( long winded rant alert, I'm a little crabby, eye still hurts, icky weather, etc... food and fashion to follow, promise...)
A 1946 American William Wyler film about three servicemen trying to piece their lives back together after coming home from World War II. It won the 1946 Academy Award for Best Picture.
WORLD AIDS DAY
(" anybody want a drink before the war?" )
All red ribbony and hopeful, we beat on. Not really a part of my life, at all, as the first real snow of the unraked season falls, cleaning up the whole world. This was not always the case, even though, as I have said many times on here ( I think, could have been the writing in my head..) youth and the closet saved my life.
My pink and green so called life in the early 80's is what it is, or was what it was, more or less clueless to the world around me. Those dark days of three tv channels and pbs. Remember St. Reagan did not utter the word until 86-87. I was lucky.
People just one hair older than me, out being all Stonewall + 10, riding high that disco wave of glory, died. Nasty and alone, gross, swollen and spotted. Kicked out or to the curb, and really all but now forgotten. Rich white America moved on,like this guy says, better drugs, " living with, living with, not dying from....."
FAST FORWARD
The night before World Aids Day 2010, every gay man in the country along with every tween girl sits down to watch the hot hot hot, 8pm broadcast showing of a beautiful young gay as gay can be castrati lovingly sing DON'T CRY FOR ME ARGENTINA to his too pretty for words boyfriend. ( after last weeks tear jerker of family unity and same sex slow dancing) We are here, we are queer, and boy or boy are they used to it!
The war is over... right?
DADT, DOMA, ENDA, Abc/lmnop... blah, blah, blah. Thirty years after the decimation of so so many gay men, our community still has to fight, tooth and nail for ANY crumb of dignity or legality . Just yesterday, the report comes out saying that men and women in the armed forces don't give a hoot about open gay and lesbian soldiers, but that does not matter to the Onward Christian Soldier movement? Again, yesterday, the Illinois House passed a " domestic partner " bill and it looks like it may pass the state Senate. The most basic of human dignity for same sex couples.... not their sacred marriage, but some legal protection for people. OUTRAGE raining down from the pulpits/radios and poorly done Internet sites ( and as always now, tweet, tweet, tweet...). We are a horror, we are a scourge, we are a pox on this country. "All men are created equal".. but " gay is icky" trumps that....Newsweek magazine claims their side " is winning" . Every single news operation, running any story that is the slightest bit " pro gay" feels the need to counter it with the MOST horrible and Fred Phelps-esque talking head, all in the name of fairness. There are links to view all of these, not going to post them here, cause it would mean watching them myself. But just ask yourself. Does the mainstream media seek out the Klu Klux Klan or Aryan Nation to re-butt any pro African American civil rights story?
I hop up on my little cyber soap box and I rant and rave and blow off steam, hopefully here, sometimes they slip into the facebook, almost never coming out well. The lgbt Americans that survived the early years of Aids are exhausted. Today it is all but impossible to get glbt folk really fired up, not really a surprise. Just today, and yes, yes, yes, I know, global Aids is what is important, yadda yadda... get your own blog, they are free. Just today, when we are so close, and still so far, I get a little bit of self pity and angst. Why does their Bible trump my Constitution ? Why is their SO much passion and hatred towards people, who really want no special rights at all? And again, I know and am thankful at the advances that New York State has made, just tired.
So, world AIDS day, glad I slept through it, but happy guys like the above film maker are here to remind us. It really does feel like such an uphill battle sometimes, when things are not at all bad for Neil and I ,really. Could not be more out and accepted in the community, he fights the good fight daily ( hourly) within his church. We are activists, small a, within reason. Happy there are folks out there doing more, just wish I understood why , after all these years, we still have to.
I hop up on my little cyber soap box and I rant and rave and blow off steam, hopefully here, sometimes they slip into the facebook, almost never coming out well. The lgbt Americans that survived the early years of Aids are exhausted. Today it is all but impossible to get glbt folk really fired up, not really a surprise. Just today, and yes, yes, yes, I know, global Aids is what is important, yadda yadda... get your own blog, they are free. Just today, when we are so close, and still so far, I get a little bit of self pity and angst. Why does their Bible trump my Constitution ? Why is their SO much passion and hatred towards people, who really want no special rights at all? And again, I know and am thankful at the advances that New York State has made, just tired.
So, world AIDS day, glad I slept through it, but happy guys like the above film maker are here to remind us. It really does feel like such an uphill battle sometimes, when things are not at all bad for Neil and I ,really. Could not be more out and accepted in the community, he fights the good fight daily ( hourly) within his church. We are activists, small a, within reason. Happy there are folks out there doing more, just wish I understood why , after all these years, we still have to.
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