Subject: What Are We Marching For?
From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 8 Jun 1999 19:03:33 EDT

What Are We Marching For?     

By Robin Tyler, Executive Producer
Millennium March on Washington for Equality

Tuesday, June 8, 1999

My lover woke up this morning and said, "The gay thing is over." I replied, 
"What do you mean by that?"  

We had both read the extensive article in the morning's LA Times about 
veteran activist Morris Kight and the celebration of Christopher Street 
West's 29th Annual Gay and Lesbian Pride Celebration.

She said, "You know, gays and lesbians are visible now."  

"Does this mean that our community will accept visibility in place of 
equality?" I asked. I was getting angry.

African Americans have always been visible. Does this mean Rosa Parks should 
not have moved to the front of the bus? And what are we talking about, 
visibility? So in New York and San Francisco and Los Angeles, we are visible. 
But what do Mississippi and Wyoming and all of the vast rural areas of our 
country have in common with big cities? And in all areas, we have to look 
over our shoulders, especially those of us who are visible, so that we don't 
get violently attacked, beaten, or murdered.

So today there was a large and well deserved article on Morris Kight, elder 
gay activist. But yesterday's article in the LA Times was about how the 
California Legislature would not pass a bill to protect gay youth. Hey, this 
is 1999, and this weekend in Los Angeles, 500,000 of us will participate in 
the Pride Celebration!  Hey, we're visible! But, we still cannot protect our 
youth.

One of the questions regarding the March on Washington has been, "What are we 
marching for?"

What are we marching for?  How about ENDA, so that GLBT people can have the 
right to hold a job?  It is incredulous that we think that states alone will 
grant us equal rights. We cannot even get a bill passed to protect gay and 
lesbian youth here in the "grand, out, and homosexually-visible" state of 
California.  Do we think that the states of Mississippi and Alabama and Utah 
are going to protect our community with regard to jobs?  We are marching for 
the right to get and keep our jobs!

Matthew Shepard was murdered in Wyoming, and yet, even after that horrific 
murder, GLBT protections were not added to the hate crimes bill in that 
state. We don't even have the right not to get murdered. We are marching 
against violence!

A few years ago in Florida, Mary Ward had her child taken away from her by 
the courts and custody was given to her ex-husband, a convicted murder. The 
judge said publicly he would rather give the child to a murderer than to a 
lesbian. Mary Ward died of a heart attack brought on by the stress and pain 
of her ordeal. Today, in Florida, gays still cannot adopt children. We are 
marching to keep our children!

James Hormel, finally, and we are grateful, has been named a U.S. Ambassador. 
This is a great achievement. Thank you Bill Clinton. But, the ‘don't ask, 
don't tell policy,' a ‘compromise' bill which Barney Frank helped to author, 
has resulted in more GLBT people being thrown out of the military than ever 
before! No thank you, Bill Clinton.

So, Barney Frank, when you say public Marches are not necessary, are a waste 
of time, I happen to strongly disagree with you. This is what gay politicians 
and organizations have been saying to us since the first national gay and 
lesbian March on Washington in 1979. You continue to fight the good fight in 
the suites, Barney. However, many of us will follow the advice of Jesse 
Jackson, who said to the GLBT community in a speech I attended in Washington 
last year, "Never, never get off these streets. We must continue our struggle 
in the streets, as well as in the suites." Jackson was right when he said 
that pressure must come from within and without. We're marching to keep the 
pressure on our elected officials!

We have visibility, at least in those states and cities with major GLBT 
populations.  We have pride -- and an industry of "rainbow wear" to support 
it.  What we don't have are equal rights.  

A small group of activists in our community believe that gay people should 
not have the right to serve in the military. After all, the military is part 
of the "U.S. oppressive capitalist regime." The fact that 90% of our 
community wants the right to serve their country does not matter to them. The 
fact that the military is the largest employer of minorities and can 
guarantee a college education does not matter. I am an anti-war activist. 
However, Margarethe Cammameyer, Alan Shindler, Keith Mienhold, Leonard 
Matlovich, and tens of thousands of others wanted to -- and still want to -- 
serve their country through military service. And I support their right to 
choose. We're marching so that GLBT people can have equal rights in the way 
they choose to serve their country!

And despite those who are feeling complacent, AIDS is not over. Not in this 
country, not in Africa, not in Asia, not anywhere. Most people in this world 
cannot afford the drugs or have no access them. It is a myth that AIDS has 
been cured. This disease is one of the greatest crises our community and our 
society will continue to face into the next century. We're marching because 
the AIDS crisis is not yet over and neither is the discrimination associated 
with it!
 
A small group of activists in our community believe that legal marriage is 
part of a patriarchal institution that must be eradicated. And yet 90% of our 
community wants the legal protections, rights and privileges that marriage 
guarantees. It's not about everybody wanting to get married. It's about 
having the right to get married. We're marching for those in our community 
who want full equality under the marriage laws of this country!

So this is Pride Month. And, yes, we are in movies, on television, in 
newspapers, and have become one of the ‘chic' issues of the decade. But 
visibility can pass in the blink of an eye. Next year the press could decide 
to focus on some other group. No, pride is not enough. Visibility is not 
enough. Large lavish dinners are not enough. Having politicians inside the 
beltway is not enough.

Here's what we demanded in that first March on Washington in 1979:

– Repeal of all anti-lesbian/gay laws.

– Passage of a comprehensive lesbian/gay rights bill in Congress.

– A Presidential executive order banning discrimination based on sexual 
orientation in the Federal government, the military and federally-contracted 
private employment.

– An end to discrimination in lesbian mother and gay father custody cases.

– Protection for lesbian and gay youth from any laws used to discriminate 
against, oppress, and/or harass them in their homes, schools, jobs or social 
environments.

We do not yet have one of the civil rights that we demanded in 1979.

We're marching to end all social, economic, judicial and legal oppression of 
lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people!

Some people say, "We have held three previous Marches on Washington. How will 
this March be different?" Well, this time, by a conservative estimate, the 
GLBT vote comprises between 6% and 7% of the national vote. The Millennium 
March on Washington is going to continue register our community. And we are 
going to show up on the streets of Washington next April 30th, six months 
prior to the presidential and congressional elections (unlike the '93 March, 
which was held after the national elections) to demonstrate that we are an 
organized political force to be reckoned with. We will no longer be dependent 
on pre-election promises. We've learned our lesson. We understand that we are 
a major political force and we know how to use this power. This is what is 
different about this March.

Our opposition has convinced some that we are asking for ‘special rights'. 
Since when was getting a job, not been murdered, keeping children, serving 
the country,
and legally protecting our partners "special rights"? These are nothing more 
than basic civil rights. This time, we are politically organized.  And this 
time, we have the power to strongly influence the election.  We're marching 
to the voting booth in November of 2000!

And there's another reason why we're going to march on Washington. The truth 
is that a significant majority of grassroots activists across the country 
want the March on Washington. They believe in it. They support it. They are 
preparing to attend. The objective facts bear this out. The Advocate 
Magazine's Internet Poll shows 84% of respondents support the Millennium 
March. The DataLounge Poll shows more than 85% support it. The PlanetOut 
Survey shows that more than 60% of the LGBT community wants to attend the 
Millennium March. And in the last four weeks alone more than 5000 people have 
registered their plans to attend at the MMOW Official Website at 
www.mmow.org. 

Let's put this in context: One group over the past year has collected 
signatures of 500 people to oppose the March. However, in only the last four 
weeks alone, over 5000 people have registered to attend the March. We're 
marching because a significant majority of grassroots activists believe the 
time and cause are right!

We, one of the strongest group influences on the next election, are going to 
Washington, DC on April 30, 2000 to demand our full and equal rights, so that 
the next generation of the GLBT community will not loose their jobs, their 
children, their families, their homes and their lives. We are marching so 
that the next generation will not be called faggots or dykes or sissies as we 
were. We are marching because we have the strength, the determination and 
self-esteem to believe we deserve full equality, nothing more, nothing less. 

That is why the Millennium March on Washington, April 30th, 2000 will be 
historic. Because we're not content to end with mere visibility and Pride. 

We have only just begun.

Robin Tyler, Executive Producer
Millennium March on Washington For Equality
April 30, 2000

_________________________________
_________________________________
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: 
Robin Tyler has been intimately involved with the organization and production 
of each of the GLBT National Marches on Washington, having served on the 
National Steering Committees for the 1979, 1987 and 1993 Marches. She has 
been a leading activist on behalf of lesbian and gay, women's, and AIDS 
movements and was also the first openly gay or lesbian comic in North 
America. Robin currently serves as Executive Producer of the Millennium March 
on Washington, scheduled for April 30, 2000.

For more information on the Millennium March on Washington, visit the 
official website at http://www.mmow.org -- or send e-mail to [email-masked].