Here's to the Violets: My Thoughts on Gay Rights (Video)

Here's the text of a speech I wrote with my friend Ron Marasco for the Human Rights Campaign's recent gala in New Orleans. The clip of it is below. Enjoy!

I am so happy to be with all of you tonight. To celebrate the work you do--and to have a bourbon or two later.

The great Tennessee Williams wrote---

--of course I'm starting with Tennessee Williams. I'm in New Orleans, at the HRC gala, and I played Blanche DuBois.

Which is why I never go anywhere without a paper lantern in my purse.

Tennessee Williams wrote a line that I felt was appropriate for tonight. And appropriate to this time in our history, your history, and to the rights that everyone in this room is fighting for. It is a line that meant so much to him, it's on his gravestone.

"The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks."

"The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks."

To me, its meaning is simple. The hard, the cold, the oppressive will--at long last--be broken apart by a force that is beautiful, natural, colorful, alive.

That's what tonight is about, what the people in this room are about. We're a bunch of violets breaking through the rocks.

And it is happening.

The rock is cracking away. The rock of hate and falsehood is being broken apart.

All across this country, regular Americans who were born and bred in towns where a gay couple wouldn't dare walk down a street--all over these American Main Streets--something is changing.

Blue-collar guys are looking up from their work, grandmothers are speaking up at the dinner table; and they are saying something to members of their family, and co-workers, who are against gay marriage.

They are saying in one, increasingly-loud American voice, "Honey, rather than worry about who someone else loves--and why, think about who you hate--and why!"

The violets are breaking through the rocks.

America has always been a country of common sense. A country of innate goodness--although a goodness that is sometimes slow to action. As Winston Churchill said, "Americans are always ready to do the right thing. After they have exhausted all the other possibilities."

We have exhausted all the other possibilities. And it is time to call an injustice an injustice.

It is an injustice that we send a gay or lesbian soldier to die in a war--to give their life for a country that won't let them be legally bound to the person they love.

It is an injustice that a soldier gives their life for a Military--an exemplary Military in every way--except one in which they cannot have the picture of their lover cut-out in the shape of a heart and taped to their locker because that would be "telling." Such a ugly word.

It is an injustice that, in this room, many of you pay your tax money to the very public institutions that deny you rights other Americans enjoy; pay your tax money for public schools that will not accept you as legal parents; pay your tax money for the paper on which they print the goddamn marriage licenses you cannot get.

And while you are paying your tax money for all of the above, a preacher can stand in the pulpit of a multi-million-dollar mega-church advocating the damnation of gay Americans and not pay one thin dime in taxes.

You know, I occasionally watch those preachers on the Christian TV stations.

I always think to myself: How can I believe your theology when I can't believe your hair?

I find it intellectually offensive when people shrink the Bible to fit the small-mindedness of their bigotry.

Leviticus 18:22 and Deuteronomy 22:5...the famous list of the "abominations." Bible verses which, by the way, also list as a mortal sin things like "the wearing of a garment made of two different kinds of fabric."

Yes, the Bible verse they use to condemn homosexuality also calls Polyester-blend an abomination.

Well, in this, perhaps the Lord has a point. But if you took away all the Polyester-blends in those mega-churches....most of the women would be naked.

In my Bible I see no evidence of Jesus telling same-sex couples they cannot love each other.

And he could have. He was a carpenter--if he made good furniture every gay man in Nazareth knew Him.

The fact is: it's happening.

All the violets--gay Americans, lesbian Americans, Bi-sexual Americans, transgender Americans, people of color, and the people of this city forgotten by Washington in hurricane Katrina--we are all are starting to break through the mountain of straight, white, male lawmakers in Washington.

Their time is over. And they know it. Which is why they are looking increasingly ridiculous and beleaguered. To me those guys look like one, big casting-call for the lead role in a very bad production of Death of Salesmen.

Because America is starting to say those lawmakers are wrong about "Don't ask don't tell," and wrong to oppose gay marriage. The way they were wrong, wrong, wrong about the war in Iraq.

A war that was created by who? A straight, white man named George W. Bush. A straight, white man named Dick Cheney. And a straight, white man named Condoleezza Rice.

The rocks are breaking. And it's time to call certain people on the hypocrisy of their stance against gay marriage.

Newt Gingrich: against gay marriage, but on his third wife.

That recent convert to an anti gay-marriage stance, Rudy Giuliani: third wife. Rush Limbaugh: vehemently against gay marriage and....yep, third wife. A third wedding that was performed by none other than Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Clarence Thomas: second wife.

4 men, eleven marriages, and you must be lectured on love by them? This Mount Rushmore of Divorce!

Ladies and gentlemen, as all of you in this room know so well, political activism tells us now what history will tell us later.

The people who support "don't ask don't tell;" and who oppose "gay marriage" are wrong. And their children and grandchildren will know they were wrong.

This is the age of Obama. And the people who oppose these causes need to realize that. But there is someone else who needs to realize that this is the Age of Obama.

Obama.

It is time, Mr. President. Do not fall behind others on these issues. My God, Dick Cheney announced that he is in favor of gay marriage.

And on that very day, the National Weather Service reported hell froze over.

So Mr. President, please catch up. Or you are in danger of being considered "just to the right" of a man who is "just to the left" of Vlad-the-Impaler.

Newsweek magazine just said about gay marriage--and I quote: "This train's left the station. Time to get on board."

It is happening.

Something is changing.

Oh--there is still a lot of work to be done. But it will happen.

And when it does--when "Don't ask don't tell" is scrapped, when gay men and women can marry the people they love--when that day comes, people across this great land will be looking for a place to party.

And I say: Come on down to New Orleans! I'll be so happy I might swing naked in a window on Bourbon Street!

Me and Rachel Maddow!

Yes, across America we will celebrate because, at long last, that day will have arrived. But to the people in this room--that day will not only have arrived for you, it will have arrived because of you.

Thank you HRC. Here's to the violets.

Comments

[Jsens3]

In spirit I agree with everything but am put off by her slamming straight white men. I am a straight white man and I am 100% in favor of equal rights for GLBTs. Straight white men don't have a monoply on bigotry; look at the California vote! Look at the hostility to gays in the black community! Look at such groups as The Eagle Forum! Hostility and bigotry know no boundaries of race or gender.

I am always amused by bigots reliance on Old Testament rules. Let's look at a few more for laughs:

Women who bear a male child must wait 33 days to be purified from their bleeding and must not touch anything sacred; if a girl is born this doubles to 66 days.

Men may not cut the hair at the side of the head or clip off edges of the beard.

Tatoos forbidden.

Don't mix meat and milk - no cheeseburgers and a glass of milk!

No pork, no shellfish, no catfish.

And this is only a taste!

[EAHARA]

As I get amused by amateur theologians such as yourself who have no clue about the Bible other than what they have jerked out of context to defend their skewed understanding of it. Any theologian worth half his pay would run your small brain out of town on a rail.

All the examples you gave belong to the Old Covenant. The covenant changed with the coming of Messiah. Those laws, which were dietary, were put aside, and if you know anything about the Bible at all, you would even know the book in which God made it clear that they changed.

The moral law, on the other hand, does not change from covenant to covenant. Thou shalt not steal still applies today. So does thou shalt not murder.

And so do the sexual restrictions.

Let me give you a tip: if you are thinking of making a living doing theology -- don't quit your day job!

[Octoberluna]

LOL another man who presumes to know the mind of "god" - let me know when he says it's not ok for you to have drunken procreational intercourse with your unmarried daughters - let's see how you make that lovely story more pallatble - or was it just the times - don't forget those are the same daughters offered up to a gang rape in order to spare the bungholes of two complete strangers that Lot picked up at the city gates and brought home because they were so beautiful. LOL having read the damnable thing from cover to cover I was appalled, horrified and occasionallly pleasantly surprised when I came to sex poetry that somehow became gospel! LOL again.

[davidcannon]

Just rude, self rightious and uninformed.

[zenlikejen]

Take this any way you wish, but your post makes you sound like an insufferable d ouche. I hardly think he was attempting to be some sort of theologian - at least no more so than those who continually pick and choose which passages they they deem "relevant" depending on which day it is or which argument they've stumbled into.

Did you actually have a POINT to make with all of your blustering over theology?

[Glenna Jones-Kachtik]

I've asked this before from other people who are so biblically based and never received a real answer. If God felt so strongly about homosexuality; why didn't he make it one of the Thou Shalt Nots? He was pretty specific about the Shalt Nots and they were a moral code & what most of you biblical scholars say our laws came from...so why is thou shalt not commit homosexual acts not right out there with the other 10???? According to my Grandmother's Bible (which was underlined and marked in and studied) the Shalt Nots are: No other Gods before me (He was a jealous God after all); Not making any graven images (which begs question of crosses, depictions of Jesus, Mary etc); Not take the name of God in vain (which means no cursing HIS name); To remember the Sabbath Day & keep it holy (the Jews use Fri-Sat; Others change it to Sun & Catholics have mass many days); To honor thy Father & Mother; Not to kill (I assume that means any living being whether you agree with them or not); Not to commit adultry (which means sleeping with someone not your married partner & is the only commandment I see that has to do with sex); Not stealing or taking things not belonging to you; Not bearing false witness (lying about anything); not coveting anything that belonged to anyone else.
So, if HE is so all fired unhappy about homosexuality, why didn't he make it one of

[Grada3784]

Except , of course in the situation in Acts, right after Peter has his vision, he's called to Cornelius, a Roman official and a gentile. Clearly what God had cleansed in the vision was far more that just some animals used for food.

[Octoberluna]

add to that the things you CAN do - like your daughters - and do we really want to use that as a guideline?!

[grey32]

You are correct and it isn't straight white men, its people who only know hate and they come sadly in every flavor. Just as there are gays who hate hipanic's or blacks. Gay men who hate gay women and vice versa. Gays who hate trans and on and on. Seems everyone wants equality but; everyone doesn't want others to have it. I've seen it all.

You are right to call it out.

[slowtono]

I love the position Gay's are marching to. God sucks, we man and women rule, What a joke and a promise of failure. The very tune of the music is to throw down the church, that I great person that I am have come to realize that I am greater than God. It's understandable, because the God who made nature in what ever value or equation you put it in deemed there would be a male and a female, and yet gays dispute that natural fact cry out , It is wrong I'll choose!

[rick91]

Gay people think that "God sucks"? No way! What an ignorant comment.
Gay people "dispute" the fact that there are males and females? Nonsense. Everybody knows there ARE.
Gay people "choose" to be gay? BS. Did you "choose" to be straight?

[Octoberluna]

huh? what?

[JonShank]

First of all YOUR God is nonexistent. Perhaps there is some god out there somewhere.­.. you miss the point. This is about law not religion. Consenting adults have the right to get married if they want. They are expected to pay the same taxes and obey the same laws, they get the same rights.

[grey32]

Slow is correct - you are slow. No one has any idea what GOD wants or doesn't want. What God thinks or doesn't think. EVERY and I repeat EVERY religious writing, belief, law, etc, etc was created by a human - God was not in the slightest way involved.

God doesn't suck "people" who are so arrogant as to believe they and they alone have it all figured out and their way is the only - yeah they SUCK big time. If your my role model, I'll pass.

[zenlikejen]

Yoda? I always thought you were fictional.­...

[PA Blue]

No, he's not Yoda. Yoda was wise.

[tugofpolitics]

Yes, please leave the Bible out of it. There are a couple of confusing parts in the Bible: Jesus's teachings are not one of them.

Claiming that the anti-gay marriage, pro-'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' crowd is motivated exclusively by hate makes you appear ignorant. Some may be. Some obviously aren't.

Government should just get out of the marriage business all together. Civil Unions for everyone. It'll cut down on our divorce rate. Even most so-called 'Christians' don't even understand 'till death do you part.'

They can come up with a softer, friendlier term like 'separatio­n.'

Oh, and how about those white, straight males? Pretty 'brave' of you to tackle us like that by grouping us all in with Byrd, Biden, Bush, Cheney, Kennedy, and... Rice? Hey, I see what you did there. We used to call that hitting below the belt.

[silk olive]

She didn't group all white men together, re-read the post. She was addressing the notion that straight, white men (especially those who don't seem to hold the sanctity of marriage in high regard by divorcing multiple times) have been calling the political shots for gays and lesbians who wish to marry one another.

PC- High Art - your portrayal in High Art of the German heroin addict was truly amazing. "Is she with the teenaygah.­." Priceless!

[Rrhain]

How can someone be against equality for gay people in every corner of life without hating gay people? You don't do that with anything else you don't like and it isn't like there is any threat to your way of life if gay people achieve equality in every aspect of life.

Please help us out. What is the motivation behind denying people basic equality as demanded by simple decency, let alone the Constitution, that does come back to fear and hatred?

[hojo1962]

Please explain to me, WHAT inequality are you talking about!!! Gays have the same rights as heterosexuals in our country! The Constitution speaks of equality of RACE, CREED OR COLOR! It says NOTHING about lifestyles. There is nothing in the Constitution that give ANYONE the right to marry!! Marriage itself is a Sacrament, a Sacred institution, a Religious bonding, designed, created and by Almighty God himself, thousands of years ago, between ONE MAN AND ONE WOMEN, given for pro-creation, for the purpose of furthering and expanding of life itself. Homosexual marriage does niether! It neither pro-creates nor furthers life!!---- Homosexuality is in direct oppostion to the Basic Moral Principles of NATURAL LAW- instituted by God since the beginning of Creation. ------------Please don't use this "hate" rehtoroc when someone disagrees with you concerning homosexualtiy---to disagree has NOTHING to do with hate. Just like voting against O'bama has nothing to do with "hating blacks

[jerrygarcia1]

Great speech and only one of the reasons Patricia Clarkson has been my favorite actress and big screen crush ever since I saw her play Catherine Ness in "The Untouchables" in 1987. It was fitting she had a role in the movie "All The Real Girls."

Thanks for blog. I agree with your sentiments and thank you for doing quality movies. You should be a role model for a lot of young stars. Class, quality and giving a voice to the voiceless through your acting choices, that are not always glamorous. Here's hoping we all get to go to NOLA and celebrate victory soon.

[Gary Maynard]

I love this article ... I have read so much lately that I am getting an ulcer from all the bad news ... But this just made my day

[youngblood360]

Perfect speech, Patricia! Well written, spoken and above all spot on. The religious right wing is nothing more than a festering organization for bigotry. It used to be that Church was an oasis for peace - now it's nothing more than a training ground for terrorism. I appreciate your optimism, Patricia - but I'm not fully convinced yet that Obama has given up on us. I believe he will come around but we may need to wait a few more months (afterall, he has only been in office not even 6 months). Rome was not built in a day - and it took 8 long years to screw this country up - so it's going to take some time to undo the damage of the Bush/Cheney years. We've seen tremendous progress over the past few years, and we will see more this year as well. Happy Pride everyone!

[gregory9]

Brilliant actor, wise and compassionate woman. She's the anti-Ronald Reagan.

[green108]

Give Obama a copy of the speech.

[LintLass]

Hear, hear. Let's send him a bunch. :)

[antaeus]

"So Mr. President, please catch up. Or you are in danger of being considered 'just to the right' of a man who is 'just to the left' of Vlad-the-I­mpaler."

One among the several witty constructions in this address. I don't think Obama wanted to have this issue attain the prominence it has, but then . . . what goes according to plan? The fact is that the image of a Dem president being outflanked by traditional opponents on this particular issue is more than a witty line in a speech; it's a possibility.

[marignymitch]

I think the plan was all gay issues will quiety leave the stage and move quietly to the closet. I'm pleased the plan's not working. Obama has been outflanked by Darth Vader. Who'd a thought!

[CornetMustich]

Kudos to Patricia!

Cheers, Joe Mustich, Justice of the Peace
Washington CT USA

And kudos to New England (except RI) and Iowa.

It's time for marriage equality and fairness in America. Are you listening Mr Obama? Why are you now supporting DOMA and "Don't Ask, Don't Tell?

As Malcolm X once said - snakes can be white, as well as black too. (I'm paraphrasing here).

[eliteandproud]

Yes, I am surprised that RI is lagging behind. Perhaps especially because Providence has an openly gay Mayor - and an excellent Pride celebration, "PRIde"

[Giordano Bruno]

Violets in rocks is an interesting metaphor. The gay community is outraged with the President's callous disregard for our civil liberties. We have been told that times are tough, and we should be patient. More patience. Meanwhile an equally strong and not quite as lovely flower grows in the rocks, a thistle that appears to be prevailng. I am glad Ms. Clarkson sees positive movement on this. Unfortunately those who can really make a difference, the President and the California Supreme Court appear to be unphased. Giordy

[obtusegoose]

Terrific speech... and the analogy "The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks." is perfect.

I loved the part about the hypocrisy of the conservatives who are against gay marriage. Most of them have been married three times, yet they have the audacity to say that they believe in the sanctity of marriage. I don't think people (such as Rush or Rudy) that spew such inane rhetoric are even capable of feeling shame. Because if they did, I think it would overwhelm them.

[marignymitch]

Ms Clarkson:

Nice talk. Thanks so much from fellow New Orleanian. I hope Obama gets the memo.

Still the Bible is correct: Polyester blend is an abomination.

[scpajor]

Wonderful speech!!

[jglass54]

I've always loved Patricia Clarkson as an actress and as a good ol' New Orleans girl, but now I love her even more as an eloquent and funny supporter of same-sex marriage rights. And I want to see her play Blanche DuBois!

[eliteandproud]

Has anyone already mentioned her brilliant turn as Ally Sheedy's German lover a few years back? Not recognizing her from previous roles, I assumed she was a fabulous German lesbian actress!