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...failure
I live abroad much of the year. But for years I worked as a waiter and bar tender in Provincetown.
I'd been a way from P-town for several years when, four years ago, my Costa Rican partner and I went for Carnival and for him to meet some of my friends there.
One night, as we strolled Commercial Street, we went into the HRC's VERY high end retail store on the main drag.
Everything, of course, was emblazoned with the "equality" logo.
Frank, my partner. who's a successful gay business man in Costa Rica was appalled at the over priced merchandise in the shop.
He was more appalled as to some of the countries where some of this merchandise was manufactured.
He approached the cashier, a twenty something, heavily tatooed and pierced young lesbian and asked her if she understood that in many of the countries where these high end, trendy, "equality" promoting products were being manufactured, textile workers, whether gay or straight, have no rights.
I said, Frank, this HRC group is probably paying this kid 8 bucks and hour and telling her she should be grateful to have the opportuinity to spend a summer in Provincetown, even though on eight bucks an hour in Provincetown you can't even afford a seasonal tent site in the local campground.
as I've said before, I'm a fifty five year old faggot who was on the front lines of the fight for MANY years, but when I see the caliber of this largely self anointed, self important, thirty/early forty something gay leadership, especially those "inside" the Beltway, I am both both saddened and embarrassed that our community has come to this.
It, as we often say campily, "ain't pretty.
I cannot say I could write such a lengthy and typo-free letter with Obama's dick in my mouth.
It is time for HRC to make it crystal clear in all press releases and public events that it speaks on behalf of its membership ONLY. You are not elected representatives of the gay community and the misguided statements issued by your organization run contrary to a very large part of the gay community. Stop misrepresenting yourselves as "leaders" of the gay community or as spokesmen for a community much more diverse and informed than your own members.
State that you are speaking on behalf of YOUR MEMBERS ONLY. You are not representatives of the larger (much much larger) gay community.
Joe should look for another line of work that he is more qualified for, like maybe a full time ass-kisser position.
Sorry, I am not somebody who feels that the HRC is one of those groups.
What I see is a group that gives cover to those that do a disservice to the glbt community. But they are very good at collecting money.
Maybe the HRC is really good at playing the Washington game. It would be nice to have balance from those who are supposed to be our advocates.
You know, advocates who will express their dissatisfaction with our constantly being sent to the back of the bus and told to wait our turn for civil rights.
It is not 1994, it is 2009. When it comes to glbt issues, the rest of the western world has left America in the dust.
I didn't like it a decade ago when the HRC and their bretheren were only able to summon up rage at the murder of a young, white, gay man, because he looked like somebody who fit their chosen demographic.
It was right to be furious about the murder of Matthew Shepard. His memorial is my avatar.
But what of the killings of Byrd, Schoendeis, Gunn, Araujo, Teena, and countless others? Where was the rage for them? I don't think the African-American civil rights movement was that selective in the 50s and 60s, when determining who to mourn.
Similarly, today, the Democrats know that they have us in their back pocket thanks to the efforts of sell-outs like Solmonese.
Sorry, I no longer feel that they deserve an inch of latitude. Or another cent. That money is better spent on groups that actually echo our concerns.
Let them drink cocktails.
This is an extremely dangerous time for them organizationally (I mean that in terms of organizational growth). Most non-profits that survive to some level of maturity hit a point in their development when things start working and they attempt to maintain that system, even when the world is changing around them. They become blinded to the fact that when something that would have been awesome and amazing 10 years ago happens, today it's not even worth commenting on. Organizations that get stuck in the "it's working and we're sticking with it" mode die horrible deaths with their good work forgotten in the more recent memory of their decline.
What I'm reading this week is they've become so enamored of their seat at the table they've forgotten the point of having the seat was to be a full participant in the conversation, not a lapdog for the host.
Obama's problem is he's pissing on us and telling us it's raining. The HRC's job isn't to convince us it's really raining, it's to tell him it would be better to stop pissing on us before we get really annoyed. If they don't realize that or aren't capable of doing it, then they should die and let the successor organization take their place. Just because I respect the work of the Mattachine Society as the pioneers they were doesn't mean I'd be a member today if their mission was the same as stated in 1950.
That does not negate, however, the fact that many in the LGBT community DO feel like this.
Thankfully I'm not one of them.
NY-23 was terribly embarassing for the Right because you had wingnuts trying to out-crazy each other, and republican bashing republican for being not crazy enough for the wacky base. If there's going to be fodder for the right, let's put our professional face forward.
That isn't the front that should be put up for this. I think John has put out the complaints that the community has with DNC and Human Rights Champagne, but it doesn't sound like a letter from someone you just broke up with.
DNC/HRC is like the cable company. Yelling, screaming, and being a pain in the ass gets you ignored. Working with them gets you a little bit of help, but if that's not the way you want to go, you take your dollars elsewhere.
I don't think anyone can realisticly say HRC is detrimental to our community. At worst, it's inaction.
This is our chance to show the face of our disapproval without sounding like we were stood up on a date.
1) There are not all that many in the glbt community who are versed all that well in gay politics unless they have a vested interest in it (for example, marriage or parenting issues, or a serviceperson who is in danger of getting booted).
Many people give their contributions to HRC and just assume that they are looking out for our interests. I am truly amazed what a small percentage of my gay friends are aware about what is, or isn't being done for
them by glbt advocacy groups. For the most part they know little of gay politics until they see a story about the Maine defeat. Very few come to forums such as this one.
So, they make their contributions and spend their money, without knowing what little has been done on their behalf.
That money could be better spent on advocates who are a little less complicit in allowing such political inaction to go unchallenged.
So, my first contention is that the HRC is taking money to perpetuate their organization and their access, with little in the way of accomplishment to show for it.
2) But what is even worse is that groups like HRC give credibility and cover for the Democrats, so that they feel that they do not need to do more than they already have.
I am sure that Rahm Emanuel has calculated that Obama capitulating to gays on any issue will only cost votes in 2010. Therefor, the pitch is to play along to keep the Dems in power. But we get nothing out of it for the glbt community.
This would be fine if they didn't lie to us and promise us otherwise, in exchange for our money and activism to help them get elected.
We were used. Blatantly used.
So, you see, I do not see it as simply a matter of cannabilism and eating our own.
I feel that the HRC, by their deliberate political maneuverings, enables the Obama administration to continue using gays as pawns. Pawns to raise finances and pawns to help them get re-elected.
Fool me once....
Second, your argument assumes that, at worst, they are merely responsible of nothing more than "inaction." They are accepting the dollars of sponsors and donors in the name of the LGBT community and doing actual damage to us with those dollars. The loss in Maine creates serious damage to our cause for equal protection under the law. The DNC/HRC handily snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and handed a bunch of feathers out for the caps of those who use religion as a guise for hate/discrimination. How's your morale? Mine's shot.
All of that? It is _damage_.
Yet, they still have this core of group-think fascists putting out a bad word on those miserable little mislead gays that might dare speak out against them. From its very first days, HRC has not represented even a common interest of mine. When I (a gay military veteran - retired) write to them with some constructive ideas for other directions to follow (simultaneously) and they respond back to me as if I were an errant, petulant child it is time to re-think the how's and why's around the actual PURPOSE of the organization.
They cannot and will not brook disagreement in their ranks or from their fellow fags. It isn't my fault, but I'm totally willing to keep rubbing their noses in it. As it stands, they cannot truthfully say that they have ever had my best interests at heart. I mean, come on, where's the beef?!
What has HRC done for you? Why should we quell the voice of critique in a fashion that comes across (to me) as "respect" when they have none for the community they claim to represent? Why does HRC get to come across as if our actions are at cross-purposes to each other but that mine are wrong and theirs are righteous? Why do they get to set the tone of the discussion? And, WHY oh WHY do they think that they are the only ones who can effect change?! I am well over tired of them...they aren't even good puppets of the bureaucracies.
How'z'bouts we _not_ focus on conditionals of IF and WHEN and get to the NOW part. Yeah, how'z'bouts that...
NOW, what a novel idear...
They need to be squeezed too, until they start demanding results instead of pining for access to the administration.
Barrack Obama makes me the sickest of everyone though. A black man makes it all the way to President of the United States, with help from the gay community, and he can't lift a finger to help others gain their civil rights. What a slap in the face. I'll never be able to look at the man without disdain again. Never.
When, the HRC calls asking for money I'll tell them to GTFO and hang up the phone.
Wow.
Just...wow.
They need to disappear!
Last summer, my partner of 11 years and I decided to get wills, power of attorney for health care and property. Another thing we wanted to do is set up a living trust - making an LGBT-support organization a beneficiary. I was given the task of researching a worthwhile group.
I called HRC - it took 4 phone calls to speak with a live person - and told them our intention. When I asked for a list of specific accomplishments the HRC made on behalf of LGBT people, I was referred to the HRC web homepage.
I remarked that the HRC page listed news stories of advances in the LGBT community over which the HRC wrote,"WORKING FOR LESBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL AND TRANSGENDER EQUAL RIGHTS." When I asked which of these advances were made as a direct intervention of the HRC, I was told - "Let me get back with you..."
No one ever got back to us...
HRC is full of "it" . . .
Seriously, who's interests are they working for? I think it's for the great White House cocktail parties and presidential speeches at their annual fund raiser.