Dowd speaks with Feinstein about Prop 8 and Harvey Milk.
The gays were outfoxed by their opponents. In both Prop 6 in 1978 and this year’s Prop 8, the specter of children being converted to a gay orientation was raised. Feinstein said the TV ad of Prop 8 supporters insinuating that “gay marriage would be taught in school really hurt.” (“I can marry a princess,” a pigtailed girl told her mom in the ad.)
“I think people are beginning to look at it differently, I know it’s happened for me,” Feinstein said of gay marriage. “I started out not supporting it. The longer I’ve lived, the more I’ve seen the happiness of people, the stability that these commitments bring to a life. Many adopted children who would have ended up in foster care now have good solid homes and are brought up learning the difference between right and wrong. It’s a very positive thing.”
I e-mailed Larry Kramer, the leading activist for gay rights in the era that followed Milk’s, to get his read on Prop 8. (In 1983, I interviewed Kramer about the new scourge of AIDS, and he read me a list from a green notebook of 37 friends who had died. )
“DON’T WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO HAVE RIGHTS?” he e-mailed back, blessedly cantankerous. “I AM ASHAMED OF YOU THAT YOU HAD TO ASK ME THAT QUESTION.”
While I appreciate Dowd’s piece, I do take issue with her use of the phrase “gay activists.” (Not in the Kramer reference here; it’s used more broadly elsewhere in the article): Why do people keep using that term? It’s an entire group of people, millions of your average janes & joes, who want their rights. And millions of straight people voted No on 8 as well, let’s not forget. “Activists” conjures up visions of PETA celeb fur destruction, of EarthFirst tree sits, of WTO street clashes, of ACT-UP die-ins. I have yet to see the phrases “religious activists” or “Yes on 8 activists” used– and certainly the Mormons would take the activist award in this year’s fight. So what gives, Dowd? From everything else you wrote here, I would think you know better than to perpetuate the mainstream media’s insinuating use of this word to suggest a band of radicals at work. Yes, I’m pissed as hell that 8 passed and I expect to get even more pissed if the CA Supreme Court doesn’t strike it down. So I’ll march and I’ll boycott businesses that donated to 8. Does that make me an activist all of a sudden? I’ll happily embrace the word if we start to see it used equally when referring to all those Christian political activists out there.
Just for the record, I absolutely repudiate those who cross the line by publishing personal information and intimidating in any way those who voted for 8. The Yes on 8 bullying tactics were bad enough during the campaign–although of course the largest gay-friendly businesses weren’t likely to be quaking in their shoes about public exposure (I guess those out-of-state Mormons didn’t realize how many companies have very public floats in the SF gay pride parade every year). That said, Christians aplenty have boycotted companies over the years and people (uh… activists?) of all stripes have boycotted companies to protest environmental or human rights abuses, so I fail to understand objections to the anti-8 crowd launching its own business boycott. Straights don’t get to take our money and our rights. We serve our country in every respect, we pay our takes, we raise our kids, we even go to church (natch)–and we’re no longer in the mood to be told we’re somehow lesser human beings than heterosexuals, whose screaming for the exclusive right to marriage based on some supposed superiority gets extremely tiresome in the face of 50+ percent cheating and divorce rates. As if WE’RE the threat to your marriages. Y’all are doing splendidly on your own. Expect fallout when you vote prejudice into the Constitution.
