LY #27 Notes on a No on 8 event, 1988

These notes are from Bendnotes 4, December 3, 1988.  Most of this letter is about COCC politics and intense moments in teaching.  But I want to finish up my chatter on queer issues with this materal.

"Background:  remember that I told you I had signed or was going to sign an ad which would run in the local paper asking people to vote "no" on Proposition 8, a state proposition designed to make it legal to overthrow Governor Goldschmidt's proclamation that people who work for the executive branch of state government should not be fired because of their sexual orientation.  It was called the Gay Rights proposition.  Those who supported proposition 8 did to great extent because they were fundamentalist Christians or because they believed the arguments of the creators of the proposition that it called for 'special rights' for homosexuals.  The No on 8 people (the group was called Oregonians for Fairness) used the image of Jerry Fallwell and the lines, "'It's not right.  It's not fair.  It's a witchhunt!' to try and convince Oregonians to support the bill.  They didn't mention homosexuality at all.  So anyway, I had heard from ---- [name given in letter] a local gay leader (owner of the antique store . . .  which has the dance party every Saturday night at one of their buildings, . . .  [This antique store] is 10 minutes out of town north on Highway 97.)  --- had told me that Orde Pinckney had agreed to sign the petition.  I then agreed to sign and gave him a list of names of my colleagues.  (I did not tell my colleagues that I had done so.)  He called them, got them to sign.  And the ad was published over the week-end before elections.

"We lost."

Much of the rest of this last Bendnotes is about conversations I had with the COCC liberals who had signed the petition when many of us attended a post-election party at the antique store.  I am saving those discussions for later posts.

I suppose this would be a good place to say that I was also on the founding board of Central Oregon chapter of PFLAG, the secretary and member at large for a year or two and spent several years as the editor of the newsletter.  (Pretty much a cut and paste job.)

Finally, I want to note that "coming out" is, in some ways, a never ending process if one doesn't have a super-close fit between the culturally "understood" stereotyped signs of a particular identity.  Although I have been "out" since high school, many people look at my life and assume that I am heterosexual because I am in a long-term relationship with a man and, let's face it, because I wear my hair long and chemically stressed.

LY #25 COCC Celebrates National Coming Out Day

Here I am walking through the closet door.  But there's no room.  And no closet.

The picture was taken by someone taller than myself, as you can see.  (Which could be just about anyone.)  This rainbow bedizened door was artistically installed in the upper level of the student center today in honor of National Coming Out Day (which is actually tomorrow but since our campus has few classes on Friday, events that want to attract students happen between Monday and Thursday).

COCC had a link on its front page to the Multicultural Center's National Coming Out Day events page.  (I don't know how long this particular link will be good.)  For the past few years, ever since Karen Roth became the leader of this department, COCC has sponsored a variety of wonderful events for all variety of populations.

I didn't make it to the "Gay History" jeopardy game though I did steal a cookie and cup of cocoa from the Center before going down to the cafeteria for a lunch date.  Before today's event the center had asked that folks sign the "Ally Pledge," so my name was among what looked like over a hundred others.  Some student life folks were collecting still more.

It all reminded me that even though I now experience "straight privilege," because I am married to a man (a man who loves Broadway musicals, opera, Joan Crawford, and nice clothing), when I arrived at COCC most people thought I was a lesbian.  Why?  Well, there was my appearance.  I had short hair with both a coxcomb and a rat tail.  I dressed in tailored suits.  Then there was the fact that I never used personal pronouns for my relational partner.  And the folks on the hiring committee, who'd read my vita, would know that I'd written a regular column for the Salt Lake City gay paper, The Triangle, when I was a graduate student.

Almost as soon as I landed in Bend in 1988, I also started working with the "No on 8" campaign.  Measure 8 was the anti-gay rights measure before the more famous "Measure 9."  Both, of course, were the creations of the Oregon Citizens Alliance, a a conservative Christian group lead by Lon Mabon.  Here is a note from my Bendnotes 3, from October 1988:

"With one exception I have lived a stainless life since entering this sleepy mountain community.  But wait till my name turns up in the next couple weeks on an endorsement against Proposition 8.  I got up the courage to sign because Gene Carsey (local leader in the Gay Community) told me the "old Orde Pinkney" had.  So, I figure I can explain my signature, if worst comes to worst (ie, pinkie slip time) by saying that I was taking a cue from my predecessor.  So, there my name will be, before god, the school board and everybody.     There's a saying about hanging, sheep and lambs, which I believe might be apt at this juncture."

Tomorrow I'll share more about my experience with the gay community in Bend in 1988.  And I'll explain how it came to pass that in 1992 an ex-cop explained to me that I was a bisexual.