combatting homophobia

[matt romney]

allow history to backtrack a few decades, and we have the greatest american civil rights movement. the progenitors of the infant egalitarian force were black veterans, having just fought for "their" country, coming home to an apartheid of oppression.

the reforms to the military policy towards african americans is triggered a shift in consciousness that would carry the black rights movement into baby steps.

recently, we saw the same reforms happen to correct the homophobia in the military. if we could repeat history and get more of this,





openly gay veterans fighting for equal rights, i think we could have a rebirth of the civil rights movement. and on a side topic, socialism is picking up a populist appeal in the ows wave, i believe the combination of both a strong civil rights movement and socialism could erase most of the prejudice in society today.

to do this we need to welcome the veterans to the cause. i hear too often, "sure i support gay marriage but i don't want them touching me!" how can we fight for equality if we are squeamish about our comrades' sexualities? i'm guilty too, i often find myself uncomfortable around gay couples.

we can achieve a major change in the civil rights culture if we could just adjust our internal, latent homophobia.

[Rev]

This is the lame - EST way to get attention or ask for it..
You prove once again you are just too young to even get "High"

[matt romney]

this is a clusterfuck. i'm going to make the OP coherent.

rev, i'm sure typing in rainbow bold letters, rando
m line jumping, and a complete lack of grammar is the epitome of maturity.

my post reads slightly worse than most of the stuff you put out.

[Gezus]

Meanwhile in the forum crisis thread...

[marioalosangeles]

This is a great Thread Laz... I think a lot of us have to shake off some bad habits we picked up as we were growing up. I have become more accepting of Gay people over the years... High school, I couldn't even stand to look at a gay person. There are people who I call friends now who happen to be gay...

[Gezus]

Thank you for cleaning up your OP to make it more serious, Laz.

[1871]

There is one thing I disagree with you on Lazarus and it is this;

It is not about people co-opting into a corrupt system. The point is about NOT being part of an imperial army - more people being part of an army that kills civilians is not an advancement - it is just another way for the oligarchs and crooks to say 'hey look, we are liberal, we believe in human rights, that's why we are bombing Afghanistan - to teach them about equal rights for women'. And this DOESNT mean that there's any validity to oppress anyone simply because of who they are. So to be specific - its more about the fact that they are veterans - the other stuff is irrelevant. If they are veterans saying how the war is evil, how they were wrong and misguided about joining - then fair enough. I'd say that there isn't really much excuse for that these days given that, due to the internet, it is easy to access information like http://www.rawa.org or the collateral murder video - but its about bringing people forward to the realisation of what is happening in Iraq and what they want to do regarding Iran. Gay rights,etc - yes - that's important too - rights for everyone is important - but it is a sideline in connection with Iraq and Afghanistan. Greater equality to become an employee of the oligarchs is not a move towards freedom.

[Rev]

thats better laz
I'll be honest call me an asshole an ignorant
unfriend me on facebook w.e but i will and always will think being Gay is wrong
i aint going to state my reasons but do i respect them yes i do..
but still as long as they dont fuck with me i dont fuck with them that simple..
Good thread btw laz

[ClichéGuevara]

The LGBT community has my full support.

[El Mono]

The LGBT community has my full support.

[Fuzzly Bear]

The LGBT community has no more of my support than any other.

[matt romney]

i'd like to start out with this.

(12-03-2011 11:35 AM)Sean Wrote:  The LGBT community has my full support.

(12-03-2011 12:50 PM)El Mono Wrote:  The LGBT community has my full support.

The LGBT community has my full support.

(12-03-2011 09:58 AM)1871 Wrote:  It is not about people co-opting into a corrupt system. The point is about NOT being part of an imperial army - more people being part of an army that kills civilians is not an advancement - it is just another way for the oligarchs and crooks to say 'hey look, we are liberal, we believe in human rights, that's why we are bombing Afghanistan - to teach them about equal rights for women'. And this DOESNT mean that there's any validity to oppress anyone simply because of who they are. So to be specific - its more about the fact that they are veterans - the other stuff is irrelevant. If they are veterans saying how the war is evil, how they were wrong and misguided about joining - then fair enough. I'd say that there isn't really much excuse for that these days given that, due to the internet, it is easy to access information like http://www.rawa.org or the collateral murder video - but its about bringing people forward to the realisation of what is happening in Iraq and what they want to do regarding Iran. Gay rights,etc - yes - that's important too - rights for everyone is important - but it is a sideline in connection with Iraq and Afghanistan. Greater equality to become an employee of the oligarchs is not a move towards freedom.

of course! i would never try to put out that message. my point is that we need to take advantage of this honor jingoist America places on its veterans and show its hypocrisy. we should use whats already there. greater equality in america means less bullshit overseas. see the vietnam protest-civil rights joint movement.

(12-03-2011 10:24 AM)Rev.. Wrote:  thats better laz
I'll be honest call me an asshole an ignorant
unfriend me on facebook w.e but i will and always will think being Gay is wrong
i aint going to state my reasons but do i respect them yes i do..
but still as long as they dont fuck with me i dont fuck with them that simple..
Good thread btw laz

i'm not going to unfriend you on facebook because you are stupid. you know i love you as a person but i have no respect for you as an intellectual. well "no" relatively speaking, i guess you are better than most of the dumbfucks i go to school with. i'd argue with that, but there is no substance to argue with. perhaps if you offered some factual, historical, even theoretical support, i could try

but on the gay rights issue, the mental and instituted oppression of homosexuality is horrendous. at least victims of racism have a community to go to. at least they aren't rejected by their parents, at least they share in the stigma. an estimated 1 in 5 people, certainly more than the africans oppressed by jim crow, without any factual support, are told by society to hate themselves. and the effects are horrendous

it is cultural genocide hidden in the closet.

so what can be done? we need a dual s

we need egalitarianism.

materially and institutionally, we can eradicate this oppression with socialism (that recognizes the gay rights struggle). a terrific example of this is cuba. today, not a law exists in the book that oppresses a prejudiced demographic. even abortion, seen as murder by many in the land of the free, is decriminalized. hell, you can get a free sex change over there.

however, if you rewind a few decades, homosexuality was just as oppressed as it is today, with gay rights activists being imprisoned and open homosexuals being sent to labor camps. thankfully, castro has reversed that policy and apologized. but that atrocity serves as an example of a halfway egalitarian and the inherent failures of one.

and additionally due to a lack of a cultural movement, many african cubans find themselves in the same conditions before the revolution. it is not the fault of the state but a fault of the culture. while any institutions of racism are absent, the complete lack of a cultural black pride movement has crippled a large scale liberation of the black population.

this can be translated as a future model of successes and failures for lgbt liberation, one that needs modification.

conversely, the U.S. enjoyed some of the greatest black liberation cultural heroes ever. i doubt i need to list them, but i'll outline the most significant. every black panther, every freedom rider, every MLK disciple, every Malcolm X supporter, every Medgar Evers picketer, and many many more remain a human rights hero. whether they were reformist or revolutionary, they threw their cultural worth into black pride and liberation. but the popularity of reformism amongst the radicals led to its failures. it failed to address racism in a materialist manner and even largely a political manner. although the vast majority of national politicians declared their support for the popular civil rights movement, the mere fact Strom Thurmond, barry goldwater, and cohorts were allowed to have any influence over the political system blighted America's black liberation from the start. to truly change something for the better, we need a complete ousting of bourgeois power elements. to understand the allowance of institutionalized racism in america, look at the racial political misrepresentation. see the criminalization of a nationality. consult any white to ______ statistic google can dig up in 2.3441 seconds.

however, we can thank the American civil rights movement for hip hop. we can thank them for the civil rights act of 1964, (ignoring every other implication) our first black president, and most of all, a cultural shift from outright racism to an attempt at racial equality.

this can also be translated as a future model of successes and failures for lgbt liberation, one that obviously needs modification.

with these two examples in mind, i call for a dual attack on oppression. one economically and politically, one culturally and individually. this needs to be mutually coordinated, democratic, international, and simultaneous. the homophobic doctrine in most religions would also need to be addressed.

imagine malcolm x and che as partners. or, imagine Reinaldo Arenas sitting alongside Castro. imagine.

let's apply that to venezula, a country already leaning in the right direction.

because he deserves it.

all of this can be applied to women, an even larger oppressed group, and the parts about self-hate, genocide, and the dual plan can also be applied to victims of racism and all prejudices.