The meta issues of last week obscured the fact that a number of recent diaries touched on gay issues in unusual ways. First, we had a couple of high-profile coming out stories last week, only one of them wasn't a classic coming out story and was more significant because of that. Second, a diarist writing about health care casually used an epithet that could have been avoided in any number of ways which thoroughly derailed the recommendable diary he had written and spawned three - count them, three -- follow up diaries, two of which just made the whole thing, which by now was about language, worse.
Why am I bringing this up a week later? Because these diaries provide a way of looking at how we discuss LGBT issues here at daily Kos, and because one of the more influential diaries on the meta issues dealt with the problem, which this diarist described as bullying, in a way that made it impossible for the issues in these other diaries that got swallowed up by the meta stuff to go away without some kind of analysis. Take it away, mole333:
The LGBT community on dKos has also felt bullied at times. There is a long history to homophobia in this country, a history that is disgusting and often turns deadly. I have a friend at work who grew up gay in the rural South. He has described to me running for his life from bullies who might well have beaten him to death for who he was. When LGBT Kossacks are bullied right here on this site, we have to keep in mind that long, disgusting history of homophobia in America. Would it hurt the dKos community to go the extra mile to be welcoming rather than bullying to our LGBT colleagues? No, it wouldn't. Leave the stupid bullying to the teabaggers. I suggest we work on our tolerance rather than follow teabagger examples as bullies.
More detail and analysis below. This is just about what CAN happen, because one of the great things about discussing these issues at dKos is that we have wonderful allies here in the larger Kos community. I've done quite a bit of name-checking in this, but you'll notice that it's not in the call-out parts of this diary.
The thing is that coming out and the "f" word present two distinct and different issues.
Coming Out
Two diaries covered individual coming out stories last week. The first was about Anderson Cooper and the second was about Frank Ocean. The issues concerning Anderson Cooper came up in the comments thread. Most of the commenters looked at this as "Coming up: The sky is blue and water is wet" (gay Americans knew about Anderson Cooper already), and serious props to bink, who wrote:
At the same time, eventually, I think LGBT people of conscience realize that it is healthy and good for ourselves to take our identities public. And that it is extremely important for the LGBT civil rights movement that the public is exposed to the huge diversity of people in our community -- and to our positive qualities, as well as the (mostly-imagined) faults that are written on us, constantly, by the media.
In the comments, people wondered why it was necessary for Cooper to do this in terms of the whole outing controversy of the 1990s. Enough other commenters pointed out that it's important to teenagers and it's important in terms of honesty -- in short, that
announcing that you're gay matters. I had a diary the same day about
roughly the same thing with roughly the same response, and one gangbuster comment from
fidlerten:
The late Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected government office holder, encouraged gay people from all professions of life - and we're in every profession there is, even Republican politics - to stand up and be counted. He knew that was the only way we would ever see our rights.
I must admit, it was only recently that I came out at my job and told my GM that I was gay. She was very supportive.
I do think that gay people can come out much easier now, and believe me that means a lot coming from someone who knew what being deep in the closet was all about.
That's a great set of marching orders!
So when it came to Frank Ocean, I didn't expect to find anything that suggested that "gay" didn't matter, and pico, who wrote a terrific diary about this, deserves props for this summary too:
Frank Ocean did everything "wrong". He didn't make his coming out an "event"; he didn't declare his identity; and he spoke directly about falling in love at the risk of making his fans squirm. He penned an aching, personal letter about his attraction to another man.
and
Ocean didn't stand up and make an announcement: he made people feel his world, and that has made the world a better place. It's not going to net as many articles as Anderson Cooper or the latest DOMA challenges, but in his own quiet way, it's possible that Ocean just changed the game for good. Ta-Nehisi Coates has called it "a revolution." I think he's right.
I braced myself for the comments about how actually saying it was no longer necessary, and I found one, but the commenter who made it also said this:
I think we may be getting to the day when this is no big deal. Ironically, that is because some people MADE it a big deal . . . That's how you buy freedom in the first place. Someone has to fight for it. I fought for it. And since being homosexual isn't always visible, we are all the better for the many who have said "I am gay" or who expressed the equivalent through their actions (as I did). And now this artist has the freedom not to say that. I applaud that freedom, not the fact that he didn't say it.
Yes, Gay matters,
although it's better strategically if other people know about it. As
a Center for American Progress report observes,
Just as more people are coming out in support of ending marriage discrimination, more people personally know someone who identifies as gay—and that’s no coincidence. Polls find that roughly 75 percent of people today personally know someone who is gay, whether that is a friend, family member, or colleague. In 1992 that number was just 42 percent, marking more than a 30-point rise since then. Reports suggest that as more gay individuals live openly and tell their friends and family that they are gay, support for marriage equality will continue to rise. Those who know someone who identifies as gay are 20 points likelier to back marriage equality.
I know all about privacy, and I certainly don't expect you to wear a sign, but
if people don't know that they have gay friends or relatives (or constituents) there's no reason for them to support any of our issues. Admittedly, we're all different, and what the Frank Ocean story tells us is that there is a variety of ways for us to be honest about ourselves to the world around us.
The "F" Word
The other situation is different, because there is only one appropriate response. Here, a diarist left the phrase "total fag" in supposedly quoted material and here's a link to the the diary, because all that was removed was the blockquote. It was a very recommendable diary otherwise, about the current healthcare system and its problems. The reason it was there to begin with? First, it was a post-and-run diary over a major holiday (plausible, but bad manners anyway) and second, it was material said to the diarist that the diarist would never say (and NOT contextualized that way in the diary), as he said in the comment thread 15 times -- but not until two days after he made his initial post. This actually raises the question of what kind of person puts the phrase "total fag" into a blockquote, since this was NOT taken from someplace else but from the diarist's own memory, without thinking about it and deciding it might not be appropriate. But it gets better, since three more diaries were produced as commentary.
The first of the commentaries did the work this diary is doing. I'll let its author, commonmass, speak for his usual eloquent self:
Several of us found [the use of the phrase "total fag"] offensive, and worse, found the diary marred by an unnecessary and easily misunderstood homophobic epithet. Several pleas were made to the diarist to edit the diary to reflect his experience, rather than what looked, at first glance, like an unnecessary use of the word "fag". As of this moment, 85 people have recommended this diary.
Interestingly, those of us who--understanding the importance of this diary--called upon the diarist to make some editorial changes surrounding the use of that highly offensive word were accused of "hijacking" and worse, being "self-righteous ninnies" who would censor literature. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Those of us who objected to this wanted the diary to succeed. We felt that the usage could put people off and lead the conversation away from the intent of the diarist. It did.
But about eight hours later, it started. To appreciate the second diary, we'll start with a comment that the writer of the second commentary made in the original diary about health care, in doubling down on his first comment defending the use of the phrase (and here are the ninnies commonmass was talking about):
Really? Because some macho military right winger would say "You must be a total fag" meaning, "You are weak." It's pretty damn accurate and -- by the way -- a poignant excoriation of your opponents -- but you're too much of a hypersensitive PC ninny to see it, apparently. And I stand by my assertion that Twain would not have made it in today's PC-ninny world.
In the first commentary diary (the one by commonmass),
jayden had this to say about that comment:
Instead of acknowledging that the usage is offensive they insist on trivializing the disdain. Nothing rankles my ire more than the response "get over it." And typically upon being labeled a "self-righteous ninny" I would deliver a self-righteous smack down along with my donut. But it's a holiday and I don't have the desire to deal with doofuses on DKos today.
Said writer went on to publish
his own diary in which he said
Many of our LGBT members are apparently irony-impaired and thought the use of the word -- even in this flagrantly ironic context -- offensive. You know what? It's not. It's not. He's making a point sympathetic to your cause (that stupid people use the word "fag" as an all-purpose perjorative [sic]), and you're too stuck on yourselves to see it. Sad. Heartbreaking, really.
and then defended the use of "fag" as a First Amendment issue.
A First Amendment issue. Sure, it's absolutely your first amendment right to be as bigoted as you want. That's how most of Daily Kos will know you from now on.
Then, three days later (at the height of the meta stuff), the ORIGINAL diarist decided he had been misunderstood and had to diary that too, because in addition to the 88 recs there were at the time 40 HRs. And, really, as far as an appeal for sympathy goes, all I can say here is "WOW":
I have to say I've never before seen the level of inaccurate assessment, false judgement and misplaced animosity from Daily Kos participants as I have today. Yes, I was the recipient of these accusations and it may appear as if I'm defending myself, but I'm not. I'm defending anyone and everyone who receives such treatment.
The reaction my words elicited were nearly universal in their negativity, absolute in their condemnation and unwavering in their judgement.
I now understand how Shirley Sherrod, Valerie Plame, Barrack Obama, Treyvon Martin and others feel being the recipients of false judgements. It doesn't feel good at all.
Um, dude. You weren't quoted out of context, you weren't hounded out of a covert job, and you certainly weren't shot dead. You have some HRs because you wrote a post-and-run diary and you didn't think about what you said in it. And "false judgement"? In your case bad judgment is more like it.
Yes, I called him out for deleting the whole quote, and he was ready for me. Here's the comment thread in which the diarist defends himself for using the word by announcing he himself is gay and that he didn't want people to identify him by his sexual orientation. Some MAJOR cognitive dissonance here. I'm sorry about the closet you want to live in, but gay matters, and offensive terms for "gay" aren't acceptable even -- ESPECIALLY -- if you're gay yourself.
It's really easy. Almost everyone (not just us, but our wonderful allies here) understands that you deal with LGBT issues here by dealing with the ideas expressed in the diaries that discuss these issues, and without using words we consider pejorative. This is just to say that, although things have improved since the situation mole333 discussed in the introduction, there are still Kossacks who don't handle it this way. And when you consider that this diary, which details how the LGBT community has recently hijacked Daily Kos, was published two months ago today, we're not out of the tunnel quite yet.
4:13 PM PT: This is one of the diaries I think I'll let you republish. I've been promoting it in other ways.
4:13 PM PT: This is one of the diaries I think I'll let you republish. I've been promoting it in other ways.
