Goethestein
Goethestein
Nippon
Post rating:
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/27/bradley-manning-sf-gay-pride
Bradley Manning is off limits at SF Gay Pride parade, but corporate sleaze is embraced
A seemingly trivial controversy reveals quite a bit about pervasive political values
News reports yesterday indicated that Bradley Manning, widely known to be gay, had been selected to be one of the Grand Marshals of the annual San Francisco gay pride parade, named by the LGBT Pride Celebration Committee. When the predictable backlash instantly ensued, the president of the Board of SF Pride, Lisa L Williams, quickly capitulated, issuing a cowardly, imperious statement that has to be read to be believed.
Williams proclaimed that "Manning will not be a grand marshal in this year's San Francisco Pride celebration" and termed his selection "a mistake". She blamed it all on a "staff person" who prematurely made the announcement based on a preliminary vote, and she assures us all that the culprit "has been disciplined": disciplined. She then accuses Manning of "actions which placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform": a substance-free falsehood originally spread by top US military officials which has since been decisively and extensively debunked, even by some government officials (indeed, it's the US government itself, not Manning, that is guilty of "actions which placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform"). And then, in my favorite part of her statement, Williams decreed to all organization members that "even the hint of support" for Manning's action - even the hint - "will not be tolerated by the leadership of San Francisco Pride". Will not be tolerated.
I originally had no intention of writing about this episode, but the more I discovered about it, the more revealing it became. So let's just consider a few of the points raised by all of this.
First, while even a hint of support for Manning will not be tolerated, there is a long roster of large corporations serving as the event's sponsors who are welcomed with open arms. The list is here. It includes AT&T and Verizon, the telecom giants that enabled the illegal warrantless eavesdropping on US citizens by the Bush administration and its NSA, only to get retroactively immunized from Congress and thus shielded from all criminal and civil liability (including a lawsuit brought in San Francisco against those corporations by their customers who were illegally spied on). Last month, AT&T was fined by OSHA for failing to protect one of its employees who was attacked, was found by the FCC last year to have overcharged customers by secretly switching them to plans they didn't want, and is now being sued by the US government for "allegedly bill the government improperly for services designed for the deaf and hard-of-hearing who place calls by typing messages over the web."
sf pride
The list of SF Pride sponsors also includes Bank of America, now being sued for $1 billion by the US government for allegedly engaging in a systematic scheme of mortgage fraud which the US Attorney called "spectacularly brazen in scope". Just last month, the same SF Pride sponsor received a record fine for ignoring a court order and instead trying to collect mortgage payments from bankrupt homeowners to which it was not entitled. Earlier this month, SF-Pride-sponsoring Bank of America paid $2.4 billion to settle shareholder allegations that Bank executives "failed to disclose information about losses at Merrill Lynch and bonuses paid to Merrill Lynch employees before the brokerage was acquired by Bank of America in January 2009 for $18.5 billion."
Another beloved SF Pride sponsor, Wells Fargo, is also being "sued by the US for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages over claims the bank made reckless mortgage loans that caused losses for a federal insurance program when they defaulted". Last year, Wells Fargo was fined $3.1 million by a federal judge for engaging in conduct that court called "highly reprehensible" relating to its persecution of a struggling homeowner. In 2011, the bank was fined by the US government "for allegedly pushing borrowers with good credit into expensive mortgages and falsifying loan applications."
Also in Good Standing with the SF Pride board: Clear Channel, the media outlet owned by Bain Capital that broadcasts the radio programs of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck; a pension fund is suing this SF Pride sponsor for making cheap, below-market loans to its struggling parent company. The health care giant Kaiser Permanente, another proud SF Pride sponsor, is currently under investigation by California officials for alleged massive privacy violations in the form of recklessly disclosing 300,000 patient records.
SF pride
So apparently, the very high-minded ethical standards of Lisa L Williams and the SF Pride Board apply only to young and powerless Army Privates who engage in an act of conscience against the US war machine, but instantly disappear for large corporations and banks that hand over cash. What we really see here is how the largest and most corrupt corporations own not just the government but also the culture. Even at the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade, once an iconic symbol of cultural dissent and disregard for stifling peities, nothing can happen that might offend AT&T and the Bank of America. The minute something even a bit deviant takes place (as defined by standards imposed by America's political and corporate class), even the SF Gay Pride Parade must scamper, capitulate, apologize, and take an oath of fealty to their orthodoxies (we adore the military, the state, and your laws). And, as usual, the largest corporate factions are completely exempt from the strictures and standards applied to the marginalized and powerless. Thus, while Bradley Manning is persona non grata at SF Pride, illegal eavesdropping telecoms, scheming banks, and hedge-fund purveryors of the nation's worst right-wing agitprop are more than welcome.
Second, the authoritarian, state-and-military-revering mentality pervading Williams' statement is striking. It isn't just the imperious decree that "even a hint of support" for Manning "will not be tolerated", though that is certainly creepy. Nor is it the weird announcement that the wrongdoer "has been disciplined". Even worse is the mindless embrace of the baseless claims of US military officials (that Manning "placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform") along with the supremely authoritarian view that any actions barred by the state are, ipso facto, ignoble and wrong. Conduct can be illegal and yet still be noble and commendable: see, for instance, Daniel Ellsberg, or most of the leaders of the civil rights movement in the US. Indeed, acts of civil disobedience and conscience by people who risk their own interests to battle injustices are often the most commendable acts. Equating illegal behavior with ignominious behavior is the defining mentality of an authoritarian - and is particularly notable coming from what was once viewed as a bastion of liberal dissent.
But the more one learns about the parties involved here, the less surprising it becomes. According to her biography, Williams "organized satellite offices for the Obama campaign" and also works for various Democratic politicians. It was President Obama, of course, who so notoriously decreed Bradley Manning guilty in public before his trial by military officers serving under Obama even began, and whose administration was found by the UN's top torture investigator to have abused him and is now so harshly prosecuting him. It's anything but surprising that a person who was a loyal Obama campaign aide finds Bradley Manning anathema while adoring big corporations and banks (which funded the Obama campaign and who, in the case of telecoms, Obama voted to immunize).
What we see here is how even many of the most liberal precincts in America are now the leading spokespeople for and loyalists to state power as a result of their loyalty to President Obama. Thus do we have the President of the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade sounding exactly like the Chairman of the Joints Chief, or Sarah Palin, or gay war-loving neocons, in depicting any meaningful opposition to the National Security State as the supreme sin. I'd be willing to bet large amounts of money that Williams has never condemned the Obama administration's abuse of Manning in detention or its dangerously radical prosecution of him for "aiding the enemy". I have no doubt that the people who did all of that would be showered with gratitude by Parade officials if they attended. In so many liberal precincts in the Age of Obama - even now including the SF Gay Pride parade - the federal government, its military, and its federal prosecutors are to be revered and celebrated but not criticized; only those who oppose them are villains.
Third, when I wrote several weeks ago about the remarkable shift in public opinion on gay equality, I noted that this development is less significant than it seems because the cause of gay equality poses no real threat to elite factions or to how political and economic power in the US are distributed. If anything, it bolsters those power structures because it completely and harmlessly assimilates a previously excluded group into existing institutions and thus incentivizes them to accommodate those institutions and adopt their mindset. This event illustrates exactly what I meant.
While some of the nation's most corrupt corporations are welcome to fly their flag over the parade, consider what Manning - for whom "even a hint of support will not be tolerated" - actually did. His leak revealed all sorts of corruption, deceit and illegality on the part of the world's most powerful corporations. They led to numerous journalism awards for WikiLeaks. Even Bill Keller, the former Executive Editor of the New York Times who is a harsh WikiLeaks critic, credited those leaks with helping to spark the Arab Spring, the greatest democratic revolution the world has seen in decades. Multiple media accounts describe how the cables documenting atrocities committed by US troops in Iraq prevented the Malaki government from allowing US troops to stay beyond the agreed-to deadline: i.e., helped end the Iraq war by thwarting Obama's attempts to prolong it. For all of that, Manning was selected by Guardian readers as the 2012 Person of the Year, while former Army Lt. Dan Choi said yesterday:
As we move forward as a country, we need truth in order to gain justice, you can't have justice without the whole truth . . . So what [Manning did as a gay American, as a gay soldier, he stood for integrity, I am proud of him."
But none of those vital benefits matter to authoritarians. That's because authoritarians, by definition, believe in the overarching Goodness of institutions of power, and believe the only bad acts come from those who challenge or subvert that power. Bad acts aren't committed by the National Security State or Surveillance State; they are only committed by those who oppose them. If a person's actions threaten power factions or are deemed prohibited by them, then Good Authoritarians will reflexively view the person as evil and will be eager to publicly disassociate themselves from such individuals. Or, as Williams put it, "even the hint of support" for Manning "will not be tolerated", and those who deviate from this decree will be "disciplined".
sf pride
Even the SF Gay Pride Parade is now owned by and beholden to the nation's largest corporations, subject to their dictates. Those who run the event are functionaries of, loyalists to, the nation's most powerful political officials. That's how this parade was so seamlessly transformed from orthodoxy-challenging, individualistic and creative cultural icon into yet another pile of obedient apparatchiks that spout banal slogans doled out by the state while viciously scorning those who challenge them. Yes, there will undoubtedly still be exotically-dressed drag queens, lesbian motorcycle clubs, and groups proudly defined by their unusual sexual proclivities participating in the parade, but they'll be marching under a Bank of America banner and behind flag-waving fans of the National Security State, the US President, and the political party that dominates American politics and its political and military institutions. Yet another edgy, interesting, creative, independent event has been degraded and neutered into a meek and subservient ritual that must pay homage to the nation's most powerful entities and at all costs avoid offending them in any way.
It's hardly surprising that someone who so boldly and courageously opposes the US war machine is demonized and scorned this way. Daniel Ellsberg was subjected to the same attacks before he was transformed many years later into a liberal hero (though Ellsberg had the good fortune to be persecuted by a Republican rather than Democratic President and thus, even back then, had some substantial support; come to think of it, Ellsberg lives in San Francisco: would expressions of support for him be tolerated?). But the fact that such lock-step, heel-clicking, military-mimicking behavior is now coming from the SF Gay Pride Parade of all places is indeed noteworthy: it reflects just how pervasive this authoritarian rot has become.
Bradley Manning is off limits at SF Gay Pride parade, but corporate sleaze is embraced
A seemingly trivial controversy reveals quite a bit about pervasive political values
News reports yesterday indicated that Bradley Manning, widely known to be gay, had been selected to be one of the Grand Marshals of the annual San Francisco gay pride parade, named by the LGBT Pride Celebration Committee. When the predictable backlash instantly ensued, the president of the Board of SF Pride, Lisa L Williams, quickly capitulated, issuing a cowardly, imperious statement that has to be read to be believed.
Williams proclaimed that "Manning will not be a grand marshal in this year's San Francisco Pride celebration" and termed his selection "a mistake". She blamed it all on a "staff person" who prematurely made the announcement based on a preliminary vote, and she assures us all that the culprit "has been disciplined": disciplined. She then accuses Manning of "actions which placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform": a substance-free falsehood originally spread by top US military officials which has since been decisively and extensively debunked, even by some government officials (indeed, it's the US government itself, not Manning, that is guilty of "actions which placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform"). And then, in my favorite part of her statement, Williams decreed to all organization members that "even the hint of support" for Manning's action - even the hint - "will not be tolerated by the leadership of San Francisco Pride". Will not be tolerated.
I originally had no intention of writing about this episode, but the more I discovered about it, the more revealing it became. So let's just consider a few of the points raised by all of this.
First, while even a hint of support for Manning will not be tolerated, there is a long roster of large corporations serving as the event's sponsors who are welcomed with open arms. The list is here. It includes AT&T and Verizon, the telecom giants that enabled the illegal warrantless eavesdropping on US citizens by the Bush administration and its NSA, only to get retroactively immunized from Congress and thus shielded from all criminal and civil liability (including a lawsuit brought in San Francisco against those corporations by their customers who were illegally spied on). Last month, AT&T was fined by OSHA for failing to protect one of its employees who was attacked, was found by the FCC last year to have overcharged customers by secretly switching them to plans they didn't want, and is now being sued by the US government for "allegedly bill the government improperly for services designed for the deaf and hard-of-hearing who place calls by typing messages over the web."
sf pride
The list of SF Pride sponsors also includes Bank of America, now being sued for $1 billion by the US government for allegedly engaging in a systematic scheme of mortgage fraud which the US Attorney called "spectacularly brazen in scope". Just last month, the same SF Pride sponsor received a record fine for ignoring a court order and instead trying to collect mortgage payments from bankrupt homeowners to which it was not entitled. Earlier this month, SF-Pride-sponsoring Bank of America paid $2.4 billion to settle shareholder allegations that Bank executives "failed to disclose information about losses at Merrill Lynch and bonuses paid to Merrill Lynch employees before the brokerage was acquired by Bank of America in January 2009 for $18.5 billion."
Another beloved SF Pride sponsor, Wells Fargo, is also being "sued by the US for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages over claims the bank made reckless mortgage loans that caused losses for a federal insurance program when they defaulted". Last year, Wells Fargo was fined $3.1 million by a federal judge for engaging in conduct that court called "highly reprehensible" relating to its persecution of a struggling homeowner. In 2011, the bank was fined by the US government "for allegedly pushing borrowers with good credit into expensive mortgages and falsifying loan applications."
Also in Good Standing with the SF Pride board: Clear Channel, the media outlet owned by Bain Capital that broadcasts the radio programs of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck; a pension fund is suing this SF Pride sponsor for making cheap, below-market loans to its struggling parent company. The health care giant Kaiser Permanente, another proud SF Pride sponsor, is currently under investigation by California officials for alleged massive privacy violations in the form of recklessly disclosing 300,000 patient records.
SF pride
So apparently, the very high-minded ethical standards of Lisa L Williams and the SF Pride Board apply only to young and powerless Army Privates who engage in an act of conscience against the US war machine, but instantly disappear for large corporations and banks that hand over cash. What we really see here is how the largest and most corrupt corporations own not just the government but also the culture. Even at the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade, once an iconic symbol of cultural dissent and disregard for stifling peities, nothing can happen that might offend AT&T and the Bank of America. The minute something even a bit deviant takes place (as defined by standards imposed by America's political and corporate class), even the SF Gay Pride Parade must scamper, capitulate, apologize, and take an oath of fealty to their orthodoxies (we adore the military, the state, and your laws). And, as usual, the largest corporate factions are completely exempt from the strictures and standards applied to the marginalized and powerless. Thus, while Bradley Manning is persona non grata at SF Pride, illegal eavesdropping telecoms, scheming banks, and hedge-fund purveryors of the nation's worst right-wing agitprop are more than welcome.
Second, the authoritarian, state-and-military-revering mentality pervading Williams' statement is striking. It isn't just the imperious decree that "even a hint of support" for Manning "will not be tolerated", though that is certainly creepy. Nor is it the weird announcement that the wrongdoer "has been disciplined". Even worse is the mindless embrace of the baseless claims of US military officials (that Manning "placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform") along with the supremely authoritarian view that any actions barred by the state are, ipso facto, ignoble and wrong. Conduct can be illegal and yet still be noble and commendable: see, for instance, Daniel Ellsberg, or most of the leaders of the civil rights movement in the US. Indeed, acts of civil disobedience and conscience by people who risk their own interests to battle injustices are often the most commendable acts. Equating illegal behavior with ignominious behavior is the defining mentality of an authoritarian - and is particularly notable coming from what was once viewed as a bastion of liberal dissent.
But the more one learns about the parties involved here, the less surprising it becomes. According to her biography, Williams "organized satellite offices for the Obama campaign" and also works for various Democratic politicians. It was President Obama, of course, who so notoriously decreed Bradley Manning guilty in public before his trial by military officers serving under Obama even began, and whose administration was found by the UN's top torture investigator to have abused him and is now so harshly prosecuting him. It's anything but surprising that a person who was a loyal Obama campaign aide finds Bradley Manning anathema while adoring big corporations and banks (which funded the Obama campaign and who, in the case of telecoms, Obama voted to immunize).
What we see here is how even many of the most liberal precincts in America are now the leading spokespeople for and loyalists to state power as a result of their loyalty to President Obama. Thus do we have the President of the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade sounding exactly like the Chairman of the Joints Chief, or Sarah Palin, or gay war-loving neocons, in depicting any meaningful opposition to the National Security State as the supreme sin. I'd be willing to bet large amounts of money that Williams has never condemned the Obama administration's abuse of Manning in detention or its dangerously radical prosecution of him for "aiding the enemy". I have no doubt that the people who did all of that would be showered with gratitude by Parade officials if they attended. In so many liberal precincts in the Age of Obama - even now including the SF Gay Pride parade - the federal government, its military, and its federal prosecutors are to be revered and celebrated but not criticized; only those who oppose them are villains.
Third, when I wrote several weeks ago about the remarkable shift in public opinion on gay equality, I noted that this development is less significant than it seems because the cause of gay equality poses no real threat to elite factions or to how political and economic power in the US are distributed. If anything, it bolsters those power structures because it completely and harmlessly assimilates a previously excluded group into existing institutions and thus incentivizes them to accommodate those institutions and adopt their mindset. This event illustrates exactly what I meant.
While some of the nation's most corrupt corporations are welcome to fly their flag over the parade, consider what Manning - for whom "even a hint of support will not be tolerated" - actually did. His leak revealed all sorts of corruption, deceit and illegality on the part of the world's most powerful corporations. They led to numerous journalism awards for WikiLeaks. Even Bill Keller, the former Executive Editor of the New York Times who is a harsh WikiLeaks critic, credited those leaks with helping to spark the Arab Spring, the greatest democratic revolution the world has seen in decades. Multiple media accounts describe how the cables documenting atrocities committed by US troops in Iraq prevented the Malaki government from allowing US troops to stay beyond the agreed-to deadline: i.e., helped end the Iraq war by thwarting Obama's attempts to prolong it. For all of that, Manning was selected by Guardian readers as the 2012 Person of the Year, while former Army Lt. Dan Choi said yesterday:
As we move forward as a country, we need truth in order to gain justice, you can't have justice without the whole truth . . . So what [Manning did as a gay American, as a gay soldier, he stood for integrity, I am proud of him."
But none of those vital benefits matter to authoritarians. That's because authoritarians, by definition, believe in the overarching Goodness of institutions of power, and believe the only bad acts come from those who challenge or subvert that power. Bad acts aren't committed by the National Security State or Surveillance State; they are only committed by those who oppose them. If a person's actions threaten power factions or are deemed prohibited by them, then Good Authoritarians will reflexively view the person as evil and will be eager to publicly disassociate themselves from such individuals. Or, as Williams put it, "even the hint of support" for Manning "will not be tolerated", and those who deviate from this decree will be "disciplined".
sf pride
Even the SF Gay Pride Parade is now owned by and beholden to the nation's largest corporations, subject to their dictates. Those who run the event are functionaries of, loyalists to, the nation's most powerful political officials. That's how this parade was so seamlessly transformed from orthodoxy-challenging, individualistic and creative cultural icon into yet another pile of obedient apparatchiks that spout banal slogans doled out by the state while viciously scorning those who challenge them. Yes, there will undoubtedly still be exotically-dressed drag queens, lesbian motorcycle clubs, and groups proudly defined by their unusual sexual proclivities participating in the parade, but they'll be marching under a Bank of America banner and behind flag-waving fans of the National Security State, the US President, and the political party that dominates American politics and its political and military institutions. Yet another edgy, interesting, creative, independent event has been degraded and neutered into a meek and subservient ritual that must pay homage to the nation's most powerful entities and at all costs avoid offending them in any way.
It's hardly surprising that someone who so boldly and courageously opposes the US war machine is demonized and scorned this way. Daniel Ellsberg was subjected to the same attacks before he was transformed many years later into a liberal hero (though Ellsberg had the good fortune to be persecuted by a Republican rather than Democratic President and thus, even back then, had some substantial support; come to think of it, Ellsberg lives in San Francisco: would expressions of support for him be tolerated?). But the fact that such lock-step, heel-clicking, military-mimicking behavior is now coming from the SF Gay Pride Parade of all places is indeed noteworthy: it reflects just how pervasive this authoritarian rot has become.
getfiscal
getfiscal
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating:
+
Goethestein posted:But the fact that such lock-step, heel-clicking, military-mimicking behavior is now coming from the SF Gay Pride Parade of all places is indeed noteworthy: it reflects just how pervasive this authoritarian rot has become.
actually heel-clicking has always been popular with the friends of dorothy
gyrofry
gyrofry
Kurdt
Post rating:
+
he blew more than the whistle, you might say
getfiscal
getfiscal
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating:
+
wasted
wasted
Post rating:
+
San Francisco has been reactionary ever since Jefferson Airplane became Jefferson Starship
gyrofry
gyrofry
Kurdt
Post rating:
+
seriously though, manning being gay/trans is obvious psyops, in the vein of julian assange as rapist, kim jong il as abductor of japanese actresses/nba memorabilia collector, etc
getfiscal
getfiscal
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating:
~
it's actually preemptive counterpsyops. assange knew he would quickly fade from public consciousness and that wikileaks would be forgotten about, so he told breanna to make up the trans thing and he traveled to the saudi arabia of feminism to put his wiener in a sleeping lady.
Superabound
Superabound
Not Your S.H.I.E.L.D.
Post rating:
+
this what heppen when you fight so hard for inclusion into the two most conservative institutions in American society. they gazed into the abyss, and the abyss gaysed back
HenryKrinkle
HenryKrinkle
hi
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+
the movement's relative silence on the issue of homeless LGBT youth is also disgraceful.
MadMedico
MadMedico
Post rating:
+
wasted posted:San Francisco has been reactionary ever since Jefferson Airplane became Jefferson Starship
We built this city to SUPPORT OUR TROOPS
jiroemon1897
jiroemon1897
YUNG JIRO AKA SHOWA STUNNA AKA
Post rating:
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getfiscal posted:
Nice N.W.A. font.
SariBari
SariBari
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~
HenryKrinkle posted:the movement's relative silence on the issue of homeless LGBT youth is also disgraceful.
getfiscal
getfiscal
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating:
+
HenryKrinkle posted:the movement's relative silence on the issue of homeless LGBT youth is also disgraceful.
i believe the strategy is to integrate queers into mainstream institutions (family, politics, military) so that angry dads and vicious moms don't throw out their homo son/daughter. of course that's a bad strategy but fortunately the homeless youth will have prostitution to fall back on once that's legalized by women who like burlesque shows and have bad bangs.
raptornomics
raptornomics
Post rating:
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poor bradley 
Keven
Keven
Post rating:
+++++
Speaking of women who have bad bangs, how about little green pills wife
stegosaurus
stegosaurus
Post rating:
+
she bangs. *clears throat* she, uh, she bangs.
cleanhands
cleanhands
Post rating:
+
is this surprising though? its become a cliche that that men with fascist tendencies are closeted homosexuals, and were probably seeing the effects of these fascists being normalised
its fucking weird that theyd try and push it on the out n proud diapers & dummies crowd though, whose lowest common denominator is that they throw tantrums when told to behave normally by anyone in charge. the self congratulatory nature of civil rights protest also means any organiser worth his gold hotpants will be comparing himself to manning and identifying with his struggle against The Man
then again idk who gives a shit about gay rights in the first world so idk what difference any of this makes
its fucking weird that theyd try and push it on the out n proud diapers & dummies crowd though, whose lowest common denominator is that they throw tantrums when told to behave normally by anyone in charge. the self congratulatory nature of civil rights protest also means any organiser worth his gold hotpants will be comparing himself to manning and identifying with his struggle against The Man
then again idk who gives a shit about gay rights in the first world so idk what difference any of this makes
mustang19
mustang19
Post rating:
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Gay "rights".
ilmdge
ilmdge
Online
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+
a lot of gay boys get kickd out of their homes, become homeless. it's really sad. but in the media, gay men are the bougiest ppl to ever exist. what's the deal
mustang19
mustang19
Post rating:
~
getfiscal
getfiscal
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating:
~
ilmdge posted:a lot of gay boys get kickd out of their homes, become homeless. it's really sad. but in the media, gay men are the bougiest ppl to ever exist. what's the deal
most gay men with jobs don't drop baby anchor and use all that extra cash to buy teak furniture for their condos. so if you're gay you've either got a lot of extra cash or you're homeless.
mustang19
mustang19
Post rating:
~
Also you get a lot of LGBT scholarships and liberal friends.
ilmdge
ilmdge
Online
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queer eye for the straight guy was an abomination
getfiscal
getfiscal
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating:
+
ilmdge posted:queer eye for the straight guy was an abomination
todd barry said the best part of that show was how surprised they'd act whenever like a 47 year old divorced truck driver didn't use eye cream or something.
aerdil
aerdil
Post rating:
+
actually the inside scoop about this is that they couldnt do bradley manning since i'm the grand marshal of the sf pride parade this year., it leaked that i had contracted the most severe case of fail aids any1 has ever seen and they had to honor my one make a gay wish foundation request
gyrofry
gyrofry
Kurdt
Post rating:
+++++
saying fail aids is no longer funny or acceptable
aerdil
aerdil
Post rating:
~
yeah, says the dude w/ the goddamn failaids gang tag, fuycking hyprocrite go cunt yourself on the corner somewhere, biTCH.
Superabound
Superabound
Not Your S.H.I.E.L.D.
Post rating:
~
ilmdge posted:a lot of gay boys get kickd out of their homes, become homeless. it's really sad. but in the media, gay men are the bougiest ppl to ever exist. what's the deal
bc the media is manufactured by the gay Jews whose liberal parents sent them to Julliard and business school instead of the gay Christians whose parent beat them and forced them to live in an alley and sell their bodies for drugs/pray until their prayer hands bleed
aerdil
aerdil
Post rating:
~
soirry that was uncalled for, i apologize. i hope this momentary lapse of reason doesn't affect our friendship from this moment forward gyrofry. fuck, i am so sorry.
gyrofry
gyrofry
Kurdt
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get it together friendo
ilmdge
ilmdge
Online
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he's still reeling over his exclusion from The Fail Aids.
peepaw
peepaw
Post rating:
+
wasted posted:San Francisco has been reactionary ever since Jefferson Airplane became Jefferson Starship
now they're just jefferson wheelchair
[account deactivated]
swirlsofhistory
swirlsofhistory
Post rating:
+
The unstated assumption is that gay peoples political values are tied to their sexual identity, and therefore they should come to the aid of another gay person who is under attack for something that has nothing to do with gay rights. Why should a gay pride parade be friendlier towards anti-war politics than any other corporate sponsored event?
It's typical of 'queer' activists to point to Pride's history of being an "iconic symbol of cultural dissent and disregard for stifling peities" as a way to emotionally blackmail gay people back into a culturally subversive identity, a move that actually works to undo progress toward gay rights and social acceptance. Supposedly having been born gay means living a 'queer' lifestyle and accepting 'queer' values, a total rejection of the 'heteronormative' oppressor society.
These activists overlook that the whole reason why there was a unique gay culture to begin with was because gay people could not live openly, and were kept separate from the wider culture by discrimination and violence. Progress has been made in changing this, and as a result the reasons for cultural uniqueness are happily disappearing. But queer politics would like to turn back the clock in many ways; convince gay people that they should be against war or capitalism because they're born subversive, not because gay people are also rational human beings who can understand why war and capitalism are harmful things in themselves.
It's typical of 'queer' activists to point to Pride's history of being an "iconic symbol of cultural dissent and disregard for stifling peities" as a way to emotionally blackmail gay people back into a culturally subversive identity, a move that actually works to undo progress toward gay rights and social acceptance. Supposedly having been born gay means living a 'queer' lifestyle and accepting 'queer' values, a total rejection of the 'heteronormative' oppressor society.
These activists overlook that the whole reason why there was a unique gay culture to begin with was because gay people could not live openly, and were kept separate from the wider culture by discrimination and violence. Progress has been made in changing this, and as a result the reasons for cultural uniqueness are happily disappearing. But queer politics would like to turn back the clock in many ways; convince gay people that they should be against war or capitalism because they're born subversive, not because gay people are also rational human beings who can understand why war and capitalism are harmful things in themselves.
Superabound
Superabound
Not Your S.H.I.E.L.D.
Post rating:
~
hmm. well i hate to admit youre right, so, uhh, i wont
swirlsofhistory
swirlsofhistory
Post rating:
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Hey gays, you owe the left so you better start showing up to our demonstrations. Lookin at you too black people.
Goethestein
Goethestein
Nippon
Post rating:
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if nothing else it's an interesting thing to note that gays, which were probably the most populated openly subversive movement for decades, got corporate funding and are now speaking against a real subversive because Are Troops.
[account deactivated]
drwhat
drwhat
mt.real
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wait, a counterculture was subverted by capital and absorbed into the mainstream and now is being marketed to & coerced against its own interests or original reason for being huh
weird
weird
HenryKrinkle
HenryKrinkle
hi
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it would be interesting to do an in-depth comparison the current LGBT movement to the current black civil rights movement and note the various ways both have sold out.
i mean, people like Al Sharpton go on MSNBC to shill for the Obama administration and charter schools. shameful stuff.
i mean, people like Al Sharpton go on MSNBC to shill for the Obama administration and charter schools. shameful stuff.