The day Californians enshrined bigotry into their constitution on November 8, 2008 was also a day that changed my life forever. I woke up. I was a product of harassment and ill treatment due to being gay growing up in the Midwest. I had been treated like a second class citizen, and here was my adopted state guaranteeing that the world knew that we thought all lgbt people were second class. But that election night, a fire grew in my belly as I watched No on Prop 8 slip between our fingers. Finally, I snapped. Electing Barack Obama wasn't enough.
And the sleeping dragon woke up. I was not going to take this shit any longer. "We are people, too, goddamnit!" I thought and began a quest that I still continue today. I attended nearly every protest rally, every sit in, and every street closure in Los Angeles for the weeks and months following Proposition 8's passing. We marched down the middle of Santa Monica Blvd on November 9 from West Hollywood all the way to Westwood to the Morman Temple and back in tens of thousands. In later months I attended the Meet in the Middle rally in Fresno for CA LGBT leaders to meet, discuss the future, and show middle America Californians that we were there and not going away.
Months after that, I flew to Washington, DC to march in the National Equality March. 500,000 people: families, straight allies, Latinos, Asians, immigrants, whites, African Americans, children etc marched from the White House to the Capital where a massive rally was held. We were there to be seen but really only wanted what everyone else wanted: to be treated equally. I left DC with hope in my heart: 49 other states and their citizens were also not going to take what happened in California lying down. "We're here for you," people said with accents from other states proudly wearing FUCK Prop 8 shirts. And they meant it. Prop 8 had lit a fire under all of our asses with the haunting idea looming over our heads: if it can happen in Cali, it can happen anywhere.
In hindsight, I'm glad Proposition 8 happened here. Had it not passed, I don't think the rest of the LGBT rights movement would have caught fire as easily. I told myself that I wouldn't allow another state on my watch to "go down" without a fight. So I started doing what I could. Every state with similar measures began receiving phone calls from me to their elected officials. I phone banked voters in Illinois, Missouri, Maine, Minnesota, Washington, and Maryland. I phoned senators and representatives in 11 further states. I befriended pro/"our side" representatives and did what I could to help their field offices spread the word about LGBT equality. I began fervently posting the updates of these states to my social media, and really started my own personal crusade to make this country better. And it worked.
Illinois defeated their marriage ban by 3 votes. Later, their house passed a measure approved by their senate, and Illinois because one of the first states to adopt marriage equality to their constitution via their legislature. In Washington, Maryland, and Maine, the people passed LGBT marriage rights legislation and it was the first time the people had voted for marriage equality in the world and passed. Soon a marriage ban was collapsing per week in each state. A few years later, 70 percent of this country had marriage equality. And when the Supreme Court finally struck down Proposition 8, we knew it would only be a little more time before these opinions swept over the nation.
And I never looked back. I don't want to be a politician. I don't really want the responsibility of being a community organizer. But I am a proud and able bodied American. I love my country and am blessed to live here and be from here with its advantages. So I will, as long as I still have life and breath in me, continue to fight the good fight and for what's right. I won't stand by as HIV/AIDS is still a crisis without doing anything. I won't let planned parenthood get stripped of its funding. I want equal pay for women and for women to stop being treated like second class citizens. Not on my watch, honey! I won't stand by as transgender people are butchered monthly and murdered. I won't stand by as Black people and minorities are not only being taunted, harassed, and murdered by the police, but are also having their lives ruined through our failed penitentiary system. I won't stand by as cancer continues to be such a devastating killer in this country. And finally, I won't sit on my laurels when we have the candidate of a lifetime whose honesty and integrity have given myself and the millions of other folks that he has inspired HOPE that this country so desperately needs while HE and the movement needs all of our help to get elected.
This election and the Bernie movement is exactly that: a political revolution. It's not about Bernie: it's about this Missouri born California boy sick of it and I'm not willing to take it anymore. Healthcare is a right. Women should be paid equally. Marijuana should be legal. LGBT should be able to lead normal lives. Campaign financing does need reforming. Universities need to stop being businesses that drown our future generations in debt. This is why I am for Bernie and will do what I can to get him elected. It frankly isn't even about Bernie Sanders the man: it is about the idea that if we stand together and demand change, we can and will achieve it.
I am not a perfect person: totally self involved and often selfish, but I know in my heart what is the right way to act and that if I am able bodied, I too can contribute something. Be it in my own way from my own living room dancing in my underwear or not.
#slacktivist
