CAPITAL COVERAGE NEWS SERVICE
media in the public interest
Whose America?
Unitarians Pre-plan Timely Response to
Unexpected Gay Losses
by John Zeh
CINCINNATI (Oct. 26) - They might have reeled out of control
after all the anti-gay leavings they had to wade through the
past three weeks. Or felt smug, knowing that their church's conference
examining how best to wrest back power from the anti-gay radical
right was prophetically pre-planned.
There had been three recent murders especially relevant to the
liberal Congregationalists - of an upstate New York doctor who
performed abortions, Wyoming gay student Matthew Shepard, and
a bisexual worshipper from a suburban church near here. All happened
in the wake of another untimely dump seen as lethal to gay rights-
the U.S. Supreme Court's refusal to overturn Issue 3, America's
only anti-gay dis-entitlement approved by voters.
But despite their frustrations, over 110 Unitarians and guests
at a conference here Oct. 24 kept their cool.
They gathered quietly to study, discuss, and plan appropriate
responses to the horrific events. Speakers and participants tackled
issues of race, religion, homophobia, censorship, and sexism
at an all-day session convened by the First Unitarian Church
in Avondale.
The goal was to "rediscover our own influence on the political
and social climate," said convener Tommie Thompson, an urban
planner and parent whose Committee for Social Concerns titled
the seminar "Whose America Is It? Responding to the Radical
Right."
"We wanted to learn valuable strategies to assure that rational
thought is preserved," she beamed as 21 unregistered attendees
entered the church where President William Howard Taft worshipped.
People shared personal experiences of anti-gay harassment, the
real meaning of the city Charter amendment that prohibits city
protections of homosexuals, and next steps in the five-year Issue
3 battle. They outlined threats from the anti-woman Brothers'
Keepers movement, how the Queen City has become "the world
capital of censorship," and discussed how citizens must
win back influence over conservative media.
"I'm frightened," said the town's first female mayor,
Bobbie L. Sterne. "And I want to scare you very much. There's
been a deliberate attempt to intrude religious philosophy into
civil law."
When she added sexual orientation to the city's Human Rights
Ordinance (HRO), a homophobic minister testified that gays should
be killed. "Love is the strongest thing," said the
25-year city council member, "but hate is even stronger."
"The anti's always have better organization, and go about
it in a fanatic way," she added, fearing what may happen
if religion is allowed to escalate in the shaping of public policy.
"In the Islamic faith, (marital) infidelity is punished
by decapitation," said Mrs. Sterne, who recently retired.
There's going to be a lot of headless people in this country."
Distress at the daylong meeting was tempered, however, by words
of hope from other long-time politicos, who urged people to help
get out the Nov.3 vote.
Former council member and Ohio Governor John J. Gilligan reflected
on his work in the early civil rights movement here. Back then,
he took two council colleagues he had invited to a Reds baseball
game at Crosley Field in the black-populated West End to veteran
civil rights activist Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth's church, finding
a march to predominately white downtown underway. "He said
if people spit, curse, or throw rocks, we will bless them,"
Gilligan reported.
The civil rights movement began, he noted, "with small groups
of people who said racism 'isn't right and we're not going to
put up with it.' We got others to feel compelled to share our
beliefs of decency and brotherhood, and things began to change.
That's the spirit we need now."
Keynoter Rev. Meg A. Riley, director of Faith in Action of the
Unitarian Universalist Association in Washington, D.C., acknowledged
the grief that politically-concerned locals feel. "I've
heard you share the pain of living (here)," she said. "This
healing together is important, as long as we don't accentuate
powerlessness."
Reporting back from a workshop of 14 women and four men strategizing
on GLBT issues, Linnea Lose outlined plans to mobilize groups
not originally involved in fighting against Issue 3 by "narrow-targeting"
individual congregations of all faiths. "I am pleased to
report that (we) do not feel powerless," she said. "We're
tired, but not finished."
Stonewall Cincinnati director Lycette Nelson said her political
action group seeks support from all segments of the region. "Building
a broad-based coalition is really crucial so people see our repeal
initiative as a community-wide issue, not just a gay issue,"
she said, announcing a meeting on Issue 3's impact and renewed
challenges for 7 p.m., Sunday, Nov.1, at Mt. Auburn Presbyterian
Church.
Overcoming "a barrage of an apathetic populace" among
mainstream citizens is a formidable task, said Corey Shapiro,
senior organizer for People for the American Way, a progressive
citizens' lobby based in D.C. "People are tired of politicians
lying, and $40 million spent on a witch hunt (against President
Bill Clinton)."
He warned that the Family Research Council's Gary Bauer, a Newport,
Ky., native, who may seek the Presidency, "is on the rise,'
administering a $14 million budget and stumping for conservative
Congressional candidates like northern Kentucky's Gex Williams.
"The well-funded right doesn't even have to have a Get-Out
the-Vote (GOTV) program." he said. "But we can beat
them, because we have ideas and values on our side."
One value-laden idea that was a common thread among speakers
was re-gaining control of language, especially on the street
and through the media.
Stonewall's Nelson said she and her partner were verbally harassed
(as Matthew Shepard lay in a coma at hospital in Laramie, WY)
because Lycette (pronounced "lee-set") merely had her
arm on the back of her girlfriend's car seat. Later, when the
pair went walking - without touching- a pair of young men yelled
"f-ing dykes," she said, editing herself for the several
senior citizens in the audience. "This kind of intimidation
goes beyond violence. It's language we hear constantly."
It's an awful experience, she said, in the wake of Wyoming, New
York State, the Issue 3 ruling, and the murder Oct. 14 in suburban
Union Township of Michael J. Carpenter. Police say Carpenter
may have taken home a male hustler from a downtown gay bar during
happy-hour cruising, while his female wife was at work.
But what really sent her "over the edge" were printed
words in a Cincinnati Enquirer editorial saying Issue 3 voters
(62%) were justified in thinking local gays sought "special
rights" when Mrs. Sterne amended the HRO. The Gannett daily
warned that smokers, pedophiles, shoplifters, and alcoholics
might be next to demand unique protections. "All this has
made me think more and more how we must respond - how to control
language. The religious right has won control of the media. "
The struggle that must be mounted, she said, "is about reclaiming
America's very basic language - to speak about free speech, religious
freedom, free expression. Solutions are not easy, she said, but
"we must get the discourse going as fast (as our opponents)."
One tactic to regain control of language, she and others said,
is holding editors accountable. "Assassination, of course,
is the ultimate form of censorship," said William Messer,
a board member of the local America Civil Liberties Union and
founder of the Campaign Against Censorship in the Arts. "But
media is the big problem.
"People around the world know Cincinnati not for Proctor
& Gamble's global pre-eminence, the (baseball) Reds' historical
primacy, or even TV's Jerry Springer. They know us for our bigotry,
intolerance, and repression." The catch-phrase is no longer
"Banned in Boston" he said, but "Censored in Cincinnati.
"We're the world capital of censorship."
The Issue 3 loss "was totally a language game, played artfully,
and now successfully, by our opponents," agreed panel moderator
Alphonse Gerhardstein. He was lead council on both the successful
challenge to Ohio's "Partial Birth Abortion" statute
and on Issue 3 challenges, and continues as a key prisoners'
rights litigant after the Lucasville riot and recent escape of
inmates at a privately-run prison.
"To be clear about what we lost on Issue 3, it's tragic,
" he said, "absurd, totally horrible." Despite
the Supreme Court's "sweeping" decision overturning
Colorado's Amendment 2, America's high court let stand the Issue
3 amendment to Cincinnati's Charter, which Gerhardstein called
"our supreme law, our Constitution." Gone are prohibitions
against discrimination in housing, public accommodation, employment,
and hate crimes.
The high court "has written discrimination into our government's
most important document, he carefully told the audience. "I
fear that it's a bellwether on other issues we face. We need
more people to care about these issues, and not wait for lawyers
to file (litigation)."
Gov. Gilligan said people should maintain their "basic faith
"in each other as "politicians play to prejudices and
fears," noting that the media "won't touch any serious
issue" for an extended time. "No wonder people tune
out. Our job is to penetrate that screen."
Ideas were aplenty. Sign on to Working Assets long distance phone
service, earning free personal calls and letters to elected officials,
one person suggested. Support Community Shares as an alternative
to traditional workplace giving, said director Mary McCoy, whose
work Gerhardstein called "really exciting, a progressive
peoples' United Way."
Long-time gay activist and retired University of Cincinnati professor
Larry Wolff spoke of his success in getting letters-to-editors
published as head of St. John's Unitarian Church's social action
group. "You don't have to be a literary genius," he
smiled. "You realize that, if you read letters from our
opponents."
