Actually, to be honest, this post isn’t ALL about the OUT West Boot Camp that I went to last weekend. Some of this has mulled around in my head for awhile as I’ve been working with different folks on different projects all related to Marriage Equality and justice for LGBTQ folks. But this blog post IS a response to the boot camp and Christine Pelosi’s call to reflect on our experiences and to blog about them as a way to continue the conversation in a very public way.

First, through the process of telling a little of “me”, I’m going to start with what I haven’t learned yet. If you don’t start with what you don’t know, then you’re missing the biggest opportunities for growth.

I feel like I’ve been an activist for LGBTQ justice for a long time now (not so long comparatively though!) and through many different life “events” and identity iterations. I’ve participated in many different ways from letter-writing and phone-calls to signature gathering, rally attendance, rally coordination, phone-bank attendance, phone-bank training, data-entry, event planning and on and on and on. Most recently, I’ve been stepping into more visible leadership roles as I feel that I have more experience and a voice that counts, or should count, and with the support and encouragement of fellow activists and friends. It’s clear to me (and others) that I have a real passion for pursuing civil rights but it isn’t always that easy for me to say why.

I guess the easiest answer to that question is that I’m queer and therefore as a queer person, I’m not at all okay with the idea that I could not marry my (theoretical) woman love. But really it’s more complex than that – I’m really not okay with oppression in any form. I find that it is important and personal to me to root out the cause of oppression wherever it is and whomever it affects – to call it out and name it publicly and within myself. Maybe it’s the mixture of academic and personal understanding of the many intersections of power, privilege and oppression. Maybe it’s just a developed sense of empathy based on my personal life experiences. I guess what I’m saying is that the reason that I am so passionate about marriage equality is because I feel that achieving this goal is one more step towards untangling the larger web of privilege and oppression whose effects are felt in very real every-day life by so many.

So, you see I don’t have any easy answer to “why.” One of the most repeated “calls” that I heard (from Dr. Eric Lee among others) and that I repeat in my daily life is that queer folks have to be out and visible. And I think some of us, even those of us who are fairly seasoned activists in the very practical ways are not necessarily the best at talking about ‘why’ on the personal level. So many folks have so many different reasons for their involvement in the struggle for queer justice – and most of those reasons are very personal. After all, it’s the personal story that is hopefully going to help us change hearts and minds. So we, and here I mean “I”, have to answer that call to be out by finding that sound byte – not just the rational argumentation that I’m good at delivering (even with emotion!) – but with that personal story that’s going to appeal to folks’ hearts.

So I guess I did learn something about my story – being “out” and visible for me means that I have to go deeper…

Other things that I learned:

Research is needed. I have a confession: I’m a sociologist (no, really I’m in the PhD program at UCSB) and prior to this boot camp I was a little annoyed with the idea that we needed more research. I thought that dammit, we done enough research now we need to simply put it to use. Clearly my social science degree should be revoked. We need continuous research on what messaging is effective such as whether it really is having “gay” couples in our ads or whether it should be the kid of said couple or whether we should really be about “hearts and minds” or if we should really be stocking up on rational arguments and rebuttals. I’m convinced that it’s going to take both and that we are going to need to be one step ahead at all times – but that’s why we need continuous research.

On the topic of messaging, I had a epiphany during Fleischer’s presentation when the young woman (who I believe stated that she used to a Mormon) stood up and said something to the effect that we want certain representations of our community and certain messaging because we are still trying to overcome the stigmatization of our identities, our sexuality, our selves. Add Pelosi’s four-square message box and it is clear to me: We want our parents’ acceptance and love. We want people to stand up for us and love us, exactly as we are. And that IS the goal of the larger movement. But the campaign for marriage equality is about meeting voters where they are. And they want to hear that their kids aren’t going to be taught about homosexuality in schools or that their clergy won’t be required to marry gays (shudder). We want to say “who the f*** cares anyway” but we won’t get their votes that way. We won’t win. We aren’t going to get everyone to agree that gay is good. But we might, might be able to get people to see the distinction between civil and religious marriage and if we can get people to see us as “human” long enough that they will understand that larger distinction, we will win. One step at a time, right?   Read More »