I am a little surprised by the furor over the Afghani man who is facing the death penalty for converting to Christianity. His situation reminds me a lot of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, the opposition for which is the belief that individuals should be able to be themselves. The Afghani man could certainly say “okay, okay, I’ll be a Muslim” and then continue to believe whatever he wants, inside. But the American response is that he should be free to be a Christian if he wants. Well, guess what, folks - gay soldiers should be allowed to be gay without having to pretend they’re straight or anything else they want to be.

But the conservatives won’t make the connection. They support this man’s freedom to be an “out” Christian because Christianity is a good thing. Homosexuality, on the other hand, is a bad thing - and so gay people shouldn’t be allowed to be out.

Getting married in the United States is fairly easy. One man and one woman must intend to get married, get a blood test, and get a license. There is no proof of cohabitation, no proof of intimate relations, no time limits from your previous marriage. Establishing a domestic partnership, though, is more complex.
Read the rest of this entry »

Oh my god! George Takei is gay! This is so cool!

Yay Sulu!

Please indulge me in a bit of self-righteousness and indignancy as I continue to challenge the femme invisibility barrier.

I’d heard a few days ago that someone had complained that J and I were not lesbians. Of course we thought that was silly, but we weren’t sure who had said it, as the information seemed to have gone through a long grapevine. That night at dinner one of the deaf men I was eating with asked me if I was a lesbian. I said yes and he seemed fine with that. The question nagged at me though, until tonight. It was toward the end of the cruise, I was chatting with a deaf guy and his hearing boyfriend at the leather party, and I told them about this trange question. They were surprised by that, and we talked about it for a few moments. And then who should walk up but the guy I suspected all along. Now, this guy is a hearing interpreter from Baltimore; I did not know him before the cruise. He walked up, said hello, and then we had this exchange:

Him: Can I ask you a personal question?
Me: Sure. (knowing what’s coming)
Him: Are you a lesbian?
Me: Yes. (conversation was in ASL; I used an emphatic form of yes)
Him: Are you in a relationship?
Me: Yes, for seven years.
Him: How nice for you. Do you have a picture of your partner?
Me: Uh, not on me, no.
Deaf guy: Do you have a picture of your boyfriend?
Him: Well, he’s here. I can bring him over.
Me: She’s not here because she’s already going on a cruise this month with her mom, blah blah blah.

So then he went off, and the deaf guy, his boyfriend, and I marveled at the guy’s balls that he asked me such a thing to my face. I was miffed, but we talked about things like narrow-mindedness and interpreter ethics. I finally decided I was going to go, and I said goodbye to my friends. On the way out, though, I decided I was going to give the guy a big fuck you.

At first I went to the computer cafe to search for the guy’s email address. I didn’t find it, so I went to Flickr, found a suitable picture and printed it, then logged off. The total cost was $2.65 for this. Now, the picture I’d chosen was specific. It has me and A standing with Teddy, International Mr. Deaf Leather 2004, between us. Perfect. So I took it back downstairs to the party. (By the way, I did have a rum and coke in me at this point.) I couldn’t find the guy at first, but I ended up telling a couploe of other deaf people why I was looking for him. I also told M, the male terp, who mentioned that he’s been getting asked all week if J & I are straight. (At least five times, by hearing people but not the guy I was after.)

Finally the nice deaf guy spotted the guy dancing far away. I couldn’t see him, so the deaf guy offered to take the printout over to him. After a few minutes he returned and said “I showed it to him. He knows the guy in the middle [Teddy]. You’re safe!”

So I felt pretty good. But I still can’t fathom the question. Femme lesbians do exist, dammit! Just because 99% of the lesbians on this cruise are (sometimes soft) butch does not mean femme dykes are a straight man’s fantasy? (I think he might have been jealous that he didn’t get my job but rather had to pay to be there.)

Thanks very much to Elizabeth for calling my attention to this Daily Kos update about Johnson & Johnson. It seems the AFA noticed J&J is advertising on LOGO, the new gay cable channel from MTV. The AFA took offense to this and is encouraging members to contact Johnson & Johnson and voice their opposition. So far the J&J people have gotten many more calls against their sponsorship of LOGO than they have gotten supporting their involvement in the gay community.

To contact Johnson & Johnson and express your support for their advertising on LOGO, call 1-800-962-5357, option 5 or 1-877-895-3665.

I would never have expected this, but Riki Wilchins of GenderPAC has just demonstrated a shocking stereotype related to gender presentation. In the news release A Father’s Lesson in ‘Manhood’ Deals Deadly Blow to Toddler Ms. Wilchins was quoted as saying:

This father - like countless fathers - was dead set on raising Clint Eastwood and not Alan Alda.

That comment made my jaw hit the floor so hard I just had to write back immediately.

I am astonished at the comparison Ms. Wilchins has just made between Clint Eastwood and Alan Alda. I would think that of all people, she should understand the hurt stereotyping can do. Clint Eastwood may match the American ideal of a “real man” but that is no reason to insult Alan Alda in this way. I am a longtime fan of his and I am just shocked by this. I’m sure even he would agree that he is no Clint Eastwood or John Wayne or the Marlboro Man - but I hardly think it is fair that he should receive this treatment from the executive director of an organization built on acceptance and diversity. Ms. Wilchins would have done much better to have left names of real people out of the picture altogether.

My friend perigee has started what has the potential to be a really cool project: a queer wiki. Here’s the notice:

Hi folks, this is an announcement of a new collaborative Wiki-based effort to provide a non-commercial, shareable information resource for anyone who needs one, written by as many different kinds of queer and allied persons as are interested in helping out.

My friend jhames came up with the idea recently, and we would like to be as inclusive as possible, inviting as many people who are interested in participating as we can get involved.

The Wiki is based on a pretty substantial server with a high bandwidth, so we’re not too concerned about high traffic, but the caveat is that because we’d like to be careful with the contributor population and discourage spammers and trollers, we’re vetting each new user account by hand, so if we’re a little slow to start, we apologize, but we hope to make this a good experience for all.

If you’re new to Wikis, I encourage you to try it out anyway. It’s usually a good learning experience, and the way Wikis work, they encourage collaboration, discussion and sharing, so we’re hoping for good things here.

If you are interested in helping out, or in just seeing how far we’ve gotten and how far there is yet to go, come on down to queer101.malcolmgin.com. At present we intend to remain an entirely private organization, and as far as I’m concerned there should be no ads or other leeches on your time or ours.

Feel free to forward this notice to anyone you think might be interested. If you do, please don’t edit it unless you can’t avoid it, and please drop by my LJ and let me know where you reposted or forwarded it to.

• Right Side of the Rainbow
  News and commentary on law and politics by a right- of-center, gun-owning, gay Texan.
  (tags: queer)