OnLine With Zoe

Out Love, not Out Rage

I saw Outrage on Friday.  Besides being supportive, I was curious.  I am always looking for agreement, camaraderie, unity.  I found the movie’s premise lost under the weight of the title.  Even watching the movie makers on the View that morning, it wasn’t readily obvious that author and blogger, Michael  Rogers was objecting to closeted people voting against their very people they have relationships with.  Closeted gay men in politics are voting against HIV/AIDS funding, against gay marriage, against making crimes against LGBT people a hate crime.  It is the chasm between their sexual orientation and their visible, measurable, callous voting record.  Frankly, for me, it begs the question, would they be less stalwart if they were straight.
 
The characters in the movie, opening with Larry Craig, were all recognizable.  Those of us who read gay news are aware of these men and their voting records.  I have to admit, I have zero idea what this looks like to straight people.  Heck, I got emails this week asking me if Adam Lambert is gay – straights see things very differently than I do.  Governor McGreevey was bright, radiant – no really – like someone who just discovered deep spiritual relief.  Governor Crist was slimy and resistant; what is the opposite of present? 

A paragraph  on women ~ Elizabeth Birch of the Human Right Campaign was terrific, moving and honest.  Rep. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin was open and relaxed.  Oh but the wives, the terrified wives, standing next to the pathetic closeted husbands at counterfeit press conferences; Mrs. Craig, Mrs. McGreevey, Mrs. Crist.  Actually there are thousands of straight spouses who are trapped infraudulent lives,  holding their families together.  How the gay spouse can do this is really beyond me.  I kissed a girl, I liked it and I came out; all within about 5 seconds.   And it is no secret that there are many, many lesbians and bi women in politics ( no I have not slept with all of them) but I can tell you that I have never seen them vote against LGBT rights or human rights for that matter.
 
But what really bothered me, deeply bothered me, was one clip of Larry Kramer, beloved founder of Act-Up.  Certainly this brave hero of the LGBT movement said dozens of quote-ables during the taping but what they chose to show was Mr. Kramer saying that activism comes from rage, from anger.  For me it was like hearing nails on a chalkboard.  I have spent over 40 years working to deepen my understanding and practice that successful, lasting activism comes from love.  You cannot convert the opponent by burning his car, breaking her windows, clubbing their kids.  Fear will never create conversion.  (aren’t we having a national conversation about torture on this right now?)

However, more importantly, the oppressed will become poisoned by the violence.  The minority has to find love in their heart and become irresistible.  That is the only way to create a healthy movement, a true lasting conversion and extinguish fear.  I was fortunate to spend some time with Jeremy Gilley, the British filmmaker who is creating International Peace Day, through his film-making of Peace One Day and The Day After Peace.  I told him that I am not as worried about those who die by gunshot as I am about those who pull the trigger as they live on with their hearts broken.  Violence is intoxicating, contagious and another disease – like homophobia.
  
Tuesday, May 26 is California’s Day Of Decision.  On Facebook, the White Night Riots video has been viraling around.  I want to tell people that clearly those 1979 riots did not work or we would not be rising up for our rights in 2009.  Releasing of violence may be billed as good for you but it isn’t.  It is not some limited energy that must be spent.  It is a viral, burgeoning disease that only attracts itself.   If you are angry, you deserve to be loved.  If you are homophobic, you need to love and be loved.  No matter what happens on Tuesday, extinguishing  anger with love is the only way that will last.  

American Idol From My POV

Last night’s American Idol was an extraordinary show.  I sat on the couch with the poodle, skipping through the commercials having a great time.  The last few minutes sucked, as we all know Adam Lambert is the more talented, long term idol but that’s what happens when voters are little Christian girls who dream of Kris Allen being their friend, singing to them on their thirteenth birthday.  Hell, all us older girls (over 17)  and gay/bi guys, who want Adam to sing to us on any birthday, just didn’t vote – “vote, we don’t need no stinkin’ votes!”

The insight that bowled me over and is still powering through my day, began with Cyndi Lauper and Allison Iraheta.  Sitting knee-to-knee, singing Time After Time, led me to feel thrilled for Allison, thrilled out of her mind.  It just seemed glorious, unimaginably glorious to be next to her idol; almost appearing to be peers; knowing their are not in one way and clearly equal in another.  Of course they are links in a chain of artistry and we had a front row seat.  The TV show included, among others,  Lionel Richie with Danny Gokie, Queen Latifah with Lil Rounds and Adam Lambert with KISS.  These pairs are runners in the relay of music. 

I wondered who I would like to meet.  Who have I met that handed me a baton?  Names poured though my mind; Mary Daly, Sally Miller Gearhart, Kate Millet, Barbara Love, Gloria Steinem, Grace Welch, Riane Eisler, Flo Kennedy, Dr. Joseph Lowery, Jacqui Ceballos, Margie Adam  and so many more.  The reason I could feel so much for these contestants was because I have sat knee-to-knee with my inspiration. 

What am I doing to hand off this baton before my time is over?  There is lots of conversation within the American Women’s Movement about “intergenerational feminism.”  American Idol made me really question the uproar.  I doubt if Allison felt that Cyndi was too old to be playing with her, even though Cyndi was playing an old fashioned Appalacian dulcimer.  Carlos Santana, Queen, Rod Stewart were sure not presented as old and out of date. 

In the world of feminism, I think the problem is identifying the baton.  My experience is that older women think the baton is the message imbedded in their tried and true methods and, for the most part, the methods are entirely out of date.  For younger women, the message and the methods are not what they need or can use. 

The real baton is courage, insight and passion.  Older to younger, experienced to newbie, seer to seeker, this entire conversation will change both in content and context when the baton is properly identified as energy ignited with wisdom ~ not message or methods.  They are specific to each activist, each generation and not required for the movement to continue.  Insisting that the methods and message are the baton is short-sighted and counter-productive.  As Kara Dioguardi said it all season, true artistry is taking a classic and making it your own. 

Find Some Balance ~ Roe v Wade is Going to Explode

If you watched Meet the Press today, ( no I did not get up at that hour, I TIVO’ed it) you heard that a new Gallup poll said that, for the first time, the majority of US adults identify as pro-life.  In fact it is now 52%.  It is not lost on me that the President did not keep his campaign promise to pass the Freedom of Choice Act.  Some may recall that NARAL endorsed Obama/Biden.  I can’t help but wonder what they are thinking today.

I have to admit that I am really enjoying participating in the Marriage Equality movement.  I am not used to working on a movement that is on a roll, that is national, that has reached its tipping point.  It is thrilling; exhilarating.  It is finding leaders and heroes.  Have you heard of Lt. Dan Choi and his organization, Knights Outs?  Join with them, donate to them and demand that Obama repeal DADT.   Obama did write a note to 2nd Lt. Sandy Tsao; Thanks for your wonderful and thoughtful letter. It is because of outstanding Americans like you that I committed to changing our current policy. Although it will take some time to complete ( partly because it needs Congressional action ) I intend to fulfill my commitment!    Get on board with this movement and push this wave.  It is uplifting to feel momentum! 

You need to establish some balance because the whole country is about to split and spit and kick and yell as the Supreme Court appointment is announced and debated.  The wild protesters outside of Notre Dame today are just a small sample of the wicked ugly zeal the anti-choice people thrive on.  I have stood many, many times, toe-to-toe with anti-choice people and they simply confound me.  I cannot imagine standing on a corner holding a photo of a saline burned fetus ~ what would that feel like?  Frankly if I was anti-choice, I would want posters that were easy to look at, radiant with prana, ~~ but oh, wait that vibration is pro-choice, pro-liberation, pro- freedom.

While circling the Circle of Orange at the 2008 Roe v. Wade Demonstration I had the most interesting experience.   Usually I march in silence and occasionally I feel inspired to stop and say a decade of the rosary with a Catholic family.  Obviously it is fun to demonstrate that love of the rosary is not the private property of the anti-choice people.  As I was standing still, a woman walked up to me and asked if my name is Zoe.  “Yes, it is.” I replied.  She went on to explain that she had been in my NOW chapter in the 70’s.   I asked her how she came to change her mind about abortion and she told me that it happened from watching a show on the Discovery Channel about fetal development.  Seeing the formation of a hand, a heart, was what it took for her to become an advocate for the anti-choice movement.  The entire time we talked, we held hands.  Her teenage children were horrified that their mother was friendly with a pro-choice (baby-killer)  person.

I love that moment.  I am proud of that moment.  She recognized me and felt she could speak with me.  I must have been open that night; open to any and all.  I am very much aware that I am often not open but this moment made it clear that I am capable of it; so much so it is perceivable by an opponent.  What is on the horizon scares me a bit, concerns me a bit,  the country is going to argue and claim ownership of god and goodness and trust and liberty.  I need to be balanced, stand silently in the face of violence and hold my heart open. 

"Health Insurers Agree to End Higher Premiums for Women"

I never intended to be a one note person and, chances are you know I am not, but this ERA thing keeps pouring through me.  I am absolutely certain that the explicit inclusion of all genders in the US Constitution will change the fundamental vibration of my country and, thus, the world.  It is easy to understand when I consider how it feels now without the ERA.  We kill people, thousands of people, to force countries to include all genders but here, it seems to be VERY important to NOT include everyone, as it has not passed in 86 years. 

It upsets me that I get pigeon-holed both by issue and age on this.  It is easy to perceive.  Dismissive people may think it is masked; be assured it is not.  What is the thinking on this?  That it is trivial?  Tired of listening?  Oh, pro-ERA people are dam tired of it and proof of its importance is easier to demonstrate everyday. 

New York Times, May 6, 2009, “WASHINGTON — Insurance companies offered Tuesday to end the practice of charging higher premiums to women than to men for the same coverage."  Maybe this admission by Karen M. Ignagni, president of America’s Health Insurance Plans, a trade group, before the Senate Finance Committee did not register on your rector scale but it should.  Feminists have been writing, speaking, protesting about this for many, many years and, more importantly, the gender disparity held by health insurance companies has been identified as the primary obstacle to the ERA. 

Ellie Smeal explained that the ERA wasn’t lost in the public square, but behind closed doors ~ Insurance companies, banks, and other corporate interests thought the amendment would be bad for business.  Insurance companies would no long be able to charge women higher health insurance premiums, deny pregnancy coverage, or pay less on women’s annuity plans because of a longer lifespan.  Banks would have to give credit to women on an equal basis. 

Charging women more for insurance, covering Viagra and not birth control pills; simply put ~ fining women for their biology is BIG BUSINESS.  And big business means very big campaign donations.   I know there are campaigns for the Equal Rights Amendment going on in non-ratified states.  I know people are spending hours and dollars working on legislators to pass the amendment in three more states. 

But this news, that the insurance companies may charge people equally, may just be the lifting of the biggest obstacle to realizing my dream of the ERA. 

Working on my Racism

As you can see in the blog below, the National Women's Law Center posted a correction in the comments.  I just cannot stop thinking about it.  Like hundreds of others, I signed up to blog on Fair Pay Day about the significance of the day.  God knows we need information about the wage gap and, surprisingly, that the day is not a celebration as so many seem to think.  It is not a holiday; it is a significator of hard work reaping different values based on sex.  It is based on the number 77.8 %.  The short hand of it is that a man and woman who start working fulltime on January 1, 2008, it will take the woman working to April 28, 2009 to make the money a man made by December 31, 2008.

I can remember carrying signs that said 59 and 63 cents so, now, to see this increase to 77.8 is slow but growing increase.  This has been a real pillar of my talks.  I tell college students that they borrow at the same rate but have to pay back with this disparity.  And a two adult household of gay men makes 200% but two lesbians make 156%.  And that a husband and wife working make 178%, etc.  Then I would look around the room and, with shame and alarm, I would say that Black and Latina women make even less with their gender compounded with their race.  I thought I was taking responsibility for the racial inequity.  But hidden in the top amount of 77.8 is a racism that I cannot stop thinking about. 

As I was told yesterday, 77.8 is not what I can make as a white woman.  White women make 81%.  After all of the years carrying a sign with this all important number I find out that this is the AVERAGE of what women make which, obviously, means that the disparity between the races is not only worse and wider but HIDDEN in this averaging.  I am just furious about this.  I am just in tears about this - I have participated in this amalgam of obfuscation, not that I think it is intentional but its not clear, not honest and carries a callousness that we, as caring people, have to examine.

As an activist, I often throw around the room the proper axiom that we are only as advanced as our least; how we care for the least is how we care for all; we can be known by how we treat the least among us.  There are so many ways to say it that it is attributed to King, Gandhi, Jesus, etc.  But how can we ever make this determination if it is all rolled into one?  Wouldn't the right thing be to go with the least?  Isn't the real wage gap the White men and Latina women = 41 cents?  The signs should read 59 cents.

Over the last year I have been giving some of my time to the Marriage Equality Movement, not without some internal conflict.  Let's face it the best thing to do would be to delete marriage from governmental lexicon entirely but, in any event, it is about equality and I deeply believe in that.  However I am concerned that the masses of men and women, upon winning the right to marry and have unencumbered access to over a thousand rights, will consider the job done and stop participating in the work for equality.  The men will go home the victors and the women will still be earning less, under represented, missing from the Constitution and this evasive, all important, equality will still be be needing advocates. 

One man who knew this was Harvey Milk.  He insisted on including women in politics and society.  (memo to Lance Black - what were you thinking??)  Just as Gloria Steinem will speak on a panel only if Women of Color are seated also.  Over 40 years of carrying signs about the wage gap and today, TODAY, I crack open in seeing that even my sign was racist.  I am not guilty.  I am not wrong.  I am evolving.