I Hate Perez Hilton

I pretty much hate Perez Hilton. Well, hate may be a strong word, but I hate the entire concept of celebrity spokes people that are spokespeople for an entire community based on...well...their celebrity.

Yesterday, I was in the midst of my daily combination of cardio torture and CNN, when Miss California took the stage. It was like watching a toddler pulling a giant booger out of his nose. You watch in horror as the juicy, green, jiggling gelatinous mass makes its way from the kids nostril slowly into the child's mouth, where he slowly chews the mucus gum before swallowing. You know it is a hideous and disgusting habit, but you can't turn away even as your face tries to pull away from its bones and your stomach begins to roil. That is the exact look that CNN Newsroom anchor Tony Harris had on his face when, after a few minutes, he cut back to the newsroom saying, “I think that is quite enough of that.”

I couldn't agree more...except....EXCEPT...Perez Hilton's crazy ass was on CNN last night pushing again for Miss California to respond further regarding her comments regarding gay marriage. Listen up Perez...the woman is against gay marriage. She didn't get crowned Miss America. She almost lost her Miss California crown. She only continues to have importance because YOU-- a jumped up member of the paparazzi-- continue to give her importance. She is vacuous flesh bag that is entitled to her opinion, no matter how wrong it may be, but by continuing to bring her into the public spotlight you take valuable air time from shit that really matters. As a matter of fact, I would rather watch a video of the kid eating the booger on infinite loop on every channel on the planet than see Perez Hilton's face on ANY news source from CNN to TMZ ever again.

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If you think I am resentful, you should have seen the look on Tony Harris' face.

Basically, this is why I am not pleased: once again a quasi intelligent human being with a talent (his happens to be semi-witty commentary on tinsel town glitterati) has somehow been catapulted into a position where he is the face of a movement. I have never seen Perez Hilton in a room wondering how to get young people to a lobby day or making sandwiches to pack for a cross country bus trip to the U.S. Social Forum. I have never seen him on the streets or in a room of organizers wondering how to best respond to the latest murder of a trans person. He has no credibility with the community yet, by virtue of sucking dick and a good publicist, he is all of a sudden supposed to represent our community? Who the hell vetted him? Cher?

(My apologies to Cher. I actually love you, and I would be proud to have you represent me in Congress.)

This actually smells like something Karl Rove cooked up. I am going to look into that.

And, really, if the media needed a celebrity spokesperson to bring issues of importance of the queer community into a public conversation...why oh why couldn't they have gone with Wanda Sykes. There is a woman who is actually funny, politically savvy, has a deep grasp of current events, and understands and TALKS about the intersection of race, poverty, and sexuality. Oh wait...I know why...she's black. And, she's a she. Curses...foiled by sexism and racism again! .

Tell you what...Perez Hilton can do the White House Correspondents dinner next year. Put his ass in front of people who actually know something about some shit...let him make a fool out of himself...and then banish him back to his blog and to judging the occasional beauty pageant. BUT, put one of those dog shock collars with a satellite tracer on him...so if he even THINKS about talking about queer politics...we can push a button and buzz his ass on the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro if need be.

Actually, Perez, I don't hate you. I just hate what you do. I hate that our system is set up so that those that are actually fighting the good fight and have a broad based analysis of how this nation and this world really works and have thought strategically about how to change it for the better (deep breath....continue please) are the ones that can't get the local cable access station to cover an event. But a pastel gay boy with no particular analysis of social change can manage to get a CNN anchor to grimace with disgust but still cover his unsavvy and unstrategic ramblings. You are not helping anyone, and you are providing credibility to the inanities of a dumb ass blond that never would have had a forum if not for you.

(P.S. I understand that Perez is Cuban...as a white Cuban aka a person of color with white skin privilege he has an even GREATER responsibility to use his celebrity responsibly and in the service of justice...instead of just milking his access and his ability to pass in order to self-aggrandize and make a buck)

Obama and Gay Marriage or Shut the Hell Up and Let the Man Run the Country

So, I have seen numerous articles lately yellin' and screamin' and lambastin' Obama for not speaking out on the subject of gay marriage. Though President Obama has made his support for civil rights clear, and though he has made mention in the past that he supports civil unions, and though every indicator shows that if the Democrats in Congress got their thumbs out of their asses and passed a repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act he would sign it, still, certain, largely privileged white middle class gays, seem to think that Obama should stop his work on the economy, health care, two wars, and poverty in order to take up arms on the gay marriage front. Get a damn life people.

Obama is doing EXACTLY the right thing by NOT raising the queer marriage issue back into the national spotlight. The Republicans used, quite effectively, the spectre of gays getting married as a successful wedge issue for...well, almost fifteen years. Clinton, bowing to pressure from the right, signed the Defense of Marriage Act into law instantly catapulting the marriage issue onto the national stage. Marriage, in general, is a state's rights issue. Obama, who, I will remind everyone, was a constitutional law professor, is being extremely savvy right now. Since he has taken office three states, and a fourth one soon, have instituted the right to marry for same sex couples. Our constitution has a little itty bitty clause in Section Four part II called the Full Faith and Credit Clause, which reads:

Full faith and credit ought to be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings, of every other state; and the legislature shall, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings, shall be proved, and the effect which judgments, obtained in one state, shall have in another.

That means if you get married in Vermont then Minnesota must recognize that legal union. Since the U.S. Constitution requires full faith and credit, and since the U.S. constitution supercedes state constitutions, it doesn't matter if Minnesota has a constitutional amendment banning same sex unions (it doesn't actually)...once a nice quiet lesbian couple in New Hampshire decides to move to Utah...and is denied recognition of their marriage...they appeal..until they get to the highest courtin the land, and .a ruling by the Supreme Court will quickly annihilate those pesky state constitutional bans on same sex marriage. Sort of like Lawrence versus Texas. Remember that one people? With a quick little vote of the Supreme Court, anti-sodomy laws were invalidated across the country (and, ps, it was this court...with this composition...that struck down the anti-sodomy laws...all indicators are that Obama will be selecting three new justices sometime in the next few years...shift of balance of power...duh).

Of course, raising the issue of same sex marriage to the federal level again will rally the Republican base, create an INSTANT wedge issue between certain elements of people of color communities and the Democratic Party (which, of course, will split Obama's base), and it will raise again the spectre of a U.S. Constitutional ban on same sex marriage. It has been made clear that such a ban will never pass, but siphoning off precious political capital right now to fight off a re-energized Republican base and a split Democrat base on this issue will make it nigh on impossible for Obama to push the Republicans out of the way on the health care reforms we need, social security, social safety network issues, immigration and the border, and a whole host of other social justice issues that DESERVE and WARRANT immediate attention.

Obama knows that it is only a matter of time before a critical mass of U.S. states have approved queer marriage, and that, by such approval, will trigger a series of judicial events that will result in the extension of marriage rights to all queer folks in every state. At that point, the Defense of Marriage Act, if it has not been repealed, will be low hanging fruit and easily plucked off. How the hell would members of Congress justify “protecting” federal marriage rights when the Supreme Court has closed the case on the states rights side of the issue.

I am so damn frustrated with these half baked queer pundits that can't see past the ends of their own wedding rings to see the big picture. Obama is NOT standing in the way of queer marriage. He is keeping his party in check around the issue by NOT creating a situation where he has to worry about legislators turning their attention away from the issues that we NEED to address. It would be foolish, stupid, and untimely for Obama to stop what he is doing to focus on marriage when the fantastic efforts of local and state organizers are doing the work, swiftly, and with much success.

The road isn't easy towards justice, and, unfortuantely, in the system under which we labor there are times when STRATEGY dictates form (which it ALWAYS should). Folks that are running around pissed off because Obama hasn't hosted a mass queer wedding in the Rose Garden are demanding form without any strategy or strategic thought behind it.

Let's be clear: Obama is not perfect, but he is working on the bigger picture...which, right now, means getting the almost 10% of people in this country that are unemployed back to work. That means ending two wars that are draining tens of billions of dollars a month out of our economy and killing innocent soliders and innocent Iraqis and Afghanis. That means changing our health care system so that it makes sense and the 40 million uninsured in this nation have access to health care. THOSE are the issues that Obama should be focused on. THOSE are the issues that he is focused on. And the largely white gay men that are attempting to UNSTRATEGICALLY force his hand are going to do nothing but lay the groundwork for a base splitting circus that will, in the long term, hurt the queer movement and result in a retardation of the amazing work around marriage equality that has already been done.

Back off.