When I was a child, we spent the summers living at my grandmother’s house. It was always dreadfully hot, and she lived hours from the beach, so, being the enterprising children that we were, my sister and I early on figured out how to get some needed relief.
On Monday, we would call our great aunt, who lived a few blocks away, and chat, mostly about the weather. On Tuesday, we might head over to her house to visit, and be very polite, and chat about the weather.
On Wednesday, we would find opportunities to talk with our great aunt and our grandmother, mostly about the weather.
By Thursday, our great aunt, who was elderly and had a car with a chauffer, would call to offer to have her chauffeur take us on a day-trip to the beach the next day.
Mission Accomplished.
The politics of gay rights are much like my summers at my grandmother’s house. Hints, back-and forths, and what amounts to a lot of talking about the weather.
The problem is, we’re not children, and we shouldn’t be dependent upon the “adults” – in this case, the government – to get our day at the beach.
Having just spent five exhausting weeks creating and planning The Great Nationwide Kiss-In, I returned to work today to continue the fight for gay rights. I’ve been catching up on the news, I watched Bill Clinton denounce DOMA, I’m hearing DADT might get repealed. But I realized all the players, on all sides, sound like my sister and I did.
We were hot and tired. We wanted to go to the beach. We couldn’t just ask; we had to find creative ways to get what we wanted from the people “in power.” I say, enough is enough. It’s time to mount an all-out assault for our rights.
While it won’t be a day at the beach, it will be