Born to love

As I walked through the crowds protesting against the California Supreme Court's decision to up hold Proposition 8 in Long Beach, I was drawn to a mature heterosexual couple walking hand in hand with a sticker on their chest that read: "I DO."
Neither of John Eddy nor Nicole Street were gay or bi, nor were any of their children homosexual, but they felt compelled to participate in the rally.
"Because we support equality for everyone," said Street, a Long Beach resident.
The man and woman, who do have gay and lesbian friends, said fighting for freedom for all was enough to impact them directly.

After the interview Street shared this:


If I’d Been Born to Love a Woman


If I’d been born to love a woman
Or a man to love a man
Encouraged beyond reason
To feign an interest
To deceive
To try to make it work
It would be to suffer
On the inside
And in time, likely hurt the ones I love.


I’d struggle to fit in
In all the ways I could
Baffled
Filled with anxiety
And I’d be angry
Maybe at God
I hope I’d come to realize
I, too, am one of God’s beautiful creations.
I’d try to hold onto that image
Even when they called me “Sinner”


Striking from nowhere
Fangs pierce my flesh
Venom invades my veins
A victim
To destroy


Why?
They’d say
“Just making sport”


But snakes only bite when threatened
What are they afraid of?
With their rosy reptilian faces
Looking so innocent, so pure
As they recoil with loathing

I can hear them now:
Terminate their employment and for God’s sake,
keep them away from our children-kind of hatred
Beat him, tie him to a fence and leave him to die
like Mathew Shepard-kind of hatred


“Us---and them” mentality
Makes a haven for hate
Caustically mutating
Fear to intolerance
Superiority to persecution


Manipulate the system and you can justify anything…
History has taught us that “separate but equal”
Actually means unequal.


No you can’t go in
The decision’s not yours to make
You can’t adopt children
You have no benefits,
There is no choice
And there never will be a ring.


A whole second class
Wanting oneness
Focused on the big picture
Subjected to those little-picture people
Egocentric and shame based
Saying things like:
“How could you do this to me”,
“Where did I go wrong?”
And “God loves the person, He just hates the sin.”


But not to worry
I watched some program about a synagogue
That offers a course on how to un-gay yourself
Not kidding
And many churches
Purport to help you reform (or is that repent?)

So very Christ like
Man I’d run from that
I’d run and I’d keep running
Until I got to a place
Where I could be me
Where it’s safe to be who I am
(My friends might ask, “Are you talking this planet?)


I’d seek protection under the law
The law is impartial
I’d get fair treatment
I’d have rights
Then I’d wake up
And remember prop 8
When we made discrimination legal.


Back in the bondage of bigotry
Day of Decision
California Supreme Court
Upholds Prop 8, six to one


Our justice system allows a minority
To be squashed by a majority
That has to change


We all want a chance to live a beautiful life
Equal, not separate
Everyone equal


Each who is enlightened, enlightens another
And so there is reason to hope
Harvey Milk said
“We will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets…”


Yes, but it is up to all of us
Not only gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer
Straight people too
Together
We are the anti-venom
--Nicole Martine Street

A day the state won’t stand still

The earth won’t stand still May 26, a tremor set off by the roars and footsteps of LGBT activists is on the horizon in California.
In Long Beach, is scheduled at 7 p.m. Tuesday on the corner of Broadway and Alamitos Avenues, when the California Supreme Court decides whether to uphold same-sex couple’s right to wed in the state or take away that right and dissolve about 18,000 same-sex marriages in the state.
Herds of men, women and children also plan to take to the streets, from San Francisco and Sacramento to San Diego and Los Angeles, and meet in the middle the Saturday after the decision day.
“Meet in the Middle is a statewide reaction to Proposition 8 (a 2008 voter measure opposing the marriages of same-sex couples) verdict, —win or lose,” said Robin McGehee, lead organizer for Meet in the Middle 4 Equality. “We are asking people to journey from across the Western region to Fresno, Calif. … come stand with us and create a rally base for equality.”
The event will include materials on voter canvassing, personal story telling techniques, a children’s garden area, nonviolence and civil disobedience training. Speakers such as former Harvey Milk aid Cleve Jones and activist Robin Tyler, also will be part of the event.
Since February, planners have worked with the city to have a rolling permit that allows for this rally on a week to week basis until the court decides on the case.
“I have certainly not seen an event of this proportion,” said Nii-Quartelai Quartey, a spokesman and organizer for the progressive network Courage Campaign. “We are going to gather and say in one voice, ‘Give us our liberty.’”
Event organizers expect attendance to be in the thousands.
“I cannot imagine committed activists across the state staying at home knowing that this historic event is taking place and will likely mark the beginning of a more inclusive movement,” said Quartey, a Los Angeles resident.
Pouring the LGBT and ally flocks to Fresno is quite significant in the struggle toward equal rights in California, organizers said. Opponents of Prop. 8 neglected to campaign heavily against the measure in Central California, which is largely conservative and votes that tilted the scale for the measure came from constituents in that area.
“We were left out of the No on 8 Campaign,” McGehee, 35, said. “There are LGBT people (living) in this area. The reality is that, for the most part, (we are) very much living in a ‘don’t ask don’t tell’ community.”
McGehee, who together with her wife has two children, speaks from experience. She said she and her spouse were harassed and kicked out of their 6-year-old son’s Parent Teacher Association. Thus, her experiences have brought her to the conclusion that even if the state Supreme Court rejects Prop. 8, work toward achieving fair treatment for LGBT people must continue. Teen suicide, hate crimes, gays in the military and transgender rights are equally chief issues that must be tackled.
“Marriage is just the cornerstone issue,” said McGehee, a human communication professor at the local community college. “Even if we have the symbolism of equality through rights that we gain, it doesn’t mean we will be treated as equals by individuals. We know that we have to change hearts and minds and it’s not just something that can change with a ballot initiative.”
To do so, organizers say they are taking a page out of history, basing the event on the Montgomery, Ala. Civil Rights March and the Freedom Summers of the 1960s.
Organizers say they also seeking to make the event a diverse platform, where people from the labor, Latino, black, straight, faith base and LGBT communities join forces.
Quartey, who never imagined he would involved in organizing such events, said the arguments against same-sex marriage are the same as the arguments that were used to keep interracial couples from marrying. Such arguments, which assume gay people have a diminished capacity to love, pushed him onto the activist arena.
“For communities of color in particular that don’t see the importance of them to get involved in this issue I say that marriage equality is an extension of equality and full equality under the law, period,” said Quartey, who is a black man. “I understand that among communities of color our faiths appear to complicate things and our leaderships … uses our discomfort to drive a wedge on this issue. But what we are saying, under the law, we all have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Quartey’s call to action wasn’t lonesome, said McGehee.
“(Prop.8) was a wake up call on how quickly your rights can be denied and how quickly you can be bullied into silence,” she said. “We need to reach into communities that don’t really understand us and No. 2 we can’t just stop our work if we gain a little bit of semblance of equality.”
Long Beach Equality organizer Tom Crowe agrees.
“For those people who think we should weigh it out, take one hand, open your palm and smack yourself silly,” he said
For more details about the event and events in your city visit: http://www.meetinthemiddle4equality.com/

Mexico's Little Treasure at Long Beach Pride

By June 3, the California Supreme Court will vote on the right of same-sex couples to say “I do” legally. In the meanwhile, Long Beach and the rest of the state are celebrating their sexuality.
The 2009 Lesbian and Gay Pride Parade, which took place Sunday May 17, was themed “Your Rights, Our Rights, Human Rights.”
That title shined through its grand marshals Robin Tyler and Diane Olson, one of the first same-sex couples to marry and litigate against Proposition 8, the voter-approved ballot measure that seeks to limit legal marriages to heterosexual couples.

“We can no longer use a slingshot while our enemies use a sledgehammer,” Tyler,
67, said. “Win or loose our community should never be invisible … If we lose,
then for the first time in American history, a protected minority will be taken
OUT of a constitution … There is no making peace until we get our civil rights.”

San Francisco’s Mayor Gavin Newsom, who in 2004 directed his city’s county clerk to issue marriages licenses to gay and lesbian couples. The dashing mayor, who recently announced his candidacy for governor in 2010, was modest and approachable; thanking the community for their support, engaging in conversations and taking photos prior to the parade.
Local honorees also stood out at the parade. Latina spiritual leader Rev. Sunshine Daye and AIDS activist was chosen as this year’s community grand marshal.
Only about 6 people, among the thousands that showed up for the event, protested the event.
Daye, who ministers the science of the mind philosophy, said religion itself is not to blame for the ignorance of the few.
“Religion is not the root of all evil,” Daye said. “Hatred promotes separation and discontent amongst all people … A lot of religious communities may frown upon it because we’ve been socialized to have a hierarchy when it comes to sexual expression.”
Song, costumes and dance adorned Ocean Boulevard in Long Beach for the 26th year. The fun poured onto the city’s Shoreline Drive for an all-day continued celebration with vendors, food, drinks, and Urban, Country and Latino dance tents.
Kat Deluna, Jazmine Sullivan, Sara Bareilles, Smash Mouth and Laura León and son Yaxkin were among the festival’s headlining celebrities.
A 4.7 earthquake was a preamble to the diva of Mexican cumbia Laura León and telenovelas (soap operas) said she considers that everyone has the right to do with their bodies as they please and that not only her country, but the world could learn something from the event and each other.
“The only thing I have received from gay people is love,” said Leon, cigarette in hand before her performance. “Gays have great writers. They create my dresses, my makeup, my songs, my scripts. I have great gay friends who are my life and my adoration.”
Leon, whose fans often call her “La Tesorito” (Little Treasure) and whose popularity is comparable to Cher in Latino America, made her stage entrance with a rainbow colored dress and her hit song, “El Premio Mayor,” (The Major Prize).
“Have you seen my dress; what it symbolizes?” said León, who closed the night Sunday at the Latino festivities tent. “It’s (rainbow) colored with lots of love.”