Commentary
Open letter to Bobby
/
Edwards
Editor’s Note: The following open letter
was submitted by Jim Hood, past chair
man of the Eugene Gay People’s Alliance.
Bobby Edwards is chairman of the Eugene
Human Rights Commission.
Dear Bobby:
I am taking this opportunity to respond
publicly to your most recent statements
(in the Jan. 12 Emerald) about the Gay
People’s Alliance and our matter
currently before the Eugene Human
Rights Commission, because it looks now
as if the only way we’re ever going to have
a dialogue on this is through the press.
Although GPA has asked repeatedly, over
and over, that Commission members bring
us their questions, reservations, or ob
jections regarding our request for
changing the City Code—I mean, this
would seem both fair and proper if the
Commission were dealing with us in good
faith—we continue to hear nothing directly
from Commission members, but at the
same time to read in your public remarks
new objections and newly-recognized
“underlying issues.’’
Hypothetical complaint
The latest such issue you raise relates to
a hypothetical complaint of job
discrimination. I quote: “Suppose, for
example, that an employer has no place
on an application form for an indication of
sexual orientation. If someone is denied
the job and comes back to the commission
alleging that he was denied the job
because of his sexual orientation, we won’t
have the resources to find out if the
complaint is valid or not.”
I don’t know just how limited HRC in
vestigatory resources are, but since the
complaint you describe is obviously
preposterous, it doesn’t seem to me that a
Warren Commission-scale investigation
would be required to throw the case out.
To suggest that a gay person would
charge discrimination in a situation where
the employer clearly had no way of
knowing the person was gay is comparable
to suggesting that a Black person would be
likely to charge discrimination in a
situation where be submitted an ap
plication by mail and gave no indication of
his race, but still was denied employment.
I really can’t agree that these are cases
of sufficient legal intricacy to require
handling by the courts and the district
attorney's office.
Eager to respond
But this is only “one of those underlying
issues,” according to the Emerald story.
Perhaps the others are not so readily
answerable. We are eager to respond to
them, but so far we are hampered by not
knowing what they are. I think you will
agree that it would be unfair and unjust for
the Commission to reach a decision on our
request without exploring these questions
fully. I realize that Commission members
are busy people, but after all, this matter
has been before the HRC for nearly six
months. (I think I may pertinently add, in
this connection, that of the four HRC Sub
committee members who have met with us
over the past six months and explored the
ramifications of our request in face-to-face
dialogue, three have progressed from
positions of either opposition or neutrality
to become our most ardent and outspoken
supporters on the Commission.)
We will continue to respond in the press,
if necessary, as we become aware of
Commission questions through that
medium; but we are at a loss as to why this
seems to be the HRC’s only method of
communication.
The fact is, I’m afraid I have become
rather skeptical as to how much of what
we put into print is actually read or
assimilated by Commission members.
You yourself, Mr. Chairman, admitted to
me—on the same evening you said you had
decided not to support our request to
change the City Code—that you had not
even bothered to finish reading the GPA
Fact Sheet on Homosexuality.
You are quoted in the Dec. 20 Eugene
Register-Guard as feeling that
homosexuality is not “a natural thing,”
that it is “an abnormal practice.” These
questions are dealt with at some length in
the Fact Sheet, along with such other basic
matters as legality, morality, labeling and
stereotyping, the “sickness” theory, and
the generalized oppression and specific
discrimination that gay people suffer.
Assumed burden of proof
In our Dec. 18 letter to you and the
Commission, we challenged anyone to
prove that there is anything wrong with
being gay, to prove “that homosexuality is
inherently pathological or that it
represents any inherent organic or
psychological defect.” Since we have
assumed the burden of proof and produced
evidence to the contrary—and our
challenge has been met with only silence—
it seems to me again unfair for you to take
your doubts and reservations to the press
instead of to us.
I want to respond, finally, to your ob
jections in both the Register-Guard article
and in last Friday’s Emerald to our use of
analogies and comparisons between the
oppression of Blacks and the Black
movement, and the oppression of gay
people and the Gay Liberation Movement.
In the Emerald you are quoted as saying
you felt “insulted by the . . . use of
parallels between the Blade experience
and the Gay Liberation Movement,” and
that you feel “they have been exploiting
Blacks to further their own goals.”
Since this amounts virtually to a charge
of racism, I want to answer you in some
detail. To begin with, I do not regard the
comparisons and analogies we have used
as bring “parallels,” the term you use in
both articles. Parallels, as I understand
them, are extended comparisons or
analogies, down-the-line and point-by
point. Nothing could be more obvious than
that the discrimination experienced by a
person because of his skin color, and the
psychological oppression experienced by
another person who must spend his life
pretending to be something he is not—in
order to avoid discrimination—are not
parallel.
Since the whole thrust of our presen
tation before the Human Rights Com
mission has been that the oppression of
gay people is unique, probably unlike
anything in the knowledge or experience of
most Commission members, and therefore
something they would need to be informed
about at length, I am baffled by your
repeated assertion that we have used
“parallels.” Wehave, I will admit, tried to
relate gay oppression—the unknown—to
the Black experience when comparisons or
analogies have seemed applicable and
natural, precisely because to any sensitive
and informed person the Black experience
in our society is almost synonymous with
discrimination and oppression. The
comparison in the third paragraph of this
letter is an example. But this is a far cry
from trying to parallel Gay and Black.
Regret offense
I regret, nevertheless, that you have felt
so offended personally by the comparisons
we have made as to suggest that we are
“exploiting Blacks” to further our ob
jectives. I regret also that you have vented
this grievance to the press at every op
portunity, but have not seen fit to bring it
up with us in face-to-face dialogue. I would
be interested to know, for example,
whether you find Huey Newton’s analogy
between racism and the attitude of people
who oppress gays—quoted in our Dec. IS
letter to you and the Commission—either
invalid or insulting. Since I went to some
length in that same letter to explain to you
my own feelings as to the validity of our
use of such analogies, and since both your
statements to the press have been made
subsequent to your receipt of our letter, I
can only assume that you found my ex
planation unsatisfactory, in whole or in
part.
Perhaps I should quote a portion of that
explanation, since it is our only official
written statement to the Commission on
this matter. I wrote as follows:
You and Lewis Peters, in particular,
seemed to resist and resent our use of such
analogies, and to reject the idea that there
is any basis for comparison. I think that
what separates us here is a fundamental
difference in perspective.
To you and Lewis, the Black movement,
presumably, is an established and multi
faceted fact: you perceive all its subtleties
and complexities, its various historical
roots, patterns of development, and future
directions. As for the Gay movement—
again, I am presuming—you have little
information (the societal residue of scare
stuff, myths, stereotypes, plus our
propaganda) and less empathy. But to
us—to gays with a developing political and
social consciousness, the Black movement
is a historical precedent.
Tais is true partly because it is in our
interest to view it as such: we gained a
sense of identity as an oppressed group
largely because of the examples of the
Black movement and the Women’s
movement, and it’s only natural that we
should also project our struggle to liberate
ourselves and the society along similar
lines.
Further, we have access to far more
information to counter our own residual
prejudices about Blacks and Women. TTiis,
together with our first-hand experience of
oppression, inevitably gives rise not only
to analogies relating to oppression,
political strategy, etc., but also to a
greater degree of empathy (as I see it) for
the Black and Women’s movements than
they have so far accorded the Gay
movement. The analogies come more
readily to us, then, partly because we have
adequate information about both
movements (or all three, including the
Women’s movement) on which to build
analogies, and partly because many of the
analogous patterns we see are really
potential analogies—our projections,
plans, and hopes.
The explanation seems to me com
prehensive enough, and our motives
honest and non-exploitive, so I still am at a
loss as to what is improper about our using
such analogies and comparisons as may
occur to us. Can it be that your objection
actually is to any association, whatever,
with gays—even a semantic one, through
figures of speech? I would hope not. But in
the continuing absence of another ex
planation, the only alternative would seem
to be that you have in fact read our
statement and understood our position,
and are nevertheless exploiting this issue
yourself.
Jim Hood
Past Chairman
Eugene Gay People’s Alliance
Letters
Hoax
It was at the ASUO Senate meeting of
Dec. 7, 1972 that a vote was taken to con
firm Cliff Zukin as Senate President—with
Mike Bonner and a group of his supporters
contesting this confirmation—the
following is a list of those Senators who
voted against his confirmation.
Mike Bonner 1359 Patterson
Bernice Hanson 1359 Patterson
Tom Bonner (Mike’s brother)
Joan Baker 1255 Mill Apt. 22
Cathy Ralston 1255 Mill Apt. 22
Barbara Woodside 1255 Mill Apt. 22
Gloria Gonzalez 1255 Mill Apt. 8
Rosa Solano 1255 Mill Apt. 8
Keith Parrish 1230 Ferry Apt. 7
RossLienhart 1230 Ferry Apt. 7
Hank Itkin 90 East 24th Place
GretWalther 90 East 24th Place
Larry Taylor 1410 High
Bryce Zabel Douglas-Walton
Dan “Buster” Heims 1000 Patterson
Room 306
Gary Ball 325 West 14th Apt. l
It is profoundly evident, to any, and all,
who will look at this list, and compare
addresses, that the coalition which was
backing Mike Bonner for the Senate
Presidency is composed of his roommate,
his brother (another brother lost in an
attempt to get back into the senate), his
close friends and their roommates, and
four roommateless friends.
I wonder if the students know and realize
just what a tremendous hoax Mike Bonner
has perpetrated on them—my only hope is
that the students will not allow themselves
to be fooled all the time by this person. It is
also quite apparent that with such close
association existing between these
senators that divergent views are not
being represented in the senate, and the
constituencies which they are supposed to
represent are presently without true
representation.
Roger Wyatt
Jr. History
345-4875
Protests article
We protest the recent article written by
Josh Marquis entitled “Car Accident Kills
Two.” The information contained in the
article inplied that the accident was the
result of initiation rituals of Sigma Chi
fraternity. Since the accident is still under
investigation it is unnecessary to throw
bad light on the Greek system, by at
tempting to correlate the death with
initiation.
Becky Schick
1967 University Street
Editor's Note; The information alluded
to in the above letter is part of the official
police investigative report of the Warne
accident. The Emerald did not feel obliged
to hide those facts in order to make the
Greek system look “good” as Ms. Schick
might hope. Further details in the in
vestigation will be reported as they are
released.
Drive-in classes
Since, at any given time between 8:30
a.m. and 5 p.m., approximately three
quarters of the student body on this
Campus is searching for a parking place, I
have a modest suggestion: rather than
build new parking spaces or expand the
campus, the University should contract
with local drive-in theatres to conduct
drive-in classes during the daytime.
I don’t think this suggestion is any more
absurd than the alternatives presently
available to students, which are 1) live
within walking distance of campus and
pay astronomical rents for abysmal
housing, or 2) live far from campus, pay
cheap rent, and dodge the meter maids.
Of course, this letter will probably get
some flak from the eco-bicycle fringe, but
I think anybody who pays $90-plus for the
pleasure of riding a bike through the
Oregon monsoons and getting it ripped-off
after two months is probably not college
material anyway.
Gil Johnson