Strength in diversity
Protest hits Boy Scouts for anti-gay bigotry
By Frank
Sarjanovic
Los Angeles
Demonstrators gathered Aug. 26 at the Boy Scouts of
America's Newport Beach Seabase in Orange County, Calif., to
protest the BSA's discriminatory policies toward gay
youths.
The multimillion-dollar 400 feet of bay-front property,
according to the BSA, comes courtesy of the Orange County
Board of Supervisors. It is operated by the Orange County
Council of the scouts.
People living in Orange County have become outraged that
their tax dollars are used to fund an institution that openly
discriminates against people based upon sexual
orientation.
Whether they are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered or
straight, taxpayers' concern on this issue is spreading like
wildfire across the country. More and more people are
standing up to say that discrimination of any kind is
unacceptable, and that allowing an institution such as the
BSA, which promotes its program as instilling in young people
"solid values and good citizenship," is giving the message
that it is okay to discriminate. This in turn promotes
violence against lesbian, gay, bi and trans people.
Even the American Medical Association has stated: "The
BSA's discriminatory policies toward GLBT people are bad
public health. The feeling of being hated promotes severe
emotional damage." U.S. government statistics report that
lesbian, gay, bi and trans youths are three to seven times
more likely to commit suicide than heterosexual youths.
In addition to the intense internal pressure of being
closeted, lesbian, gay, bi and trans people who are open
about their sexuality face ridicule, humiliation and violence
such as being spit on, harassed at school, work and in
public, physically beaten and, in some cases, such as Matthew
Shepard's and others, murdered.
FBI statistics document 1,558 reported "hate crimes"
toward gay, lesbian, bi and trans people in 1999 alone. The
BSA openly promotes the idea that gay and lesbian people are
"a burden" to society, are "diseased and unworthy," adding to
the climate of anti-gay violence. Hate crimes against gay,
lesbian, bi and trans people have increased dramatically over
the past two years.
"It's important to be proud of who you are, gay or
straight," said Joe Delaplaine, organizer of the Stonewall
Initiative for Equal Rights, initiator of the Aug. 26 dem on
stration. "No matter how you try to suck up to people who are
oppressing you, they are still going to come down and slap
you down no matter what. So we have to band together with
other oppressed people to make permanent change for the
better."
Chants like "We're here, we're queer, we're equal, get
used to it!" roared out of the crowd.
Preston Wood from the International Action Center in Los
Angeles gave a motivational speech: "Gay, straight, bisexual
or transgendered, whatever we are, we're all together and
we're not going to allow them to wreak havoc and perpetuate
their hatred against us. So we've got to do like the older
generation did at the Stonewall Inn in New York City and
fight back!
"We've got to send a message to them that we are not going
to allow them to push us back, that we are going to fight to
the end, until we win our rights, and we are going to do this
by uniting with everyone who is fighting back.
"There's a change going on. You can feel it around the
world. In Seattle, in Genoa, Italy, the people want a world
of love, appreciation, inclusion, not a world of division,
violence, discrimination and segregation."
Many speakers at the demonstration also brought up the
Bush program. "Bush knows he is isolated by all the
progressive people. They can't function without dividing us,
so it's important that we stick together," said John Parker
of the IAC.
Other speakers also encouraged people to surround the
White House on Sept. 29.
The diversity of the people at the protest--gay, lesbian,
bi and trans, straight people, people of different cultures,
races, religions and genders--recognizing and uniting
struggles to fight back the Bush attack gave tremendous hope
that a world of true equality and social justice is
possible.
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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