.

Phil – thank you for speaking up. I agree now, and it’s been a hard lesson to learn, that making “Once again–and my point in the FIRST PLACE–go after actions, ideas, not people. Making blanket statements about whole groups of people has never done ANYTHING constructive.”

This controversy has almost cost me my sobriety. The personal attacks and the name-calling hurt me so deeply that I was willing to throw everything I’ve worked so hard for this on year and a month and some change away because I don’t want to feel the pain. For all of you, and yes I know that some of you are smarter than me and more educated and have a better command of the English language and can do verbal acrobatics and have engaged in a lot of intellectual masturbation, but everyone seems to discount, ignore or dismiss the main point that I have been making over and over and over concerning our need to engage, support and welcome persons of color in our combine fight for our civil rights. Because of that, and because I refuse to subject myself to all these personal attacks being thrown in my direction, I will follow Phil Reese’s lead and un-subscribe to this comment threat. You guys can continue to engage in this parana-like feast, but I won’t be reading or responding to anymore of your insults. I’m learning a huge lesson from all of this and I now agree with Phil Reese and the good people over at Bilerico.com–that it is in poor form to attack someone personally. The irony that most comments of “off-with-her-head” and “Grow up dude” that has been thrust in my direction are lost to the people who are the ones that need to grow up themselves. Again, thanks Phil, for your kindness–that’s the true definition of class.

I accept that there is a hegemonic heterosexual super-majority at work in our culture. A portion of it supports LGBT equality (and it’s growing), and another portion of it does not.

Slights are just that, slight.

The slights that Nakhone has experienced as an Asian are merely a figment of his imagination, just like the slights that you have experienced as a gay man are merely a figment of your imagination.

And yes, you should just accept the hegemony of the heterosexual super-majority.

all beef aside, these blanket statements being made about groups of people and these casual assumptions are disheartening. As a white man even I can see clear as day that its extremely difficult to be a PoC in the LGBT community. How hard is it to see that? Look at how Mr. Keodara is getting judged, not for his demeanor and tone in this post, but for his truthful observation that its not easy being non-white in our movement. I’m not giving Mr. Keodara a pass on the aforementioned press release, but give the man a break. He made a valid point about what its like to be a person of color in our predominantly white ‘my-shit-don’t-stink,-I-can’t-possibly-BE-racist-because-I-vote-democrat’ circles.

@Chitown Kev: you’ve done a noble job of trying to educate some of these troglodyte commenters, but I’m afraid to say its as Sisyphusian task–Queerty is an echo chamber (for the most part) and many of these folks come to these comment threads because they just LOVE to stay nice and warm inside of their comfort zone and NEVER have to deal with the fact they’ve ever had ANY privilege ever, and that they’ve EVER made someone of a different race uncomfortable with their behavior.

Not saying all… just… many.

It hurts a little reading a lot of these highly out of orbit comments, but I know better than to try and get into it here. Chitown Kev has a WHOLE HELL of a lot more patience than I have (clearly) because he’s stayed perfectly calm and rational with y’all through all of this. I’m unsubscribing from this thread, because I just can’t stand to get any more of this ‘I’m not racist, but all you other races ALWAYS pull this racialism’ nonsense in my inbox.

Once again–and my point in the FIRST PLACE–go after actions, ideas, not people. Making blanket statements about whole groups of people has never done ANYTHING constructive.

Far be it for me to presume that humanity is predictable, but frankly, it is.

When you agree with some members of the African American community that insist on a separation between their struggle for civil rights and ours, you only continue to perpetrate a lie. Civil rights will continue to be a universally needed political feature of individuals in a society. Stop assuming that people can never know your troubles, or that people are even trying. Stop assuming that this is about some sort of groveling, that people need to have their faces dragged through the mud on this. You’re making all sorts of racist and inflammatory comments against white people as though you have no need to follow what you preach, and it’s just absurd. Speaking as someone who has devoted a large part of my activism to working within communities of color (sidebar: that’s the term the NBJC used, bud, in my work with them, and has continued to use; if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for me), I understand the rage. I really do. You think we can’t possibly empathize or understand rage? Grow up dude. Your racial rage may be derived from a particular experience to your situation and characteristics, but stop with the holier than thou crap already. Admitting that you’re just as human as the next person, and just as common as the rest of us are, is a hard step towards unification.

If you’d spend more time getting the chip off your shoulder, perhaps you’d understand the entire message that is Barack Obama. Part of living in the contemporary world where EVERYONE is “utterly victimized” is that playing the victimization card is hollow. If you’re looking for an end to racial discrimination, that will never happen. Stop talking in extremes. Anyone stupid enough to think that pointing to Barack Obama’s message to his community to pull themselves up by their own boot-straps and work hard is a sign that racial discrimination is dead is a fool. Anyone who completely ignores his deeply important message because they don’t want to distract from the continuing existence of racism is a coward.

For the record, shame is shame. I would agree that “self-hater” is a pretty sensational term, but like it or not, it exists. A dear friend, John, who is light skinned African American, once confided in me the shame he felt in his status, in his race. We talked often about how he was uncomfortable with his skin color (colorism) even within his own community, and how he had never thought about where his shame had come from. He’d tell me at length how he didn’t really see it as white folks, but that it arose out of his circumstances.

Did institutional racism contribute to this plight, this unfortunate status? Absolutely! Centuries of being disenfranchised and treated as second class aren’t great. I don’t think anyone of any reasonableness is going to argue that point. Is white-baiting going to solve this? No.

By all means, curse all you like. If raising hard truths about race are met with enough anger to make you utter obscenities, then I’m not sure that’s anything I can help you with. Sounds like a personal problem.

As for the trite little comment about LGBT versus Racial plight, let me tell you a little secret: for 1100 years, LGBT people have not been enslaved in the West — they have been executed. They were so hated, they were not even spoke of. They were sent to Concentration Camps and not liberated until the 1960s. They were systematically destroyed for decades, or simply locked up with the criminally insane. They are the last resort to enforce gender compulsion, in all communities in this country. They are the ultimate unspeakableness, the ultimate offense to something more common than skin color: gender. It strikes at the heart of something so taboo in the culture for so many years that even 150 years of scientific research validating the LGBT community as neither ill nor abnormal has met with little to no effect. The Supreme Court has acted 5 times in 50 years to enforce an end to racial discrimination, the Congress Twice, and the Executive in an ongoing fashion through the Department of Justice. We can count Bowers v Hardwick and Lawrence v Texas as our only LGBT victories, however limited, with immediate severe backlash by state after state in the last 7 years.

I’m just not moved by a pissing contest, Nakhone, whether you’re asian and I’m white or whether she’s lesbian and I’m straight. If you really want to dig up atrocities, horrors faced by individual categories of people, all you’re really going to realize is that the only community that hasn’t been the subject of utterly horrific treatment at the hands of some purported majority is the wealthy, and even they took a hit in 1917 Russia and 1793 France.

You have no idea what I have done with my life, or the way that I die inside when one of my many friends of color are hurt on account of their race or background. Arab, Latino, African American, South Asian, East Asian: honestly, I tend to be the only white guy in the room with my friends.

I don’t have any sins to account for, and I don’t have any reason to feel shame for the treatment of people of communities of color, except the shame that every person of any conscience should feel at the mistreatment of another human. I don’t commit acts of social violence, and I’m not going to accept the blame for it just because I’m white. You are as racist in that expectation as a pedestrian crossing to the opposite side of the street when an African American Male approaches, Hecter Projector. Honestly, do you hear yourself when you say these things, or is the victimization blaring in your head so loudly it drowns out all reason?

I think the only person that needs a little evolution — or perhaps a little maturity — is you. If your preconditions for getting people around this table is some absurd demand that we see people in sharp relief for their color and act like utterly castrated ninnies dancing around everyone’s personal grudges and slights, you can just cash in that ticket, because it’s worthless. No one in their right mind, of any race, is going to agree to that.

Do you really think it would be different if the situation was reversed? Isn’t hegemony just the nature of racial super-majorities?

Is your anger actually coming from your belief that you have not received the recognition you personally feel you deserve? Is there some messianic thing going on with you?

I’m just asking.

With that said, although I agree a lot of the points that you made, however, your assumption that racial discrimination doesn’t occur in today’s society makes you come across as insular yourself. I came out in Atlanta and have experience many racial slights because of being Asian. White LGBTs can’t relate to that or might not be able to empathize with that because you haven’t experience it due to your white privilege doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist and to dismiss it as being a “hollow” cry doesn’t advance your argument.

“I often hear screams of anger from some in the communities of color that white people are permitted access to their humanity, when this racial group denied access to theirs for centuries. That’s really nothing more than vengeance, old vengeance. It is as if racial minorities fear that if white people are exposed to still be struggling for their rights, too, it will somehow make people forget the struggle of the communities of color (CoC), or that CoC will loose their opportunity — as though rights are just some sort of political lottery that you have to scoop up while you can. The effect of this sort of mentality is to paint a picture of desperation, malice born of vengeance, and of people elbowing ahead in line because they think the faucet is going to run dry at any minute.

The best thing that these members of a CoC can do for themselves is to come to grips with their own self-hatred issues. As anyone in the LGBT community can attest to, being the subject of hate from the larger community creates a lot of shame. What’s worse, it becomes generational. I cannot believe that it is any different for the CoC in this country, because much of this reactive violence and anger are pretty textbook psychological responses to inner shame.”

I don’t know how to respond to that but say that I won’t cuss. Your getting inside the heads of the people of color communities and mind-reading their motivations is disingenuous and will only serve to resent the whites. I agree with the African-American community, and I have not always, that the LGBT community’s struggle for civil rights comes nowhere near comparable to their struggle because our fight is vastly different then theres. They were denied access to many political and social institutions that we enjoy. So to go and accuse their being angry at the comparison as somehow their streak of vengeance is to deny their wounds of discrimination that they’ve suffered, for 500 years, and continue to suffer today. To go and point to President Obama’s elevation to the first African-American president as an end to racial discrimination in this country is wishful thinking. Racial discrimination exists today.

In 2008, the League Against Defamation reported that hate crimes against African-Americans, Hispanics and Asians have increased by 5% (if I remember correctly). Here’s an article I wrote on the matter: http://socalvoice.net/asian-vo.....%99s-next/. Here’s another article for your reading pleasure: http://socalvoice.net/asian-vo.....imetime-tv.

Your call for us persons of color to get over our victimization and labeling us as self-haters is to deny the white communities responsibility in looking at your sins and ending those shameful acts of emotional violence against your persons of color counterparts.

I’ve read a copy of Alan Down’s the Velvet Rage and I agree that some of the anger I hold in my heart has to do with the shame I feel from being demeaned, dehumanized, condescended upon and rejected by the white LGBT community, specifically gay white men. And, all the hateful, catty, hateful and racist comments on this thread only proves that gay white men are a whole bunch of ignorant, privileged, insensitive, arrogant and contemptuous bunch.

Yes, I will continue to work for my rights and for the rights of people who would deny that I am their equal and those people who I am referring are gay white men. I will have compassion for them and I will practice accepting that this is where they are on their spiritual journey. I’d been trying to tell them to evolve already cause we need to get everyone on board so we can win this fight for our civil rights. Yes, I know that when the bigots look at us, they don’t see our race, our ethnicity or our social status, all they see is a homosexual that’s an abomination in their book. In a perfect world, of which we don’t inhabit, I know that we have to push all our differences aside and fight together, on behalf of each other and side-by-side with one another. But, we don’t and in order for that unification to happen, change has to come from inside our community.