David Kaufman2013-05-21T02:46:00-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/author/index.php?author=david-kaufmanCopyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc.HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for David KaufmanGood old fashioned elbow grease.The NOM Scandal: No One to Blame But Ourselves!tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.13848142012-03-29T12:06:00-04:002012-05-29T05:12:01-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/stoke a "race war" to hinder nation-wide marriage-equality initiatives has been as broad-based as it has been bombastic. From LGBT groups such as Freedom to Marry to hate watchers like the Southern Poverty Law Center to black leaders including former NAACP chief Julian Bond, NOM has been universally decried for its efforts to pit blacks and Hispanics against the LGBT masses.
Yet the one group that has yet to be held accountable for the NOM debacle is the LGBT leadership itself. Indeed, having spent much of the past five years playing their own dangerous race game, LGBT talking heads have helped stoke the very atmosphere of animosity that fueled NOM's craven, color-based policies. Erroneously blaming African Americans for the passage of Proposition 8, attacking our black president for his, well, blackness, denouncing the black church, demonizing black people (particularly black men), and recklessly encouraging anti-black blog sentiment have been a hallmark of leading LGBT figures ranging from David Mixner to Andy Towle and Dan Savage. Not only have these writers fanned the flame of community-wide hatred, but they've consistently reaffirmed the now NOM-exploited notion that gay and American equals white and male.
While homo-stream defenders will decry my allegations, the evidence could not be more compelling. Savage, for instance, famously posted, and then cowardly erased, a hate-filled screed in the immediate aftermath of Prop. 8. Then a year later, Mixner, a veteran civil rights advocate with a long history of righteous achievements, singled out the "threat" of non-white voters in the run-up to Maine's 2009 marriage-equality ballot. Meanwhile, there's Towle, who, via his blog Towleroad, frames post after post in the most racially divisive contexts possible while cynically hiding behind a veneer of impartiality. Towle's readers have a love affair with the word "nigger" -- which Towle apparently feels no need to remove from his comment feed.
Such unrepentant (and unchallenged) racism, however, is only half of the gifts LGBT talking heads have handed NOM. Nothing if not cleverly comprehensive, NOM leaders understood the implications of an LGBT leadership almost completely void of black faces. Brazen in their unabashed whiteness, LGBT entities ranging from activist groups such as the American Foundation for Equal Rights and Equality Matters to television programs like The A List and In the Life are nearly devoid of black faces. As GLAAD President Jarrett Barrios put it bluntly some 18 months ago, "Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender African-American people remain largely invisible in the media today."
Take this clip from a fancy AFER fundraiser last year: lots of smiling faces, but not one black or Hispanic. Or this In the Life episode criticizing Barack Obama; once again, it's black-free. Indeed, the only black person regularly seen on Logo's gay reality program wasn't even gay. As for African Americans who do appear within the gay-stream (folks such as Pam Spaulding, John Amaechi, and Don Lemon), rather than add much-needed diversity, they typically parrot their Caucasian patrons while offering little context and scant criticism.
With such as sorry state of internal LGBT affairs, it's little wonder NOM seized upon this dangerous divide. But with NOM clearly taking a blow from their idiotic blunder, the real challenge is for LGBT people themselves to diversify their ranks. Some, like Equality Matters scribe Kerry Eleveld, have promised reform: "We will definitely ensure there's a wide range of voices ... [W]e're certain to develop an [Equality Matters] diversity advisory board," promised Eleveld in an interview I conducted with her last year. Nearly 18 months later, that "advisory board" has yet to appear. Color me surprised!
While LGBT leaders gorge themselves on NOM's takedown, they must also embrace this moment as an opportunity for much-needed introspection. NOM's action, while deplorable, merely reflects a sorry state of affairs sowed by a self-appointed gay-stream that rivals the Tea Party in its disdain for diversity. By arming our enemies with the façade of uniform whiteness, LGBT groups ensure that a truly progressive social justice movement will never take hold. And the results hurt no group more than LGBT people themselves. ]]>President Obama and Marriage Equality: Move On Already!tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.13366802012-03-12T18:51:00-04:002012-05-12T05:12:01-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/machers are once again commanding our commander-in-chief to "evolve already" in his support for same-sex marriage. This time it's Joe Sudbay, the AMERICAblog editor who originally elicited President Obama's now famous "attitudes evolve, including mine" retort just over 500 days ago. Writing for this site, Sudbay scolds the president for holding tight on the marriage question while issuing a litany of doomsy prognostics if he fails to evolve immediately.
Trading original thinking for boilerplate bombast, Sudbay regurgitates the same-same set of facts, stats, and figures employed by his boredom-inducing brethren in the quest to attack Obama's inaction: that the president is behind popular "progressive" sentiment; that he risks alienating his LGBT/leftist base; and that anti-equality types will vote against him regardless of how he evolves. As Sudbay sees it, with marriage equality a likely anchor of this summer's Democratic Party platform and a given in 2016's election cycle, the president's evolution is essential for party cohesion, effective media messaging, and all-around progressive good cheer.
The problem with Sudbay's calculus, beyond its painful banality, is that it's all theory and little action. Deadened by demands and laden with soulless simplicity, Sudbay's self-serving missive fails to account for the very real, and still very uncertain, political pathway ahead. Sure, he acknowledges that "rhetorical gay-bashing will be a regular element of [the GOP] nominee's campaign." But his lack of critical, and certainly intellectual, analysis renders this statement both hollow and hapless. By minimizing the Republican threat, Sudbay hopes to maximize the president's own personal shortcomings while insinuating the (false) existence of political parity on the marriage debate.
Sudbay's game of disinformation is as dangerous as it is disingenuous, threatening to confuse a still uncertain electorate in a year when every vote has never been more valuable. More frustratingly, Sudbay's stance does little to progress the very issue he claims to care so passionately about. While I, too, would welcome the chance to marry one day, we live in a republic, not a monarchy, and President Obama simply cannot make that happen. At least not on his own. And by binding the fate of marriage equality solely with the White House, Sudbay obscures this battle's far larger truths while doing little to prep "the community" for the long war still to come, most notably the arduous and very necessary journey to overturn DOMA in either the Senate or Supreme Court.
Sudbay's actions are easy and childish, reckless and irresponsible, and reflect the entitlement and myopia that have plagued the national LGBT movement for the past half-decade. Indeed, without his request, and certainly without his responsibility, folks like Sudbay have effectively handed Obama ownership of the LGBT movement and retired to a life of cozy laptop complaining. Along the way, they have crafted an imaginary political universe where the president, and the president alone, can determine the fate of marriage equality while recusing the LGBT masses from becoming masters of their own fates. It's a "civil rights" movement without the "civil," a "social justice" crusade without the "social." Sudbay demands that Obama "make it better" without demanding that his own gente make it better for themselves. Nice shout-out, Sudbay, for victimhood and powerlessness, particularly as GOP super-PACs work overtime to ensure that they come true.
The truth is that LGBTs are hardly victims or powerless. As recent state-level campaigns in New York, Maryland, and Washington confirm, the marriage battle, when conducted intelligently and proactively, can have a happy ending. And one need only look at 40-plus years of vocal, vigorous activism to see the movement's impact on everything from health care to global human rights. Sudbay's stance, however, suggests a newer, "back-seat" approach to activism that shares little of the "by-any-means-necessary" spirit of Stonewall or ACT UP, Harvey Milk or Larry Kramer.
Along with fellow "Obama-firsters" like Jon Aravosis, Kelley Eleveld, Dan Savage, and Pam Spaulding, Subday inhabits a reactionary realm of command and demand rather than get-up/stand-up. But if only those demands were focused elsewhere. I'd start with the infamous (and highly influential) cohort of homo 1-percenters, names like Apple CEO Tim Cook, White Collar actor Matt Bomer, and perhaps fashion designers like Marc Jacobs -- gay pop- and consumer-culture presences who personally profit from LGBT patronage but do little to propel LBGT progress. I, for one, have had enough of straight celebrity "allies" touting the necessity of LGBT equality or promising vulnerable teens that "it gets better"; now is the time for LGBT celebs to do it themselves. Exiting the closet would be a welcome first step!
Meanwhile, back along the Beltway, Sudbay's anti-Obamaism raises a host of additional questions and concerns, particularly with the looming threat of a marriage-equality recall on Maryland's fall ballot. Even the most clichéd kumbaya-ers would have to concede that race and class have emerged as an unwelcome and unexpected cofactor in the marriage-equality movement. Ever since Dan Savage, er, savagely bashed black voters in the wake of Proposition 8's results, black culture, black churches, and literally black people themselves have borne the brunt of LGBT ire.
And no black person more so than Barack Obama.
While it would be easy to dismiss these accusations as hysteria, or even a logical reaction to an admittedly conservative African-American church culture, one only need to look at Aravosis himself for a far more troublesome explanation. As Aravosis personally told me during a 2010 interview for theroot.com, "Well-educated minorities [like Obama] -- one would hope they would be more sensitive to other minorities. ... That is the expectation: He should be trying harder because he is a minority." Put in more blatant terms, Obama should be held to a higher, or at least separate, standard, because of his race.
Whites, even the most well-meaning, "progressive" whites, are likely to find little fault with this thinking upon initial inspection. After all, there is a certain, albeit false, "logic" to the oppressed empathizing with the oppressed. But as I wrote back in 2010:
Aravosis may merely be expressing a popular (yet unspoken) sentiment, but the notion that African Americans should be held to a higher standard than their white counterparts is the very definition of racism itself. What's more, like most race- (or racist-) based ideologies, it places the president in a position where even his greatest pro-gay achievements will -- like the repeal of DADT -- never fully satisfy his critics. At best, Obama's victories will be rendered Pyrrhic; at worst, they will be repackaged as an act of generosity by his (mostly white) naysayers.
Which leads us back to Sudbay and marriage equality. Unlike during the DADT debate, President Obama has little if any power to overturn DOMA and federally legalize same-sex marriages. Yes, it's important that the president take an active stance on state-level marriage-equality ballots this November to ensure that LGBT victories are not rendered defeats. But it's equally important that folks like Sudbay begin to rally LGBTs themselves rather than rely on Obama to do their work for them. Most crucially, with issues of race and class certain to craft marriage-equality battles in states like Maryland, LGBT talking heads must abandon the undeniable race-based rhetoric that has defined their anti-Obama attacks. It's divisive, conservative, and a total turn-off.
While I'm personally in no rush to the altar, I respect and understand that many LGBTs are, especially those with foreign-born partners. Call me naïve, but I suspect that comprehensive marriage equality will be a legacy of an Obama presidency, though it cannot be a legacy of Obama himself. In the meantime, for this to happen, I don't need President Obama to "evolve"; I need him to get reelected!]]>Can DADT's Repeal Help Obama Reclaim the LGBT Love?tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.8005432010-12-22T21:41:28-05:002011-05-25T18:20:30-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/Rachel Maddow and Andrew Sullivan are roundly declaring the repeal "Obama's victory," there remains a segment of the LGBT community for whom this president can do little or no good.
Indeed, despite the president's monthslong maneuvering to end DADT's 17-year reign of terror, many LGBT voices are reducing his role to marginal, 11th-hour efforts to appease angry activists. And some are simply leaving President Obama out of the picture entirely.
Writing for The Daily Beast, feminist author Linda Hirshman offered gratitude to soldier groups like the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network but made no mention of the White House. Influential lesbian blogger Pam Spaulding thanked Senators Kay Hagen and Richard Burr along with Congressman Patrick Murphy, but had no appreciative words for the president.
Over at progressive site AmericaBlog, writer John Aravosis does thank Obama at the end of a long screed, but only with a tepid, "And even the "President, who finally got into gear (albeit a tad late) and made the calls necessary to make this happen." Long-time LGBT leader David Mixner offered little more than a lukewarm "the repeal of DADT would not have happened without Pres. Obama... he was clearly on our side." While Jim Burroway cleanly quips: "In the end, President Obama's strategy worked after all. But it worked not so much because it was a brilliant strategy but because he was lucky."
While a few individual writers hardly speak for the entire LGBT community, there's little doubt that the president has been vilified by many gay-stream leaders since his election two years ago. Yet considering the president's impressive record on LGBT issues -- from enacting hate-crimes legislation to extending benefits to federal employees and ending the ban on HIV-positive visitors entering the United States -- that anger seems confoundingly misdirected. After all, wasn't it President Clinton who approved both DADT in 1993 and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) three years later -- two of the most regressive laws in the history of civil rights legislation. And weren't LGBT rights further imperiled under George Bush -- who infamously opposed extending hate-crimes legislation to protect LGBTs and promoted a constitutional amendment defining marriage as an exclusively heterosexual institution?
True, President Obama must still undo DOMA as well as pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) to meet all of his LGBT campaign pledge. But considering he's two-for-two in less than two years, isn't it time Obama's gay-haters began showing him some love? Or at least move on from the notion that Obama is a "homophobe," a "bigot," an "enemy of the gays" -- and any of the other epithets routinely hurled against him.
"The president is obviously not a homophobe, but he is a pragmatist, someone who governs from the center," observes Jillian T. Weiss, a professor of law and society at Ramapo College of New Jersey who regularly writes about LGBT topics. "This drives people crazy, particularly folks at the margins, like activists solely focused on marriage equality," she adds. "For them anything less than this 'holy grail' could be construed as homophobia."
Although Pres. Obama once favored same-sex marriage, he now supports civil unions -- a position shared by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the LGBT favorite during the 2008 presidential campaign. Activists such as Spaulding regularly deride Obama's faith-based opposition to marriage-equality and his now infamous quote: "For me as a Christian, (marriage) is a sacred union. You know. God is in the mix." Indeed, that Obama is religious at all is often used by critics as proof of his anti-gay sentiments.
Yet with the Obamas clearly no more churchgoing than the Clintons before them, why has Bill and Hill's Christian faith escaped the same kind of scrutiny? It's simple, says Americablog's Aravosis: "Obama is the president, Hillary is not." Yet Aravosis also offers a more alarming explanation -- one echoed by fellow LGBT bloggers from Spaulding to Mixner: Obama is black -- or at least biracial. And Obama's race should not only make him sensitive to LGBT issue, but more sensitive than the white presidents before him. And this includes white presidents like Clinton responsible for the very regressive legislation our black president is currently saddled with repealing.
"Well-educated minorities (like Obama)... one would hope they would be more sensitive to other minorities, that is the expectation," Aravosis explains. "He should be trying harder because he is a minority."
Aravosis may merely be expressing a popular (yet unspoken) sentiment, but the notion that African-Americans should be held to a higher standard than their white counterparts is the very definition of racism itself. What's more, like most race(racist)-based ideologies, it places the president in a position where even his greatest pro-gay achievements will -- like the repeal of DADT -- never fully satisfy his critics. At best, Obama's victories will be rendered pyrrhic; at worst, repackaged as an act of generosity by his (mostly white) naysayers. "All of the activist heat (to repeal DADT) may actually have saved Obama's presidency," Aravosis says. "The repeal could still blow up in his face, but if implemented right it really might save him."
Despite the strong anti-Obama current among many in the LGBT chattering classes, the good news is that the LGBT masses clearly support the president. An October poll of almost 4,500 LGBTs by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research (GQR) found that 64 percent of respondees "strongly" or "somewhat" approved of President Obama's performance on LGBT issues. What's more, a similar figure want to "work with" rather than "protest" the White House on the path toward LGBT equality.
Perhaps, most telling of all, bloggers like Aravosis and Spaulding have virtually no impact on mainstream LGBT politics or thinking. As the GQR report noted, even the most well-followed LGBT blogs like Towleroad or Queerty were read by a mere three percent of respondents; Americablog by two percent, Spaulding's Pam's House Blend by a scant one percent.
The disconnect between the bloggers' perspectives and that of the LGBT masses is not necessarily surprising. After all, "there are multiple communities within the LGBT 'community'," says Juan Battle, professor of sociology, public health and urban education at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. "Some gay people approve of the president and some don't -- just like in the larger society."
Despite the disconnect, one person who certainly is reading Aravosis, Spaulding and Towle is Obama himself. He invited them to the White House for the DADT-repeal signing, along with activists such as former Lt. Dan Choi and GetEQUAL's Robin McGehee. As some of his harshest critics, the bloggers and activists are certain to continue demanding that Obama live up to the rest of his "fierce advocate" campaign pledges. Nonetheless, the invites confirm that the Obama White House has -- at least for this week -- reached a much needed détente in the battle to sway LGBT public opinion.
This article originally on The Root. ]]>John Browne: Big Oil's Reluctant Gay Chieftantag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.5074062010-03-25T13:07:16-04:002011-05-25T15:55:20-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/Beyond Business, the new autobiography by former British Petroleum (BP) chief John Browne. The book, released in Britain in February, is essential reading for anyone -- homo or hetero -- with an ear for corporate finance, international intrigue, political celebrity and the type of career-ending sex scandals almost unimaginable in the 21st century.
Yet it was barely three years ago that Browne -- a 41-year BP veteran lauded by the Financial Times as "The Sun King"-- resigned after lying about a former male lover who threatened to expose their four-year relationship. Deeply closeted, Browne used his considerable industry influence to try and block Canadian Jeff Chevalier from revealing details of their dalliance in a Fleet Street expose. Initially insisting the pair met while jogging in London's popular Battersea Park, Browne's career was doomed when he ultimately admitted they actually hooked up via the far more salubrious Gay escort site, Suited and Booted.
Despite his Cambridge degree, a royal peerage, prime minister pals and billionaire business partners, Browne's demise was dishearteningly swift at BP -- a company whose market value quintupled during his 12 year reign as CEO. More than three years on, Browne is clearly still embittered about the entire experience -- despite the freedom it gave him to finally open his closet doors. "I had been found out; I panicked," he writes of Chevalier's revelations. "What was in my mind is hard to say; confusion, anger but most of all a sense of betrayal and affront."
Beyond Business' release comes at a precipitous moment for LGBTs over on this side of the Atlantic. On one hand, from Ellen Degeneres and Neil Patrick Harris to Johnny Weir and the kids on Glee, American pop culture has never skewed pinker. Meanwhile, LGBT civil rights struggles -- such as ending the ban on Gays in the military and approving ENDA -- are front-and-center on national political agendas.
Yet at the same time, corporate America's glass closet remains as suffocating today for many Gays as it was for Browne a generation ago -- despite dramatic improvements in both public and private workplace protections. Indeed, Browne's case exposes an often unspoken -- and uncomfortable -- contradiction in LGBT-land: While more Gay folks than ever populate America's mass-media arenas, "Some 51 percent of Gay people remain open to almost no one in their offices," says Daryl Herrschaft, director of the Workplace Project at the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's leading LGBT political association. Even though "companies are taking stronger steps to make Gays and Lesbians feel welcome."
Propelling this dichotomy is a combative combination of Left Wing liberal optimism and Right Wing religious resistance. For even as progressives cultivate an atmosphere of openness and tolerance, many conservatives have yet to be swayed in their core opposition to homosexuality -- whether in the bedroom, boardroom or screening room. "It's a classic case of media acceptance before political acceptance and mainstream cultural acceptance," observes Joe Dolce, parter with PR firm DolceGoldin and former editor-in-chief of Details. "Sure, Ellen may have her own talk show, but that does not change the reality for someone like John Browne. People may wonder how a story like his could happen in 2007," Dolce adds. "But it could still happen today because for many people sexuality remains a very private issue."
Nearly one-half decade after resigning from BP, Browne is a far different man than during his DL days. He's happily partnered to a younger former investment banker, lives between posh pads in London and Venice and serves as Chairman of The Tate Museum. In fact, as Browne himself concedes, his story wraps up with an almost cliche-bordering Hollywood ending. "One the gifts of 2007 is that I can be very open," he told The Times of London. "Two parts of me have been joined together," he adds, "really for the first time."
After four decades deftly (if not maddeningly) segregating his public and private spheres -- not to mention 20 years living with his Auschwitz-survivor mother -- 61 year-old Browne has certainly earned his right to an autumnal happiness. Indeed, over the pages of Beyond Borders, Browne describes his 40-year pas de deux hovering at the fringes of the sexual liberation movement. Early on, we read of a 20-something Browne enjoying anxious excursions to a Beat-era Greenwich Village during his post-Stonewall BP posting in New York. Yet as his star rises, so too does his closet door close as Browne trades Manhattan-styled openness for the testosterone-fueled world of Russian oligarchs and South American oil fields.
There were certainly rendezvouses; not to mention occasional missteps, such as a Scottish oil industry event where he awkwardly bumped into anonymous trick. But mostly Browne perfected the fine art of don't talk/don't tell -- once even flatly denying his sexuality to a prying Financial Times writer. "It was obvious to me that it was simply unacceptable to be gay in business, and most definitely in the oil business," Browne recently told The Times of London. From a curious kid cruising Gotham Gay bars, BP turns Browne into the corner office equivalent of George Falconer, the closeted, 60s-era professor in Tom Ford's Oscar-nominated film A Single Man.
At a time when work-place homophobia can seem almost anachronistically Mad Men-esque, the cases of both Browne and Falconer are important reminders that out LGBTS -- as much as women or ethnic minorities -- remain corner-office rarities. Which is why the tragedy of Beyond Business is how much Browne was unable to reconcile his professional power with his personal desires during his tenure at BP.
Although Browne has clearly moved on to a happier and certainly healthier place, just as the arrival of an out super-star would help finally shatter the celluloid closet, so too would an out super-CEO embolden the current generation of Gay corporate climbers.
"One of the key causes (of office closetedness) is the lack of out Gay leaders helping to ensure people feel safe coming out at work," says HRC's Herrschaft.
Out Gay leaders like John Browne.]]>The December Project: One Million Voices to Repeal Don't Ask, Don't Telltag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4430282010-02-01T14:15:35-05:002011-05-25T15:20:23-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/
No, not because I'm a stalker; unless you count Barack Obama -- who I'll be stalking relentlessly for the rest of this year to ensure he repeals Don't Ask, Don't Tell in 2010.
But neither Barack -- nor myself -- can do it alone, which is why I am appealing to you, dear readers.
My appeal is fairly straightforward. A few weeks back I went to a meeting at New York City's venerable Gay and Lesbian center. It was attended by some of the very same folks inhabiting that ultra-exclusive power-Gays summit you may have read about last week. But this meeting was in Greenwich Village not Tennessee -- and the message was clear: How to get the American power structure to take LGBT issues seriously.
About 25 people showed up to the meeting including one political insider who let us know loud and clear that if we want our politicians to respect our voices -- then those voices must be heard loudly and clearly.
Politicians, he said, only care about one thing: Staying in power. Which means incumbents want to be reelected, while challengers are battling to take their places.
This all translates into one key thing: Politicians listen to voters and if their constituents want the President to repeal DADT, they'll want the President to repeal DADT.
Although the military operates on a national scale, this debate is very much local. Because in order for Pres. Obama to enact a comprehensive, nationwide, fully-enforceable and completely-lasting DADT repeal, he'll need Congress and the Senate to approve it.
Yes, Pres. Obama could issue an executive order to end soldier discharges right now. But it could be overturned by his successor -- whether in three or eight years.
In order for DADT to become law, it must be passed by both the Senate and the House -- and this is where you come in. The majority of Americans want DADT repealed -- we just need to make sure our elected officials understand this.
YOUR Senators and Congressmen need to know that YOU want DADT repealed and that you demand they take a similar position.
To do this, they must hear from you -- either via email or phone. And they need to hear from you now. Earlier this week I sent emails to my representatives -- Congressman Charlie Rangel of New York's 15th District and Senator Kirstin Gillibrand urging them to demand Pres. Obama end DADT.
Imagine if thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of other American did so, too. Simply called or emailed their Congressmen/women and Senators to say we want DADT repealed and we want you to help make it happen.
So this week I've launched a new program -- The December Project. My goal is to get 1 million people to contact their representatives by December and let them know they want DADT to end.
At the end of this piece, I will list the contact info for senators and congressmen/women nationwide. Just scroll through the list and you'll find your own representatives.
As for those who feel Obama has let them down -- that they no longer have faith in his promises.
Fine: I'll contact your congressman/senators for you! Send me your name and your COMPLETE zip code and I will do the rest. I'll even shoot you a confirmation email letting you know it's been done. Contact: prjctdcmbr@gmail.com
Many LGBTs out there feel Pres. Obama's DADT promise is too little/too late. That a year of false-starts renders the man un-trustable.
So be it.
I, however, take a very different view: That the President's promise is an opportunity we cannot ignore. That LGBTs finally have an identifiable, actionable, deadline-promised goal that we must make happen. From Maine to New Jersey and most recently Hawaii, the past year has seen a slew of LGBT defeats and we must not miss-out on this chance for an LGBT success.
I say the Obama promise gives us a core issue to rally around and secure the success we need as a community to confirm our clout and move forward in 2011 to achieve additional wins -- most notably the enactment of ENDA and repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act.
Again, the goal is 1 million representative shout-outs -- by any means necessary. And while we're at it, I've opened a PayPal account -- the goal, once again, is to support politicians who will vocally declare their opposition to DADT and commit to working/voting toward its repeal.
We want as many elected officials officially on our side -- and one of the best ways to get them there is by supporting their candidacies financially, particularly in an election year.
So there you have it -- The December Project. Get 1 million Americans to contact their elected officials to demand they help Pres. Obama repeal DADT.
Don't wanna do it? Fine -- I'll contact them for you. Just send me your details and let's make it happen!
The December Project on Facebook]]>If Not Now, When?: Demand President Obama End Don't Ask, Don't Tell!tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4370252010-01-27T12:15:55-05:002011-05-25T15:20:23-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/skip speaking of DADT entirely.
I often use the word "reckless" to describe such voices, but in this case reckless would be generous. Because not only must the President speak of DADT during his address, he must lay-out a plan for its eventual repeal in a way that is democratic, long-lasting and moral. Not because juvenile Gay media types say so.
But because you, Barack Obama, you said so!
Unlike many other LGBT bloggers, I've never stooped to calling President Obama a homophobe. Yes, decisions such as the Rick Warren inauguration appearance were certainly misguided. But to brand Barack Obama a homophobe both diminishes the very potency of that word while opening the door for real homophobes to one day take this community down.
Instead, I believe the President is as sensitive to LGBT concerns as he is to the concerns of every oppressed American. It took eight years for Bill Clinton to wreck havoc on Gay America with DADT and DOMA and I never anticipated this damage could be undone in a mere 12 months. How anyone could only confirms the poisonous myopia of the insta-everything Gay-stream.
White House haters may view the repeal of DADT as just another opportunity for an anti-Obama blog-smear. But we must remember this is truly life and death for LGBT soldiers. For them, this is not a mere headline or debate topic, but rather their ability to serve safely and securely while protecting our safety and security. This is an issue with no room for cynicism, but only respect, urgency and action.
Most importantly, this is the moment -- one of many still ahead of us -- where LGBTs must stop their Bama-bashing and Dem-dissing and demand (yes, once again!) that the President abide by his promise to repeal DADT. Not because the President "owes" us something, or has "thrown us under a bus" (come on!). But because he has a moral imperative to abide by the moral compass I believe has always guided him.
Ending DADT is simply the right thing to do. And Barack Obama knows it.
While President Obama can certainly kick-start a DADT repeal, this is not a one-man operation. Particularly if we want to ensure such policies will truly -- and irrevocably -- become law. It's essential President Obama show the leadership and will needed to end DADT, but it's equally key that we as citizens demonstrate we are right there behind him. That as much as we demand he act as a fierce advocate for LGBTs, that we are equally fierce advocates for ourselves.
Perhaps one cynical truth is absolutely certain, politicians are -- in the main -- mostly preoccupied by a single goal: Retaining their jobs. If their constituents support a DADT repeal, they'll support a DADT repeal. But they must hear from those constituents -- and they must hear from them now! Indeed, as we gear up for tonight's address, it has never been more crucial to send a shout-out to the White House that the nation will no longer tolerate discrimination against our soldiers.
I have spoken aggressively against LGBT talking heads who bash the Oval Office with little concern for the consequences of their actions. Lots of bashing has gone on since details of the President's speech have begun to emerge on Monday. I do not call myself a leader. But I do ask those who truly desire LGBT equality trade defeatism for a solutions-based mindset that will usher in the change Pres. Obama both promised and must deliver.
First move: Contact your Senators (here) and Congressmen (here) NOW and let them know you support the DADT repeal and demand that they do, too.
]]>Enough: Scott Brown and the Betrayal of the LGBT Lefttag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4337162010-01-25T15:10:01-05:002011-05-25T15:15:20-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/schadenfreude surrounding Scott Brown's Massachusetts Senate win is the final confirmation of the current LGBT leadership's betrayal of 50 years of progressive politics. It began within minutes of Coakley's concession speech: A volley of "I told you sos" by her haughty Carolina highness, Pam Spaulding. Mock-shock and caustic concern from the dirt-dishers over at Queerty. Dispassionate dispatches from those "just-the-facters" Towleroad, Joe.My.God and the AMERICAblog. And finally -- a muddled, misanthropic, self-serving and -- obvi! -- Obama-bashing brief from David Mixner.
That Brown won should have come of little surprise to these LGBT "leaders" or their devoted fan base. After all, Spaulding, Queerty, Mixner and Co. practically cheer-led the former Cosmo-hunk to this critical triumph. Having officially turned on their president, these netrooters have conceded the greater good for their own shortsighted image-inflating. Well aware of the monumental consequences of a Republican win, Gay-stream media nevertheless continued their Dem-dissing and Obama-bashing with little concern for its election-day implications.
Now those implications are quickly becoming clear: Health care is at risk following the loss of the Democratic Senate majority. Additional Democratic senate seats are vulnerable to attack by an emboldened Republican party. Progressive White House initiatives may now be scaled back as Obama is forced to downsize his populist platforms. And -- most crucially -- the very LGBT issues these leaders triumph have never been more threatened by political rollbacks and the potential for voter-led regressive propositions. Our very economic, civil and physical liberties are imperiled -- and all Spaulding can dish up is an "I told you so". All Mixner can muster is yet another MLK-mooching missive on HuffPost.
Shame!
The real "I told you so" actually began back in November, when John Corzine lost the New Jersey governorship to that right-winger known as Chris Christie. Corzine's defeat ended New Jersey's quest for same-sex marriage -- all but guaranteed by the ex-governor and a supportive legislature before the election. Corzine knew this, Christie knew this and so did the Gays. Yet rather than rallying behind Corzine, the Gay-stream endlessly bashed his greatest supporter -- Pres. Obama, who made numerous Jersey visits stumping for the ex-Goldman Sachser.
Two months later, a near repeat: Critical election, crucial causes -- but LGBT cynicism instead of support at the appointed hour. Arabs may be fond of saying "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," but the Gay voices must clearly believe that "the friend of my enemy is my enemy".
The sobering truth is that the real enemies of LGBT Americans is actually their useless leadership -- if they may be called that. Their uselessness is as vast as it is dangerous: Devoid of any real and realistic political platform. Corrupted by an unfortunate (and unprecedented) conflation of technology and ideology. Desperate in their embrace of short-term allies with little concern for long-term benefit (Cindy McCain, Ted Olson -- come on!). Unrepentantly racist and race-bating on the White side; complicit, silent and homo Tom-like on the Black. Steeped in anger whilst mired by impotence. And shamelessly borrowing from earlier civil rights movements with zero respect or understanding of what they were truly about.
In fact, it's time to stop with the niceties and simply tell it like it is: Enough with the Loving v. Virginia references and its "Blacks got their rights too" reductivism. End the Mixner-styled "Gay Apartheid" hysterics and endless take-downs of the Black church. It's boring, it's tired, it's obnoxious and it's offensive.
Most crucially, same-sex marriage advocates must finally understand they cannot equate their struggle with the African-American battle for Civil Rights or South African movement to end Apartheid. Not because Marriage Equality is not a noble goal, but because they are simply not the same thing.
And -- yes, I'll dare say it -- because they simply have not earned it!
A century passed between the end of slavery and the Civil Rights Movement's first major successes. The anti-Apartheid movement took at least half that time. I only hope Gay folks won't have to wait so long.
Along with all that bigotry, the greatest offense of the past Gay 12 months has not been the sheer self-induced defeat. Rather, it's been the complete and total intolerance for any sort of critical or original thinking by Gay leaders. Coming from a tradition of Wilde and Stein, Baldwin, Bowles, Kramer and Foucault, this is a truly 21st century state of affairs. Gays and Lesbians have an honorable history of liberation literature and intellect which seems, sadly, to have died during the AIDS years. Today, Gay media -- both big and small -- have become a marriage-focused monolith for whom nuance and subtlety are simply nonexistent.
It's an "us-or-them" mentality leaving little room for the actual complexities of real LGBT life -- which is often messy, scary and especially for young people and urbanites very, very lonely. Marriage is a goal -- and a beautiful one. But I can't help but think that for many homo-singletons, a simple Gay second-date -- and not Gay-marriage -- is a far more immediate concern.
Just ask them.
As the White House and Pres. Obama enter this much-needed period of introspection, it's time the Gay-stream did so as well. Although the Prop. 8 trial trudges on in California, the harsh reality is that the marriage equality movement is slowly dying in the rest of the nation. Along the way, its mean-spirited mantras are beginning to wreck potentially irreparable damage on America's Left leaving the nation -- OUR NATION! -- truly vulnerable to Right Wing take-over.
The bitterness and vitriol filling LGBT attacks on the Dems must come to an end, replaced by a respectful and actionable solutions-based agenda. Most crucially, major LGBT institutions must learn from their previous mistakes and work to rectify them, rather than settling for sloppy repeats. Case in point: The glaring omission of a single Black Gay leader on the American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER) advisory board. Yes, Julian Bond is the head of the NAACP and it's lovely to see him there. But considering California is the state where the whole "Blacks vs. Gays" debate had its sorry start, the inclusion of a Gay-Black voice would have gone far towards much-needed reconciliation.
I am American, mixed-race, Jewish and Gay. I am, you could say, an ultimate minority. Because of this I do not take my liberties for granted -- and I will fight relentlessly against anyone who imperils them. This includes reckless LGBT leaders concerned more for their own bloated public images than the greater public good. Leaders like Mixner and AMERICAblog who would seem to truly want this White House to fail -- yet fail themselves to offer any sort of realistic back-up plan. Or even explain why.
Nonetheless, I believe equally as strongly in the rights of all citizens and I, like my LGBT brethren, expect those rights to be honored at the highest levels of government. LGBT Americans are certainly fighting a battle for civil liberties and I stand ready to form that first phalanx. With the future of our nation now literally at stake, however, it's high time our LGBT leaders began showing this monumental campaign the intelligence and gravitas it deserves. ]]>Under Attack: Can Harold Ford Survive New York's 'Angry Gays?'tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4293722010-01-22T10:21:14-05:002011-05-25T15:15:20-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/
"Ford's crossed a line and he cannot be allowed to become our senator", says Jon Winkleman, a longtime gay activist, former ACT-UPer and avowed Ford-foiler. "We're taking this man down," he declares, "by any means necessary."
As pale-faced as he is baby-faced, Winkleman may not exactly make for a modern-day Malcolm X. But his homo-liberationist ideology is quickly gaining traction among LGBT leaders who are mad as hell and aren't going to fake it anymore. Done with donating to do-nothing Democrats, stung by same-sex marriage setbacks and fed-up with fat-cat LGBT political groups, a new generation of queer radicals is now scaling their ire upwards. They're protesting politicians, targeting traitors and boycotting bigots with proven anti-Gay paper trails -- policy flip-floppers like Harold Ford.
"It's time to be taken seriously," said Robin McGehee, the co-director of last October's National Equality March in Washington, DC. She led a civil disobedience strategy session at the Lesbian and Gay Center last Friday evening, which was attended by more than two dozen "angry gay" activists; targeting Harold Ford, Jr. was their serious topic number one.
With his polished pedicure and shiny SUV, Ford may act all teflon tough. But let's hope his doorman is a little harder-core -- because these gays are coming to get him. "We've got his address in the Flatiron District and are planning a protest this week," confirms Corey Johnson, the boyishly bearded bad-ass , who got seriously face-to-face with State Senator Carl Kruger in Albany last month. Kruger's crime: On the record -- being one of eight Dems who voted against same-sex marriage last month. Off the record, at least according to Johnson, bachelor Brooklynite Kruger is a hypocritical closet-case.
Pretty and pedigreed, Ford, too, has a mild case of the gay face. But those emerald eyes will likely be of little defense against close-contact fighters like Johnson. Their beef seems to knows no bounds: Ford's dismal anti-gay voting record back in Tennessee. Two-faced Dems like Kruger and Bronx pol Hiram Monserrate here in New York. And nationwide frustration with Pres. Obama's foot-dragging on key campaign issues like Don't Ask/Don't Tell and the Defense of Marriage Act.
Vowing "not another one, not again," Gotham Gay leaders have made it clear that screw-over season is over -- especially for entitled arrivistes like Ford -- who is emerging as a test-case for LGBT battles to come.
"This is the worst place and the worst moment for an anti-gay carpetbagger like Ford," says activist John Aravosis, whose blog, AMERICAblog News, is leading a LGBT boycott of the DNC. "He's sort of like a perfect storm to stir up the protest pot."
The rapid-fire LGBT response to Ford confirms the potency of their furor -- and newfound commitment to taking on politicians deemed enemies of the gay state. But even armed with weapons like this recent anti-Ford PSA, whether that anger can actually translate into political damage remains to be seen -- particularly considering Ford's deep-pocketed patrons.
Yet, even at the primary level, a Ford win would be a big loss for Gay Inc. -- punked yet again despite such a clear moral majority and authority. Indeed, if Ford is to emerge as a Gay-power test-case, then Gay-power must prevail.
Less tested, meanwhile, is the role of race in this debate.
Ever since the defeat of Prop. 8 in California, an undeniable "blame-the-Blacks" undertone has infiltrated the marriage equality movement. Yet while White gay leaders insist Ford's politics -- and not his pigment -- are the only issues at play in New York, some gay Black leaders remain unconvinced.
"Ford could certainly receive a lot of the White gay anger directed at African Americans after the same-sex marriage defeats," says Kenyon Farrow, executive director of Queers for Economic Justice and no Ford fan. Ultra light-skinned and with scant Negro dialect, Farrow says Ford could "also emerge as a proxy target for Pres. Obama" -- a ballot-box rejection of yet another (supposedly) anti-gay Black man.
Yet even if the LGBT attacks do turn racial, it will be tough for a man like Ford -- fair-skinned, prep-schooled and married to his own Elin Woods -- to play the race card. "Ford must win the Black and Latino vote, so he'll make it about race, he'll insist 'the White gays are against me'," says gay Black-blogger Rod McCullom, who will soon launch a new anti-Ford website. "But I would love to see him dissing the White man at some rally in the South Bronx or out in Brooklyn," McCullom adds. "I would love to see him claim racism with his lovely blonde wife by his side."
]]>Meet Vincent Morgan: Harold Ford's Pro-Choice, Pro-Gay Marriage, Pro-New York Congressional Candidate Cousintag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4297382010-01-20T15:07:51-05:002011-05-25T15:15:20-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/Congressional Candidate Vincent Morgan.
While some folks may know him as the hunky Harlem investment banker challenging the legendary Charlie Rangel in Upper Manhattan's 15th Congressional District, Morgan actually offers a far more compelling back-story.
Case in point: The man's a Ford -- as in Harold Ford, Jr.!
Indeed, Morgan is Ford's first cousin -- the son of Harold Jr.'s uncle, John Ford; a long time Tennessee State Senator.
As he and I discussed this morning over breakfast, Morgan grew up poor on Chicago's South Side, raised as an only child by his grandmother and mother -- who met John Ford in her late teens and gave birth to Morgan after a brief relationship.
Morgan did not find out about his illustrious father until his early teens and finally met the Ford family during his years studying at Howard University in Washington, DC. In fact, with barely a year between them, Morgan and Harold, Jr. have led remarkably parallel lives, despite being raised at the opposite ends of the economic scale.
Both went into finance -- Morgan is vice president and community banking officer for TD Bank. Both are involved with politics. And both share the same tell-tale Ford family coloring and features.
But there is much they do not share. Forty year-old Morgan -- married to a film-maker and father to two young kids -- has lived in Harlem for 10 years and is no newcomer to either the city or the 'hood. "There's no carpet-bagging here," he says.
Indeed, he's intimately familiar with Rangel himself -- having helped run the old man's campaign back in 2002.
Morgan also appears to have none of Ford's political baggage. He is firmly pro-choice and unequivically believes in Marriage Equality, a position potentially at odds with many of his prospective Harlem constituents. "Some advisors have warned it would be unwise to support same-sex marriage, but this is just the right thing to do," says Morgan, whose campaign has formed an LGBT campaign committee. "We've let the religious right marshall this debate," he adds. "But to me, this is simply about relationships -- I support same-sex marriage and everyone's right to have their own relationships respected."
Morgan's sentiments are hardly surprising considering his unique background. While many of his cousins -- and 15 half-siblings -- were at prep school like Harold, Jr., "I grew up poor, I dropped out of high school and got some help by people who believed in me," says Morgan who ultimately finished high school before enrolling in Howard and eventually completing graduate school at Columbia University. "I know what it's like to feel like an outsider. I was the 'light-skinned' kid in an all-Black neighborhood, I did not have a father, I was wedged between groups."
Today, Morgan hopes to channel that earlier sense of isolation into unifying Harlem as he challenges Rangel for New York City's coveted 15th Congressional District.
A seat Rangel -- now under investigation for financial misconduct -- has held since 1971.
As for Harold Ford, Jr. -- whom he has met many times -- Morgan says the two ocassionaly bump into each other in social settings, but don't really mix-and-mingle.
And that's fine. "There may be a lot of impressive people in my family, but I am not running as a Ford, I am running as my own man," says Morgan, who was raised far from the Ford's political power-base in Tennessee. "I did not know my father, and at times I have felt a little cheated by that," he adds of John Ford, who is now in Federal prison following a 2007 bribery conviction. "But I suppose it's the same for any kid in that situation."
Almost two months after his announcing his candidacy -- and eight months to go before September's Democratic primary -- Morgan is about to kick his campaign into high gear. This coming Tuesday is an event at Harlem wine bar Nectar, and Morgan will essentially be in full campaign mode thereafter.
It's been a long journey for Vincent Morgan from Chicago's South Side to Harlem, Rangel, Ford and beyond. But despite his modest beginnings and unique family history, the real work is still to come.
LGBT and progressive leaders still reeling from Ford's unexpected arrival take notice: Morgan supports you and needs your help. And as a pro-Gay, pro-choice, pro-community candidate -- he certainly deserves it.
"There are so many people in Harlem and New York with stories like mine," says Morgan, who hopes his youthful zeal will appeal to voters in a district that stretches literally from the Upper West Side to Washington Heights. After 40 years of Rangel & Co. in office, "Harlem is ready for change."]]>Wear and Tear: Why the Presidency is Hazardous to Obama's Healthtag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4288702010-01-19T09:47:12-05:002011-05-25T15:15:20-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/
"I've seen President Obama gray more in past year than during the two years I followed him on the campaign trail," observes Amy Rice, co-director of HBO's Obama campaign-pic By The People. "I guess it comes with the territory."
Yet while the external effects of the Oval Office may be literally written on his face, far lesser-known is the damage all that endless stress is having on 48 year-old Obama's insides. From increased blood pressure to decreased libido, thinning skin to thickening arteries, the Presidency is a 24/7 stress-inducer rapidly aging both body and mind.
"Our research suggests a president ages two years for every one year he is in office," observes Dr. Michael Roizen, chief wellness officer at the Cleveland Clinic and author of Real Age: Are You as Young as You Can Be?. "And this can certainly accelerate in the first year."
So as Barack Obama gears up for year two, what exactly are the internal side-effects of all that nonstop Presidential tension?
Cardiovascular problems are the main result of prolonged stress as evidenced by the numerous presidents suffering heart attacks in office. Often the coronaries were kept from the media. "Johnson certainly had heart problems, WIlson suffered two strokes in 1918, and Eisenhower apparently had a heart attack in 1953 that was never admitted," says Clemson University Prof. James A. McCubbin, a scholar of presidential health. "This is part of the reason why 20 percent of all presidents die while in office."
Although often difficult to diagnose, extreme-stress can affect mood and mental acuity, says Manhattan psychologist Barry Richman, MD. "Increased anxiety, early-morning awakening, chronic insomnia are all possibilities," Richman says. Heightening the risks, Richman adds, is "Obama's relative newness to politics, though he does appear to be a quick study."
Stress induces the body's "fight or flight" response which can alter the immune system and leave it vulnerable to attack. "Common colds, viral infections even H1N1 are all possible results," explains Stephanie McClellan, MD, co-author of the new book So Stressed.
Keeping that immune system suppressed is cortisol, a hormone released during moments of high-tension to restore body-balance, but harmful in case of prolonged exposure. Elevated cortisol levels can lead to bone loss, diabetes and thinning skin, explains Dr. Roizen. "By weakening immunal responses, cortisol can also hinder our body's cancer-fighting cells." Thinner skin, meanwhile, provides an easier entryway for sicknesses and infections.
All that cortisol can also leave the body in a quasi-state of continued inflammation, Dr. McClellan adds. "This is taking place on a cellular level, and can result in tooth decay, gum disease and other oral-care problems."
Along with anxiety, presidential stress can afflict far greater damage on a president's mental health, explains Prof. McCubbin. "George Washington clearly showed signs of dementia," he says. Indeed, with neurons less able to repair themselves, there are a range of more immediate risks which can include impaired memory and lack of concentration. "Stress can leave us more easily distracted," Dr. Roizen explains. "This makes you more accident prone especially if you're driving -- though the President isn't doing much of that these days."
When accidents do occur, heightened stress can also make it harder for the body to recover. "Stress shortens telomeres," says Dr. Roizen. "These are then end-point on DNA which keep chromosomes healthy and able to repair themselves." Much like the tails of Avatar's mythical Na'avi, telomeres must unite for cells to heal. "Shortened telomeres mean every injury is harder for the body to repair."
In the midst of extreme stress, the last thing the male body thinks about is reproduction, says McClellan. "The focus is on self-survival, not survival of the species," she explains. The result: Lower sperm count, reduced sperm motility and a possible decrease in libido. "I don't claim to know about the President's sex life," she continues, "but performance can definitely be altered."
The theory that stress is the main cause of ulcers is no longer exactly precise. Ulcers, actually, can result from the presence of the Helicobacter pylori bacteria in the stomach. While 80 percent of those infected with H. pylori never remain symptomatic, "researchers have found that stress was a major cause of those who do develop ulcers," according to McClellan. If Pres. Obama is an H pylori carrier, he should certainly be concerned about developing ulcers.
Despite all this doom and gloom, President Obama is well-positioned to emerge from the Oval Office with relatively little permanent damage beyond that grey hair. For one thing, he surrounds himself family and friends, the most important stress-buster available. "That supportive relationship with Michelle is the main thing he has in his favor," says Dr. Richman.
Most important, with his penchant for arugula and fondness for fitness, Obama "came into the White House already doing all the right things," observes Roy Johnson, editor-in-chief of Men's Fitness magazine. "He may have his cheat foods just like the rest of us," Johnson adds. But if he keeps up those basketball games and sticks to those gourmet greens, "Pres. Obama could very well leave Washington as healthy as he arrived."
]]>Urban Legend: Black Men, Gayness and the Hypocrisy of the DLtag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4168632010-01-13T12:05:32-05:002011-05-25T15:10:21-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/HuffPost blogging, but a few constants have emerged since I began posting late last year: Few folks actually read entire HP pieces; reader comments typically have zero relationship to the pieces being critiqued; and mention the words "Black men" and "gay" in the same graph, and the conversation will invariably turn to the DL.
The DL -- or "Down Low" -- popularly refers to a subculture of urban Black men who inhabit a fuzzy middle-ground between hetero and homo. Back in the day, they would have been called "bisexual". But mostly operating outside of mainstream Gay realms, DL dudes have today traded sexuality-based labels for an identity far more rooted in race and class. Far removed from the loci of White homo-politans, the DL is basically a Black and Brown thing, with little need or interest in dominant-culture approval.
Trouble is, as the case of recently-outed NFL-er Ovie Mughelli confirms, the rest of Gay society can't seem to get enough of the DL -- fetishizing, problematizing and pathologizing it in the media, academy and public health organizations. Falsely vilified for spreading HIV within the larger Black community, DL men have also become a convenient totem for the "dangers" of a sexuality that strays from easily-brandable and acceptable conventions.
Rather than align themselves with the "good" Gays now popular on TV, DL men have formed their own kind of "in-group" allegiances -- trading mainstream visibility for the comfort and security many simply need to survive. Along the way, they've been derided as a quasi homo-Fifth column -- blasted as weak-kneed and cowardly for not embracing their "true" homo-selves.
There is nothing new about the DL. Indeed, it had a bit of a moment one-half decade ago when both The New York Times Magazine and The Oprah Winfrey Show devoted ample air-time and column inches to the topic. I, however, was living abroad back then and missed most of the DL's initial media frenzy. But in tandem with recent attacks by Marriage Equality leaders on larger Black culture, dissing the DL has now reached levels that can no longer be ignored.
There is little doubt that many Gay Black men operate in a world far removed from their White brothers. But whether this condition demands its own sub-cultural classification is far from certain. What is certain, however, is that Black men contend with social, cultural and economic pressures often far more complex than Caucasians. Author Benoit ("I'm-a-sex-addict") Denizet-Lewis touched upon this nuanced reality in his New York Times Magazine piece, quoting noted Black Gay artist Glenn Ligon:
Ligon, whose artwork often deals with sexuality and race, thinks that the pressure to keep homosexuality on the DL does not come exclusively from other black people, but also from the social and economic realities particular to black men. ''The reason that so many young black men aren't so cavalier about announcing their sexual orientation is because we need our families,'' he says. ''We need our families because of economic reasons, because of racism, because of a million reasons. It's the idea that black people have to stick together, and if there's the slightest possibility that coming out could disrupt that, guys won't do it.''
Writing about a Black topic as only a white man could, Denizet-Lewis gives scant attention to what should have been his piece's key conceit. Indeed, rather than vulgarly focusing on bath-houses and "bottom brothas", Timberlands and Thug-life, the author might wisely have explored an issue central to Gay men of every color: What is the literal price of the closet and how do men cope when that price is too high.
The funny irony is that we need only look at White Gay America for answers. Whereas Black men who live beyond the Gay-stream are demonized and derided, their white counterparts are certainly tolerated -- if not celebrated. In fact, a quick look at the public profiles of...say...well-known news anchors or weather-men or Oscar-winning actresses reveals a life that -- if they were Black -- might easily be called the DL.
Yet, while poor Blacks are bashed as traitors for opting out of openness, wealthy White folk are offered compassion and understanding -- afforded excuses like "the glass closet". Those closets protected, they're then coddled with "cutesy" gossip mentions and snarky Gawker exposes despite the very real damage their hiding-in-plain-sight does to the communities that need them most. Many are certainly rich and possibly powerful -- but where are they in the battles to end DODT and DOMA.
In fact, where are they at all?
It's oh-so easy to declare Pres. Obama homo Enemy Number One for not yet reversing the homophobic actions of his White democratic predecessor. And, indeed, the President's second year must demonstrate far more "fierce advocacy" than his first. But I say some of the worst enemies of Gay America aren't politicians, but rather its bloated, greedy and quasi-closeted court jesters whose cowardice makes a mockery of the brave -- and far more vulnerable -- LGBTs living truly open and authentic lives.
Back during DL 1.0, I was living in Tel Aviv where I dated a young Israeli-Arab who -- according to Yankee LGBT conventions, would be on the DL. Tarek (as we'll call him) came from a lower-income neighborhood in Jaffo, the son of a fisherman. Although outwardly secular, Tarek was raised in the type of traditional Muslim family typical of the Middle East: Abaya-covered home-maker mother; extended family under one roof; strong expectations of marriage. When he said "my father would kill me if he knew I was Gay," Tarek was not exaggerating.
But as an Arab minority living within a Jewish majority, Tarek was also -- without doubt -- socially, culturally and economically disadvantaged among an openly anti-Arab Israeli society. He may have had the brains to succeed as high as a Jew, but certainly not the support or opportunities. So Tarek (often like DL Blacks) inhabited a clutch of cultures -- a common presence in Tel Aviv's Gay bars, but closeted back at home. Aware of the risks and limitations of his Jaffo community, but with zero ability to abandon it.
Perhaps -- most crucially -- Tarek deeply loved and cared for his family in a way that is often foreign to middle-class Westerners. As much as Tarek couldn't risk losing his family -- despite their obvious limitations, he mostly didn't want to. Tarek's life was far more complex than anything I'd ever encountered and made me -- a Gay/Black/Jewish dude -- very proud and grateful to have been born American.
Back in New York, I've often though about Tarek -- who despite those deep family ties, would certainly have traded his life in Israel for a chance at my American birthright. I'm also certain he would have been horrified by the kind of America-bashing often employed by U.S. Gay-stream leaders shamefully ignorant of what it really means to live as an oppressed LGBT like Tarek.
Like many of the kinda-Gay men who inhabit my Harlem 'hood, Tarek had a very real desire for love, compassion, family and security that transcended simple notions of sexuality. While many Gay may find all that -- and much more -- in Chelsea or the Castro, those who seek it elsewhere have every right to do so. For these are core human conditions -- and there is nothing "down" or "low" about that!
]]>He Talk Pretty One Day: Reid, Obama and "Negro-Speaking"tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4201072010-01-12T18:04:10-05:002011-05-25T15:10:21-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/
While it is clear Reid's behavior was anachronistic and insensitive, his actions actually leave me far more puzzled than pissed-off. For the entire affair highlights what has always been one of the great unspeakables of the Obama presidency: How else is the man supposed to speak?
Indeed, the facts...pardon the pun... speak for themselves. Barack Obama is the son of a white mother and absentee African father raised in Hawaii -- perhaps the most un-black state in the union. That he would speak -- to put it bluntly -- "like a white guy" is both logical and organic. Speech is an acquired characteristic with zero race or genetics-based pre-determinants. The president's speech patterns betray the culture and geography of his youth -- spent far from the centers of African American life in exotic Pacific Rim locations. There is nothing controversial here -- just factual.
Reid's sheer surprise at Obama's diction -- and the resulting disgust by many black commentators -- display an equal disregard for the truths of Obama's past. They also -- finally -- reveal America's unease and unwillingness to honestly accept the president's bi-racial background. Indeed, Barack Obama may be righteously touted as the first African-American president, but I have always found this title plainly problematic.
Convenient at best and spurious at worst, an "all-black" Obama allows Americans -- of every color -- to freely overlook Obama's complex historical background in return for an easily-brandable racial identity that is not entirely on point. Culture (as much, if not more) than color help shape and steer identity and individuality and when it comes to Barack Obama, the culture that defined the president's upbringing was not African-American.
This truth may be difficult for many, but it is a core truth. Pres. Obama may be married to an African-American, have fathered African-American children and have steeped himself in African-American culture -- but his predominant formative experiences were predominantly non-African-American. Many, of course, will say "so what, it doesn't matter" -- particularly because of the racial awakening the president underwent during his early adulthood.
But I am certain this matters greatly to the president himself. For just as social scientists argue that gender is as much psychological as physiological, so too is race. A racial identity is comprised not just of pigment and shade, but the societal, cultural and spiritual experiences associated with that coloration. Both may certainly exist separately. But remove one and you inherently affect the other.
This is particularly true for native-born African-Americans, whose legacy of slavery and ethnic disenfranchisement has denied us much of the cultural specificity enjoyed by whites (i.e. "Italian-American," "Irish-American," "Jewish-American" customs and traditions). Glenn Beck may claim it doesn't exist, but African-American culture is very much alive and well. What has been lost, however, is the more precise links to our histories that would allow African-Americans identities rooted in distinct cultures/nations rather than a racial monolith.
Which leads us back to Pres. Obama. I have never met the Commander-in-Chief, but I've always felt a strong kinship with the man. I, too, am bi-racial, was raised by a single white mother and grew up out West in predominantly non-black, majority-Asian surroundings -- in my case, San Francisco.
Like the president -- at least according to Reid -- I am "light-skinned" and do not possess a "negro dialect," And like Pres. Obama, discussions about my speech-patterns are both boring and banal. Many observers have wondered why the President seems so disinterested in this entire matter. I, however, find it plaintively clear: Folks (both black and white) have harassed Barack Obama for "speaking white" his entire life -- Harry Reid is simply the most famous.
Pres. Obama's speech patterns are an organic, integral and essential component of his background and those who question this -- both black are white -- are equally confused and misguided about his identity. For whites, this confusion suggests, once again, that people of color are to be suspected and dissected despite their obvious achievements. It also reveals a deep unease with the access earned by folks like Barack Obama -- brown boys who speak like the white guys.
For black people, the focus on the Obama's dialect is also concerning. Being badgered for the way you speak is no less painful when that bullying comes from blacks. Moreover, it also raises offensive and unnecessary issues of "authenticity" where they do not belong. One doesn't have to "speak black" to "be black" -- or at least to claim their foothold in the African-American community. Moreover, as Obama confirms, one does not need to "speak black" to proudly serve as America's first black president.
Well aware of the societal hurdles ahead of me, my wise mother used to say "you have to be a million different people to a million different people." Sadly, at least in this case, Mom was wrong. Mixed-race people must establish a core sense of self that is anchored from within -- and never determined by external surroundings. Failing to do so would not only leave us unfulfilled, but downright schizophrenic.
I speak the way I speak -- and whether in Harlem, Hells Kitchen or the Haight-Ashbury, it's all the same. As for Barack Obama: He doesn't speak like a white guy or a black guy -- he speaks like Barack Obama.
]]>Southern Discomfort: Gay Inc.'s Harold Ford Jr. Problemtag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2010:/theblog//3.4184352010-01-11T16:57:53-05:002011-05-25T15:10:21-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/
The news of Ford's Senate interest was immediately received with the type of vitriol typically reserved for the Becks and Palins of the world. Instantly branded "anti-Gay" by important and influential LGBT blogs, Ford's unimpressive record on LGBT issues was touted as proof-positive he has no business holding office in his adopted home-state.
The criticism hurled against Ford was both expected and warranted. Yet I could not help but recoil at seeing yet another Black democrat skewered by White Gay leaders with zero concern for the implications of their actions. Picked apart by bitter bloggers even before he'd had a chance to lay out his New York agenda, Ford was cast as a carpet-bagging bigot and yet another Black man out to get the Gays.
Of course the blogs (and bloggers) who lambasted Ford may themselves not be racist -- or at least resorting to blatantly racist language. But a quick look at their viewer comments confirm that many of their readers are far less generous. Indeed, this comment from the popular blog Towleroad says it all:
He lives in Manhatten (sic), is in his 30s, a minority AND a democrat and a full blown homophobe?
If New York queers allow this piece of dirt in to any position...well, go burry (sic) your heads in quick sand.
At 39-years-old, Ford is indeed in his 30s and as an African-American, he's certainly a minority. But a full-blown homophobe -- not so much. In fact, although Ford's record back in Tennessee is unquestionably less than ideal, his potential plan for New York State remains an unknown. He has in the past voted against same-sex marriage, but just today announced that he is for civil unions and marriage equality. He's voted to limit abortion rights and increase the rights of gun-owners, but both issues would certainly have to be tweaked to accommodate liberal New York voters.
These are key issues which Ford must account for. And he must be given the opportunity to do so. But there is some serious accounting due by the race-based haters who've chosen -- once again -- to blame a Black Man for problems far beyond his control. Much like Pres. Obama, Ford is the latest whipping boy of the Gay media elite -- an easy target for a frustrated and impotent movement lashing out like a bewildered bully.
The issue here is one of responsibility. Terms like "anti-Gay" -- like "Gay Apartheid" before it -- are powerful and loaded. They also carry important implications of hatred, violence and -- as cases such as Jorge Lopez Steven Mercado demonstrate -- even murder. Harold Ford has displayed none of these attributes. Branding Ford "anti-Gay" is not just shrill and counter-productive, it waters down the danger of the truly anti-Gay like those who lynched young Mercado.
Then we come to the issue of race. Many might say by glazing over Ford's color, Gay-stream bloggers have opted out of this particular color-war. Not quite. As I've regularly argued, since the repeal of Prop. 8 in November 2008, race has been at the core of nearly every element of the Marriage Equality battle -- racism, race-baiting, race-appropriating and race-traitoring. This is a movement now swirled in race and Harold Ford's 11th hour arrival is no exception.
The problem here is one of relevance. Ford's race should -- of course -- be of zero relevance to his candidacy. But then again, neither should race have played any role in the unending take-down of Black America by Marriage Equality leaders. As the comment above -- and many more -- confirm, any issue dealing with Black folk and Marriage Equality is fated to become race-based and hateful. That tide has simply reached a point of no return.
Well aware of this sorry state-of-affairs -- and mostly responsible for its genesis -- the mainstream Gay media must demonstrate that while race has become an unavoidable element of this conversation, racism must not allowed to do so. This is particularly crucial because so few alternative voices are allowed any breathing space -- while Gay thinkers who dare stray from the mainstream are quickly brandished traitors and sell-outs.
Harold Ford will have to work hard to secure the dollars and votes of skeptical New Yorkers -- of all colors and sexualities. Indeed, much like Hillary Clinton before him, Ford is yet another Southerner searching for redemption up North. Unlike Clinton -- a politician I deeply admire and twice voted for -- Ford actually held political office before arriving in town. Perennial Gay-fave Clinton may have gone on to become a seasoned and successful political force, but it must be remembered her only achievements down in Washington were a failed health care plan and...well...surviving a failed marriage.
Harold Ford has -- like it or not -- emerged as a political reality and must be afforded the opportunity to state his case. Do not forgot that before she was appointed senator, Gilibrand herself held many conservative and regressive views, but was allowed the breathing room to redefine her agenda. Along the way she became a champion of many key liberal causes -- including the battle for Marriage Equality. With that battle now on life-support, perhaps its time to recruit as many new allies as possible -- yes, even the Black ones.
]]>Black Man Rising: President Obama and the Anti-Defamation League's "African-American Issue"tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2009:/theblog//3.4070372010-01-02T18:20:55-05:002011-05-25T15:05:19-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/"Top Issues Affecting Jews in 2009". Published annually, the report detailed the key geopolitical incidents and concerns which shaped both the good and bad news last year in Jewish communities worldwide.
From the ongoing threat of a nuclear-armed Iran to June's Holocaust Museum shooting in Washington, DC, the passing of the Federal Hate Crimes Bill to the UN's highly controversial Goldstone Report, the ADL brief illustrates that both philo- and anti-semitism remained alive and well in 2009.
While all of the ADL's "top issues' were certainly newsworthy, the group chose one in particular to kick-off its missive: "Barack Obama became the first African-American to assume the presidency". Although part of a larger talking point highlighting executive changes in both Washington and Jerusalem, the wording of this statement could not be more curious.
Because in honoring Pres. Obama's election, the ADL chose to conspicuously lead with and solely focus on his race -- not his campaign, his party-affiliation, education or any element of his administration or cabinet. Just his race. As the ADL makes abundantly clear, any Obama news worth reporting can legitimately begin by qualifying his ethnic origins.
WTF?
As the son of a Jewish-American mother and African-American father, I am intimately-familiar with the complex, collaborative and often contentious history between Blacks and Jews in this nation. And indeed, I am not wholly opposed to the ADL's decision to highlight Pres. Obama's race as an "issue" that affects Jews -- and by association, Israel. What is bothersome, however, is the wantonness, randomness and insincerity of the ADL's actions.
As an organization rooted in rooting out bigotry and discrimination, the ADL is well aware of the weight afforded to any race-based analysis of the Obama presidency -- no matter how celebratory or minor. Well funded and unquestionably well connected, ADL officials are also clearly conscious of the import afforded to any document resulting from their press machine -- particularly one with as loaded a title as "ADL Highlights Top Issues Affecting Jews in 2009".
At best, the ADL should know better than to include Pres. Obama's race anywhere in this critically important missive. At worst, one could legitimately ponder just what exactly they hoped to achieve with such race laden language.
The problem is we have no idea. Because after launching their report via race, the ADL's release essentially never mentions it again. Instead, in its brief appearance, race is employed as a canard, a wild-card, a sound bite -- the ADL is instructing us to believe that race matters, we're just not told exactly why. With American Jewish leaders among Pres. Obama's most vocal critics since his inauguration, such lack of context is reckless, insensitive and simply lazy.
This is not the first -- and potentially not the last -- time the ADL has highlighted Pres. Obama's race when commenting on his politics or policies. Indeed, in a response to June's historic Cairo speech -- the one later lauded as "groundbreaking" in the Top 10 list -- ADL national director Abraham Foxman not only made note of Obama's race, he suggests it may be muddling his Middle Eastern agenda.
"Every individual brings his own baggage (to the presidency)," Foxman said. "He's an African American . . . and he has rediscovered his Islamic roots after two years. I don't like it, but I understand it."
What's most troubling about the ADL's Top 10 List is the way it reaffirms the organization's -- and perhaps American Jewry's -- historic inner-conflict with African Americans. On one hand, you have statements like Foxman's above -- which spuriously links the President's race with Islam and unfounded anti-Israel sentiments. But then you have documents such as Rage Grows in America: Anti-Government Conspiracies -- which bravely and dramatically highlights "the current hostility (that has) swept across the United States" since Pres. Obama's election. The ADL releases an impassioned statement lauding Obama's inauguration as "a true milestone in our history and it is, in one sense, a realization of the dream". But then it shamefully stays silent when the President is viciously attacked for his race by a group of young Jewish Americans in Jerusalem this summer. I'm hardly alone in wondering just how quiet the ADL would have remained had those kids been Black and their target Benjamin Netanyahu!
I'm a Jew and a Zionist and firmly believe that anti-semitism must be identified and attacked by any means necessary. Five thousand years of history more than confirm that Jews can be unjustly, violently and murderously targeted even in the most progressive societies -- from Moorish Spain and Weimar Germany to an isolationist 1930s America and even Israel itself.
Nonetheless, much like the folks behind the Marriage Equality movement, there remains something rotten, churlish and downright sloppy about the ADL's relationship with Pres. Obama's race. Indeed, the fickle, irresponsible and almost infantile behavior of leaders from both groups -- American Gays and Jews -- has been perhaps the most disappointing political development of the past 12 months. I may be premature in predicting an unholy alliance between the Homo-Left and Judeo-Right. But such a marriage of convenience can no longer entirely be discounted as both sides -- mired in misguided thinking and embracing similarly incendiary language -- strive to confirm the old Arab maxim that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend".
Pres. Obama is clearly no enemy to either group and his race has no part in any discussion highlighting political issues affecting...well...anyone. I asked the ADL to explain why they placed Obama's race so prominently in their release and never received a clear answer.
Intended for and distributed among mostly Jewish- and Israel-focused organizations, I suspect the ADL likely figured their "African American issue" would simply remain "within the family". But in this era of Web 2.0, the fact that ADL officials could assume such verbiage could possibly pass unnoticed is, perhaps, the most offensive misstep of all.
As we enter a new year -- and new decade -- here's hoping the ADL's next Top 10 list is written with far more sechel than its last.]]>Tom Ford's A Single Man: Gay, Straight AND Othertag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2009:/theblog//3.4039062009-12-28T11:05:27-05:002011-05-25T15:00:22-04:00David Kaufmanhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kaufman/or lack thereof -- of A Single Man, the debut feature by former Gucci creative director Tom Ford. The film -- a big-screen adaptation of Christopher Isherwood's 1964 novel -- zooms in on a pivotal day in the life of a gay professor overcome with loss following the sudden death of his long-time partner, Jim.
Set in early Civil Rights-era California, A Single Man is meticulously styled in Ford's tell-tale maximalist/modernist aesthetic. Every piece of furniture, clothing and set design betrays the arch mid-century glamor Ford has long touted -- a coolly controlled palette repeatedly shattered by lust, anger, loneliness and grief.
That homosexuality anchors each of these emotions renders Ford's "A Single Man is not a Gay film" claim tenuous at best. But God is in the details -- and the details of George Falconer's gayness are as murky as the cocktail-induced haze anesthetizing his boozy best friend Charlotte, played by Julianne Moore.
A Single Man opens with one death, Jim's, and ends with another. Much of what transpires in between can most accurately be described as enduring rather than living. George numbly negotiating the obligations to his students, his colleagues and his acquaintances. His battles to restrain a still very active libido without erasing his remaining sexuality. His stabs at kindness and compassion even as he feels both have forsaken him. And his fleeting flirtations with hope and joy despite the real possibility each -- at least for him -- are long past their expiration dates.
These are universal experiences in basic humanity immediately understood by anyone -- of any sexual orientation -- for whom loss is no stranger. And, indeed, in much of the film Falconer's homosexuality is an afterthought -- more suggested via metaphor than explicitly conveyed through dialogue or dramatics. There is no Brokeback-like coitus-crescendo in A Single Man, only expertly-stylized sensuality coupled with glimpses of the magical-yet-mundane coupledom that George cannot live without.
This is where Ford's "Gay/not-Gay" claim may truly hold water. Because either by consequence or design, A Single Man reveals very little of what it means to actually be Gay in early '60s America. His homosexuality suspect, George routinely encounters -- and smoothly deflects -- what we could now call homophobia from his neighbors, Jim's family and even his best friend. We quickly learn how they feel about George's Gayness. But drowning in doom and despair, George himself is far less forthcoming.
Instead, George's inner world is filled with little more than memories and sorrow. And by omitting his day-to-day Gayness, Ford transforms his protagonist into a sort of "every-Gay" upon which viewers and reviewers can easily ascribe their own contemporary narratives.
It helps that George certainly looks the part. Slim, handsome, White and well-off, George effortlessly conforms to the almost impossible-to-meet standards of any sexuality in any era. Pre-AIDS and bordering on the celibate, George also displays the benign, buttoned-up Gayness currently touted as the homo-ideal. Young men crave him, women desire him and his enduringly-glam gal pal still seeks a life with him decades after their brief dalliance. Remove all that grief and Gay-hating and being George doesn't look so bad. And as Ford makes clear, with Jim around it definitely wasn't.
It would be easy to project a political agenda upon A Single Man and declare it an allegory for current gay-lib battles like the Marriage Equality debate. Yet doing so would be both imprecise and anachronistic. For one thing, George certainly pays a steep price for the intolerance around him. But despite alarmist CNN articles, we've mostly evolved past the era of "family-only" funerals and code-laden literature lectures.
Then there is Ford himself, who's repeatedly insisted A Single Man is even less political than it is gay. Considering Ford self-financed the flick, such sentiments owe as much to potential profits as identity-politics. But even if he is copping out, Ford is one Gay icon who's more than earned his pass-pass.
Forever-partnered -- and forever out -- Ford has long been a rare genuinely Gay presence in fashion-land. And while hardly warm-and-fuzzy, Ford's remained a visible -- and relatively virtuous -- counterpoint to the sex-and-drugs vulgarity of suddenly-sexual colleagues such as...say... Marc Jacobs. You may hate Tom Ford because he's rich and thin -- I certainly do -- but there's never been anything contrived about his sleek-and-chicness.
Which leads us back to Ford's film. I, too, agree with the charges he straight-washed A Single Man's marketing campaign. Promotional posters featuring Moore and Colin Firth en amour certainly do smack of insincerity if not downright manipulation.
But both Ford's medium and message need to be heard and I say get folks to the cinema by any means necessary. Critics aside, A Single Man is a singular success precisely because of its manipulative abilities. The film is not tragic like Brokeback Mountain or heroic like Milk, but rather elegant, intelligent and refined on the outside -- unjust and enraging within.
A Single Man isn't a film that demands you take to the streets -- or to the ranch. Instead, with its focus on love and loss, the film draws you inward to a place of contemplation rather than confrontation, compassion rather than outrage. These are all essential human conditions -- and essential conditions for any struggle to truly triumph.
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