Kettle, Pot, Yadda Yadda Yadda…..

Matt ‘SONDA – yes, that SONDA, the still-gay-only-SONDA nine years later’ Foreman is over at Shillerico pretending to constructively oppose HRC:

The reality is that we are two separate movements: the Human Rights Campaign and everyone else.

Imagine if we could get past these divisions and present a truly united front in the fight for complete equality for LGBT people. There is a chance to do this right now, as the HRC Board of Directors works to name a successor to its president, Joe Solmonese, who will be stepping down in March.

…

[T]he cause of LGBT equality has suffered because of a deficit of trust and a surplus of ill will between HRC and the rest of the movement.

That last sentence will appear to most to be a neutral encapsulation of the history of the LGBT movement over the last few decades.  In reality, however, its as much of a dodge as Herman Cain’s press conference was yesterday or the typical Boner-Cantor-apologist claim that both major parties are equally responsible for the state of the economy. 

Every last ounce of ill-will directed at the Rhode Island Avenue Cesspool has been earned by the Rhode Island Avenue Cesspool – whereas, the Rhode Island Avenue Cesspool has yet to amass even one quintillionth of the moral capital necessary to even think about legitimately expressing any ill-will against any LGB and/or T individual or group.  (Four years after ENDA 3685 and, still, the only trans woman to ever be allowed to earn a living as an employee of the Rhode Island Avenue Cesspool is someone whose primary pre-HRC experience consisted of being a preacher in Europe?  I rest my case.  No appeals.)

The cause of LGBT equality has suffered not only because of actions taken by HRC that simply are not in the best interests of the vast majority of the LGBT people that it claims to represent but because of actions taken by HRC that actively and substantively harm trans people.

You know, Matt…

The way that the Empire State Pride Agenda (ESPA) – under your control a decade ago – acted in a manner that has actively and substantively harmed trans people not simply in the state of New York (via SONDA) but by neutering what was left of the National Gay-Lesbian Task Force once you got bumped up there from the back benches of state policy advocacy.  Maybe you don’t remember the gay transphobes who, for all of their transphobia, were actually historically accurate in 2007 when they called you out as a toothless hypocrite for claiming to support a national trans-inclusive gay rights law when you folded like an onion skin tent on the issue at the state level – but I do.

And right now I smell a gay neo-Armstrong Williams and a very inorganic, deceptively worded pile of criticism of HRC.

As the members of the HRC board weighs the next steps for the organization they lead, let’s imagine an alternative to the recent state of affairs…

• Imagine if HRC’s political donations were actually in sync with those of Gill Action’s Political OutGiving program and the Victory Fund’s work to elect LGBT people to office.
• Imagine if organizations with deep understanding of specific issues – the needs of gay families, bullying or anti-LGBT violence, work in communities of color or faith, marriage equality, etc. – could partner with, rather than compete with or work around HRC on their specific priorities.
• Imagine if the grassroots, grasstops and financial clout of the LGBT community was brought to bear in a focused way on our top priorities.
• Imagine if HRC partnered with Equality Federation organizations and local groups to build their collective power, lists, fundraising bases and expertise.
• Imagine if information and leverage points were shared honestly so that our community could start playing legislators and policymakers the way they play us now.

Can you imagine?

I can. Let’s hope that the HRC board of directors can, too. Because if they do, then we all win.

Especially the out-of-touch. marriage-derangement-syndrome-addled champagne-swillers of Rhode Island Avenue – for whom you’ve just mapped out what you and they can claim is a cooperative strategy but, in reality, is just a take-over strategy.  There is no such thing as Wal-Mart cooperating with locally-owned grocery stores and pharmacies, there is no such thing as Koch-owned officeholders cooperating with legitimately-elected representatives – and there is no such thing as HRC cooperating with state and local interests.  The illegitimate end of each of those truthful dichotomies has interests that are fundamentally opposed to and incompatible with the interests of the legitimate, productive masses at the opposite ends.

Deceptive piles of ‘analysis’ by feckless wonks-for-hire who have never had to live under the short end of the ‘compromises’ that they were rewarded with promotions for making won’t change that – and neither will whatever non-white-skin-clad and/or trans tom mouthpiece that the Rhode Island Avenue Cesspool comes up with as Pee Wee Solmonese’s replacement in order to claim that it really isn’t what it is, what it always has been and what it always will be.

Current odds, courtesy of my imaginary transsexual bookie:

• Stampp Corbin – even money
• Jonathan Capehart – even money
• Diego Sanchez – 3:2
• Winnie Stachelberg – 3:1
• Generic non-gay (but, of course, non-trans) person (in order to claim the ‘post-gay’ mantle): 3:1
• Susan Stanton – 4:1
• Ken Mehlman – 4:1
• Hilary Rosen: 10:1
• An Elizabeth Birch comeback: 20:1
• Generic trans person who might have some experience that can be protrayed to the malleable masses as being law or policy-related but whose actual experience is the substantive equivalent of being a preacher in Europe: 1,000: 1
• Generic trans person who has actual law or other policy-related experience and will actually work toward the best interests of trans people: 1,000,000,000:1
• Generic trans woman who has law or other policy-related experience and will actually work toward the best interests of trans people: 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000:1