I watched the 2006 Boston Gay Pride Parade last Saturday, June 10th, along with friends at the corner of Appleton and Columbus Streets in the South End. It was raining all day long, as you can see in the photos below. Luckily, I had worn my old PVC yellow rain jacket with hood - and let me tell you - it was everyone's envy! When everyone else was carrying umbrellas too feeble to withstand the winds, I stood comfortably on one corner enjoying the parade and secretly gloating over others who were stupid enough not to wear practical raingear.
Speaking of the parade, it was the most pathetic parade I've ever seen in the nearly ten years that I have been watching. Due to inclement weather, the parade had to be delayed one hour. But it wasn't the weather that bothered me as much as it was the disorganization and the commonality of the parade. There were more of the same from previous years, and much less of new. You had the usual characters like drag beauty queens, topless dykes on bikes, and leathered muscle boys - nothing that I have never seen before. I was hoping that the two gay male mannequins would be paraded, but none of that sort. There was not a soul protesting Macy's either. And lo and behold - miraculously - I didn't see any religious freaks carrying "God Hates Fags" signs!
Last night, I watched Larry King Live on CNN and the panelists debated a rather cliché topic: Is Homosexuality a Sin? The panel included America's first openly gay Episcopal bishop V. Gene Robinson, an openly lesbian Episcolian minister, a Southern Baptist minister, a conservative Catholic priest, a conservative Episcopalian priest, and Andrew Sullivan, an openly gay TIME columnist and devout Catholic who runs his own blog. Sullivan argued that he was born gay, that he is what he is, that he loves the Catholic Church, and encourages lapsed gay Catholics to come back to the church and to love their faith. The conservatives held on their literal interpretation of certain scriptures that allude to the condemnation of homosexual acts.
Like the Boston Gay Parade, there was nothing, absolutely nothing, that I have not heard before. Religious gays will always find ways to make themselves believe that God loves them for who they are and what they do in the privacy of their bedroom as long as they're monogamous. On the other hand, the religious conservatives will always find ways to make themselves believe that every word in the Bible is divinely inspired and closed to interpretation. As Robinson brilliantly stated, the conservatives waste too much time scrutinizing, criticizing, judging and condemning gay people instead of focusing on real issues that truly threaten the world like diseases, poverty, social injustice, crimes, etc. We can spend as much time as we want debating human sexuality, doctrinal differences, theological questions and whether or not Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had children. Who cares? The conservatives may claim to be God's favorite children, but they also know that they will always fall short of His glory. Anyone who presumes to be spiritually pure will be the last to enter paradise. After all, we will all be judged for the way we treat each other, and not for how much goodness we have accomplished or how many Bible verses we can recite.
I'm off to Washington, D.C. this weekend to attend a fashion show! Woo-hoo!
Now here's something to make your gay blood boil. Boston Herald reported:
Macy's removes gay pride display
BOSTON --Macy's department store has removed a window display marking Boston's gay pride week after a group that opposes gay marriage complained it was offensive.
The display at the downtown Boston store featured two male mannequins, with one wearing a gay pride rainbow flag around his waist, next to a list of several planned Boston Pride Week events.
MassResistance, formerly the Article 8 Alliance, which has campaigned against gay marriage and gay-themed textbooks in public schools, objected to the display and said the mannequin wearing the flag had a "skirt" on, the Boston Herald reported.
The group posted pictures on its Web site and scores of its supporters complained to Macy's by phone and e-mail.
Elina Kazan, a Macy's spokeswoman, said the store decided to remove the mannequins but leave the list of events in order to strike a balance. Displays in previous years did not use mannequins.
"We believe in diversity, and our customers are very important to us," Kazan said. "But (the display) did offend a few of our customers, and we had to re-examine it.
ACLU of Massachusetts spokeswoman Sarah Wunsch criticized Macy's for "succumbing to the bigotry" of what she said was a fringe anti-gay group.
Kazan said that the display offended "a few" of Macy's customers. Why would Macy's yield to the demands of just a few narrow-minded customers when it should be spending more of its energy in attracting a larger open-minded customers? A few years ago, I had written to Macy's customer relations department protesting the sale of real fur coat at its downtown Boston store, and the only reply I got was a generic "thank-you-for-writing-but-we-do-believe-that-it-is-appropriate-that-we-offer-all-of-our-customers-a-wide-array-of-merchandise-choices."
Every winter, there isn't a day when you don't see fur-wearing mannequins at Macy's display windows, and as an animal welfare activist, I am offended everytime I see them. I am offended by the horrendous cruelty and violence involved in the manufacture of fur, yet Macy's and other stores continue to deny such abominable practice even when it is well-documented. Now the religious freaks at MassResistance claim that they are offended by the sight of "two male mannequins, with one wearing a gay pride rainbow flag around his waist." How could anyone, seriously, be offended by a pair of plastic mannequins especially when no living creature was purposely killed or hurt in the making of the mannequins? How often do you see male mannequins together ("celebrating" Gay Pride) in a Macy's display window, compared to female/male mannequins wearing real fur coat and/or skimpy swimwear (I am surprised the religious nuts have not made a big deal about the latter!)
Just based on the arguments above, I don't see the logic behind Macy's decision to remove the mannequins whatsoever. By caving in to the demands of a religious few - which, by the way - may not necessarily affect Macy's profits - Macy's has now officially become a "slave" to religious fundamentalists, in the same way that European host countries have submitted themselves to the demands of their Islamofascist residents. Yes, Macy's has allowed a fringe minority group of ignorant, miseducated, misguided and obnoxious individuals to affect the way the store handles its business and its relationship with the gay community which, by the way, is a far greater consumer than the MassResistance barfbags.
The Controversial Mannequins: Before & After
Mannequin police on patrol to nip it in the bud
In its February 10th editorial, The Boston Phoenix, an alternative newsweekly with a liberal bent, stated three reasons for not publishing the controversial Mohammed cartoons that initially appeared in the Danish newspaper, The Jyllands-Posten. Their primary reason is "Out of fear of retaliation from the international brotherhood of radical and bloodthirsty Islamists who seek to impose their will on those who do not believe as they do."
Read the entire editorial here.
At least they were being honest. Somewhat.
But what bothers me is when they stated that the editors of the Danish newspaper "were ignorant of the cultural prohibition against religious images in general and the particularly sacrilegious nature of depicting the Prophet Mohammed."
Ignorant? Certainly not the Danes. Flemming Rose, culture editor of The Jyllands-Posten, said: "We have a tradition of satire in Denmark. We do the same with the royal family, politicians, anyone. In a modern secular society, nobody can impose their religious taboos in the public domain."
Tra-DI-shawwwwwn.... TRADITION! I look forward to the day when the Danes resort to their Viking traditions to eliminate Islamonazism in their beloved country.
