Why Alphabet Soup Upsets My Stomach

As a gay man, I have found myself at odds with many in the community on how we as a whole label ourselves. To be honest, the current trend has me concerned that our efforts have become splintered and divisive at a time when we need unity more than ever before. The “alphabet soup” approach needs to be retired, and a single defining word which encompasses all aspects of the community must become commonplace.

A bit of my own history first. As I stated, I am gay. It took twenty-one years to accept that fact about myself. It was the summer of 1986, between my sophomore and junior years at Texas A&M. When I had arrived as an undergrad in the Fall of 1984, Gay Student Services Organization (GSSO) was still fighting the university in federal court to get official recognition as a student group. Despite not yet being “out,” I wrote letters supporting “them.” I was on campus - still in the closet - the day the Supreme Court chose to not hear A&M’s appeal of the Fifth Circuit Court’s ruling that they had to recognize GSSO.

So, back to Fall 1986. I joined the now-recognized Gay Student Services at the first meeting of the semester. Spring of 1987 I was elected Vice President, and became the de-facto President that summer. After I dropped out of college at the end of the Summer semester - facing the reality that I had been diagnosed with HIV - I left GSS, since I was no longer a student.

In 1989, a group of lesbians wanted to force the organization to change its name, from Gay Student Services to Gay & Lesbian Student Services (or GLaSS). Two former officers of GSSO and myself defended the original name of the group, as did a few gay women who found the term “lesbian” to be too militant. Ultimately, our side lost the vote, and the next month, none of the lesbians who had forced the change were there - and they never returned.

In 1997, Ellen Degeneres infamously came out on her sitcom, Ellen. She didn’t announce that she was a lesbian. She proudly stated (through the open microphone), “I’m gay.” Not, "I'm a lesbian." Gay. Most people, when coming out to friends or their parents, phrase it the same way, regardless of gender. It’s easier.

Jump forward to August 2000. After my thirteen year relationship ended with a crash, I decided it was time for me to do something for the gay community - something I’d been denied by my now ex. I set out to create an organization for queer faculty & staff at A&M. The name our committee came up with prior to the first formal meeting was Gay & Lesbian Professional Network. I wanted to avoid the mess that GSSO/GLaSS went through by being pro-active.

No such luck. At the first meeting there was a bisexual woman and a transgendered woman. Each insisted that their designation be included in the organization’s name. I’d thought ahead and made certain the it was in the bylaws, but that wasn’t enough for them. I pointed out how important it was that those outside our community - Texas A&M University being well-known as ultra-conservative -  know who we were, and that a lengthy name or acronyms would just confuse everybody. After much debate and giving the members a month to consider, the vote was to name the group GLBT Professional Network.

I’ve done a great deal of thinking since then. Is it a detriment to our community to put every possible letter of the alphabet into every organization’s name for people to feel included? How do we decide the order of the letters - which comes first, and should that honor rotate? As you add Intersexed, Queer, Questioning, Asexual, Pansexual, Non-Sexual, Xenosexual, Unisexual, and more to the soup, wouldn’t it soon be easier to include every letter - just to be safe?

How about that Sesame Street song? “Ab kadef gee jeckly mnop ker stu witsez”? I’m sure Bert & Ernie would love to sing it for us. I’d bet the Muppesexuals want to have their personal label in any organizations name, too. Would you risk angering Dr. Bunsen Honeydew and Beaker by ignoring their demands?

Or shall we just pick the letter of the week out of a bag of Scrabble tiles? Of course, how many would we need to pick to make everybody happy? I don’t think there’s enough letters in the alphabet to make everybody happy.

And when the words are shortened to just the first letter, how can anybody know what they stand for? Perhaps A is for A-sexual. Or maybe Andro-sexual. Could be Almost-sexual. How about Any-sexual? When only those on the inside know what the letters mean - and even then, not everybody in the community will be aware - it divides us, and thus weakens us and our voice.

Why Queer Queer Queer, QUEER is the Word

While gay may suffice for gay men and women, it doesn’t quite work for all aspects of our community. A transgender person may begin life as a gay man, but become a straight woman. Somebody born with indeterminate gender can still be straight, but still consider themselves outside the “norm”.

This is why I feel it’s time for us to embrace the queer.

Perhaps it’s best to start this discussion with the definition of the word.

strange or odd from a conventional viewpoint; unusually different; singular

The main reason many people in our community dislike the word queer is that first meaning. While I myself often embrace my strange sense of humor, and relish in being seen as odd by somebody that doesn’t know me (or even by those who do), I do understand how the word can still hurt. Any word, used to diminish another, causes pain to the one targeted. I know. I’ve suffered the slings and arrows of verbal name-calling myself - was called queer (among other things) in high school a number of times.

But as we age, we should learn how to turn the negatives that life (and people) throws at us and make them positives. Much like turning the pink triangle patch that homosexual men were forced to wear in the Nazi concentration camps into a symbol of our struggle. We remember the pain by claiming the mark as our own. A way to announce to the world, “Never again.”

Now on to the second definition. I can understand being different, but what makes it unusual? Look around you. Every person is unique. Now look in the mirror. Okay, not the best suggestion because you look exactly like your reflection - only reversed. But use that to see what makes you different, especially unusually so. Do you realize that  you aren’t seeing yourself as the world sees you? That the part in your hair appears to you to be on the right, but it’s actually on your left. Wow. That’s pretty unusual when you think about it.

As for singular, I’m going to defend this by showing my gayness. Why being singular is a wondrous thing. By using lyrics from a Broadway play. 'A Chorus Line,' to be exact.

One… singular sensation
Every little step he takes.
One… thrilling combination
Every move that he makes.
One smile and suddenly nobody else will do;
You know you'll never be lonely with you know who.
One… moment in his presence
And you can forget the rest.
For the guy is second best
To none,
Son.
Ooooh! Sigh! Give him your attention.
Do. I. Really have to mention?
He's the One!

There you have it. Queer embraces us all - not despite our unusual differences, or despite our singular-nes, or despite our strange and odd ways. Queer defines us because of these things. Queer brings us together, unites us, and strengthens us as a community. And that’s a good thing.

One last defense. The classic march chant. The one we say when “I’m mad and I’m not going to take it anymore” just doesn’t speak to us the right way.

“We’re here. We’re Queer. Get used to it.”

Or, in my opinion:

“We’re still here. We’re all Queer. You damn well better get used to it!”

We should not fear them, and if we are united in name, we become united in purpose, and the Power of Queer becomes invincible and unstoppable. And then they will fear us. We, the United Queers of America.

Especially when we don our gay apparel and it's not even a holiday.

On the California Supreme Court Ruling

There are times I'm ashamed of my fellow Americans. The very negative response to the California Supreme Court's ruling that marriage equality was a right under the state Constitution just amazes me.

In all reality, the rights of full equality - inclusive of all Americans, not just some or most - is the purpose of our nation's Constitution as well. It is also embodied in our Declaration of Independence - that ALL [...] are created equal.

Why are so many people afraid of letting everybody live their lives, free of interference from government, church or society? If one person has a right, should not everybody have it as well? How selfish to think that liberty should ever be exclusive.

When I was a child, I loved what I understood America to be. I believed in it then, with the innocence an naivete of a child. As I grew older, I began to see that what I believed in was as real as Neverland, or Wonderland. Or Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy. I realized that only one word suffice to define all of these things: lie.

But I'm realizing something else. That we have all been deceived and thus disillusioned by that lie. So, in response, we fail to accept the power of the words which built our nation. We the People no longer hold the power in this country, so we grab at straws, believing it's right to allow a majority to take away the rights of a minority. That a judicial system put in place to ensure the rights of the minority are not denied by the democratic process must be "activist judges" when they are simply doing their duty as proscribed in the Constitution.

If only our electoral system works as smoothly as voting for constitutional amendment to take away from our neighbors, families and friends.

But be cautious: in trying to vote in Constitutional amendments, you set a precedence. What if all the non-white Americans chose to unite against the white Americans. They nearly have the majority, and we white folks tend to blow off voting. You could wake of after election day with no rights at all. Bet you'll be wishing you hadn't gotten rid of all those "activist judges," won't you?

But the "battle" over marriage rights does not belong in the states. It's a federal right - a civil right.

And I will continue to fight for the America I loved as a child. Fight to bring true "liberty and justice" - and equality - "for all."

Open Letter to Barack Obama

Okay. I've held my tongue long enough.

Senator Obama,

As a gay man, I'm tired of being told by a black man that I should be in the back of the bus, that I can't eat in the front of a restaurant, or that I must drink from a different water fountain.

Okay, perhaps that's not entirely true, but as a man who pays an equal share of taxes as a non-gay person does, I'm certainly not feeling that I am getting an equal share of the liberties my fellows on the 'straight' side of the fence receive.

We've been told we shouldn't be teachers, or be allowed near children. We've been blamed for AIDS and condemned and damned because of a virus which can affect and is affecting anybody. We are told we can't hold office, we can't have our jobs or our housing rights protected. We are even denied the rights to life, liberty and happiness - which are, supposedly, unalienable.

I - and the entire gay and transgendered community - am being treated like a second-class citizen. Take those few steps back in time, when you and the black race were treated as described above. How did it make you feel? Like an American, or just somebody who paid full price for a piece of the dream and got nothing in return?

Take a few more steps back, when you would never have been allowed to hold the office of Senator, nor could you have run for the office of President of the United States. Just don't step back too far, or you just might find yourself in chains. Or worse.

Last week in Oregon, you stated "We’ve got a war that is bankrupting us. And we’re going to argue about gay marriage? I mean, that doesn’t make any sense.”

Hmm. Interesting. The Vietnam war began in 1961. The Civil Rights act was passed in 1964, the Voting Rights Act in 1965 and in 1967 the Supreme Court made the ban on interracial marriage illegal. The Vietnam war raged until April 30, 1975. So, perhaps those unimportant issues which improved the lives of the black citizens of this nation should have been ignored while we were so deeply involved in war. They could have waited for a later time.

I am certainly not suggesting such a thing. I believe it is a sad "birth defect" that, despite the powerful words of our own Declaration of Independence, it took nearly 100 years for the slaves to be granted freedom, and another 100 for the civil rights act to be passed to protect that freedom.

But that does not mean that another select group of American citizens should be denied full equality. Nor does it give you the right to use your religion to support such denials of liberty.

Faith created the stigma and discrimination surrounding HIV/AIDS, and continues to do so. Faith was the problem, and is not the solution. A virus has nothing to do with religion. Period. In fact, a virus is perhaps the most secular thing there is. Keep religion out of AIDS; we remember the damage they already did to the fight against this disease. I remember.

The President of the Unites States must be secular. To oversee a nation of such diversity requires that one not put their religion before the equal rights of all people.

The America I grew up loving and believing in is one where every person has the same rights, the same opportunities. Nobody should feel themselves restricted in living their lives. Nobody. Not you, not me. Not anyone.

So consider your words carefully. How would you react if, back in the 1960's, somebody said "We’ve got a war that is bankrupting us. And we’re going to argue about CIVIL RIGHTS FOR BLACKS? I mean, that doesn’t make any sense.” What if they said that today?

A bit of perspective, walking in another man's shoes, is good for the soul. And, perhaps, the sole as well.

If you want to be a force for change, then truly change how Americans are treated in this nation. The words "with liberty and justice for all" are powerful, and mean a lot to the people of this nation. Make is so. Ensure that we truly are the land of the free, the land of the equal.

Keep Religion Out of Texas Government

"When the Federal Republican Constitution of their country, which they have sworn to support, no longer has a substantial existence, and the whole nature of their government has been forcibly changed, without their consent, from a restricted federative republic, composed of sovereign states, to a consolidated central military despotism, in which every interest is disregarded but that of the army and the priesthood, both the eternal enemies of civil liberty, the everready minions of power, and the usual instruments of tyrants."

So reads the second sentence of the Texas Declaration of Independence, ratified unanimously on March 2, 1836 while the Alamo was under siege by Santa Ana's armies. They are the words of true Texans (and Texians and Tejanos). They are the true voice of Texas.

Being a native-born Texan, I've been ashamed of my home state ever since George W. Bush was elected Governor. Perry has added to the disaster that Texas has become.

When Perry announced support for the unethical and unconstitutional (both state and federal) amendment to deny gay Texans equality in marriage, he did so in front of a church. He played the Christian voters like a harp, just as George W. Bush has been doing.

"The instruments of tyrants" indeed.

With the adding of the words "under God" to the state Pledge of Allegiance, Perry has further played the religion card. Many people seem to believe that those words had always existed in the federal pledge, but they have not. That pledge had been written by northern Baptist minister Francis Bellamy on September 7, 1892. Bellamy strongly agreed with our nation's founders of the importance and necessity of separation of church and state.

In 1954, the words were unconstitutionally added to our nation's pledge, forever blurring the boundaries, and our nation's liberties continue to suffer from this

The question now is, do I stay or do I leave? The answer is written in the blood of the fallen defenders of the Alamo. I am a Texan, a Texan am I. I will stay, and fight, for I shall never forget the Alamo, nor the sacrifice which it represents in the name of liberty for all.

In the immortal words of William Barrett Travis, "Victory or Death!"

Texas Declaration of Independence