The Tolerance Trap

[PalJoey]

Ringing phones. Lypsinka, 1993.

http://youtu.be/EAEwvMS1rxI

[YouWantitWhen????]

I know, you are Professor Plum, with the rope, in the library.

Or, maybe the accessory has been exposed to a bit too much hair spray fumes.

[WhizzerMarvin TrinaJasonMendel]

That arrangement of Get Me To The Church On Time!!

[Liza's Headband]

Why do you lie, CC?

You show the video of this performance (or used to show it) to your students at the Conservatory during final exams. At least that's what you told me when I watched it.... You wore a black getup with gloves and earrings or a pearl necklace, maybe? It has been so long that I cannot exactly remember but I'm sure I am close.

Surely a professor of your stature would not lie to his message board friends.

[FindingNamo]

PJ, wayuh did you evuh find that performance? Have you had it on V. H. S. all of these yeeahs?


LH obviously considers real names to be powerful weapons tools to use for his own purposes. Now, he pretends it's all benign and not intended to intimidate or silence, but I disagree. He also says he would have no reason to bluff, so here's an offer: If LH reveals his real name here in this thread as he has been doing for others on this board and if I, in fact, know him, I will admit it. Even if he has stretched the truth a bit and kind of sort of invented the part about ever being in my vicinity in the real world (and he has) but is in fact a friend of mine on Facebook, I will admit that too. Maybe I'll even, oh, how shall I put it … toss my head back and laugh and say "How the hell are ya?" and "Let's go get a drink!".

But he won't. Because he's a fraud and a bluffer.

ETA "You show the video of this performance (or used to show it) to your students at the Conservatory during final exams."

Really? I thought it was rarely shown? Finals happen a couple times a year. And now you're just revealing your sources.

"You wore a black getup with gloves and earrings or a pearl necklace, maybe?"

Really, this is getting like the psychic medium episode of South Park.

"No? I mean, was it blue, more of a dark blue, was the getup made of CLOTH?"

[Liza's Headband]

You did show it to me and I always thought it was a FABULOUS performance, for what it's worth. You were originally so embarrassed about it but I felt you had no reason to be!

<3

[FindingNamo]

You're a liar.

[Liza's Headband]

Haha! By staying anonymous, I guess that makes me a "liar." But I have in fact seen the performance. I wish I could remember which song it was you performed. No, but seriously, weren't you wearing a black evening gown of some kind?! I thought you did.

[FindingNamo]

So so so so so light on the details.

It's the fact that you're lying that makes you a liar. The anonymity is the only reason you get away with the lying. For now.

[Jordan Catalano]

It is interesting how my posts referencing "the worst troll"'s new identity are automatically deleted, much like any reference to the actual "worst troll" were automatically deleted.

[PalJoey]

weren't you wearing a black evening gown of some kind?

Is the Headband still referring to Namo?

In an evening dress?

[FindingNamo]

The 'band is throwing great wee little fistsful of pasta at the wall and hoping some of it sticks. The scent of desperation is in the air.

[HorseTears]

What the **** is going on in this thread? I really hope Namo and Headband aren't the same person.

[JerseyGirl2]

So, LH, if you are so determined to prove that you know Namo in real life, why not identify yourself? You say you aren't a liar, so what's the point of anonymity? You are only trying to push buttons and keep getting creepier and creepier. Come clean. Out yourself. If you are telling the truth, you have nothing to hide.

[PalJoey]

And who is this "CC" the Headband keeps referring to?

[Jordan Catalano]

Bloom?

[henrikegerman]

We invited the "tolerance trap" when we embraced or at least welcomed, without more critical thought, the "it's not a choice" hypothesis as a litmus test for tolerance.

As in all things, free will versus determinism is an interesting scientific query.

But it should never have been treated as sine qua non for respect and rights for GLBTQ people.

Making "we can't help it" the gravamen for equality is asking to be merely tolerated. It reinforces rather than challenges the idea that there is something wrong with us. It, indeed, "actively undercuts robust integration and social belonging by allowing the warp and woof of anti-gay animus to go unchallenged."

It's as if we had stuck up for the bullied black kid on the playground by proclaiming "leave her alone, she can't help it if she's black." Rather than proclaiming "leave her alone, there is everything beautiful and nothing wrong with her being black."

[ErikJ972]

"And who is this "CC" the Headband keeps referring to?"
Chris Christie?!?

[PalJoey]

Paul Rudnick just posted in his "Moments of Gay Zen" blog:

Creepy right-wing blowhards, like Maggie Gallagher, are asking for “tolerance” for fundamentalist Christian homophobia, something I support, as long as the homophobes don’t want to get married.


Moments of Gay Zen

[FindingNamo]

Remember the day when *someone* posted on here "WE all know it's genetic"? That was an interesting day.

[Kad]

If only there were a feature that many members on this board vocally fought for that could be used to render users one finds unpalatable invisible - a "block" feature, if you will.

[tazber]

Does anyone think that tolerance can turn into acceptance over the span of a generation (or two)?

Can we realistically expect people to accept something that for so long has been ingrained as wrong?

If all the progress we've made is attributed to tolerance, then so be it. But after some years, once people begin to see that gays are no different than anyone else I think (and hope) society's attitude will move toward acceptance.

It's a process.

Thoughts?

[FindingNamo]

I agree with you, it is a process.

But for me and other queer liberationists, it's a process tinged with melancholy.

It's captured for me in this section:

How did we go from gay liberation to gay predisposition? Or even from gay pride to tolerance, immutability, acceptance? Such a far cry from the days of "We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it." The tolerance trap murmurs instead, "We’re here, we’re not really queer but vaguely gayish, be nice to us."

[WhizzerMarvin TrinaJasonMendel]

I think a lot of that change is due to gay being so normal now, which I think is a good thing. We don't need to tell people to get used to it because they already are used to it. I didn't need to defiantly walk into my senior prom with a guy. I simply showed up and danced alongside everyone else.

[FindingNamo]

I think there's good and bad sides. At the crux of the idea of liberation is the notion of creating something new, not destroying the past but building a better future on everything that's gone before. "Normal" lacks any creative spark at all.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Creepy right-wing blowhards, like Maggie Gallagher, are asking for “tolerance” for fundamentalist Christian homophobia, something I support, as long as the homophobes don’t want to get married

I love that. I'm so tired of the anti-gay folks (usually the ones of the Christian variety) going on about how they "love" everyone, which is crazy to me that you'd "love" people and want to go out of your way to things that mess with their lives (Prop 8, et al). I'd never seriously say I loved someone I didn't know, and I think I probably actually hate these people, yet I'd never support amending constitutions to prevent them from marrying or having children or think they should be fired for their beliefs of anything. But somehow these people think they are some how to moral victors because of the BS "love" they keep professing.