I'm so fucking over this shit. Couldn't people at least find a new stereotype?

I just wanted to attempt to track the evolving sources of information and opinion that have been flying across my computer screen this last week. I don't necessarily agree with what's expressed in the articles below, but I think they're worth reading if you haven't seen them already.

There are protests taking place around the country tomorrow (Nov 15, 2008). I'm not sure what the point of them is, but I do think if nothing else it's a good rallying point for lgbt & allied people who are rediscovering their political voices. To find out what's happening near you, check out http://jointheimpact.com

11/5/08 - Dan Savage on "Black Homophobia" (which pissed me off, as Dan Savage does even while he often makes me laugh). Particularly because this blog entry spawned the phenomenon of every anti-Prop 8 blog post leading with a comment about how African-Americans "caused" the passage.

11/7/08 - Facts Belie the Scapegoating of Black People for Proposition 8. Granted, this is a long, detailed, and data-laden piece on the Daily Kos, but it gives concrete reasons why people are fucktards for BLAMING PEOPLE OF COLOR.

11/7/08 - Utah faces boycott after Mormon work for Prop 8 (from Yahoo News) This was the only article I could find just now about the crazy boycotts people are suggesting now of Utah and other things which are not directly related to the elements within the Mormon church who funded the Yes on 8 campaigns. I understand people are looking for a target for their anger, but boycotting a whole state is a little... ridiculous.

11/8/08 - No-on-8's white bias (latimes.com) This piece seems to really annoy white (gay) people, and I'm not sure why, or I don't care why? Something like that. It says a lot about the current fractured (and racist) state of the gay (specifically gay) rights movement.

11/8/08 - Mormon and Catholic churches complain about being the target of Prop 8 protests

11/8/08 - Andrew Sullivan even had some things to point out in a post called Gays, Blacks, Marriage (I'm sure he wrote more, but I'm only linking this one)

11/9/08 - Open Letter to White Activists (which I'm glad someone wrote)

11/10/08 - A rough night for gay Obama supporters on Salon.com

11/11/08 - Anti-Gay, Anti-Family is Dan Savage's Op-Ed in the New York Times, which thankfully avoids railing on people of color and instead points out the law in Arkansas which passed, preventing gay people and single people from adopting in Arkansas. He also mentions despicable role of the Mormon Church (Church of Latter Day Saints in funneling funds & volunteers towards the passage of Proposition 8.

11/11/08 - Prop 8 Myths is Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com weighing in with his amazing grasp of polling data
(I included dates where I could so you can sort of see the evolution of the discussions)

Exactly.

from Of The Invisibility of Social Privilege and Institutional Racism

Via the indispensable Ampersand:

This should be mandatory material for any introduction to sociology course to explain the simple yet often hard to understand for our students fact that we do not all experience the social structure and interact with its social institutions in a similar fashion. Our social statuses, here race, generate a whole set of social circumstances, privileges and disadvantages that are often left unexamined. Which is why it is absurd to even discuss "equal opportunities" as something other than clever propaganda and foundational myth.

Moreover, social disadvantages and privileges are invisible, especially for the dominant categories (and sometimes even to the disadvantaged who might buy into the dominant ideology). That society is overall experienced as more structurally and interpersonally violent for the disadvantaged is a greatly under-discussed social fact that contributes to the reproduction of these forms of violence.

Full-size on Flickr