HOW JUST BEING YOURSELF BECAME A FORM OF ACTIVISM
TED KERR / ted@vueweekly.com
Last week I sat down with Michael Phair to talk about queer activism both before and after the Vriend v Alberta case. Looking back I always find myself inspired that the case had its beginnings in Edmonton, that our queer community came together to raise money, awareness and that we had an impact on the eventual victory. When I look back I wonder where is the community now? Why aren’t we more active?
It was these questions that made me think that this week’s column, coinciding with the Vriend v Alberta Supreme Court verdict anniversary, was going to be a Larry Kramerish essay telling homos to get off their asses. I met with Phair hoping that he felt the same way and would provide me with a quote. He did not oblige, instead we had a conversation in which he said a simple and insightful thing: “Things have changed.”
These three words gave me permission to look back on our history with more clarity and kindness, with less judgment and impatience. It allowed me to see that the present is vibrant with action, and I just hadn’t recognized it.
Then I started thinking, what has changed, how has it changed and where are we now? Being something of a compartmentalizer I walked away from the conversation and began to organize what I know about queer history and activism. I came up with seeing our history in three waves.
Mattachine to the Bathhouses: Standing Up and Standing Proud
The first wave of queer activism was about gaining recognition of homosexuality in the mainstream culture through targeted efforts or responses to systemic violence. Groups like the Mattachine Society, founded in 1950, worked to “unify ... educate ... assist [homosexuals].” The group communicated and worked towards achieving their goals through meetings and publications like One and The Mattachine Review.
One of the most defining moments of the first wave is the Stonewall riot that took place on the night of Jun 29, 1969. It was one of the earliest and now one of the most often referred to moments of homosexuals fighting back, in this case against police, mafia intimidation and blackmail. Stonewall is also the reason we celebrate Pride in June.
Laying the foundation for the second wave were the bathhouse raids that were happening across North America, specifically in the early ‘80s, including the 1981 Pieces raid in Edmonton. Typically men were either charged or threatened with out-dated and rarely enforced “bawdy-house” laws. Most charges never made it to court but the experience changed the lives of those involved, most often leading them to come out about their homosexuality (either voluntary or otherwise) and/or become politically active.
The efforts of the Mattachine Society and the experiences of the Stonewall riots and the bathhouse raids created a sense of empowerment that informed homosexuals that they didn’t have to be ashamed of who they were and that they deserved fair treatment and equal rights.
AIDS to the Courthouse: Gaining our Rights
Empowered and angry by the experiences of the first wave, the second wave of queer activism is built upon the lessons learned from being on the defensive and applying them offensively in securing rights, privileges, freedoms and access for all sexual minorities.
The AIDS epidemic provided poignant reasons for homosexuals to get organized and political. As thousands needlessly died, both the media and governments remained silent about what was being called the gay plague. Queer-led groups like ACT UP created media spectacles that captured people’s attention and shamed businesses and politicians into lifesaving action including research and development. Out of the AIDS crisis many queer leaders and groups, like The Lesbian Avengers, emerged.
The cornerstone of the second wave is the legal victories. Vriend v Alberta as well as same-sex marriage debates that were happening around the world ensured that more than just being seen, queers were being protected under the law and recognized as full citizens for who they were.
Suburbs to Art and Culture: Living our Rights
For me the third wave of queer activism is the living out and animating of our hard-won visibility and rights. It is about applying the notion that the personal is political to queers and that everything we do no matter how abstractly, is a form of activism. We are our activism.
Of course Michael Phair has been providing Edmonton with an example of third wave activism for almost two decades. During his 15 years on city council he went from being the gay one to being a much-loved symbol of what makes our city great.
We see the third wave activism in the mainstream through Ellen, who early in her career wouldn’t even come out, but has now become a 21st-century icon. Seeing her every day on TV, knowing that she is a lesbian, has a transforming affect on the viewers. Gay goes from exotic to ordinary, which some queerists may argue is a step back for true queer activism and is part of the danger of having queer culture be lost to the mainstream.
More actively we see third wave activism being practiced through art and culture including sport. Groups like Team Edmonton and events like the Outgames counter popular misconceptions that gays can’t throw and lesbians can’t dance while creating a space outside of nightlife for queers to be social and feel good about themselves, while the Exposure Festival and the musical Bash’d, which recently won a GLAAD award, use art to showcase the queer contribution to the modern human experience, often enlightening a viewer to the realities of queerness.
In the end third wave queer activism is as simple as writing this column—or reading it for that matter. In my next column I will look more into the third wave by suggesting that Edmonton is an illustration, if not an epicenter of third wave activism
Showing posts with label Activism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Activism. Show all posts
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Friday, February 22, 2008
Queermonton: Week of February 21, 2008, Issue #644
QUEERMONTON
YOUR VOTE CAN MAKE THIS AN ELECTION ABOUT HUMAN RIGHTS
TED KERR / ted@vueweekly.com
The Mar 3 provincial election is important to all Albertans. It’s an opportunity for us to speak through our vote and tell the current government what we think of its leadership. It also provides an opportunity to empower new voices to be heard.
Sarah Flynn, interim administrative professional officer at the U of A’s new Institute for Sexual Minority Studies and Services says that she casts a ballot “to make sure that irrespective of whether the candidate or party I support actually wins, at least I’m showing my endorsement of those willing to discuss and address human rights.”
Kristy Harcourt, queer activist and former host of CJSR’s Gaywire, agrees, especially when it come to issues of human rights. “Gay people need to vote. Our rights are recent, fragile and we have a say over what our governments do in our name.”
Voting is the simplest form of political action afforded to a citizen that is often taken for granted. For NDP activist Robert Smith, who had a hand in creating the party’s first gay and lesbian caucus, voting is the opposite of apathy: “You can’t expect change to happen, you have to be part of the process—voting is part of that.”
Another part of the process is getting informed. The Progressive Conservatives have been in power for almost 37 years. In that time they have done some good for Albertans, but in the last 15 years they have let the promise of their vibrant beginnings slide.
In 1971, a modern, urban-centric leader by the name of Peter Lougheed led the PCs to a surprise victory in the Alberta provincial election, upsetting the seemingly entrenched Social Credit Party that had been in power for 36 years. The Harvard-educated former Edmonton Eskimo went on to lead the PCs to three more electoral victories and leave a legacy with the party that has helped them maintain power for over three decades.
During his time as premier, Loughheed introduced the Alberta Bill of Rights, stood up for Alberta by fighting with former prime minster Trudeau over the National Energy Program and started the Alberta Heritage Fund to ensure that the profits from our province’s natural resources would benefit Albertans for generations to come. He also empowered Horst Schmid, the PC Minister of Culture, to let the arts flourish in Alberta.
In the years that have passed the Conservatives, primarily under the leadership of former premier Ralph Klein, has moved sharply to the right of the political spectrum, squeezing out diversity and social welfare, and in doing so have eroded many of the Lougheed government’s accomplishments. The Ministry of Culture has become the monolithic Tourism, Parks, Recreation (and, oh yeah) Culture portfolio, health care is on the road to becoming two-tiered, the environmental damage of the oil industry is the smelly elephant in the room and the recent activity around royalty payments points to a government, even under new leadership, that is more loyal to business than citizens.
For queer citizens the most poignant of erosions was the Conservative government’s 1998 refusal to read sexual orientation into the very Alberta Bill of Rights that the party created. By ignoring the Supreme Court of Canada’s 1998 decision in the Vriend vs Alberta case, where the Alberta provincial government was sued for not protecting the rights of a citizen, they have effectively said that queer Albertans are not citizens worth protecting.
In 2000, two years after Vriend, the government added to the erosion by creating an amendment to the province’s marriage act that defined marriage as being between a man and a woman. The amendment included a notwithstanding clause, which is like a veto card that legislators can use to override certain charters in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In theory the clause would have allowed Klein to override the then-upcoming 2005 federal ruling that legalized same-sex marriage in Canada. In the end the clause was more symbolic because marriage is a federally granted right.
Klein’s actions are emblematic of the PC party’s stance on human rights. By attempting to deny one group protection the government has created a precedent for how all minorities could be treated.
The travesty of lost promise within the Progressive Conservative party lies not solely within the party itself but with Alberta’s electorate. We voted them in, or worse, by not voting, we stood by powerless as they abused us. But a change is possible.
By not voting we are rendering ourselves mute and empowering someone we disagree with to represent us. By not voting we are paving the road to corruption and are allowing the very people who want to curb our rights the opportunity to do so. If there is someone who knows the power of voting it’s five-time city councillor Michael Phair.
“There are thousands of excuses for not voting and that’s the reason you end up with a government that you don’t want—so vote and elect the government you do want,” Phair says.
To get to know the candidates better, join Team Edmonton for its free Feb 23 mixer at Amber Brewery, where representatives from all the major parties have been invited to join the fun. It is an opportunity to get involved and talk to someone who might be representing you at the legislature. V
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Queermonton Vue Weekly Week of January 24, 2008, Issue #640
There were reports in mid-January of confusion from those involved with organ donation. Starting in December of 2007 Health Canada made changes to its organ donor policy that now potentially excludes organs donated by gay men. While it is true that these new precautions are in place, it is not meant to discourage gay men from donating. What it does mean is that more information will be gathered at the time of donating that will help Health Canada to determine the risk of the organ based on their own criteria.
People were confusing Health Canada’s policy on organ donation with the Canadian Blood Services’ (CBS) flawed policy on blood donation which states that “All men who have had sex with another man, even once, since 1977 are indefinitely deferred [from donating blood].” The CBS reports to Health Canada, so any policy of the CBS is a policy of Health Canada. At the root of the ban on gay male blood is the higher rate of HIV among gay men, a disease that is passed through bodily fluids like blood, semen, vaginal secretion and breast milk.
Many university groups across Canada, not including the U of A, called for a review of CBS’s donor policies, some of which are seen as a form of institutionalized discrimination, including Question 18, the infamous “sex with another man” question.
Many other groups of people are also banned from donating blood, including those who have travelled to France for longer than three months or those which spent one month in the UK between 1980 and 1997. This is based on the inability to test for Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease, a human form of Mad Cow Disease.
At around the same time as all the blood and organ hoopla was happening, CTV.ca reported on a very important story stemming from the Annals of Internal Medicine’s new findings on MRSA, the bacteria which can spread through casual skin to skin contact and can lead to abscesses, ulcerations and life-
threatening infections. The story read, “Sexually active gay men are many times more likely than others to acquire a new, highly drug-resistant strain of staph infection related to the MRSA bacteria.” The actual report states that “the germ appears to be transmitted most easily through intimate sexual contact.”
On the tip of everyone’s tongue in these stories were the words “anal sex,” but nobody was willing to say it. What is at risk by not saying anal sex is the further discrimination of gay men, the continued confusion of sexual acts and behaviour with sexual orientation and the well-being of sexually active people regardless of labels.
One of the lone institutions that was willing to use the term anal sex was the CBC. In its online story regarding gay men and organ donation the CBC quoted Toronto gay activist Dean Robinson: “I think it’s more of an issue of anal sex, anal intercourse, than it is to do with whether someone is gay or straight.”
Simply being gay does not put someone at greater risk of sexually contracting HIV or MRSA. Gay people’s blood is not being refused because of our supposed collective love of Kylie. We are not being asked about our sexual orientation or past when donating organs as a way of making conversation. In the collective minds of policy makers and squeamish media, gay means anal. As HIV Edmonton education coordinator Lynn Sutankayo says, we need to “stop referring to anal sex as ‘gay sex.’ Studies indicate that about 25 per cent of heterosexual couples have had [anal sex] at least once, and 10 per cent regularly have anal penetration.”
According to my own non-scientific studies, this number is way higher. Not to mention the fact that, as many homo dudes can attest to, gay does not always mean anal. From oral to intercrural intercourse (thigh sex), from heavy petting to whatever, there are as many definitions to gay sex or sexual activity in general as there are combinations of people.
This is serious. We need to start calling things by their proper names and saying what we mean even if it causes discomfort. MRSA is a health risk, and Health Canada’s policies on blood and organ donation are barriers to dismantling systemic discrimination. As long as we talk in orientations and not behaviours, we’re missing an opportunity to talk about our bodies and how we use them in a real way. All people, regardless of how they are sexually labelled, need to know about the risks associated with all sexual behaviours. All people who engage in anal sex need to know how to take care of themselves on the road to pleasure and all people need to understand that gay men are not being denied the right to donate blood because they are less human or more dangerous but because of a sexual act that they may or may not engage in.
Use a lot of lube and a condom when you have anal sex. Go slow, have fun, have a safe word (“yellow” for slow, “red” for stop), and do it because you want to. Also: wear a seatbelt, let your coffee cool before you drink it, chew before you swallow, look both ways before you cross the street and wash your hands—that last one is actually the best defense against MRSA.
People were confusing Health Canada’s policy on organ donation with the Canadian Blood Services’ (CBS) flawed policy on blood donation which states that “All men who have had sex with another man, even once, since 1977 are indefinitely deferred [from donating blood].” The CBS reports to Health Canada, so any policy of the CBS is a policy of Health Canada. At the root of the ban on gay male blood is the higher rate of HIV among gay men, a disease that is passed through bodily fluids like blood, semen, vaginal secretion and breast milk.
Many university groups across Canada, not including the U of A, called for a review of CBS’s donor policies, some of which are seen as a form of institutionalized discrimination, including Question 18, the infamous “sex with another man” question.
Many other groups of people are also banned from donating blood, including those who have travelled to France for longer than three months or those which spent one month in the UK between 1980 and 1997. This is based on the inability to test for Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease, a human form of Mad Cow Disease.
At around the same time as all the blood and organ hoopla was happening, CTV.ca reported on a very important story stemming from the Annals of Internal Medicine’s new findings on MRSA, the bacteria which can spread through casual skin to skin contact and can lead to abscesses, ulcerations and life-
threatening infections. The story read, “Sexually active gay men are many times more likely than others to acquire a new, highly drug-resistant strain of staph infection related to the MRSA bacteria.” The actual report states that “the germ appears to be transmitted most easily through intimate sexual contact.”
On the tip of everyone’s tongue in these stories were the words “anal sex,” but nobody was willing to say it. What is at risk by not saying anal sex is the further discrimination of gay men, the continued confusion of sexual acts and behaviour with sexual orientation and the well-being of sexually active people regardless of labels.
One of the lone institutions that was willing to use the term anal sex was the CBC. In its online story regarding gay men and organ donation the CBC quoted Toronto gay activist Dean Robinson: “I think it’s more of an issue of anal sex, anal intercourse, than it is to do with whether someone is gay or straight.”
Simply being gay does not put someone at greater risk of sexually contracting HIV or MRSA. Gay people’s blood is not being refused because of our supposed collective love of Kylie. We are not being asked about our sexual orientation or past when donating organs as a way of making conversation. In the collective minds of policy makers and squeamish media, gay means anal. As HIV Edmonton education coordinator Lynn Sutankayo says, we need to “stop referring to anal sex as ‘gay sex.’ Studies indicate that about 25 per cent of heterosexual couples have had [anal sex] at least once, and 10 per cent regularly have anal penetration.”
According to my own non-scientific studies, this number is way higher. Not to mention the fact that, as many homo dudes can attest to, gay does not always mean anal. From oral to intercrural intercourse (thigh sex), from heavy petting to whatever, there are as many definitions to gay sex or sexual activity in general as there are combinations of people.
This is serious. We need to start calling things by their proper names and saying what we mean even if it causes discomfort. MRSA is a health risk, and Health Canada’s policies on blood and organ donation are barriers to dismantling systemic discrimination. As long as we talk in orientations and not behaviours, we’re missing an opportunity to talk about our bodies and how we use them in a real way. All people, regardless of how they are sexually labelled, need to know about the risks associated with all sexual behaviours. All people who engage in anal sex need to know how to take care of themselves on the road to pleasure and all people need to understand that gay men are not being denied the right to donate blood because they are less human or more dangerous but because of a sexual act that they may or may not engage in.
Use a lot of lube and a condom when you have anal sex. Go slow, have fun, have a safe word (“yellow” for slow, “red” for stop), and do it because you want to. Also: wear a seatbelt, let your coffee cool before you drink it, chew before you swallow, look both ways before you cross the street and wash your hands—that last one is actually the best defense against MRSA.
Queermonton Vue Weekly Week of October 31, 2007, Issue #628
1998 was a tumultuous time to be gay on the flat plains of North America’s prairies. Big skies and land as far as the eye could see provided no protection from the unruly human winds that in this so-called modern time often deliver crueler storms of torture than Mother Nature ever could.
Vriend vs Alberta
On Apr 2, 1998 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in the Vriend vs Alberta case that provincial governments could not exclude LGBT individuals from human rights legislation.
The Supreme Court’s ruling was the result of a six-year battle that began when Delwin Vriend was fired from his job as a lab coordinator at King’s University College in Edmonton due to his sexual orientation.
When Vriend attempted to file a discrimination complaint with the Alberta Human Rights Commission his request was refused on the grounds that sexual orientation was not protected by Alberta’s code of human rights. This meant that Vriend could not sue the College directly for discrimination because, in the eye of Alberta’s laws, being a sexual minority was a seemingly justifiable reason to be fired. With that decision, Vriend sued the Government of Alberta and its Human Rights Commission for not protecting him. The issue was not that the college fired him because he was gay, but that the college could fire him because he was gay.
In 1992, Vriend’s case against the Province resulted in an Alberta court ruling stating sexual orientation must be written in as a new protected class under the human rights legislation. However, the provincial government appealed the decision through the Alberta Court of Appeals and had the decision overturned. This meant that Vriend and all other sexual minorities were in the same boat as when he was first fired, a precariously unsafe one that could easily be led by a homophobic captain throwing queers overboard, leaving them with no lifejacket.
This final ruling at the provincial level led Vriend and his team to take the case to the Supreme Court of Canada where within a year the hearing was over and the Vriend camp emerged victorious. In the end all provinces read the Supreme Court’s ruling into their human rights legislation—all except Alberta, which to this day has yet to read it in.
Matthew in Wyoming
I find it hard to write about Matthew Shepard. I don’t know where to start and I need to believe that you already know what happened starting Oct 6, 1998. I don’t know how much detail to go into nor how much of him to bring into it and how much of what happened to share.
With Vriend it’s different. As simple as it is to see that there would be no Vriend vs Alberta without Delwin, the story quickly finds it’s own narrative. Vriend becomes the symbol for the small army of people including Delwin that fought hard and won the case.
With Matthew it is about one young man who could have been and has been countless young people among us. The difference is that most of us escape with a cautionary tale that makes us shake our heads with disbelief later in life. Matthew paid with his life, his head shaking and flinching from the impacts of fists and the butt of a gun. He was tied to a fence on the outskirts of a city that wasn’t even his own, beaten by two strangers who lured him out of the neon danky glow of a bar by pretending to be gay with the somewhat-innocent intent to just rob him. But everything came loose; things got out of hand.
Matthew suffered a fracture that went from the back of his head to his right ear—an earthquake inside the flesh of his head, damaging his brain stem and affecting his body’s ability to control its own heat or make the heart beat.
They left him for dead, without a wallet and shoeless, begging while they went to rob his house, only to be distracted from the task by more violence and subsequently apprehended. A mountain biker found Matthew the next morning, a near-lifeless lump clumped up against the cold autumn earth. He was unconscious and died in a hospital within six days.
If it were not for hearing Matthew’s mother Judy courageously tell the story in the hopes of “making even a small difference,” I am not sure I could even attempt to write about Matthew. But who am I to cower at an opportunity when even his own mother can say the words: Matthew was killed because he was gay. Matthew was a victim of a hate crime even if, at the time, the state of Wyoming was not equipped with the laws to say so.
Find out more. But don’t google him, because hateful websites come up. Instead, search out The Laramie Project at the library, video store or local playhouse. In fact, Victoria School of Performing and Visual Arts is putting on a production this November.
Six months, life and a border separate Vriend’s victory from Matthew’s murder. When viewed together the stories show two men unwittingly illustrating the similarities between the terrain of Alberta and Wyoming and the vastness between rights and realities, intentions and actions. The world did not become a better place when Vriend was passed and it did not stop when Matthew’s heart did. Ten years later, we who still live on the Prairies carry on and so does the world around us.
Vriend vs Alberta
On Apr 2, 1998 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in the Vriend vs Alberta case that provincial governments could not exclude LGBT individuals from human rights legislation.
The Supreme Court’s ruling was the result of a six-year battle that began when Delwin Vriend was fired from his job as a lab coordinator at King’s University College in Edmonton due to his sexual orientation.
When Vriend attempted to file a discrimination complaint with the Alberta Human Rights Commission his request was refused on the grounds that sexual orientation was not protected by Alberta’s code of human rights. This meant that Vriend could not sue the College directly for discrimination because, in the eye of Alberta’s laws, being a sexual minority was a seemingly justifiable reason to be fired. With that decision, Vriend sued the Government of Alberta and its Human Rights Commission for not protecting him. The issue was not that the college fired him because he was gay, but that the college could fire him because he was gay.
In 1992, Vriend’s case against the Province resulted in an Alberta court ruling stating sexual orientation must be written in as a new protected class under the human rights legislation. However, the provincial government appealed the decision through the Alberta Court of Appeals and had the decision overturned. This meant that Vriend and all other sexual minorities were in the same boat as when he was first fired, a precariously unsafe one that could easily be led by a homophobic captain throwing queers overboard, leaving them with no lifejacket.
This final ruling at the provincial level led Vriend and his team to take the case to the Supreme Court of Canada where within a year the hearing was over and the Vriend camp emerged victorious. In the end all provinces read the Supreme Court’s ruling into their human rights legislation—all except Alberta, which to this day has yet to read it in.
Matthew in Wyoming
I find it hard to write about Matthew Shepard. I don’t know where to start and I need to believe that you already know what happened starting Oct 6, 1998. I don’t know how much detail to go into nor how much of him to bring into it and how much of what happened to share.
With Vriend it’s different. As simple as it is to see that there would be no Vriend vs Alberta without Delwin, the story quickly finds it’s own narrative. Vriend becomes the symbol for the small army of people including Delwin that fought hard and won the case.
With Matthew it is about one young man who could have been and has been countless young people among us. The difference is that most of us escape with a cautionary tale that makes us shake our heads with disbelief later in life. Matthew paid with his life, his head shaking and flinching from the impacts of fists and the butt of a gun. He was tied to a fence on the outskirts of a city that wasn’t even his own, beaten by two strangers who lured him out of the neon danky glow of a bar by pretending to be gay with the somewhat-innocent intent to just rob him. But everything came loose; things got out of hand.
Matthew suffered a fracture that went from the back of his head to his right ear—an earthquake inside the flesh of his head, damaging his brain stem and affecting his body’s ability to control its own heat or make the heart beat.
They left him for dead, without a wallet and shoeless, begging while they went to rob his house, only to be distracted from the task by more violence and subsequently apprehended. A mountain biker found Matthew the next morning, a near-lifeless lump clumped up against the cold autumn earth. He was unconscious and died in a hospital within six days.
If it were not for hearing Matthew’s mother Judy courageously tell the story in the hopes of “making even a small difference,” I am not sure I could even attempt to write about Matthew. But who am I to cower at an opportunity when even his own mother can say the words: Matthew was killed because he was gay. Matthew was a victim of a hate crime even if, at the time, the state of Wyoming was not equipped with the laws to say so.
Find out more. But don’t google him, because hateful websites come up. Instead, search out The Laramie Project at the library, video store or local playhouse. In fact, Victoria School of Performing and Visual Arts is putting on a production this November.
Six months, life and a border separate Vriend’s victory from Matthew’s murder. When viewed together the stories show two men unwittingly illustrating the similarities between the terrain of Alberta and Wyoming and the vastness between rights and realities, intentions and actions. The world did not become a better place when Vriend was passed and it did not stop when Matthew’s heart did. Ten years later, we who still live on the Prairies carry on and so does the world around us.
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