Open Letter from Colorado

The national queer leadership understands so little about any of the states
between the coasts that we have pretty much been left to fend for
ourselves.  When we finally acknowledge this, though, we'll probably be
much better off.

Take for example the recent article in OUT magazine recommending that
people ski in Wyoming rather than Colorado.  Now, Wyoming is certainly a
beautiful state, and they do have skiing there, but they are certainly not
more friendly to queers than is Colorado.  The point of a boycott of
Colorado is not to create alternative recreational areas, it's to put
pressure on a state that has passed a hate law.

Oregon, by the way, is really no better off-they are still fighting the
same battle, for one thing.  The OCA was much more visible and active with
its hate rhetoric than was CFV in Colorado (including the firebombing and
murder of a gay man and lesbian).  The fact that Colorado lost and Oregon
won was not due to lack of organization or effort on the part of Queer
Coloradans, something folks in Oregon know all too well.  Colorado and
Oregon have very similar populations and politics-we were essentially test
states for two different strategies of hate laws.  That's why they are
using the wording from the Colorado amendment.  (This letter was written
only 2 days before the Oregon vote in which we lost 5 counties.  I'm really
sorry for y'all and I guess we can really say that we know how you must
feel.  Hang in there!)

Torrie Osborn, director of NGLTF, when she came to Boulder to try to call
off the Colorado Boycott and was informed that this was not her business,
said that Boulder was the worst community she had ever been in and that she
had never seen more horizontal hostility.  I've got news for
Torrie-Boulder, the worst community she has ever been in, the community
that lacks organization, etc., got 75% of the vote against Amendment 2 with
a record 90% turnout, is the first community in the country to include
sexual orientation by popular vote in its civil rights ordinance, and in
the 6 years since the ordinance was passed has increased queer visibility
dramatically while increasing the voter support for queer rights by 25%,
from 50% in 1987 to 75% in 1992.  On the other hand, Washington, D.C.,
where Torrie lives, just lifted its sodomy law only 3 weeks before a
million queers showed up to march.

Which is exactly the point of this sure to be controversial letter.  Queer
visibility works.  Queer activism works.  In the almost two years since we
first learned about Amendment 2 and Colorado for Family Values, almost all
of our attention has been diverted toward fighting this hate law.  But the
most successful work has been done in communities that have become more
active/activist.  Boulder went from 33% support for queer rights in 1974 to
75% support in 1992.  Denver increased support for queer rights from 50% to
60% in only one year (1991-1992).  And Colorado Springs, the birthplace of
Amendment 2, increased attendance at their pride march from 200 in 1991 to
3,000 in 1992.

At first, the strategists who fought Amendment 2 didn't even want to make
it a queer issue.  Their original plan was to try to fight it on the basis
of home rule, in other words, that communities should be able to pass their
own laws.  Of course it was obviously a civil rights issue and was most
successfully fought on that basis in Boulder, Aspen and Denver, all
communities which voted Amendment 2 down and all communities that already
had an ordinance.  But some of the best activist minds in our state were
diverted for two years (eventually it will be many more) in order to
maintain the rights we already had.  There was no attempt to be aggressive,
to really go after the right wing.

The right wing, in other words, is doing really well by just keeping us
scrambling.  Nothing proactive.  No new ground.  Just the status quo.

So the first major tactic of the right wing is to keep us busy fighting for
nothing.  And the second major tactic is to try to kill us through our
blood pressure, our suicides, our internalized oppression, our murder.  The
impact of this large scale hate crime is profound.  This heinous group of
radical Christians have no qualms about lying, no qualms about attacking us
in vicious ways (hate mail, death threats, firebombing), no qualms about
killing queer teenagers and queer activists.

So, here are some important tips for fighting this in your state.  I'm so
thankful, in a way, that the campaigning part is over.  It was horrible and
drained the energy of many people who are very important to me, as well as
my own.  We're still doing all we can to fight it here and to help y'all in
any ways we can.

1)  BE AS QUEER as you feel comfortable being and as visible as your
community can handle and then push it farther.  It's true that Boulder is a
liberal community, but liberals can be as difficult to work with as
conservatives.  The point is that what we can get away with in Boulder will
get us arrested in Denver and killed in C. Springs.  But don't buy the
argument that going into the closet and being nice is going to help fight
these fundies.  (This weekend we've finally resumed our public drag
(lesbian and gay) zaps at locations around Boulder.  Dyke daddies escorting
lipstick lesbians out shopping and the "Advice Girls" giving advice to the
lovelorn).

2)  BUILD COALITIONS with people of color, Jewish and women's groups from
the very beginning. Fight sexism, racism, and anti-semitism within your own
organizations.  The right wing is attacking all of these communities
aggressively simultaneously and if we work together we can spread them too
thin.

3)  DO THE POLITICS YOU ARE COMFORTABLE WITH and back off when you are
doing too much.  Some people need to hang back and do support work for the
front line activists.  Otherwise, everybody will burn out and there won't
be anybody left on election day.  DO THINGS IN SHIFTS.  

4)  USE YOUR BEST SKILLS (if you are a writer, write.  if you're a
psychologist or media person, strategize, implement, offer support
workshops.  if you are a street activist, ACTIVATE, if you're a drag queen
or a lesbian thrash band, be a public drag queen and a dyke fundraiser.)

5)  ATTACK THE RIGHT WING ON ALL LEVELS.  Colorado for Family Values
studies their audience very carefully and tailors their message to that
audience.  If there was a mistake in the otherwise excellently run campaign
we ran in Colorado, it was that we put out one message while the
fundamentalists put out several (all of them lies).  People attach to the
message they want to hear.  If you put out only one message you won't
attract the attention of groups that are either more sympathetic or less
sympathetic to that message.  CFV, on the other hand, would tell one group
that they don't hate while telling another group that we should be sent to
camps and gassed.

6)  RATHER THAN IN-FIGHTING, remind each other that you are choosing to
fight the hate rhetoric differently.  You don't have to agree and in the
grand scheme of things two different strategies will not cancel each other
out.  They will simply reach different audiences.

7)  NEVER DEBATE THEM.  For Christians, facing up to their idea of Satan is
a source of strength.  It gives them great pleasure (probably sexual) to
get into a real struggle.  But I can guarantee that it will do nothing for
a queer except damage your mental health (I really mean this.  People who
went through debates with them were diagnosed with psychological trauma
afterward.)  Besides, debates create the idea that there is a right and
wrong which will be determined by the winner of the debate.  This is faulty
logic.  Their lies are more media-interesting than your truths.

8)  DON'T BELIEVE THAT THEY CAN BE REASONED WITH OR TRUSTED.  Activists in
Colorado who made this mistake ended up videotaped and used by the fundies
for their twisted purposes.  The fundies cannot be reasoned with.  Their
intent is to do harm and they CANNOT be educated.  

9)  TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF.  Don't do drugs or drink.  Eat healthy food. 
Start going to a queer or queer friendly counselor.  Join a queer choir. 
Make queer culture.  Take yourself out to dinner.  Take a bath.  Have HOT
and SAFE sex.  (violate a sodomy law if you can).  Have parties.  Make new
friends.  Make up with old friends or lovers.  Celebrate life.  Get rid of
attitude by talking to each other.  Love each other.

10)  REMIND YOURSELF AND YOUR FRIENDS THAT THERE IS A REASON THINGS SEEM
DIFFERENT IN THEIR LIVES.  People around here couldn't figure out why they
were so tired, why their job or school performance was down, why they
didn't feel motivated.  Being surrounded by hate is a tough thing and it's
exactly what the fundies want.

11)  THERE IS NO ONE ANSWER.  Education is not THE answer.  Stickers and
buttons are not THE answer.  Legislation is not THE answer.  Armed
revolution is not THE answer.  All of these things do their own thing. 
Choose whatever you can best do and help out the others when you can. 

In the month before the election, so many people were wearing
anti-Amendment 2 buttons that it seemed like everyone in Boulder was queer.
 Up till then, you could still use them for cruising.  In Amendment 2, we
may have lost a major battle, but we may be winning the war.  Our coming
out groups are packed to the gills (if you don't have one, start one,
because you'll need it).  Our parades are larger (from 5 thousand to 50
thousand in five years).  Straight groups are getting it and getting
involved.  There have been 4 (14 total in CO) new PFLAG groups started up
in the last year.  Queer culture is alive and well.  Of course we are
hurting, but at least we can get back to marching forward.

I'm really hurting for all my sisters out there.  I know you are feeling a
lot of the same feelings I felt two years ago.  But the best way to get a
fundie is to LIVE!  Please contact me at the address below (email or
otherwise) and circulate this letter freely with my name.  If you want to
include the letter or parts of it in your literature or local queer papers,
please just send me a copy at the address below.

Love, Gogo Dancer. 

   

     

Jim Davis-Rosenthal
Academic Access Institute
Campus Box 184, Lower Norlin
University of Colorado
Boulder, CO 80309-0184
rosenthj@ucsu.colorado.edu
(303) 492-1417