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furrbearFrom Rev Susan Russell's blog An Inch At a Time: Reflections on the Journey. Rev. Susan surrently serves as President of the GLBT Episcopal group Integrity USA and serves on the staff of All Saints Episcopal Church, Pasadena, CA, as Senior Associate for Parish Life.
I’m writing this on the plane home from Washington DC, -- where the sense of energy and anticipation of new hopes, new beginnings and new opportunities was positively palpable. The first thing I saw when I got off the plane on Tuesday at Reagan National was the rack of “Yes, We Did!” t-shirts in the airport gift shop -- and the news all week was practically giddy with inauguration, transition team and new administration appointment talk.
Our work with the Human Rights Campaign Religion Council (the meetings I was there to attend) was all about how we – as religious leaders committed to an inclusive legislative agenda – can help move that agenda forward, as we come to the end of eight years of “Don’t Even Think About It” and enter a historic new era of “Yes, We Can!”
And yet.
In California, we face the uphill battle to undo what a multi-million dollar campaign of fear based disinformation did on November 4th when we took a historic step in the other direction of writing discrimination into the state constitution and eliminating the right of same-sex couples to civil marriage by passing, by a narrow margin, Proposition 8.
And what I’m wondering tonight, on this homeward bound flight toward LAX, is if the 2008 California election has not done for systemic homophobia what Hurricane Katrina did for systemic racism -- exposed it to the harsh light of day in a way that it can no longer be either ignored or denied. And I’m wondering if we can’t claim that reality and mobilize around it.
Because here’s the deal: a fear-based campaign doesn’t work unless people think there’s really something to be afraid of. We may think it’s ludicrous to imagine that the institution of marriage which has so far survived Mickey Rooney, Elizabeth Taylor and Britney Spears (not to mention Henry VIII with his six wives and Solomon with his many!) is going to be “threatened” by a few thousand same-sex couples wanting to live happily ever after. But remember, a “phobia” is – by its very definition -- an “irrational” fear: so there’s no point trying to use logic to overcome it.
And it is no more true that only those with “Yes on 8” signs on their lawns are infected with homophobia than it is that only those burning crosses on other people’s lawns are infected with racism. Homophobia is – and continues to be – both an external and internal challenge to liberty and justice for all in this nation. And it is a challenge we must meet head on if we are going to fully live into the promise of “Yes, We Can!”
The first “nudge” I got on this was last week as I watched (yet another) CNN report on the Prop 8 struggle. At the end of the interview with Lambda Legal attorney Jennifer Pizer, the reporter said to her, “Isn’t it time to stop marching in the streets and trying to work through the courts and instead convince voters that same sex-couples deserve to be married?”
“Whoa, now,” I thought! “What other category of American citizen has to convince voters that they ‘deserve’ equal protection?”
Now don’t get me wrong – I’m all about education and outreach to change hearts and minds – that’s what “Voices of Witness” was about, that’s what our work at Lambeth Conference was about and that’s what our ongoing work and witness toward General Convention in the Episcopal Church is about.
But if the court deciding Brown v Board of Education had waited until voters were convinced that African American children “deserved” equal education, then we’d still be looking at segregated schools and I wouldn’t be flying home from Washington DC with three “President Obama” t-shirts in my carry-on!
Barack Obama's election does not mean we’re “done” with racism – not by a long shot. But it took all of it – the courts and the crowds and the legislation and the lawyers and the protests and the persuasion to get us to this historic “Yes, We Did!” moment – and our struggle against homophobia deserves nothing less than that full court press.
And here’s why: Because homophobia isn’t just “out there” – it’s “in here.”
This week, a member of our Integrity Board received an email from a member in her region, saying he did not believe Integrity should be supporting the Prop 8 protests, suggesting that “instead of making a big to-do about it, we should instead prove that we are worthy of marriage.”
She didn’t ask me for a response, but I gave her one anyway:"What pack of lies we've been told that WE -- citizens of these United States and baptized members of the Body of Christ have to "prove that we are worthy of marriage." Let me put that in theological terms: BULL SHIT!! I'll get back to you when I'm a little less lit about this."Well, it’s been a week and I’m not less “lit.” But here’s my response today to the idea that we have to “prove we are worthy:”
No, We Don’t
No, We Don’t
No, We Don’t
We do not have to prove that as citizens of these United States we are entitled to anything less than the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness we claim as foundational values for all Americans.
We do not have to prove that as baptized members of the Body of Christ our relationships are any less whole, holy and blessed than those of our heterosexual brothers and sisters.
What we can and will prove, however, is that this attack against our civil rights in California is not just about same-sex marriage that impacts a small percentage of American citizens but about core American values that impact us all.
Here’s how I responded to an emailed question from a USC journalism student asking, “What did you hope to accomplish by participating in the Prop 8 protest rallies on November 15th?”
What we hoped to accomplish was what I believe we DID accomplish: give voice to the righteous indignation of those who see this battle over Proposition 8 as a civil rights struggle with much broader implications than a few thousand same-sex couples who want to live happily ever after.
What we face in the ongoing struggle to combat Proposition 8 are forces willing to abandon historic, foundational principles of equal protection, separation of powers and the sanctity of an independent judiciary in order to achieve their narrow, bigoted, theological goals. I believe it is nothing less than the slippery slope from democracy to theocracy and we are at a defining moment in that struggle as we work together to challenge Proposition 8.
What we accomplished on Saturday, November 15th at the City Hall in Pasadena and in civic centers all over this great nation of ours was the beginning of what I fervently believe will be a new movement reclaiming liberty and justice for all (not just some) as a common, shared, achievable aspiration of the American Dream.
The election of Barack Obama as our 44th president was two huge steps forward toward that goal – Proposition 8 was a disappointing step back. What we accomplished on Saturday was demonstrating our refusal to settle for that step back and to claim for LGBT Americans the same hope our president-elect has called for us ALL to claim and to proclaim.
And we do NOT have to apologize for that. We do NOT have to settle for less than that. And we most certainly do NOT have to “prove” that we deserve equal protection as citizens of these United States.
No, We Don’t.
No, We Don’t.
No, We Don’t.
Remember that “nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal?” It’s the nation that had to fight a civil war to decide whether “all men” meant ALL men or just white men. And it wasn’t a fight that ended at Appomattox – that struggle continues today as we combat the systemic racism has been called “America’s Original Sin.”
It’s the nation that had to decide if “created equal” stopped with men and extended to women – and we know that the struggle to overcome sexism didn’t end with either the Suffragettes or with Steinem but continues to challenge us as a nation at every level of social engagement.
And now we’re engaged in this struggle to decide whether religious bigots have the power to add an asterisk after “created equal” reading “*unless you’re gay or lesbian, bisexual or transgender.”
Our answer to that question as a nation must be:
No, They Don’t!
No, They Don’t!
No, They Don’t!
And what’s our answer to whether or not we can muster the discipline and the determination to continue to move this country forward on that arc of history that bends toward inclusion until liberty and justice for all truly means “all?”
Yes, We Can!
Yes, We Can!
Yes, We Can!
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Date: 2008-11-23 08:49 pm (UTC)Just sayin'.
I wonder if Susan knows my friend Patrick Penrose from Long Beach, he and his then-partner used to drive up to Pasadena every Sunday for services at All Saint's.
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Date: 2008-11-23 10:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-24 06:38 am (UTC)