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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 1, 1992)
ju s t o u t steppin since 1 9 8 3 Renée LaChance contents EDITOR VOL 10 NO. 2 DEC. 1,1992 PUBLISHER Ariel Waterwoman CALENDAR EDITOR Garland Terry FEATURES REPORTERS Real victories Irene K. Hislop Jim Hunger Lawyers, championing lesbian and gay civil liberties, are constitutionally dismantling the right wing’s platform by successfully overturning 1988’s Ballot Measure 8 along with a similar law in Concord, Calif. PHOTOGRAPHERS Linda Carter Linda Kliewer ADVERTISING Amanda Colorado Meg Grace E. Ann Hinds (pp. 16-17) Paying tribute to a courageous leader CREATIVE DIRECTOR E. Ann Hinds PROOFREADER Mary Catherine Lamb TYPESETTER Amanda Colorado FORMATTER Meg Grace The Lesbian Avengers erected a shrine honoring arson murder victims Brain Mock and Hattie Mae Cohens as part o f a vigil held in New York City in October. Thanks to filmmaker Su Freidrich fo r the photo. DEPARTMENTS DISTRIBUTION Up Front Distribution CONTRIBUTORS editorial Rex Wockner David Batterson Marilyn Davis Matthew Nelson Norm Dixon Kurt Johnson J u it O ut is published on the first and fifteenth day of each month. 6 1992. No part of Just Out may be reproduced wahoul written permission from the publisher. The submission of written and graphic materials is welcomed. Written material should be typed and double-spaced. Just Out reserves the right to edit for grammar, punctuation, style, liahility concerns and length. We will reject or edit articles or advertisements that are offensive, demcanaig or may result in legal action. Just Out consults the Associated Press Style Book and Libel M anual on edhonal decisions. Letters to the editor should be limited to two double-spaced typed pages. DendHne for subrnMons is the 1st and 15th of the month proceeding publication. Views expressed m letters to the editor, columns and features are not necessarily those of the publisher. Display advertising will be accepted up to the 2nd aid 17di of each month. (laarifled ads must he received at the office of Just Out by the 2nd and 17th of each month, along with payment. Ads will not be taken over the leiephune. Subscriptions to Just Out are available for $17.50 far 12 issues. Hist Class (in an envelope) is $30 for 12 issues. A copy of Just Out is available for $1 andfcr advertising rales are available on The mailing address and telephone number fa Just Out are: PO Box 15117, Portland, OR 97215; (503) 236-1252 Ow fas number is 236-1257. Hearts a rt touched by the passing o f Audre Lorde, whose words are still lighting our way. (pp. 12-13) World briefs AIDS crisis looms over South Africa (p. 6) Lorde’s words s till transform National news (pp. 7-9) To honor the passing ofA udre Lorde, we chose an excerpt from one o f her essays, written in 1977, entitled “The Transformation o f Silence into Language and Action" as our Local news editorial. We hope it inspires you as Lorde’s work continues to inspire us. (pp. 13-15) Profiles I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunder stood. That the speaking profits me, beyond any other effect. I am standing here as a Black lesbian poet, and the meaning of all that waits upon the fact that I am still and might not have been. Less than two months ago I was told by two doctors, one female and one male, that I would have to have breast surgery, and that there was a 60 to 80 percent chance that the tumor was malignant. Between that telling and the actual surgery, there was a three-week period of the agony of an involuntary reorganization o f my entire life. The surgery was completed, and the growth was benign. But within those three weeks, I was forced to look upon myself and my living with a harsh and urgent clarity that has left me still shaken but much stronger. This is a situation faced by many women, by some o f you here today. Some of what I experienced during that time has helped elucidate for me much o f what I feel concerning the transformation of silence into language and action. In becoming forcibly and essentially aware of my mortality, and of what I wished and wanted for my life, however short it might be, priorities and omissions became strongly etched in a merciless light, and what 1 most regretted were my silences. Of what had I ever been afraid? To question or to speak as I believed could have meant pain, or death. But as we all hurt in so many different ways, all the time, and pain will either change or end. Death, on the other hand, is the final silence. And that might becoming quickly, now, without regard for whether I had ever spoken what needed to be said, or had only betrayed myself into small silences, while I planned someday to speak, or waited for someone else’s words. And I began to recognize a source of power within myself that comes from the knowledge that while it is most desirable not to be afraid, learning to put fear into a perspective gave me great strength. I was going to die, if not sooner then later, whether or not I had ever spoken myself. My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you. But for every real word alive, spoken, for every attempt I had ever made to speak those truths for which I am still seeking, I had made contact with other women while we examined the words to fit a world in which we all believed, bridging our differences. And it was the concern and canng of all those women which gave me the strength and enabled me to scrutinize the essentials of my living. The women who sustained me through that period were Black and white, old and young, lesbian, bisexual, and hetero sexual, and we all shared a war against the tyrannies of silence. They all gave me a strength and concern without which I could not have survived intact. Within those weeks of acute fear came the knowledge-with in the war we are all waging with the forces of death, subtle and otherwise, conscious or not-I am not only a casualty, I am also a warrior. What are the words you do not yet have? What do you need to say? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you win sicken and die of them, sull in silence? Perhaps for some of you here today, I am the face of one of your fears. Because I am woman, because I am Black, because I am lesbian, because I am m yself-a Black woman warrior past doing my work-come to ask you. are you doing yours? Audre Lorde "The Transformation o f Silence into , c. _ Language and Action," 1977, from Sister Outsider, published by The Crossing Press Terry Bean talks about being part o f President-elect Bill Clinton s transition team. (p. 24) Marvin Liebman talks about his Republican ties and his love o f groups like Queer Nation and ACT UP. (P- 25) COLUMNS Relgion (P - ID ARTS Music Dr. Tantalus examines the bad girls o f music-Mado n no and Sinead O'Connor. (p. 23)
