Tag: Stonewall

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Running Away, by Pat Gourley

“I don’t make history. I am history”
Joan Baez

As with many quotes, I begin my pieces with this one is tangential. In fact, it is so tangential that I may not be able to twist it around to the topic but I liked it so much after reading it in a recent New York Times (NYT) interview with her I had to use it.

I suppose one could easily make “running away” a metaphor for staying in the closet and this may have been the case for me personally way back when. Perhaps a physical running away was what my moving to Denver in 1972 with a straight woman and three other closeted gay men was really all about. None of us on this sojourn to the Queen City of the Plains were “out” to any of the others but suspicions were running high. Give us a bit of a break though since the powerful ripples created by Stonewall had yet to make it in any big way to the middle part of America we were fleeing from.

Though I pretty much was over any running away from being queer by the mid-1970’s I have still managed to do my fair share of running away in other areas of my life. I could have for example jumped-in head first to Radical Fairie politics and I think probably have actually moved in with Harry Hay and John Burnside or at least hitched my wagon to that trip in a much more intense way than I did. Harry ever so subtly over the years was always encouraging me to do more implying that I was not living up to my queer potential.

Running away though may have its advantages at times. For me in 1980 falling in love with the man who would be my loving companion until his death in 1995 had many advantages. This choice of staying in Denver rather than picking up and moving to L.A. to be near and much more involved with Hay and the Radical Fairies worked out well. And let’s face it I think I made a much better nurse than I would have made a full-time Queer Activist even one in the orbit of the mercurial and prophetic Harry Hay.

I could go on about other areas where I have turned tail and headed for the hills but enough about me. The newspaper the Wichita Eagle first reported this past week the death in Wichita Kansas of Adrian Lamo at the age of 37. Yes, I will be quoting from the Wichita Eagle which will probably never happen again though remember the Koch Brothers are also from Wichita, with Koch Industries based there, so never say never.

Lamo was a very adept hacker. Most notably he hacked into the NYT and Microsoft among others in the early 2000’s and was convicted of computer fraud in 2004.

His greatest notoriety though came from turning Chelsea Manning into the Feds in 2010. Manning had shared with him that she had turned over to Wikileaks a large trove of classified documents pertaining to the U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan including clear evidence of American war crimes.

Manning had reached out to Lamo as someone she thought she could trust admiring, I suppose, his brazen hacks into very powerful organizations. And perhaps and I am speculating here she felt she could trust someone with clear ties to the LGBTQ community. The San Francisco Board of Supervisors had in 1998 appointed Lamo to the City’s LGBTQQ Youth task forcefile://localhost/. https/::www.wired.com:story:adrian-lamo-has-passed-away-at-37:

Lamo testified against Manning at her trial in 2013 and she was subsequently sentenced to 35 years in federal prison. This was the harshest sentence ever for a whistleblower. Barack Obama though commuted her sentence in 2016. A full pardon with honors and recognition as a true patriot would have been more appropriate but we’ll take the reduced sentence.

Quoting a friend of Lamo’s, one Lorraine Murphy, from the Wichita Eagle piece of March 16th, 2018 she described him “as someone who bounced around a great deal… He was a believer in the geographic cure. Whatever goes wrong in your life, moving will make it better.” http://www.kansas.com/news/local/article205629184.html

The “geographic cure” is something synonymous I would say with “running away” and engaged in I suspect in a disproportionate manner historically by queer folk everywhere.

Lamo was quite open apparently about queer aspects of his life but he seems to have been a poor soul often running away from something. I certainly do not know enough about the man to speculate what sort of ghosts were chasing him. Unfortunately, he is now dead and Chelsea Manning is alive and thriving and running for elected office in Virginia. Maybe the better part of valor is to face things head-on and not pick up and run away.

And though she may think she is no longer making history Joan Baez has never as far as I can tell ever run away from anything and neither did Chelsea Manning. Both women are heroines I can try to emulate in my own life and invoke when the temptation to run away presents itself, as it certainly will again.

© March 2018

About the Author

I was born in La Porte, Indiana in 1949, raised on a farm and schooled by Holy Cross nuns. The bulk of my adult life, some 40 plus years, was spent in Denver, Colorado as a nurse, gardener and gay/AIDS activist. I have currently returned to Denver after an extended sabbatical in San Francisco, California.

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Disconnect and Fear in the Aftermath of the Orlando Massacre, by Donaciano Martinez

There is a major disconnect between the
experiences of LGBTQ young people of color and the broader LGBTQ community.
That was the main message behind the need for a separate vigil that took place
in mid-June 2016 in Denver to remember the victims of the Orlando massacre.
Organized by the nonprofit Survivors Organizing for Liberation (SOL) and Buried
Seedz of Resistance (BSEEDZ), a youth project of SOL, the vigil was led by
LGBTQ young people of color.
The separate vigil was in direct response to the
first vigil that was hastily organized at a Denver gay nightclub that featured
speeches by public officials and spokespeople from a few nonprofit
organizations. When two carloads of SOL and BSEEDZ activists arrived at the
nightclub, they were shocked at the extensive presence of police officers who
were searching people as they entered the building. Appalled, SOL and BSEEDZ
activists unanimously decided not to attend the event.
“The history of queer and trans communal spaces
are rooted in acts of resistance against police brutality,” proclaimed the
public statement of BSEEDZ and SOL in direct reference to the 1969 Stonewall
Rebellion, which is widely recognized as the start of the movement that has
evolved to the modern-day fight for human rights for LGBTQ people. “We refuse
to accept suggestions that increased police presence in our queer and trans
spaces will improve risks of violence or increase any sense of safety.”
The BSEEDZ and SOL vigil was attended by a
diverse group of about 100 people from the Latina/Latino, Muslim, LGBTQ,
American Indian, Two-Spirit communities and allies. In addition to remembering
and reading the names of the victims of the Orlando massacre, attendees paid
tribute to and read the names of 14 trans women of color who have been murdered
so far in 2016.
“We wanted to let everybody know and remind
folks that this isn’t an isolated incident, that this has been happening, that
we forget the 25 plus transwomen who were murdered last year, the 14 transwomen
who have already been murdered this year,” stated BSEEDZ activist Diana Amaya
at the start of the vigil. “All of this is just part of genocide to our
people.”
The murders of 25 transwomen last year marked
the deadliest on record for transgender people in the U.S., according to
statistics tracked by SOL and other nonprofit entities that are part of the
National Coalition of Anti Violence Programs (NCAVP). According to NCAVP, last
year’s record does not include trans women whose deaths were not reported or
investigated nor do the statistics include victims whose gender was
misidentified or not even recognized by police and the media.
Speaking about why LGBTQ young people of color
oftentimes feel disconnected from Denver’s Pride event that has been organized
annually over the past 40 years by the nonprofit GLBT Community Center, a
BSEEDZ activist noted that it “hurts so much” that Pride’s history is being
erased and that the LGBTQ largest organizations “sell out.” Attendees were
urged to remember Pride’s history, which started as an act of resistance at the
Stonewall Rebellion.
Other vigil speakers included an American Indian
Two-Spirit individual who is transgender from female to male. Recognizing the
privilege that comes with being a man, he said his life has been so much easier
as a man and he has been negligent upon forgetting that other people in the
LGBTQ community are not as fortunate as he is as a man. One mother spoke about
being “scared” and having a “hard time” upon learning that her child is a transboy. Another woman attendee recounted her gay brother’s recent experience of
being escorted off stage at his college graduation when he raised his fist and
yelled the “Orlando” word.
Ayla Sullivan and Emery Vela, both members of
the slam poetry team called Minor Disturbance, read a poem they wrote for the
occasion. Before reading the poem to the attendees, they acknowledged:
“Queerness has not always been something that was shamed before the colonizers
came, it was something that was sacred. It was something that was beautiful and
it’s still something that is beautiful.”
Addressing the irrational fears of LGBTQ people
and Muslims, BSEEDZ activist Amanas pointed out that the Orlando killer’s
Muslim identity makes all Muslims vulnerable to acts of violence by white
racists. “We know Islamophobia and homophobia as the same monster known by
different names,” said Amanas, who urged vigil attendees to break the fast
during the Muslim religious season of Ramadan by sharing a bowl of dates with
other people.
Fear was the topic of a recent communication
sent to the constituents of Denver City Council (DCC) elected member Robin
Kniech, an open lesbian who represents all of Denver as the at-large
representative at DCC. She stated that, despite the vigils and the camaraderie
at Denver’s Pride parade (which she noted had fewer spectators this year), she
is “not feeling better” nowadays. “Most of my LGBTQ friends and colleagues
don’t report feeling better, not when you ask them privately,” she added.
“The reason I don’t feel better is because I
feel fear,” proclaimed Representative Kniech. “And for me, it isn’t a new fear.
It’s about fears I’ve long held. Fears I struggled with, tried to talk myself
out of, suppressed. The inability to shake the feeling that all of these fears
were real and true after all. That at some point, someone who has real issues
with gay people, will want to hurt me because of who I am. Hurt
my partner. My son because he is with me. My friends. I am afraid, and angry
about my fear. In a state where I’m protected from being fired, could get
married, and was elected as an out lesbian, I am once again thinking twice
about whether and where to hold hands with my partner.”
Acknowledging that she has a certain privilege
status despite being a woman and an out lesbian, DCC Representative Kniech
stated: “Many folks who see me on the street don’t assume I’m gay, and I’m
white in a world where violence still happens less to those of my ethnic
background. So I feel even more fear for those in our community who don’t share
those privileges. And more anger about that fear.”
Regarding many people’s rush to prove that the
“terrorists haven’t won” in an effort to resume a life of normalcy,
Representative Kniech declared: “I write this piece to honor pausing. Pausing
to feel and name the personal fear and pain that was lying in wait and has been
triggered by these events, whether among Latino/a or LGBTQ folks, those
impacted by other forms of gun violence, or others. I don’t think naming this
personal pain disrespects those who were lost, or the causes that have to be
fought.”
Upon addressing the issue that pausing to face
the fear and pain somehow means that the terrorists have achieved their goal of
making people emotionally paralyzed from fear, Representative Kniech ended her
insightful communication by stating: “It doesn’t reward terrorists. In fact, I
think talking about fear, and how dangerous it can be, within ourselves, or
motivating evil acts by others, might be important to really changing the world
where these acts of hate motivated by fear are proliferating.”
© 12 Jul 2016 
About the Author 

Since 1964 Donaciano Martinez has
been an activist in peace and social justice movements in Colorado. His
activism began in 1964 by knocking on doors to urge people to vote for peace
and justice, but in 1965 he and other activists began marching in the streets
to protest against war and injustice. His family was part of a big migration of
Mexican-Americans from northern New Mexico to Colorado Springs in the 1940s. He
lived in Colorado Springs until 1975 and then moved to Denver, where he still
resides. He was among 20 people arrested and jailed in Colorado Springs during
a 1972 protest in support of the United Farm Workers union that was co-founded
by Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta. For his many years of activism, Martinez
received the 1998 Equality Award, 1999 Founders Award, 2000 Paul Hunter Award,
2001 Community Activist Award, 2005 Movement Veterans Award, 2006 Champion of
Health Award, 2008 Cesar Chavez Award, 2013 Lifetime Achievement Award, and the
2013 Pendleton Award. La Gente Unida,
a nonprofit co-founded by Martinez, received the 2002 Civil Rights Award. The
year 2014 marked the 50-year anniversary of his volunteer work in numerous
nonprofit situations.
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What is the Real Spirit of Stonewall? by Pat Gourley


Stonewall Inn (Then)
Stonewall Inn 2012

White statues in park across
 from the Stonewall Inn








“Despite his enduring
commitment to gay rights and lifelong dedication to queer scholarship, Duberman
is deeply disappointed in the contemporary LGBT movement, noting that for the
last 20 years it has been focused on marriage equality and repealing “Don’t
Ask, Don’t Tell”. In Duberman’s view, the gay agenda is grossly myopic and its
goals of assimilation counter the spirit of Stonewall and Gay Liberation, which
sought to affirm, rather than obscure gay differences.”
http://slanthere.com

The above quote referenced from the online entity The Slant is from an interview done recently with Martin Duberman. Duberman for those perhaps unfamiliar with the name is a queer, radical activist with a very long and impressive academic background and the author of numerous books and countless articles. He is on faculty as a professor of history emeritus at the City University of New York. The interview was published online June 5th, 2013 and is commemorating the 44th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. His most recent book is titled The Marin Duberman Reader.

In reading the Duberman interview I found myself hearing similar ideas I was frequently exposed to in the late 1970’s as a result of my budding relationship with Harry Hay, life long gay activist and founder of the Mattachine Society in 1950 and very instrumental in birthing the Radical Fairie movement. It was through contacts at the Gay Community Center of Colorado in 1978 that I was able to connect with Harry and his partner John Burnside who were living in northern New Mexico at that time.

An activity I was involved in during the spring of 1979, through The Center for the week of activities commemorating the Stonewall Riots, was the 3rd annual Lesbian/ Gay Symposium held the Saturday before the Sunday March. We were still marching back then rather than having a pride parade or at least still hotly debating whether it should be a “March or a Parade”.

The symposiums were part of Pride Week activities starting in 1977 and continuing into the early 1980’s working with the support of the Center. They consisted of a single daylong program of workshops. Presentations and discussions were of topical interest to the LGBT community and often fairly broad in scope. Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell was of course not even on the distant horizon yet and marriage equality not even a figment of anyone’s imagination. For many early LGBT activists participation in the military was not consider a desirable pursuit for anyone gay or straight, and marriage was thought to be a rather unsuccessful heterosexual construct meant to primarily control women and property, definitely not something to strive to emulate.

Since I had gotten to know Hay and his loving companion John Burnside in the previous year the awareness of his rich queer activist history led me to pursue him as a keynote speaker at the 1979 Symposium. They were at that time both heavily involved in the planning for the first Radical Fairie gathering that was to take place in the Arizona desert outside Tucson later in the summer. In personal correspondence dated 6-11-79 in typical Hay fashion he agreed to come up for the event. Written letters in 1979 were a viable and frequently used manner of communication and Harry was a master at writing long letters. Regarding my request that he and John be keynote speakers he wrote: “…being ‘keynote people’ scares us. We love to rap with people but we don’t take kindly to the old hetero-imitating formalisms of speeches or addresses.”

Though I have many pages of personal correspondence with Harry in particular I unfortunately never saved my responses back to him. I apparently responded that that would be fine and they came to Denver for that Lesbian and Gay Pride weekend of 1979 and participated in several workshops at the Symposium. He spoke briefly at the rally at the end of the Pride march that Sunday in Civic Center. Harry with bullhorn graces the cover of the July 6, 1979 issue (Vol. IV, #7) Of Out Front Magazine. I do not remember any of his remarks at the rally but the theme of the march that year was “We Are Family” so I suspect he spoke to that.

Much of Hay’s thought on queers at the time focused on the three questions originally raised by the Mattachine society; who are we, where do we come from and what are we for? If we were to be pursuing these questions in earnest at the time, and they are still quite relevant today, assimilation into the larger hetero society with marriage equality and open military service were unlikely to facilitate that exploration.

In the Duberman piece referenced earlier he describes the current “gay agenda” focus on marriage and the military as very myopic and Hay would certainly agree. In fact I heard Harry dismiss both as sadly hetero-imitative and nothing we should be serious about pursuing if we were intent on getting to the root of our difference and bringing our unique gifts and contributions to the larger human banquet.

When Duberman was asked specifically about the influence of queer culture on mainstream America he responded in part: “So far, I don’t think the effect of mainstream culture has been significant, and I think that’s the fault of both the gay movement and the mainstream, which is willing to accept and tolerate us to the extent that we act like good middle class white people”.

If I can be so bold I would say that both Hay and Duberman firmly believe that our real strength comes from being “outsiders”. Perhaps the potential for at least some of the change humanity desperately needs at this juncture can come from queer folk and that will only come about if we relish and explore our differences as possible keys to viable solutions to our immense problems today. Not to throw too much of a burden on us but we really do need to be in the vanguard of a radical restructuring of the entire social order or we are pretty much screwed both as a species and a viable planet.

How wonderful if every June we could renew out commitment to being “other” and recommit to using our unique worldviews to tackling some of the greatest issues we will face in the coming year.

© 30 June 2013

 About the Author 

I was born in La Porte Indiana in 1949, raised on a farm and schooled by Holy Cross nuns. The bulk of my adult life, some 40 plus years, was spent in Denver, Colorado as a nurse, gardener and gay/AIDS activist.  I have currently returned to Denver after an extended sabbatical in San Francisco, California.