In the wake of the Houston HRC dinner protest HRC has been furiously trying to spin (translation: lie) its way out of a problem that they caused. Their latest spin line is that this was a 'conspiracy theory'
Yeah, right. I'm supposed to disbelieve ten years of evidence, history and personal experience that tell me the Homosexual Rights Campaign is a bunch of morally bankrupt liars, but transgender people are 'conspiracy theorists' according to the words of an unnamed HRC staffer?
Personally, I don't believe in conspiracy theories and don't peddle them. I'm a 'just the facts' girl who is blessed with an encyclopedic knowledge of history.
Being a minority also gives me some insight on some things as well. That combination of experiences, history and knowledge of previous Forces of Oppression hijinks tells me not to cavalierly dismiss someone who expresses concerns that may seem outlandish at first, but upon further review are later proven right.
When Rep. Maxine Waters was vilified by the Right for saying that the Feds were facilitating the flooding of Los Angeles and other large urban cities with crack cocaine and using the profits to fund the Nicaraguan contras, she was derisively called 'Mad Maxine' until a scandal called Iran-Contra broke out and Pulitzer prize winning investigative reporter Gary Webb verified the story.
When Marti Abernathey, NTAC, I and others revealed what we discovered during our May 2007 lobby day that we weren't covered in ENDA, we were called 'crazy' and liars' until October.
So when I post that a Houston dinner protest is coming, read my Phyllabuster and see that she has a meeting with HPD, I have to ask the questions why were the Po-Po's called in the first place, what did national HRC say during that initial phone call to make HPD call Phyllis Frye and resulted in the massive show of police force (and waste of Houston taxpayer dollars) Saturday for a protest that turned out 11 transgender people?I also know that the HRC modus operandi over the last decade has been to find more pliant transgender leaders, subvert organizations that don't have a master-slave subservient view of our now severely strained relationship or acquiesce to the gays first-trannies someday 'incremental progress' strategy they espouse concerning LGBT civil rights.
The transgender community resumed picketing these dinners in October 2007 and I wouldn't be surprised if more creative anti-HRC demonstrations are in the planning stages. Transpeople are that angry over the betrayal. We are beyond sick and tired of being sick and tired about being tossed aside like an empty beer can, disrespectfully being told to 'wait our turn' or being used as legislative bargaining chips.
This time, the efforts of HRC apologists and Vichy transgender organizations will not stop this campaign. The only thing that will end it is HRC making a public apology for lying to us at our signature convention about our inclusion in ENDA, and busting their asses in 2009 and beyond in conjunction with United ENDA to make it happen.
When future historians finally tackle the subject of the GLBT rights movement, it will note the appalling actions of a so-called civil rights organization directed at an allied group which needed the civil rights protections worse than they did. They will probably comment that HRC was more concerned with their own selfish interests than passing broad legislation that covered the entire GLBT community.
