Harvey Milk, Toni Morrison, James Baldwin and the Pain of Gay Life in America

I was in high school when I read Giovanni's Room, James Baldwin's heartbreaking story of pain and loss.  It was the first time I'd understood anything of the harsh realities of life for gay men, and it changed me, opened my soul and my mind the way great writers are supposed to. Toni Morrison, his close friend who has often said that she misses him still, told NPR's Michele Martin how much she would have loved to see his reaction to the election of Barack Obama.  Me too. 

I kept thinking of Baldwin as I sat in a screening of Milk ,the story of a gay man, years later, who fought discrimination with determination - and humor - and lost his life to an assassin in the process.  Harvey Milk, played by Sean Penn, moved to San Francisco from a dead-end job in Manhattan and ended up launching a political gay rights movement that took over first the Castro, then San Francisco, then the nation.  Battling anti-gay referenda in cities, towns and states, he made it possible, in ways probably not dreamed of when Baldwin fled US racism and homophobia by moving to Paris in the 1940's, for gays to live openly.

Here's what's hard though.  Baldwin wrote Giovanni's Room in 1956, when gay men suffered, for the most part, in secret.  Harvey Milk led his battles in the 1970's, as, at least in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York, they emerged from the closet into the light, fighting for their rights every day as efforts were made to push them back into silence.  In California, one of Milk's greatest successes was the defeat of a bill that would force the termination of all gay teachers. 

Look at us now.  On the same landmark day that we elected Barack Obama president, California, in a statewide referendum, repealed the right for gays to marry.  Similar efforts have become a cottage industry, and have succeeded all over the country.  

Where kids are concerned, Florida, where Anita Bryant originated her cruel anti-gay campaign in the 70's, is still fighting to maintain a recently-overturned ban on gay adoption.  Arkansas and Utah ban any unmarried couples, straight or gay, from adopting or fostering children; Mississippi bans gay couples, but not single gays.   Arkansas voters last month approved a measure that, like Utah's bans any unmarried straight or gay couples from adopting or fostering children, a clever way to be "nondiscriminatory."  Gay couples who want the non-biological parent to adopt their baby have to choose carefully in which county they file their papers.  Get the wrong judge and you're toast.  Perfectly fine candidates can lose elections because of their stands supporting gay rights.   

To read the policy side of these issues in more detail, visit Leslie Bradshaw.  She's one of the most passionate writers about the past election and the current state of gay rights and discusses the issue far more completely than I can. 

But  to a pop culture vulture like me,  it's sad to sit through a docudrama, which is basically what MILK is, 52 years after Giovanni and 30+ after Harvey Milk, and feel that, in too many ways, it could be today's news.

  

ADD:  I just discovered this post from Uppercase Woman.  A great survey/meditation on gay marriage.

Comments

[Leslie Bradshaw]

Cyndi,

I absolutely loved this post. Your attention to literature, culture and history creates a rich picture of what is (and is not) going on.

Relatedly... and while I hear what Obama is saying when it comes to 'coming together despite our differences,' I was bummed to hear that a person with such on-the-record backwards views about marriage/gay rights/gay people like Rick Warren would be tapped to kick things off at the Inauguration on 1/20/09. I know I am not the only one.

Looking ahead to 2009, it would be great to get more involved in the gay rights movement (as I have been in the past and on paper - btw, thanks for the link-love). We are all needed.

Keep up the great work, much love and happy holidays ~ L.