A Warning To Whoever Is Thinking Of Gay Bashing:

I went to the Night March: Our Solidarity Against Hate on October 9, 2010. The march wound through Chelsea from West 25^th Street and 9^th Avenue – a site of a recent bashing – down to Stonewall, unbelievably the site of another recent attack. A small crowd attended, maybe 300 people total. There were candles and nice, inoffensive chants, though a small group of young lesbians were getting cranky with the submissiveness of it all. They started being smarty-pants and interjecting slightly more aggravated statements. We were being lead in rounds of, “I am somebody,” and, “I deserve equality”. The little lesbians were saying they didn’t want to be bashed anymore. *Yawn*

I was a bit angrier than that. I was saying things like, “I’m here, I’m queer, try raping me with a baseball bat and I’ll kill you and burn your fucking house down, you stupid mother fucker” but that didn’t really rhyme.

The gay Asian soldier who got the boot and has been in the press recently led some of the chants. I wore the wrong shoes. One of the organizers was clearly out and proud and completely against contractions. He wouldn’t say “We won’t be bashed”; it had to be “We Will Not Be Bashed.” We shouted a lot and coughed from scratchy throats. A couple of people dropped their candles which then ignited the Dixie Cup at the top that is meant to block the wind and created a blaze in the middle of the street. And, I realized just how many straight people hang out in the West Village now.

We got to Stonewall, and this ancient queen who had too much to drink started addressing the crowd. “I remember the FIRST stonewall, I was there. I used to sleep with the Mafioso straight guys back then….” They took the mike from her. Then a nine year old boy with two mommies wrote who wrote a song about bullying sang. Everyone agreed that, yes, he WAS raised by lesbians – he sounded just like Melissa Etherege. And of course the song was about four stanzas too long, also an obviously inherited lesbian trait. Afterward, someone who got gay bashed in Times Square got on the mic said we wouldn’t fight back with violence but we’d show them with our love and by raising awareness, someone else encouraged us to educate our friends and families about the gay community, and then we were invited in for drinks.

What the fuck? When did being ball-less eunuchs become the norm in our community??? Where are Larry and the angry queers of Act Up? Someone suggested we needed the Lesbian Avengers to rise from the ashes; an activist group from the ‘90’s that I found to be elitist intellectual snobs, whose “actions” consisted mainly of tossing stink bombs into local politicians’ offices and spray painting a lot. But they wore black and could quote feminist poetry so somehow they would be relevant right now.

Our community has become all bitch and no bite.

One of the young smart-alecky lesbians talked to my friend Chauncey about wanting to collaborate on a website and exchanged info with him. She announced twice where she was going for a cheeseburger and split. She got us thinking – about food actually. So he and I went to the designated spot and though the young things never came we had our yummy cheeseburgers and a drink and giggled like school girls and then went home.

Not exactly “take back the night” and I’m not entirely sure what we accomplished, other than getting blisters and making a small scene on a Saturday night in the village – which of course is VERY gay. I was home by midnight.

THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED! Ooh, ow, eeff, pass me the foot cream will you sweetie?

This was our community response to the spate of recent suicides and news of bashings in the city, including kidnapping and torture of three men in the Bronx by a group of nine gang members; this weak-assed, lame, slow and respectful walk down to the village from Chelsea with chants that asked for acceptance and with candles in our hands. There are hundreds of “It Gets Better” videos being captured and launched on YouTube to encourage our kids not to off themselves. Some are really good – sweet, honest, open, and encouraging. Others are just lonely people talking about how bad they had it when they were gay teens. Some make me cringe at the incorrect grammar and poor English skills displayed. All talk about life after high school in the gay community like its nirvana and none are terribly angry. Chin up little duck, keep on keepin’ on, and once you’re here it will all be FaaaaaaaBulous.

Granted, I had a blast when I found my way to my truth – I did. After a couple of years of four activist meetings a week, phone trees, and wheat pasting, of shaving my head, taking 5am buses to D.C. to make some point or another, and of being out and proud to say, “I love you” right out loud, I immersed myself in the night life. I got high and drunk and fucked like bunny. I lived my high school experience like my high school class mates had, only in my twenties. Instead of shared lockers and class rings, apartment keys were exchanged on the third date and rainbow rings affixed to jackets. I worked with drag queens and was instructed on the art of throwing a dinner party. I was always taken care of, even if the people taking care of me were as dysfunctional as I was and a party to whatever drama had transpired that put me at their doorstep looking for support to begin with. I thought I was fabulous. I wore my red feather boa and my bustier and worked in 3” silver sequined heels at the Roxy, dropped my Ecstasy, sniffed my coke, drank my Southern Comfort, vodka shots and beer, gin and tonics, and wine by the crate. I was as much of an asshole to my fellow gays and lesbians as anyone else, and I was the very person I complain about now. My friends and I laughed at my ex’s; I couldn’t keep a single, salacious detail of my romps to myself, and was always proud of my 3-revolution weekends – a different girl each night, straight through ‘till Monday

Where are the videos about THAT?

I want to make a video – “It gets better…ish” to tell the kiddiewinks that they should hold on, they CAN get through high school *nodding big* yuh uh, yes they can…and then…they’ll have to navigate the mine field that is the gay community. I want to reassure them that after dealing with the bullshit of high school, the personal torture won’t necessarily abate, but it WILL be more fabulous. The music will be loud, the drugs free-flowing, and the drama high and psychotic. But you will find a place, and there is a community out there of big homos just like you. We’re here for you – we’ll embrace you, tell you you’re fabulous, listen to your dramatic poetry after your first break up, then set about trying to remake you in our image, play games with your head, break your heart and drive you to the brink of madness…but we’re family and we’re everywhere. We’re here, we’re queer, and we’re not going away even though sometimes you really wish we would. I want to hug the little ones and dry their tears and tell them that there are insane rules and regulations we impose on each other in our community, and lots of other social issues – like substance abuse, domestic violence, infidelity, and if you think college gossip is bad, hang onto your hats – but we ARE here, so you’re not really that alone after all, though perhaps with that description the idea of more of us may not be the liberating thought it was meant to be.

By the way, a small subset of the rules as I have found them – not a full list as that would be document thousands of pages thick – are:

• Twinks are separate and less than muscle boys, who are loathed by the Bears but accepted by the Daddies if they wear their hankie in the correct pocket.
• Women of color who are out must choose: butch or femme, and then they must act the part…at…all…times.
• Being introduced to someone’s girlfriend is a challenge to break up their relationship.
• Lying is acceptable as long as you are furthering your own agenda or the agenda of your chosen group of friends.
• Drug use and drinking, at least for a portion of your first few years of being out, is nearly mandatory, unless you are a fitness junkie.
• If you are a fitness junkie you must join a gay fitness group, sleep with at least one other member, and then gossip about that person when it doesn’t work out.
• Lesbians are required to have no sense of humor when it comes to misogynists, and a small portion of you will consider drag queens an affront to women everywhere, along with Eminem.
• Gay men must be catty and use the words “pussy” and “cunt” as though being gay men allows them as men to say things we wouldn’t accept from straight men.
• There is a uniform and a group to belong to; pure individualism is a fantasy and strictly prohibited.
• Depending on your chosen identification group, your hair must be shorn in accordance with that group’s bylaws, you must wear the appropriate footwear, and sometimes will be either required to wear flannel or required to burn it.
• Variations on a theme will be accepted but only to a point, and the theme must be aligned with one of the pre-existing subsets within the community.
• If you do not completely envelop your lover’s life within days for lesbians and a week for nesting gay men, including being connected at the hip and immediately integrating friend Facebook profiles and phone numbers, you will be treated like a pariah.
• For non-nesting gay men, you must fuck within minutes of meeting; anything up to and including 59 minutes is acceptable.
• Lesbians must nest.
• There is an exception, too, for lesbians should they wish to mind-meld within hours instead of days.
• By three months someone should start to sleep around in at least one relationship in their lives, and be the victim of fooling around at least once.
• Every damn thing for lesbians need to be processed and talked about ad nauseum, and every damn thing is either a matter for therapy, political, or both.
• However, and this includes gay men, the personal is political only if it does not interrupt your social plans, and actual, long term, focused action will rarely be requested.

But I digress. This isn’t about the rules, or subsets of the rules. It is, after all, about the kids.

Most importantly I want to correct the notion that we are in fact as weak as we are told we are and thus the only way to fight back is to take it out on ourselves. Kill ourselves or hurt ourselves with irresponsible behavior, that’s what’s expected of us and that’s exactly what we’ve been doing.  I want to tell the young-ins’, point blank, “baby, don’t jump off a bridge if someone puts a video of you making out with a dude online. Take your belt and whip that roommate with the buckle end until he lies motionless on the dorm room floor and the rest of the building has gone silent. If you’re in high school and the principal allows bullying, don’t hang yourself…burn his or her house down and send a Molotov cocktail through the living room window of the bastards who are tormenting you. And if someone tries to, or succeeds in raping you with a mini baseball bat, live through it, then get some battery acid and pour it on your attacker’s grandmother. That’s right, the grandmother, who clearly has played a role in the attitude that’s it’s fine to attack people and rape them for living a life you don’t approve of – like anyone asked – and even if she didn’t have something to do with the attitude your rapist has displayed, fuck her and fuck her family and pay back is a bitch. No more of this ‘internalize the pain’ my little ones, or candle light vigils or holding hands and singing ‘Kumbaya’…they want to act like feral animals, they will be treated like feral animals – I can and will put your ass DOWN. This is the only thing you should be thinking, my little lovelies, when someone bashes you for who you are.”

Where is THAT message? Why aren’t we in the streets with pink-and-black-triangle covered baseball bats issued at the community center with the slogan ‘GAYS BASH BACK’ printed in army font type down the side?

There was a cartoon of a religious icon in Amsterdam and it triggered worldwide protests, flag burnings, beatings, and murder. We get raped, beaten, tortured, have our youth taking their own lives, and tolerate constant attacks and public humiliation as well as limited rights under state and federal constitutions and we wring our hands and chant…”I am somebody. I deserve equal rights” and a nine year old sings a song about acceptance…waaaaa, pllllllllleeeeeeeeease like me.

Fuck that. Bash me, mother fucker. You and your Latin Kings or whoever the fuck. Show up on my doorstep, you cousin fucking, trailer dwelling, hack of a religious leader with your picket signs and I will rip that shit out of your hand and beat you into a coma with it. I am sick of playing nice, of talking to straights to help them understand my community, of asking nicely to be afforded the same rights under the law as my straight counter parts. Fuck you, your reasons, your religion if that’s what you’re blaming your ass-wipe attitude on, and get the fuck out of my way. You want a war, bitch, I’ll give it to you. I don’t claim to be perfect, and my community is fucked up, yes, but like any family, we’ll fight for our own, even if we then turn on each other during the holiday season.

So be warned straight world. Neo-Nazis set cars on fire during a gay pride march in Belgrade. Gay men are flogged in public in Pakistan. Lesbians are stoned and beheaded in different parts of Africa and the Middle East. But not here. No. This is my country, too, and I am not asking your fucking permission to be alive or to be in love. I will NOT stand back and watch you burn my brothers and sisters, rape them, laugh as they jump from bridges, string themselves up, or shoot their own faces off. I say we rise the fuck up and shake the straight cage a bit. You want to bash me? You’d better bring an army because I won’t lay down for it. And I won’t lie down and watch you do it to someone else, either.

You have been warned.

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