And today the knives are really coming out

[solarbird]

It has been often noted that an alliance is at its most vulnerable in two stages: at the verge of defeat, and at the edge of victory. This is an example.

We've just watched the GLB portion of the former GBLT alliance throw the transgendered under the bus. That was bad - real bad - behaviour, and signals very clearly that the national GLB rights movement - particularly the G part of it, if Andrew Sullivan's commentary this morning is any indication - has reached a treasured milestone in American society: the point where they can say, "fuck you, I got mine," and knife the somewhat-more-undesirable undesirables in the back to demonstrate that there's someone else they're better than. It's kind of the welcome ceremony of American politics, really; one of the things you do is turn to some of your own and say, "thanks for your decades of work and money and blood, now here's a shiny knife for you, right between your ribs. Buh-bye!"

There's been some pretending that this is about incrementalism, but that's a lie, and I think the people spouting off about that generally know it. Civil unions vs. marriage - that's incrementalism. Job protections but not lending? That would be incrementalism. Taking part of your alliance and throwing them to the wolves as untouchables? That's not. The pretending is just that - a pretense, a way of justifying the betrayal, to turn the anger of those they've betrayed into anger of their own back at their victims. How dare you complain? How DARE you?! they howl. And then they blame you for what they've done.

Today, though, the knives are really coming out. The successful vote sealed it, I suppose; the Stranger is crowing about how Good and Right and Necessary it was, tho' this time, at least, there's much more argument than agreement in the comments so far. (This wasn't true in the previous post.) The New York Times is pushing the "incrementalist" lie, heaping praise on Rep. Frank. Andrew Sullivan is going off on how the zomg trannies were never part of his coalition, and for that matter, he's not even sure having the G and L together makes that much sense either. Gay journalist Rex Wockner pretends that the transgendered are somehow new to this whole struggle, and wants to know who the hell invited them, anyway, and why don't they do their own work - ignoring the decades of effort running the other direction, of course, and the transgendered participation in (and arguably initiation of) the Stonewall Riots, as all the people on that side of this maneuver do. And the Stranger linked to John Aravosis at AmericaBlog - commending him specifically in doing so - who is all for the knifing, spending more time blasting Inclusive-ENDA backers National Gay and Lesbian Task Force than the fundamentalists, and who holds up the 70% number in that Human Rights Campaign poll to talk more about how Good and Right it all was.

I'm genuinely surprised. I thought that the "normal" queers, having so much immediate experience with the politics of betrayal and self-sabotage, would forget less quickly, or, at least, might go, "y'know? That really sucked. I don't want any part of that." But I was wrong; apparently the reaction has been less that and more, "Man, I can't wait until it's my turn. That's gonna be great."

So. Who gets thrown under the bus next? Bisexuals, who don't really count, since a lot of them (us) end up with opposite-gender partners (tho' not in my case)? It's much easier, having that option; maybe they (we) aren't so deserving. Plus everybody knows they really want one of each, and that's not what Real Gay People Want, and is kinda icky. Kinda greedy. Or maybe even lesbians, as hinted at by Mr. Sullivan today, noting that he doesn't "really believe there is even a 'gay and lesbian community' as such"? All that time lesbians put in helping AIDS-stricken gay men in the 1980s? Screw that, there are drugs now. Ancient history.

Or maybe nobody. Maybe having played out the political blood rite, the HRC and the national GLB community will manage not to shed any more letters. It's not like they can afford the numbers. But even given the manifest stupidity of such a thing, I don't know how much money I'd want to put against it. Not today, anyway. Maybe tomorrow it will be different. Maybe Monday. Maybe the NGLTF can displace HRC as the queer organisation that people actually know. I guess we'll see.

When people reference that adage about alliances coming apart at the edge of victory, they usually forget the part where that's how alliances often lose that same triumph.

I know they've just lost me.

Comments

[flirtaciousj.livejournal.com]

Ben Franklin and John Adams caved on their principles and threw the slaves under the bus at the Second Continental Congress. Without that, we'd still be part of the United Kingdom. Anti-slavery laws were brought up in Parliament for decades until they were passed.

I think they (the Dems) do represent the party, and worse still, that the Congress is actually somewhat representative of the population at large (at least on GLBT issues). I'm heartened that the bill passed the House, and has a chance to pass in the Senate (even though there is no chance of it not being vetoed). To me, that's progress. I'm not satisfied with it, and I won't be satisfied until truly equal rights are established. I recognize this as a milestone, not a destination.

I'm not saying "it's all right, don't be mad." Let that anger continue to fuel as we educate, inspire, cajole, and work.

[foibos.livejournal.com]

[...], we'd still be part of the United Kingdom.

You mean, like Canada and Australia are still part of the UK*, or like Mexico is still a part of Spain? Why is it that so many USAians still believe the "revolution" gave them a freedom they wouldn't have achieved anyway, simply by outgrowing the Crown's ability to control them?

If Franklin and Adams decided to disregard the slavery issue for no other reason than to save the independence movement, then they made a tragic mistake. Repeating it does not improve anything.

*) I'm quite aware of the remaining political ties, and they basically don't matter: Canada and Australia are independent from the UK.

[flirtaciousj.livejournal.com]

*shrugs* Although without the U.S. as a model it's less clear that the sovereign status of other parts of the empire would have developed along the same lines, I'm willing to accept (certainly for LJ purposes) that we'd be in some form of Commonwealth status by now.

As for the wisdom of that decision, I disagree with you that it was a tragic mistake, even for the slaves. Although the Brits freed their slaves in the 1830's, we'll never know how long it would have taken them to do so if they had a major economic stake (through continued dominion over parts of the North American continent) ... or indeed, whether THAT would have triggered a revolution the way it triggered the Civil War. And the concepts of personal freedom, separation of church and state and the rights of the citizen against the state would have been set back significantly.*

*) And I'm quite aware of the myriad ways we fall short of the nation's ideals. We're trying to head in the right direction.

[foibos.livejournal.com]

Although without the U.S. as a model

The hell? The colony outgrowing the parent country was a well-established model literally thousands of years before 1776.

And the concepts of personal freedom, separation of church and state and the rights of the citizen against the state would have been set back significantly.

Those concepts were implemented in Europe through a slow (century-long) but steady process with occasional flare-ups; by 1848 most nations in Europe had been thoroughly transformed by it. This is in contrast with the USA, which is still stuck in some weird half-medieval/half-modern political model.

It's not as much that you fall short of your nation's ideals as that you (at least from the outside) seem to have some strange Orwellian alternative interpretation of them. What freedom? Your middle class people are serfs, your lower class people are worse off than slaves. What separation of church and state? Your government (locally and nationally) is completely committed to Christianity, and your political debate seems to be based on the bible's teachings. What rights of the citizen? Do you have any rights at all beyond what your personal wealth or power afford you?

I'm venting frustration here, and I'm probably unfair both to you and to your country. It's just so painful to see how USA is currently disgracing itself and pulling down the rest of the world into war and oppression at the same time.

[risu.livejournal.com]

Counterfactuals are problematic, and probably not the best way to evaluate when something is principle and when it's just an excuse.

There's a way people act when they're doing the right thing at a cost to someone else---at the cost of a wrong thing.

A kind of flinchy-but-standing willingness to take the heat for it, to feel through the suffering themselves.

I think there'd be a lot more "Oh, God, I'm so sorry we're doing this" and a lot less "GO US WE DID IT" if this were a moral thing.

I'm not hearing Barney Frank out there saying,

"This is a fucking dark day, and I may be damned for it, but at least I dragged people a little forward."

And I'm not finding the bit where he excoriated every last coward in Congress who made him leave people behind before finally shaming them into giving him what they did.

So . . . unless I've missed those bits, which is possible, I'm not sure why exactly anyone who knows the history *would* think this was doing right.

Except that there is *nobody* in this world quite so disliked as a victim, and therefore nobody so lionized as the guy who's just let go of the shiv.

[solarbird]

Several people have now pointed out in various other discussion forums that the whole "we'll come back for the Ts later" thing has been bought into before (New York State, most recently), and the number of times that return has actually happened has been... zero. Which is, of course, the obvious result. In New York State, the Democrat-controled chamber is happy with things as they are and have no plans of revisiting the issue.

Which is, as I've said before, is the obvious result of this maneuver. This is not incrementalism, almost everybody knows it, and everyone who doesn't, should.

[flirtaciousj.livejournal.com]

I take a long view ... which of course has a tendancy to ignore the short term pain. I don't do that. But yes, I do believe that things like this make a difference. In my 46 years I've seen a massive shift in the general attitude towards gays in ways that would have been unthinkable even 20 or 25 years ago.

I'm not surprised that incrementalism hasn't produce a Ts law yet - I think the changes will be measured in decades, not years. According to a NY times survey, over the past decade, the percentage of Americans who thought gay acts should be illegal has fallen from 67% to 41%. Things are changing, slowly. That doesn't mean we should be mindlessly satisfied with the pace of change. But it doesn't mean that we should dismiss the changes that have happened, either.

IMHO. YMMV.

[solarbird]

Yeah, I keep hearing that "long view" crap from people who support the maneuver. I don't hear it from any of the people who got knifed. See, the thing is, this wasn't some separate track; transpeople helped start the Stonewall Riots and were there from the beginning. Trans people have been at the forefront of marriage equality fights. Transpeople were supposedly equal partners in this coalition, and, as a united front, all were moving forward together in law.

Now, that's not so much, and the Ts have been told thanks, but you're no longer useful to us, get the hell out. And being handed "incrementalism" and "long view" crap. And I don't care how it's spun, it's still crap and I'm not buyin' it.