Recently I have witnessed a great deal of conflict within Portland’s local queer community online, in the press, and in real life. Much of this seems to come about as a result of heated debates around social issues, sex, politics, art, and the complicated inner-workings of the LGBT community in PDX (and everywhere). I believe there is much to be learned from conflict, but the way some of this has been playing out lately in the public sphere has felt mean spirited and has been difficult to watch at times.

It is my belief that we were all born inherently kind and connected to one another. Each of us was handed our own set of circumstances at birth, which are sometimes pre-destined long before birth, but most babies are not born angry. As kind queer babies are growing up, we sometimes find ourselves mistreated, abandoned, and ridiculed for being different. We are held down by layer upon layer of systemic oppression buried centuries deep in a culture that has its head shoved so far up its own ass it cannot see the part it plays in the cycle of abuse. This is painful and infuriating.

So what do we do with the fury we carry from having this history? How do we reconcile these justified feelings of outrage? Many of us might not feel powerful enough to take on our families, bosses or governments at the root of our feeling oppressed, so we aim lower and end up putting our pain on one another. Instead of queer people banding together to fight external oppression, we end up oppressing ourselves through infighting. It’s a tale as old as time, but all that cutting our friends amounts to in the end is a divided community, and a divided community is not a strong one.

We are still in the midst of a culture war, friends. While many changes have been made in our favor, we cannot forget that we still live in a country that treats queer people like second-class citizens, and in a state that actively perpetuates this discrimination. I fear sometimes Read the rest of this entry »

(Originally Published in Just Out Magazine, February 2013 – Final Print Issue)

In The Trenches: The Pariah Pool

Last year was a time of big sweeping change for me. I lost two pieces of my deepest love to the great beyond, grew closer to another human being than ever before, and let go of another round of “friends” to superficiality. There seemed to be a feeling layer of marginalization spread throughout the year. Even now, in the second month of 2013, it walks beside me, greeting me at every turn. The truth is, that particular feeling and I have been walking hand in hand for as long as I can remember.

Most recently, this marginalized feeling came from some members of the queer community as well as some in the right-wing evangelical Christian community not agreeing with my inter-community dialogue work between the Mars Hill Church and members of Portland’s LGBTQ community (as well as my very public comments and opinions about the vandalism and threats of violence which followed); it came from community “leaders” who didn’t appreciate me stirring up the status quo; from the Read the rest of this entry »