The Question of Outing

Wednesday, July 14, 2004

The week is half over now! Time does seem to be moving along at a nice pace, and the measles partnership call was pretty painless. This week the Internet was working quite fast, so my update made it within minutes of me pressing send. Not sure why it took over an hour last week.

More drama with the cell phone. I entered the wrong passcode into it when it started, and now it’s locked up. I need some code that Casey didn’t give me, so the phone’s basically useless except for emergency calls. Goodie. I may have to contact Casey and find out what she knows. Eventually the cell will work again, I hope!

Water troubles continue. I tried the shower again, to utter failure. First, there was a stream…of COLD water. Within seconds, though, that stream fizzled and died. Big surprise. That’s been typical in the last week or so. I may need to ask Pet and Morris if something can be done. If I know Pet, she is certainly taking a bath every night!

The next item on my mind is not Zimbabwe specific, and in fact relates to news back home. Upon perusing the Washington Post and the Atlanta Journal Constitution (AJC), I noticed a story that’s exploded recently in the DC scene. There are two men in DC who are gay activists and have conducted an outing campaign of influential staffers who are completely out on the DC social scene but are closeted at work and serve Senators or Congresspeople who are anti-gay and pushing the marriage amendment. The amendment failed on a 48-50 vote, which is good news. The controversy surrounds whether or not the outing campaign is proper.

Predictably, the gay rights organizations, congressional staffer associations, and the Log Cabin Republicans think the whole thing is nasty, fascist, and a discriminatory against the GOP. They also say it does no good, changes no one’s mind, and plays into the hands of the religious right by sowing dissention in our ranks. Also, people should have the right to decide how the personally come out and to what degree. You shouldn’t penalize people for their jobs.

The other side says that’s rubbish. The staffers they have outed are all very influential in their jobs, and they work for people who are pushing hard to amend the constitution to discriminate against gays and make us 2nd class citizens. Their efforts are critical to the success of their member and that member’s anti-gay agenda. These staffers are also not in the closet. They are active in the DC gay social scene. Many of them have long-term relationships and go out on the town with their partners. They are well known as both gay and Republican. They only go back in the closet to work for their anti-gay member of Congress. The list distributors say they are only exposing the hypocrisy of these gay men (and they have been all men so far, except for exposing the rumor that Sen. Mikulski of Maryland is a lesbian).

I’m conflicted about this. Emotionally, I think these gay Republicans are getting exactly what they deserve. But I agree that they have the right to work for whomever they choose, and to hold whatever political beliefs they want. I may not understand how anyone can belong to a party that hates them and wants them driven out of the party and the country, but that’s not my business. My personal belief is that gay Republicans care more about power, money, and influence with the country club crowd than they do about their own civil rights. It’s a crazy trade-off in my opinion, but it’s theirs to make.

I also think coming out is a very personal process. Each person is different, and you shouldn’t generally force people out of the closet. The exception I make to this rule is someone who is actively working against the interests of the LGBT community. If a closet case is working actively to enforce legal discrimination, ban adoption, prevent the recognition of our relationships, or otherwise harm MY civil rights, I say have no mercy on such a person. That closet case should be exposed for the hypocrite he/she is. It’s been commonly said that my rights end where yours begin. You start attacking my civil rights and my right to live as a fully free AND EQUAL American, you’ve crossed a line and I will do whatever I can to fight you, even attacking you on a personal level.

These “gay at night” staffers have very influential positions in the GOP Congress. I even know one of them from my days in Virginia, Jay Timmons who heads up a GOP Senatorial committee. Everyone in Virginia knew Jay was gay and worked that imbecile George Allen. But like most gay GOPers, he felt civil rights was a minor issue, and fags that “wore their sexuality on their sleeve” (which I take to mean that it’s generally known someone is gay) deserve the ridicule they got. What’s more, the GOP promises to cut taxes (government services be damned), and that’s the only thing that matters. So I see it as a trade off of civil rights for greed, which is legitimate if morally bankrupt.

These staffers spend their nights away from the job in gay DC with people they call friends and boyfriends while spending their days in influential positions with members of Congress whose primary goal is to make gays 2nd class citizens unwelcome in America. Laws can be undone, so that’s not as big of a deal as a Constitutional Amendment. Passing an amendment would make gays 2nd class for all time, and would write active discrimination into our founding document for the first time in its history. That’s beyond the pale. These people should be called to answer for their work in support of active, PERMANENT discrimination against their own people.

I don’t care much for the argument that this is “thought police” by gay rights activists. It’s not the thoughts that are being punished, it’s the hypocrisy of their actions. People make decisions every day, and they are held responsible for those decisions. That is what these guys doing the outing are doing. They’re not even exposing people who would be fired for being gay. Sen. Inhofe of Oklahoma has a policy of refusing to hire any homosexuals in his office. He will hire gays for his committee staff, and one of those staffers was exposed. But there is a member of that senator’s personal staff who is gay but will not be outed because it would result in that person’s firing.

My friend Mike says that using sexual orientation as a weapon in any instance is wrong and no better than sexual harassment. I can see his point, but I still think it’s circumstantial. It doesn’t matter if a gay person works for a homophobic company with discriminatory policies, unless that person is the CEO and could put in a non-discrimination clause and just won’t. I wouldn’t advocate outing anyone in the military, b/c the discrimination policy is set by Congress and the President. No matter what the rank, the military person is bound to enforce and obey what the President and Congress dictate. Only people who are in positions of power to do something to prevent discrimination and harm against LGBT people and refuse should be outed, if they are out everywhere but the job. If the person in power a closet case anyway who furtively looks for tricks on the Internet or in public parks, he’s too sad of a case to do anything about. And it’s likely such a person is so emotionally fragile anyway that suicide could result if there is a threat to out that person.

The GOP has decided to wage a war on LGBT citizens across the United States for the sake of electoral gain. Just as their decision to pander to segregationists in the South was bankrupt (albeit successful), their decision to wage war on the rights and privileges of American citizenship for LGBT citizens. If you help in this fight to make LGBT Americans 2nd class citizens, then I have no sympathy for you and will not feel bad when your collective shit hits the fan. These gay people who are active in the fight to discriminate against us all are no better than the Jewish Nazi-collaborators were during that dark period. There is plenty that these gays could do for conservative causes other than be the right hand person for anti-gay members of Congress. If they have that much self-loathing and hatred, fine, but as a community, we should not tolerate them using their self-loathing and hatred to attack the rest of us.

For me, this is personal. If Richard were a woman, and I a straight man, we would be well on our way to planning a wedding by now. That marriage would have over 1100 rights and privileges, along with numerous responsibilities at the state and federal level. We are currently denied the ability to obtain those rights, simply because we were born gay. We certainly did not choose this, and we wouldn’t wish it on our children. It’s not that being gay is bad, because it’s not. It’s having to deal with all the bigotry and crap that comes with it thanks to people like Sadie Fields of the Georgia “Christian” Taliban. Richard and I would like to adopt as well, and we’ve started the process. It won’t take off until I return, but if all goes well, we could have a child within the next 2 years. That is if this war against gays doesn’t result in a ban on recognition of our relationship and a ban on gay adoption in Georgia. That’s a very real threat in the next General Assembly session too because Georgia law does not prevent gays from adoption. The sole standard is what’s best for the child. Richard and I would be excellent parents, I think, but bigotry and discrimination of the sort supported by these powerful staffers in Congress could destroy the family I’m trying to build. I’m sorry if I can’t feel sorry for these staffers as their “night lives” meet their “day lives” in a public forum. These people are actively trying to destroy the family I want to build, and I think that should be fought by any legal means necessary. If that means exposing them as the Uncle Toms they are for the Religious Right, then so be it.