LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
Quote Unquote |
Compiled by Rex Wockner |
"Gay culture is boring because gay culture is going away. And gay culture is going away because the oppression is going away. I think that's a pretty fair trade." Gay syndicated columnist Dan Savage to the Washington Post, April 27. "I know as a celebrity the most important thing I'll ever do is to stand up and make a difference for those [gay] children who need voices to speak for them.... I would beg anyone, any celebrity, to please come out. It is the most important thing you'll ever do to save lives." Actress Ellen DeGeneres at the Millennium March on Washington, April 30. "I see those [anti-gay] picketers and I think, you know, if I weren't a loving, nonviolent, spiritual person, I would really go over there and grab those signs and smash them over their heads and shove them up their asses." Actress Ellen DeGeneres at the Millennium March on Washington, April 30. "You're beautiful! We will stand with you!" Tipper Gore, Al's wife, at the Equality Rocks concert during the Millennium March festivities in Washington, D.C., April 29. "Conservatives say [Vermont's] civil union [law] reflects the 'moral rot' in society, but the very reverse is true. In our own circle of friends and family, we've known a number of gay couples who simply want what every heterosexual couple wantsintimacy, understanding, constancy. Partners who want to make a life together should be shored up, not shut out; respected, not rejected." TV journalist Cokie Roberts and her husband Steven writing in the May 2 New York Daily News. "The churches, especially, must accept much of the blame for the homophobia that still exists in Australia, as in all communities. This is both the puzzle and the challenge. It is a puzzle, because such attitudes seem so incompatible with the basic lessons of a spiritual belief. The challenge is to expedite a change of view and to reiterate the universality of spiritual outreach. In the past there was perhaps an excuse for ignorance about sexuality. Today there is none. Homophobia has to stop. Silence and shame are the means by which oppression continues." Openly gay Australian High Court Judge Michael Kirby writing in the Melbourne daily newspaper The Age, May 2. "Do your grassroots work, but don't knock the national effort. That's what I hate about this divisiveness. We're all in the same boat. So let's just pick up an oar and row already." Martina Navratilova in reference to people who opposed the Millennium March on Washington, to Los Angeles' Lesbian News, May issue. "You know, I'm not the expert in that. I can recommend some people to come here and clarify all these things." Dr. Laura Schlessinger when asked if gays choose their sexual orientation, on Larry King Live, May 3. "A University of Michigan class offers, in its fall 2000 course catalogue, 'How to Be Gay: Male Homosexuality and Initiation,' some remedial fare for the young gay student who can't tell his Oscar Wilde from his Harvey Milk. (Synopsis: The night Judy Garland died in 1969, a bunch of drag queens freaked out and fought the cops in front of the Stonewall, a Greenwich Village bar. Later, Ellen DeGeneres was on the cover of Time. There'll be a quiz.)" Washington Post reporter Hank Stuever, April 27. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 10, No. 5, May 19, 2000. |