Now, I really don’t appreciate comments such as “You won’t ever see us in the state capitol with the those Auntie Toms who live a privileged life in the suburbs while portions of our community live in the streets.” or “It’s about time some gays who actually read books instead of watching cable news …”

I live in downtown Minneapolis in a tiny apartment, and am on disability because of ongoing depression and metal illness. Nor do I watch t.v. at all, do read books, and have also lived through parts of queer history that are covered in some of those books.

So please, both sides need to drop the ad hominem tactics.

On the other hand, my feeling about Bash Back’s counter-protesting us is pretty much “come on down and protest away!” I mean, if it’s okay for JTI-TC, OutFront MN, etc. to counter-protest the St. Paul NOM rally earlier this summer, then Bash Back’s got every right to do the same at our events.

David Cummer
truecofffe.cummer@gmail.com

Or we could get rid special “recognized status” altogether and give the sort of benefits associated with marriage to EVERYONE, whether they are in a relationship or not.

But you’re right. You won’t ever see us in the state capitol with the those Auntie Toms who live a privileged life in the suburbs while portions of our community live in the streets. Gays have never accomplished anything significant through legislation.

All of our rights have come from organizing our people and making our voices heard by any means necessary — not lobbying and telling a sob story to some straight politicians who couldn’t give a flying fuck.

You seem to be under the impression that our movement started with the Stonewall Referendum.

In 2006, the “Yogakarta Principles of the Application of International Human Rights Law to Issues of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity” passed at the largest annual gathering of international human rights legal scholars. Among the essential basic human rights noted based on the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the right to have your family recogniaed as such.

Why anyone wants to protest people who take human rights seriously I don’t know.

There has been ALOT of impetus behind teh push for same sex marriage in MN. In fact, there are nearly 10,000 people involved at some level with Marriage Equality Minnesota alone and that’s an all volunteer group like Join the Impact. Others are working through Project 515 working on a more incremental approach and still others are working on it through the Family Equality Council headquartered in St. Paul which brings us the Rainbow Families conference each year at Anwantin school in Mpls. And NOW Outfront is working on marriage equality and has been instrumental in bringing Take Action Minnesota, an alliance of progressive social justice, civil rights, unions, environmental and other groups on board as Take Action has included marriage equality in their gubernatorial endorsement campaign reNew MN for this next election cycle.

Even the DFL has added marriage equality to it’s platform joining the Green Party of MN meaning half of MN’s legally designated “major and minor” parties have marriage equality in their platforms.

All 10 Democratic Farmer Labor candidates for governor are claiming to support marriage equality and all 10 are seeking Outfront MN’s endorsement this next year while not a single one did 4 years ago and that helps ALL glbtiq issues within Outfront’s purview.

So FYI. Marriage Equality is a major issue on which there is alot going on in MN. There were protests at least once a week at MN’s state capital building last year in favor of marriage equality as well as a couple of large rallies.

AND there is a bill in the MN state legislature which will likely have more than 30 cosponsors in the House when the session starts again in Feb. and there are already 3 different marriage equality bills in the state senate each with the maximum number of Senators signed on.

Also, Minnesota has generally acted on these matters before states like California and New York. For example, Minneapolis had the first transgender rights ordinance anywhere in North America and the second glb rights ordinance in the U.S. San Francisco didn’t pass it’s glb rights ordinance til 5 years later. New York City just passed a transgender rights ordinance in the 2000′s and New York state has yet to pass a law banning discrimination on the basis of gender identity while Minnesota has had such a law on the books for 16 years and Minneapolis has had such a law on the books for 35 years.

So, it is not uncommon that CA and NY would be working on other issues.

P.S. I am also working on GAMC cuts and the Minnesota Health Plan. Working for marriage equality doesn’t preclude anyone from working for the things you also claim to be working for but funny, I didn’t recognize one of you from the halls of the state capital or from any of the street protests when the work on those issues has been done either.

Groups like BB! and other radical queer orgs in MN and around the world who are not making marriage a priority are focusing on more immediate needs such as food, housing, safety, health care, access to education– things that impact all queers, not just assimilationist gays in monog relationships who want to be just like straight folks. Groups like BB! have just as much right to demonstrate for the things they want, and there are not enough chances to start discussion with other lgbt folks– showing up to events is a way to get the message out.

But ultimately, neither group is doing anything that is universally empowering because with force always comes counter-force… which is why the world is the way it is today. Full of arguments over stupid shit that isn’t real. We’re all identified with social constructs as if they are part of life… time to wake up folks. You want equal rights? Then maybe you should look at marriage as an exclusion, not an inclusion. Why? Because marriage excludes those who don’t want it. Shouldn’t EVERYONE be entitled to the benefits that come with marriage, regardless of their relationship status? That’s true equality.

Working together against a common enemy? Marriage and the state are the enemy. Queers should be working to protect their own, not working to be accepted into a system that is oppressive JUST BECAUSE STRAIGHT PEOPLE DO IT.