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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 6, 1999)
aliu Coot Stuff Antiques & x , Treasures/ i- (form erly Antique Attitudes) / ☆ ' 7372 SW Capitol Highway Portland. OK 97219 • 503-240-6267 We are located in Multnomah Village near The Bridge. Call for directione. MORELAND 1 VETERINARY HOSPITAL Dogs • Cats • Reptiles Pocket Pets Quality Care for your variety of pets. Robert Bruno, DVM Kay L. Bruno, DVM 20 years combined experience 7201 SE Milwaukie Ave. 239-9972 Mon.-Thurs. 7:30 - 7:30 Fri. 7:30 - 6:00, Sat. 8:00 - 1:00 Grandm a’ not dead yet To the E ditor : 1 didn’t have strong opinions about the June 4 editorial requesting that people dress “appro priately” for gay pride, but it didn’t surprise me that so many others did. In the follow-up editorial July 16, Marty Davis seems to twist together two different issues, and in the process commits the same sin she accuses others of: not being open to respect ful disagreement. T h e first issue, that o f nudity and general behavior at pride celebrations, is a perennial favorite. We always have people trying to get us to look like everyone else. A s a lesbian and a grandmother, I have to say that nudity doesn’t offend me. It doesn’t offend children, either, unless someone has taught them to be offended by it. A s to how a parent “explains” such things to their children, one can say simply that people are different, and like to dress in different ways. Censoring expression, whether in dress or speech, is always troubling. If we start with nudi ty, then what about leather, what about bondage, what about cross-dressing? W hat about censoring the words to a song? To be fair, Marty didn’t talk about banning or enforcing a ban on anything. She only requested that peo ple be thoughtful about whether this would be appropriate at a very public event which would include all kinds of people, including children and grandmothers. Being thoughtful and mind ful is something 1 endorse. Condemning other people’s behavior is not. W hich brings me to the second issue, that of divisiveness in the community. Accepting each other in our various stages in our various processes means accepting nudity, expressions of S/M , transgender displays, and all sorts of things that I don’t happen to subscribe to personally. It also means accepting mothers and children, gay Republicans, old fogies, baby dykes and Radical Faeries, to name a few. Writing an editorial exercises power. There are very few effective ways to respond to it that can exercise the same level o f power. A power imbalance lends itself to frustrated explosions in response. These explosive responses are not always constructive, elegant or respectful, but they are expressive. I find it interesting that the letters printed in the July 16 issue were all in agreement with M arty’s original editorial, in spite of the fact that she mentions opposition. T hat looks like an unfair exercise o f power. To say that people who disagree with you are being divisive and disre spectful is in fact being divisive and disrespect ful to those doing the disagreeing. A deeper analysis of the situation might be helpful. Prac ticing diversity is not an easy thing, in spite of all our easy talk about it. S ylvan R ainwater Portland M arty Davis responds: There is no unfair exercise of power here. All verifiable letters received by dead line were printed. For a more comprehensive overview, you’ll need also to read the letters in our June 18 and July 2 issues. Back issues are available at the Just O ut office. To the E ditor : D on’t we all feel sorry for poor Marty Davis? Just when the poor thing feels safe in sticking her neck out we all go and grab our hatchets. Tsk tsk, shame on all of us queers for not giving her “support” and for not following her little candy-coated notion of how the world should be by engaging in “dialogue,” blah, blah, blah. Here’s the deal, Marty. We are indeed a diverse, intelligent and thinking queer commu nity— that part you have correct. But just because you stirred up a hornets’ nest because you don’t want to see some dick or some boobs at gay pride doesn’t mean that we are a community in crisis— that’s your problem, not ours. We have never, as a community, agreed on much of any thing and probably never will, and we’ve done quite well for ourselves, thank you very much. We will continue to struggle against those who don’t like us because of our differences. They will continue to drag our eccentricities out and rub them in our faces and we will continue to succeed in fighting the battles in spite of our selves. Drag queens, West Hills A-listers, Bear lovers, pagan sisters, Lesbian A vengers...all of us are here, we’re queer and we know what to do without any help from you or your harebrained ideas about how we as a community should behave or present ourselves to the world. We have struggled all our lives to get to the point where we are today. Some of the tactics we used fit nicely into your “legitimate” standards, but mostly the freedoms we enjoy today were accomplished by brave and subversive people who were not afraid to get into someone else’s face. If it’s dialogue you want, I suggest you go see your therapist and leave the real world up to the rest of us. And if you are so worried about what grandma may see, how do you explain the last few pages of your newspaper? All that sex just may upset her. San Francisco. Marty D avis’ editorial reminded us o f ads looking for “straight-looking, straight acting” lovers. How boring. A n d talk about internalized oppression! W hy don’t we just all go back in the closet? S o what if some women have bare breasts? If it’s a hot day, why shouldn’t they? Men are allowed to bare their breasts. A nd all kinds of people have tattoos and piercings these days. So what? It all makes the world more interesting and compelling. By the way, my partner and I, walking arm in arm, were photographed close-up at the gay pride parade several years ago. A nd we were shown many times on the local and national television news during the N o on 9 campaign. N either o f us had bare breasts or tattoos. We have not seen many o f these images in the news, as a m atter o f fact. We don ’t believe that we all have to look or act a certain way to show people that “we deserve their respect and good will.” People can be offended by all kinds o f things, but that does n’t mean that we all have to try to conform to som e standard o f non-offensiveness. (We haven’t shaved our legs or armpits for decades.) We don’t think that we should be policing each other’s appearance or behavior. We sincerely hope that our gay pride parades continue to be a celebration for all o f us, as we continue to honor and respect our differences. D avid D iehnel C orrie H ope F u r st W endy J udith C utler Portland Portland To the E ditor : To the E ditor ; Shock value has its place, but when using it, one must question who values it. We are not going to increase acceptance of our “lifestyle” by scaring the hell out of those that we are asking for acceptance. I’m all for freedom of expression but every thing has its time and place. For those marching with the M C C dressed in full leather, is that your garb of choice while attending Sunday services? A couple of years ago I waited tables at a restaurant on downtown Broadway. O n a Satur day afternoon during pride weekend, a couple of ladies from the “mainstream” stopped in for a light lunch, Nordstrom bags in hand. W hile I was taking their order, Dykes on Bikes came roaring up Broadway, wearing full riding leathers with breasts exposed. A t first I was amused, but then I was embarrassed. The two ladies were mortified. We are looking for credibility by expressing the incredible. Certain behaviors need to be expressed in the proper forum and I’m not sure something as public as the pride parade is that forum. Diversi ty is one thing, absurdity is another. People, let’s think before we act. The conser vatives in this country started the fire and we’re throwing gasoline on it. S o M arty D avis’ editorial on gay pride exposed deep division am ongst the readership? Duh! O n e would have to be totally clueless to be shocked about that occurrence. I have long held that there is no such thing as a monolithic “gay community.” Rather, we are just as diverse and just as frag mented as the nation we live in. It’s silly to expect 10 percent o f the population— simply because o f the single aspect o f sexual orienta tion— to band together and agree on anything. Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon LaRouche and George W allace all called themselves Democ rats. You’d be hard-pressed to find anything they could have agreed on. N elson Rockefeller, Barry G oldwater and Tom M cC all all identified as Republicans. I suspect if you had locked those three in a room, body parts might have been tom off. Are African A m erican political figures all united? L et’s ask C larence T hom as and Louis Farrakhan. Should Barbra Streisand and Charl ton H eston agree on everything simply because both have been in the entertainm ent industry ? In our 10 percent o f the world we have some folks who are cam paigning for legal gay mar riage. O n the other hand, we also have some who would rather have the government not rec ognize any marriage at all, much less add more categories o f state-sanctioned partnership. A segment waits eagerly for Just Out every two weeks and thinks the paper is an important view and voice o f the “gay community.” Others think Just O ut is rather left-leaning and lesbian in orientation. There are those who live in gay neighbor- hcxxls, shop at gay stores, go to gay movies and bars, have only gay friends, and stick rainbows and pink triangles over everything visible. Oth ers, though, identify as gay only when they re in bed with someone o f the same sex— the rest of the time, no one would ever know. In my illustrious dating history, I’ve been out with Radical Faeries, Log C abin Republicans, Maoists, closeted guys, bathhouse attendants, teachers, priests and police officers. I racked my brain and tried to think o f a single thing these guys could agree on besides a shared attraction D on K eisala Vancouver, Wash. To the E ditor : My life partner and I were both appalled by the June 4 editorial. We are both 40-something Jewish lesbian feminists and have been attend ing gay pride parades since the ’70s. We could not believe how homophobic this editorial sounded— and by the new publisher of Just Out? T hat’s a scary thought. As far as we’re concerned, the gay pride parade is not about impressing grandma or Harold and his wife." It is a celebration for us, and to show people who we are in all of our diver sity. The Portland parade already appears to be rather conservative compared with places like
