“I’ll be wearing a suit, but don’t be fooled, deep down I’m a queen.” Sergio Garcia you are an utter fool.
Just two weeks ago the mainstream media was aglow with reports of “progressive” Los Angeles Fairfax High School electing a gay male as the school’s Prom Queen. What started out as a stunt has grown, and hopefully faded, into what I think is probably the worst solidification of gay stereotyping since the sitcom-ification of the gay best friend.
You’re a queen, Sergio? Really? How about that? I hope you enjoy that decades old derogatory name, and don’t feed me some line about how it’s taking the power of the word back, it’s not. I find this the “crowning glory” of what has become an increased acceptance and anopsia of stereotyping which has grown so large that we as gay men are akin to minstrels of old. We demand equality and acceptance, and yet we don’t speak out when one of our own plays so handily into the conservative’s deck. We act as if it is our job and destiny to be the entertainment. Our inexcusable silence implies approval. What would Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. do? What would Alice Paul say? Without a word from a gay community leader, Sergio and all the other stunt makers out there, for one brief moment, become the face of the gay population. We cannot allow this to continue.
We have no great leader of the gay liberation movement. Hell, do we even have a movement? Who speaks for us? We have a lot of people speaking out against us. Without any clear direction of where we’re going or any leader to take us there, the media gloms on to any fool who’s own “prank” garners any sort of response. Where is our great, civic leader? Who can the media turn to, to answer questions like “Is this prom queen issue a good thing for the gay rights movement?”
Maybe this is why our demand for equal rights has progressed so little. Maybe this is why we’re still seen is mere entertainment. Make ‘em laugh, make ‘em shine, but don’t you dare for one moment assume you’re going through the front door. It may not be as transparent as it was 60 years ago, but we are most assuredly ushered in the back door of our own country.
I have no animosity towards Sergio Garcia. He set out to achieve something, which he thought was right, and he did it – that’s the least that any of us can do. I blame ignorance and lack of leadership. Did Sergio think for one moment what the repercussions might be? Did he have any knowledge or a leader of our movement to help direct him to an answer? No.
Instead we’re expected to bounce around, like lost ships in this great expanse, hoping that we don’t run into one another or sink. It will be by sheer luck that we reach any set destination, for we are a people of great number, and great power that are content to allow ourselves to go to great waste.
The best is he who calls men to the best. And Those who heed the call are also blessed. But worthless who call not, head not, but rest. – Hesiod
The T. Anthony Chronicles 