TRANSITIONS
letters
No Coincidence
To the E ditor :
I read with interest Marty Davis’ editorial
concerning the Human Rights Campaign Coming
Out Project spokesperson [“Slam Dunk,” Feb. 16).
As you are aware, the current spokesperson is
John Amaechi, a former player for the National
Basketball Association. You suggest in your editori
al that his position as spokesperson is more than
coincidental with the recent publication of his
Ixxik, Man in the Middle.
Unfortunately, your editorial ignores the great
work that HRC is doing for our community and
chooses only to criticize HRC for selecting Coming
Out Project spokespersons who have some kind of
celebrity status.
I suspect you haven’t had the pleasure of meet
ing John Amaechi and hearing him speak. 1 have.
He is eloquent, engaging and entertaining. Because
of his history of playing professional basketball and
because he is a gifted speaker, he is able to reach
segments of our population that are traditionally
more difficult to reach. Before you rush to mobilize
criticism of Amaechi and HRC, perhaps you should
listen to a spokesperson who has a message worth
hearing.
The coming-out process is difficult for us all. To
criticize Amaechi for sharing his coming-out
experiences simultaneously in written and spoken
words shows a monumental lack of empathy for
people who have yet to come out and for those of
us who already have.
Finally, your representation of HRC as an organ
ization that does not recognize grassnxits activists and
community leaders is entirely inaccurate. Every year
at HRC dinners across the country, including the
national dinner in Washington, D.C., such activists
and leaders are recognized for their dedication to
moving our cause forward. I fail to understand how
your continued criticism of HRC for the selection of
John Amaechi advances our cause at all.
■T odd C anon
Portland HRC Steering Committee
Free to Be
To the E ditor :
First of all, I want to thank Just Out and West
Duncan for the great article “Building a History” in
the March 2 edition. With your help in getting the
word out to our community, we had a successful
conference with meaningful discussion between
attendees and panelists.
1 would, though, like to clear up one part of the
article. I have not transitioned in the work force,
Dawn Louise Wicca, 1953-2007
nor am 1 full-time M to F. My family is supportive
or tolerant, and I enjoy being transgender.
Thank you again for the support of Just Out.
Knowing that you are there to publicly address the
needs of our communities has always been
important to me.
L inda B rown
HRC Diversity Committee, Northwest Gender
Alliance
Falling for the Big Lie
To the E ditor :
Imagine my sadness: 1 returned home from
a strategic meeting with Bonnie Tinker about her
desire to mobilize people of faith around marriage
equality, only to discover the Just Out editorial
“Basic Rights" [March 16).
In that essay, Marty Davis states flatly: “What
became clearer and clearer as the evening drew on
was that there are two camps in this battle:
Christians and everyone else. Christians fear that
they are now the target....”
I was immediately reminded of the notion of
the “big lie” in Adolf Hitler’s autobiography. He
said the general public “more readily fall victims to
the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves
often tell small lies in little matters but would be
ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods.”
You will, of course, suppose that I am referring to
the foolish things these so-called “Christians” are say
ing to defeat civil unions. No. Sorry. The big lie that
interests me far more is the one the media perpetuate:
that there are two camps in this battle, Christians and
everyone else. Despite the incessant hammering on
this theme in the mainstream media, the reality is
that people of faith—including but not limited to real
Christians—are some of the greatest allies of equali
ty, justice and human dignity.
I refuse to believe Just Out is as much a victim
of the neocon big lie as the mainstream media
outlets, but it’s sometimes hard to defend my belief.
For instance, your editorial views Tinker through
the narrow perspective of a longtime lesbian
avenger, as if one could toss the spiritual basis of her
ministry into the garbage can. Likewise, during my
year on the board of the Community of Welcoming
Congregations, we routinely waited for Just Out to
take a serious look at the role that CWC was
playing in organizing people of faith across Oregon
to embrace gay believers, to counter hate and to
promote just legislation. An expression of interest
by Just Out simply never happened.
For the record, people of faith have been
defenders of our right to love for two centuries.
A Quaker memorial service
was held March 31 at Trinity
Episcopal Church in Portland for
Dawn Lxiise Wicca, who died of
complications from breast cancer
March 17. She was 53.
Dawn Smith was born Sept. 20, 1953, in
Ravenna, Ohio. She moved from Tallahassee, Fla.,
to Portland. In 1977 she married her first husband,
Tom Brenholz. In 1993 she married Kirby Umer.
Wicca, a hxikkeeper, was active in feminist, les
bian and nonprofit organizations dating back to the
1970s. She was actively involved with A Women’s
Place Bookstore in Portland and the Feminist
Women’s Health Centers in Tillahassee and
Portland, was a part of the Lesbian Feminist Study
Group from 1981 to 1983 and started a support group
through the Lesbian Community Project called
Lesbians Married to Men. She was also a bwkkeep-
er for the Oregon Federal Feminist Credit Union.
Survivors include her husband; daughters,
Alexia Davis and Tara Urner; brother, Sam
Smith; and sister, Carla Lovetere.
Brian Gregory, 1961-2007
Portland resident Brian Gregory died of heart
failure March 24. He was 46.
Bom in Reno, Nev., Gregory moved to Portland
in the early 1990s and worked at Pendleton Woolen
Mills for the past 13 years.
In England, philosopher Jeremy Bentham wrote
reams of suppressed manuscripts that constituted
a legal defense of same-sex love. He hoped his
liberal theological tract, Not Paul but Jesus (1823),
could be expanded to make our case from the
perspective of faith. Unfortunately, he could not
publish these views.
At the same time in France, socialist Charles
Fourier—using some trappings of Christian
theology—argued that it was demonstrably harm
ful to suppress lesbian and gay love. The numerous
Fourierist communes that sprang up across America
in the 1840s and 1850s were looked upon as
hotbeds of “abomination,” according to Nathaniel
Hawthorne’s novel Blithedale Romance.
Simultaneously in America, the Quaker religion
was shaken by a culture war over sexual freedom.
Radical theologian Elias Hicks argued that all human
passions were created by God, in order to lead
humanity to a knowledge of God’s love. Hicks taught
that human conscience has access to an inner light
from Gixl that trumped the “thou shall nots” of the
Bible and the church—and, as a result, that no
believer has the right to impose a kind of moral slav
ery over his brothers and sisters. The same light illu-
Gregory was well known in
the howling community, having
bowled with the Portland
Community Bowling Associa
tion League for 17 years and
served as president of the
Rosebowl Tournament board of trustees.
Also active in the Oregon Bears for the past 11
years, Gregory served on the board of directors and
as club treasurer. He was instrumental in the start of
Camp Oregon Bears, served as co-chairman for the
2001 Beards & Roses committee and devoted much
time and energy volunteering for several other com
mittees and events with the bears.
He and his partner of 10 years, Steve Learning,
built their dream home in 1999 and resided there
until 2005. Friends remember Gregory for his quick
wit, devilish grin and big heart.
Gregory is survived by his partner; brothers,
Keith and Bruce; three nieces; a nephew; and hun
dreds of friends. His parents and one brother preced
ed him in death.
A memorial page has been set up on the
Oregon Bears Web site, www.oregonbears.org.
Friends are encouraged to visit and write an entry.
A celebration of life will be held 2 p.m. April 15
at Gail’s Dirty Duck, 439 N.W. Third Ave. A private
family memorial will be held April 21 at his home.
Remembrances can be made to the Friends of
People with AIDS Foundation, P.O. Box 4014,
Portland, OR 97208.
minates a work by Hicks’ most ardent follower, Walt
Whitman. For all the subsequent generations, while
our people struggled in darkness, Leaves of Grass
(1855) survived as a spiritual touchstone.
Look up the biography of a great gay lib leader,
the late Jack Nichols, and you’ll see what I mean in
his frequent references to Whitman. During the past
10 years, I’ve also articulated this position several
times during various hearings for <xir rights.
I have been saying it and I will keep saying it until
gay and straight people alike finally get it: Bullies
believe that they must oppose love between two men
or love between two women because that love leads
away from God. The true Christian, on the other
hand, understands that our loving relationships are
our most powerful experience of God’s love, and
therefore interference with same-sex relationships is
an interference with the sacred and the holy.
To the bullies, we say: You will not interfere
with our freedom of religion for very much longer.
In the words of Susan B. Anthony (another lesbian
Quaker), "Failure is impossible.”
M itchell S antine G ould
LeavesOfGrass.org