I am trying to keep the blog going but have been busy with some stuff and the inertial to put thoughts to paper is a difficult one..... anyway, here's a new one that I felt really inspired to write.....
I just found out that tomorrow is the 10th Anniversary of Ellen's coming out - when she appeared on TIME magazine with the headline, Yep, I'm Gay.... She came out and have a roller coaster carrer before finally coming back strong with her own show. Since then there have been lots more people who have come out of the closet, Rosie, Elton John, Ian McKellen, TR Knight, Lance Bass, Doogie.... we have also seen more gay characters on TV and Movies that is not stereotypical, see Brothers and Sisters, Ugly Betty, War at Home, Six Feet Under, The Sopranos, Brokeback Mountain etc... but has things really changed?
LGBT citizens still do not have full civil rights that their straight brothers and sisters enjoys. An American citizen who is gay (or lesbian) cannot sponsor their foreign born partner for a green card even if they are in a committed relationship for years. The president of the USA, supposedly the land of the free, is trying to write discrimination into the constitution by denying LGBT families the rights to marry. Coultier called John Edwards a fag and nobody made any noise, isaiah from Grey's Anatomy called TR Knights the same (and repeated it several months later) and nobody made any noise - but a talk show host was fired today for saying something degrading to a group of intelligent baskteball player. I am bothered that the same "supposedly" african american activist who were crying foul about the remarks from the talk show host and kept quiet when his fellow brothers said degrading stuff of gay people.
I believe that there is racism, sexism and homophobia in this world.... the majority just like to do whatever they can to demean the minority, to take away their rights, just so that they can feel some kind of power. We need to stand up for equality for everybody and not just for ourselves. We are all brothers and sisters, we are all the same, if we do not stand up for equality just because it does not apply to us, we need to know that it will come back and bite us when it is our turn being discriminated.
I look forward to the day where the Uniting American Families Act is passed and all my brothers and sisters who are struggling in the US and in exile to stay together, can come back to the United States. I look forward to the day where LGBT families can have the same rights as straight families in every state, in every corner of the world - why shouldn't we if we pay the same taxes?
Will that happen? I don't know - I hope so. My partner always remind me of the Margaret Mead quote "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
