Wednesday Assignment #2: Hot Topics: Gay Marriage

Hello everyone,

In this Wednesday’s blog will focus on figureheads. For consistency, I will remain on the topic of gay rights/ gay marriage. Also, I will also briefly talk about Claudette Colvin and Rosa Parks as figure heads during the civil rights movement.

If I were to choose a figurehead for the gay rights movement, that is going to be a difficult task to do because this protest encompasses a wide variety of people in the categories of race, gender/sex, age, religion, political stance, etc. (i.e. a wide variety of intersectionality). As mentioned in a previous blog, and by Kimberle Crenshaw in her article, “Women Of Color At The Center: Selections From The Third National Conference On Women Of Color And The Law: Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color”, defines intersectionality as “I used the concept of intersectionality to denote the various ways in which race and gender interact to shape the multiple dimensions of Black women's employment experiences” (Crenshaw 2). In this case I am going to use the slightly more expansive version of this definition to, not only include race and gender, but also age, religion, political stance. It is because the experience of the gay community can fall and can be looked into any of these categories; all of which make up a person regardless of their sexuality. I want to make sure that the experiences of the gay community as well as a figurehead to be included. Similarly with a huge and diverse community of the GBLTQ group, I feel that there cannot be a truly one good figurehead in the sense of one individual person.

Regarding intersectionalities, it does seem very difficult to really and truly find a figurehead. Then, it now occurs to me that there are many people who are figureheads and can also be the face of this movement. These people can be classified into two different groups of these unsung heroes. The first group, and most importantly, is those who have been murdered just because of their sexuality. One such example is a politician named Harvey Milk. He was a politician who was elected in 1977 and took office in 1978 as a city supervisor. In November of 1978, he was assonated. It was because that, not only because he was gay, but the first openly gay man to be elected to government. Many people are killed every year because of their sexuality. There are students like Matthew Shepard, a college student (see http://www.hrc.org/sites/hatecrimes/video-progress_since.asp), or 15 year old Lawrence King (see http://www.hrc.org/sites/hatecrimes/lawrence_king.asp). The other group is the people who the living people who are gay, bisexual, lesbian, transgendered (and transsexual), and Queer people. These people are your every day Joes (in or out of the closet) who are gay. These people deserve your utmost respect because they live in a society that treats them as second class citizens. In that society, it can be filled with hatred, unacceptance, knowing they do not have the same rights as same couples, worrying about losing their jobs or health benefits for themselves and partners, and, most importantly, worried of being a victim of violence or death only because of their sexuality.

This section is going to explore the benefits and drawbacks of having a figurehead for your group. If there were figurehead(s) for the gay community, then there would be some benefits to it. They would be able to direct the community to help prompt rallies, protests, and other kinds of activity. Also, they would have some credibility to direct change in legislature to help promote legalizing equality to the GBLTQ community. They would be able to encourage the community and supports to help educate the rest of society that homosexuality is not a bad thing and something that you cannot get rid of. Another benefit is that a figurehead such as Rosa Parks (but for the gay community) can spark an entire movement. In this case, it would provide many demonstrations and other kinds of “awareness” tactics that would allow a higher likelihood in getting equality. On the other hand, there are some pitfalls that come along with being a figure head. One scenario with being a figurehead, it can spark riots, violence, and other acts of criminal activity. For example, in the case of Rodney King who was assaulted by 4 white police officers. After their acquittal, many African Americans protested, rioted, and other violent acts of criminal behavior to show the injustice of prejudice. In the case of gay marriage, if a figurehead comes about, it may spark the wrong kind of actions as in engaging criminal behavior. Another pitfall for being a figurehead, it is that you are a martyr. If like Rosa Parks, you may be arrested for breaking the law by civil disobedience and breaking the law.

There is also one more topic I would like to address. That topic would be about the Civil Rights movement. The question is: would the Civil Right movement have been different if Claudette Colvin was the face for their protest? According to the article, “The Ladies before Rosa: Let Us Now Praise Unfamous Women” by Paul Hendrickson. He says, “…[Claudette Colvin] was a small, modest, ascetic-looking, wholly untainted 42-year-old seamstress and civic activist and youth leader: a perfect and righteous symbol for igniting not just a year-long boycott but an entire movement” (Hendrickson 289-290). Also, she was also taken off the bus kicking and screaming. She was arrested because of her civil disobedience. This took place nine months before Rosa Parks declined to give up her seat and got arrested herself for the same thing. If Claudette was the icon for the Civil Rights movement, I would not know how different it would be. The protests could have died out, especially before its time or we could see African Americans equal of every single way as a white person. I feel that all the events during the Civil Rights movement should remain the same because it dramatically influenced and positively affected their status quo as United State citizens.

Sincerely,

Steven Weingarten