The Republic of T.

Am I still a gay blogger? Well, I’m still a blogger. And I’m as gay as I’ve every been. But I almost hesitate to call myself a gay blogger these days. I used to blog about gay issues all the time, but the circumstances of my life have changed. Between work, family, and the limitations of being a mere mortal, I just can’t keep up.

During the day, all my blogging is work-related. So, I write about economic issues, healthcare, Medicare, Social Security, etc, and a lot of stuff that occasionally has a gay “angle” but isn’t specifically gay related. By the time I get home, have dinner with the family, do “homework time,” bedtime, pitch in on the realities of domestic life (like loading the dishwasher or folding the laundry), and do my work-related blog culling for the next morning … I’m pretty much spent.

So, there’s a lot I haven’t covered, because I just can’t. Fortunately, someone else has. Buzzfeed has a list of “40 Reasons Why 2011 Was A Great Year For Gays.” Here’s my attempt at a video compilation. (Some things I couldn’t find video for.)

I may have written about some of this stuff. Some of it I haven’t. Anyway, it all happened.

It’s rare that two very public implosions occur almost simultaneously or resonate so well with one another as the the crashing and burning of Herman Cain’s presidential campaign and Eddie Long’s marriage and ministry. It’s even rarer that two high profile “players” like Cain and Long (or Long and Cain, or even Long/Cain, if you prefer) have the bluffs called so spectacularly and fold so publicly.

For a blogger, it’s difficult to resist either story, considering “how snide and vicious” one could get “and still write nothing but the truth.” For one such as myself, who’s written about both men, it’s impossible to resist.

Some of the parallels between the two are innocuous: both are black ministers, both are from Georgia, both have amassed significant amounts of personal wealth. Other parallels are innocuous: both, if the allegations against them are true, rose to fame pretending to be something they were not, and both were publicly revealed as frauds.

Ironically, in the long run, neither may suffer much for it.

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This may count as the “Who am I? Why am I here?” moment of the 2012 campaign season.

Mitt Romney took a hard break from his Republican opponents for the presidential nomination in an interview with a New Hampshire newspaper Monday.

Unlike much of the rest of the GOP field, Romney’s not ready to condemn the booing of a gay soldier at the last debate.

…“You’d have to look at it,” he told the New Hampshire Union-Leader, according to the Wall Street Journal. “I don’t know when they booed, and I don’t know why people booed. I will tell you that the boos and the applause has not always coincided with my own views.”

“You have to look at it,” he says? OK. Let’s.

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“Who the (Bleep) Did I Marry?” is a favorite in our house. And last night we watched the Dina Matos-Jim McGreevey story.

I know that they can only fit so much into the format of a 30 minute show, but…

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Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand
Workin’ in the dark against your fellow man
But as sure as God made black and white
What’s done in the dark will be brought to the light

~ “Run On (For A Long Time)”

The last line in the quote above is one my mother repeated often when I was growing up. She meant that those things we tried to hide, out of shame or deceit, would be found out eventually. Thus, it behooved us to live honest lives, with nothing “done in the dark” that we feared would come into the light.

My mother’s phrase came to mind this weekend, as I caught up on the sexual misconduct allegations against Eddie Long, minister of a black mega-church in the Atlanta area.

Spencer LaGrande, 22, filed suit against Long and his New Birth Missionary Baptist Church and, like the other three alleged victims, accused the powerhouse pastor of forcing him into a sexual relationship while treating him to trips around the world, travel in private planes and stays in luxury hotels.

…LaGrande’s lawsuit alleges he met Long in March 2003 during the very first service at a branch Long’s Georgia-based church that opened in a suburb of Charlotte, N.C.

LeGrande said Long agreed to be a father figure for him because his own father was an absentee father, according to court documents, and that Long began asking LaGrande to call him “dad.”

LaGrande was 17 when, according to the lawsuit, Long first made sexual contact with him during a trip to Nairobi, Kenya. The lawsuit alleges several more instances of sexual contact, both before and after LaGrande graduated from high school.

Long’s accusers have said they believe the bishop abused more young men that eventually will come forward. Many people at the church knew what was going on but covered for Long, victims claimed.

Maurice Robinson and Anthony Flagg were the first two accusers, followed a short time later by Jamal Parris.

Parris alleged in the documents, obtained by ABC News, that the bishop would request he be nude while in his presence and would request “sexual massages” and “oral sodomy” when they traveled.

Eddie Long would probably say that my life — a suburban life, with a husband and two children — is one lived in darkness. He would probably invite me to live in the “light.” That is, the “light” as he defines it.

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Every time I write one of these posts, I think — or, rather, I hope — it will be the last one. Maybe that’s because I harbor two apparently unrealistic hopes: (1) that no more children will be hurt, abused, or killed by the people who are supposed to care for them, and (2) that people will stop putting our parenting in the same category as people who do hurt, abuse, and kill their own children.

Like I said, these are unrealistic hopes. Maybe someday the reality of child abuse will be like a nightmare that fades from memory and into the distant past. But not today. And maybe someday, people will stop calling all that we do as parents — from making dinner to helping with homework, etc. — as abuse, because it’s part of being a parent, and because We’re doing it. Maybe someday. But not today

Certainly not with Pride season upon us, when the AFA finds out there’s a kid kicking off a pride parade.

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(TRIGGER WARNING: The descriptions and some of the media in this post depict extremely violent acts of child abuse. If this is an issue for you, consider yourself warned.)

I had not expected to update this series so soon after the last installment. But, via Alvin McEwen, comes the latest conservative blather on gay parents. This time, from former Arkansas governor and GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee.

He continues to oppose any government recognition of same-sex relationships. Even civil unions are “not necessary,” Huckabee said. “I think there’s been a real level of being disingenuous on the part of the gay and lesbian community with their goal of civil unions,” he alleged, referring to LGBT activists who first claimed that their goal in several states was to enact civil unions, but subsequently launched efforts to implement full marriage rights.

Huckabee went on to draw parallels between homosexuality and other lifestyles that are considered by some to be morally aberrant. “You don’t go ahead and accommodate every behavioral pattern that is against the ideal,” he said of same-sex marriage. “That would be like saying, well, there are a lot of people who like to use drugs, so let’s go ahead and accommodate those who want who use drugs. There are some people who believe in incest, so we should accommodate them. There are people who believe in polygamy, so we should accommodate them.”

No surprise here. Nor is it all that surprising that — given the connection cemented in the conservative mind that the sole purpose of marriage is procreation or the symbolic possibility thereof. This last part makes it OK for, say, infertile or elderly heterosexual couples — who physiologically unable to procreate, or well past their reproductive primes — to marry, and to marry for a “reason” that can still be used disqualify same-sex couples (who cannot reproduce with one another).

Predictably he attacks same sex parents

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This was my first experience of Ricky Martin. I didn’t know his name. I’d never seen him before. But by the time he was done, I — like a lot of people — wanted to know “Who is that guy?!”

“Do you really want it?” he sang. And by the time he was done…I did. I really did.

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I suppose it’s no secret anymore. We went down to the courthouse this morning, and got a place in line.

At least 16 couples were waiting at 7:15 a.m. inside the city’s Moultrie courthouse, which houses the marriage bureau and is just blocks from the U.S. Capitol.

Sinjoyla Townsend, 41, and her partner of 12 years, Angelisa Young, 47, claimed the first spot in line just after 6 a.m.

“It’s like waking up Christmas morning,” Young said.

Washington will be the sixth place in the nation where gay marriages can take place. Because of a mandatory waiting period, however, couples won’t actually be able to marry in the District of Columbia until March 9. Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont currently issue licenses to same-sex couples.

…Terrance Heath, 41, planned to be at the courthouse with his partner, Rick Imirowicz, 43. The two have been together for 10 years and have a 7-year-old and a 2-year-old, but Heath said Wednesday feels like “a step forward.”

“My husband has always been my husband to me, but having that legal recognition, that legal protection, makes it easier to deal with any number of situations,” said Heath, a writer and blogger. “If you tell people you’re married, you don’t really have to explain much beyond that.”

The two, who live in Maryland, plan to marry on March 9, the first day possible.

The gay marriage law was introduced in the 13-member D.C. Council in October and had near-unanimous support from the beginning. The bill passed and D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty signed it in December, but because Washington is a federal district, the law had to undergo a congressional review period that expired Tuesday.

We were number 12 in line.

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I just have one thing to say about this.

Forget WWJD. The new question is apparently What Would MLK Do? A coalition of politically and theologically conservative Christian leaders, including nine Roman Catholic bishops, who have just signed a declaration saying they will not comply with laws that could require them to recognize same-sex unions or allow their institutions to support abortions are arguing that the move is of a piece with King’s call for civil disobedience during the civil rights movement.

The declaration reads, in part: “We will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other antilife act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the equivalent.”

Instead of debating whether these causes belong in the same category as providing equal rights and treatment to racial minorities, the better question may be: Why now?After all, most people agree with the first part of the statement and believe religious institutions and individuals should be protected by conscience provisions that protect them from being compelled to participate in acts like abortion that they believe are murder. And, in fact, they are.

Fine. But if you’re gonna talk that talk, you gotta walk that walk.
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The first time I heard it, I did a double-take, because I thought I heard it wrong. The second time I heard it, I rolled my eyes. The third time I heard Sarah Palin, in her interview with Oprah Winfrey, suggest that women who choose to terminate pregnancies are essentially “taking the easy way out.”

There is much — so much, really — that I object to here, but I’ll start with one really simple point.

I don’t know, and can’t know, what it’s like to decide whether or not to have an abortion. But I can listen — and have listened — to the voices and experiences of women who have. None of the women I’ve known who have faced that choice, based on what they told me, experienced it as an “easy” choice.

Such choices — the ones that have unknown and unknowable, long-term consequences for ourselves and our families — are almost never easy choices to make. As both Republicans and Democrats demonstrate, it’s the choices we make for other people — people who are not “us” — that are the easy choices.

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I swear, if I could find an app like this, I’d buy it.

But, then again, if you read blogs on your iPhone — particularly progressive blogs — you kind of have this app already.

[From Now This is a Republican iPhone App : Dispatches from the Culture Wars]

With all due respect to Cleve Jones — who, in fact, is due a lot of respect for his years of activism — we do not need another LGBT march on Washington.

An activist who worked alongside slain gay rights leader Harvey Milk announced plans Sunday for a march on Washington this fall to demand that Congress establish equality and marriage rights for the lesbian, gay and transgender community.

Cleve Jones, whose character in last year’s award-winning movie Milk was played by Emile Hirsch, said the march planned for Oct. 11 will coincide with National Coming Out Day and launch a new chapter in the gay rights movement. He made the announcement during a rally at the annual Utah Pride Festival.

In an interview Friday, Jones said a confluence of events — a new president, the success of Milk which earned Sean Penn an Oscar, and Proposition 8 — makes this the right time to intensify the fight for equality.

“All of this working together has opened this new chapter,” Jones said. “I intend to make the most of it.”

As usual, I’m late to this story. I read it late last night, but at this point in my life, writing/blogging is near the bottom of my list. It comes after everything and everyone else. So by the time I get around to blogging a story like this one, it’s already been beat to death and much of what I’m going to say has been said already.

Nonetheless, I’ll say now what I said last night. We don’t need another march on Washington. Not now. Maybe when we have a victory to celebrate, but not when we have so much work to do.

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This series is overdue for an update. I’ve been meaning to get to it for a while now. But every time a relevant news story reminds me of it, there’s always something more pressing.

The entire time the “Octomom” saga played out in headlines and newscasts, I thought about continuing this series. Only, every time I’d get started, there’d be another revelation. At some point, I got tired of trying to keep up. I kept it in the back of my mind, though.

To tell the truth, I’ve never watched Jon & Kate Plus 8, except for a few minutes when I stopped in the middle of channel surfing and caught a few minutes of it. I didn’t know why, but something about the show creeped me out. I couldn’t put my finger on it. But when the allegations about his affair, then her alleged affair, then her alleged violent rages, his alleged lack of ambition, her tummy tuck and nose job, his hair plugs, and the difference between the reality of their marriage and the facade presented on television, I found myself asking “Why are these people famous?” All they did was have babies, and have more at one time than most people.

These people are famous for reproducing?

Then it hit me, what bothered me about the very idea of the show, let alone the show itself.

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iv

You know my friends, there comes a time when people get tired of being trampled by the iron feet of oppression … If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. And if we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning.

~ Martin Luther King Jr.

Obama and other Democrats have not said as much to LGBT activists. In fact, their actions could be interpreted to say “Please, don’t make me do it now.” As my own exchange with Pelosi suggests, Democrats seem to be taking the “rising tide” approach. Fixing the economy can help same-sex households in the same way it can hep the rest of the country. Universal health care — if it includes the kind of public plan Obama ran on — helps same-sex couples and their families by divorcing health insurance from both employment status and marital status.

Health care reform could certainly remove obstacles to health insurance for gay couples.

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I realize I should probably let it go. After all, there are some people you’re just never gonna reach.

Let me explain it this way. When I first came to D.C. to work in politics, and to work specifically on gay rights issues, I was told and came to understand that people fall into three categories when you’re working for social change:

1. The people who are on your side.

2. The people who aren’t on your side, but could be if they’re persuaded.

3. The people who are not on your side and never will be.

The first group you need to talk to in order to keep them informed and motivated. The second group you need to talk to in order to make your case and move them to your side. Talking to the third group is a waste of time and energy better spent shoring up support in the first group and winning support in the second group.

Some people are unreachable. The problem is they say things that must not go unchallenged.

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I don’t know if I’ve said it before, but I just love Jon Stewart too. Here’s a man who really gets it. From his recent interview with Mike Huckabee. (Favorite line: “At what age did you choose not to be gay?”)

In particular, he gets something that I’ve written about here before as Steve Benen explains.

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Yes. Once upon a time.

I took this survey via Lifehacker.

CNET reports that Wikipedia has received $890,000 in funding specifically aimed at creating an easier to use interface for readers with a low level of tech knowledge. Wikipedia’s goal is “to identify the most common barriers to entry for first-time writers, and then work to systematically reduce or eliminate them.” It’s an excellent idea, considering the obvious fact that there are presumably countless potential contributors with a lot of knowledge but a low level of tech skill. Still, since most of our readers are a tech-savvy bunch, it got us wondering:

Have you ever edited Wikipedia?

Well yes. But I soon stopped.

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I read about an attack on a lesbian student at Wayland Union High School, near Grand Rapids, MI, via Ed’s blog.

Police in Wayland, Mich., are investigating an attack by two 14-year-old girls on a third girl in Wayland Union High School. The victim was identified as a supporter of gay rights. The June 10 attack was purposely recorded on a cell phone video by another female, police say.

Wayland is located south of Grand Rapids and according to the city’s Web site has a population of 3,939 people.

Police told Grand Rapids-based WOOD-TV 8, the NBC affiliate, the two girls attacked the victim because she was a “gay rights advocate.”

Chief Dan Miller of the Wayland Police told the Kalamazoo Gazette the 14-year-old victim identified herself as a lesbian.

“I guess some say she’s pretty outspoken, and the other two girls didn’t like that,” he said in the Gazette. “We were told by the two suspects it was over the sex-orientation issue that they don’t believe in.

It was around the same time that I was researching the murders of Simmie Williams and Lawrence King, both of whom were harassed in school. I guess it interested me because of that, and because I was harassed in school. But I was fortunate never to experience something like this.

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I started researching the murder of Simmie Williams back in August, around the same time I began researching the murder of Lawrence King. I started researching King’s story because of the Newsweek article about his murder that came out in July, and there was a lot of controversy around it. I starting researching Simmie William’s murder because the similarities with King (gay youth, of color, non-gender conforming, etc.) and the reality that —though his murder happened little more than a week after King’s — William’s murder got far less attention.

Maybe it was because of race, maybe it was because of the difference in age between him and King, whose murder has arguably received the most attention since Matthew Shepard. But, then, that’s no different from any number of anti-LGBT hate crimes that rarely make headlines outside of the communities where they occur. Memorials are held, sometimes vigils on the murder site or where the body was found or outside of hospitals. Local groups organize. Sometimes a suspect is caught, and even tried and convicted.

But most of the rest of the world never hears.

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