COLUMN: Why I Refuse to BGLAD

From Stephen Houghton's "Ecce Queer," Spring '94 From Stephen Houghton's "Ecce Queer," Spring '94Austermann, KurtFrom Stephen Houghton's "Ecce Queer," Spring '94Austermann, KurtPol: 23520From Stephen Houghton's "Ecce Queer," Spring '94Austermann, KurtPol: 23520KL AUSCHWITZ From Stephen Houghton's "Ecce Queer," Spring '94Austermann, KurtPol: 23520KL AUSCHWITZA photograph of a man, barely younger than me, was taken on November 27, 1941 with the above documentation. Name replaced by a number. No longer a seventeen year-old painter's apprentice, no longer a human being. He was charged by the Nazis with "a homosexual act." What happened after that photo is not certain. Welcome to BGLAD week, a week to acknowledge the differences in sexuality. It is a time to educate, celebrate, and participate. I salute everything that BGLAD stands for and all the hard work of those who organized it. I am, as the acronym commands, very proud of my sexuality. I am also very angry. "Ssshhhhhh, all you queers, keep it down! "Wait for people to deliver gift-wrapped human rights. Don't get upset when you lose your job. It doesn't matter if you get bashed. Allow religions to spread lies and hate. People have a right to harass you, take away your children, deny you scholarships. People deserve to be murdered." You can't keep me quiet for long. Some people complain that queers are asking for special rights, more than we deserve. A lesbian can get fired from her job in a city other than Philadephia, and have no legal or other recourse. In other words, in most places, queers have no rights. Personal choices need to be made as to how one contributes to creating a more equal and just society. Some, like many on the University campus, are apathetic. Some work within the system. Some write letters. Some make phone calls. Some lobby. Some scream. Some do components of each. A better future will be achieved as a result of a combination of these. Anger is a fine emotion, one that motivates and is constructive. Asking politely will only get you so much. I refuse to sit back, raise my hand, and meekly plead for equal rights. I demand them. Too many people have suffered and died at the hand of bigotry and oppression. Injustice is prevalent across the boards in society. The elimination of racism, sexism, classism, and heterosexism are too important to me to calmly wait for change. I yell. I march in the streets. I will not stop. I never let issues be swept under the carpet of invisibility. I may not be able to single-handedly save ignorant America, but I will create change. "I don't care what y'all do behind closed doors, so long as you. . ." Ours is a sexual culture. Sexuality pervades all aspects of society. Keeping queer sexuality locked away from heterosexual eyes contributes to invisibility, denying queer people's existence. Heterosexism and homophobia are not matters of privacy. Privacy is just another word for the closet. The meaning of being queer is more than a sexual act. It is an identity that extends beyond the bedroom. To be vocal about your rights makes you a radical. Selfish. Greedy. You are flaunting it. You are doing more harm than good. You are offending people -- yet others have the right to offend and harm you. To borrow from Hampshire College professor Margaret Cerullo, the "politics of respectability" is what America prefers. Many lesbian, gay and bisexual people have bought into this homophobic thought pattern. "Respectability" means to tailor (read: disenfranchise) parts of their own community in order to cater to what they think America finds palatable. These lesbian, gay and bisexual people have a problem with radical queer approaches. Time is wasted infighting, being divisive, and not attacking the true enemy. Combating one another only lends fuel to the homophobes' fire. This is the same fire upon which they would love to burn us at the stake. NEWSFLASH! America will hate you no matter how white, male, conservative, nicely dressed, rich, and "normal" you are. In their eyes, there is no such thing as nice, gay people, we are all queers. The "others" that you are suppressing are just as much a part of the queer community as are the corporate lobbyists in Washington. The "politics of respectability" boils down to a politics of heterosexuality -- the straightening up of Queer America. The assimilationist "we're-just-like-heterosexuals-except-in-bed" argument does not allow discussion of sexuality, of how queers live and love, of how queers are different, of who we are. This strategy imprisons us in the closet. The strength of the queer community lies within its diversity. Drag queens and leather folk are just as essential to the acquisition of equal rights as are people of color, women and transgendered individuals. This strategy of respectability/heterosexuality avoids public confrontation, according to Cerullo. Yet, the battlefields are in the public realm. One cannot effectively fight a battle in backrooms behind closed doors while mortar shells are being dropped outside. The anti-queer enemy controls the battle lines this way. Unless their discourse is publicly challenged, nothing will be accomplished. What Cerullo advoates is a "politics of disruption and a politics of disturbance." While society does not enjoy being disturbed, it is high time we admit "the disturbance is out there, the culture is disturbed." It is time to wake America up. Whispering in the government's ear has not worked. Real change will come about once radical action has been taken. Something is wrong with America if it sanctions discrimination against any class of people. At our University we have protective legislation, titled the Non-Discrimination Policy, theoretically proclaiming the University inclusive, but we still have the exlusionary ROTC program on campus. But, wait, that's another column altogether. Go ahead, BGLAD, but do more. Be out there. Be strong. Be active. Stephen Houghton is junior Fine Arts and French major from Rockledge, Pennsylvania. Ecce Queer appears alternate Wednesdays.