Ed Garren’s Weblog

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Mobile Press-Register, Sunday, January 25, 2009

Youth Merit Award

Sarah Bryars , an eighth-grader at St. Vincent de Paul Catholic School, was selected to receive the Mobile Sunrise Rotary Club’s Youth Merit Award.

Bryars was honored at the Sunrise Rotary Club’s weekly breakfast meeting on Jan. 21. Sarah is an honor roll student, as well as vice president of the student council and secretary of the National Junior Honor Society. She is in the McGill-Toolen elementary band, on the SVS robotics team, and is an Oakleigh Junior Belle. Sarah is the daughter of Richard and Krista Bryars.

Ed’s note:

In 2005, less than 2 months after flooding from Katrina soaked their house in Mobile with 2 feet of water, Sarah had “Gamma Knife” surgery to correct an Arterial Veinal malformation in her Occipital lobe (vision) in the back of her brain.  We are all very proud of Sarah, she’s a very strong young lady.  

Her great aunt and uncle were my and my brother’s God Parents.  My brother is named after the great uncle, Mjr. Royal Francis Brewton of Mobile Alabama, who was my father’s commanding officer in Air/Sea Rescue for the Army Air Corps in WWII. 

 Leave a comment so that Sarah can see it when she checks this posting.  Thanks,  Ed

The New Administration’s goals for civil rights:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/civil_rights/

CIVIL RIGHTS

“The teenagers and college students who left their homes to march in the streets of Birmingham and Montgomery; the mothers who walked instead of taking the bus after a long day of doing somebody else’s laundry and cleaning somebody else’s kitchen — they didn’t brave fire hoses and Billy clubs so that their grandchildren and their great-grandchildren would still wonder at the beginning of the 21st century whether their vote would be counted; whether their civil rights would be protected by their government; whether justice would be equal and opportunity would be theirs…. We have more work to do.”

– Barack Obama, Speech at Howard University, September 28, 2007

President Barack Obama has spent much of his career fighting to strengthen civil rights as a civil rights attorney, community organizer, Illinois State Senator, U.S. Senator, and now as President. Whether promoting economic opportunity, working to improve our nation’s education and health system, or protecting the right to vote, President Obama has been a powerful advocate for our civil rights.

• Combat Employment Discrimination: President Obama and Vice President Biden will work to overturn the Supreme Court’s recent ruling that curtails racial minorities’ and women’s ability to challenge pay discrimination. They will also pass the Fair Pay Act, to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work, and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity or expression.
• Expand Hate Crimes Statutes: President Obama and Vice President Biden will strengthen federal hate crimes legislation, expand hate crimes protection by passing the Matthew Shepard Act, and reinvigorate enforcement at the Department of Justice’s Criminal Section.
• End Deceptive Voting Practices: President Obama will sign into law his legislation that establishes harsh penalties for those who have engaged in voter fraud and provides voters who have been misinformed with accurate and full information so they can vote.
• End Racial Profiling: President Obama and Vice President Biden will ban racial profiling by federal law enforcement agencies and provide federal incentives to state and local police departments to prohibit the practice.
• Reduce Crime Recidivism by Providing Ex-Offender Support: President Obama and Vice President Biden will provide job training, substance abuse and mental health counseling to ex-offenders, so that they are successfully re-integrated into society. Obama and Biden will also create a prison-to-work incentive program to improve ex-offender employment and job retention rates.
• Eliminate Sentencing Disparities: President Obama and Vice President Biden believe the disparity between sentencing crack and powder-based cocaine is wrong and should be completely eliminated.
• Expand Use of Drug Courts: President Obama and Vice President Biden will give first-time, non-violent offenders a chance to serve their sentence, where appropriate, in the type of drug rehabilitation programs that have proven to work better than a prison term in changing bad behavior.

Support for the LGBT Community

“While we have come a long way since the Stonewall riots in 1969, we still have a lot of work to do. Too often, the issue of LGBT rights is exploited by those seeking to divide us. But at its core, this issue is about who we are as Americans. It’s about whether this nation is going to live up to its founding promise of equality by treating all its citizens with dignity and respect.”

– Barack Obama, June 1, 2007

• Expand Hate Crimes Statutes: In 2004, crimes against LGBT Americans constituted the third-highest category of hate crime reported and made up more than 15 percent of such crimes. President Obama cosponsored legislation that would expand federal jurisdiction to include violent hate crimes perpetrated because of race, color, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, or physical disability. As a state senator, President Obama passed tough legislation that made hate crimes and conspiracy to commit them against the law.
• Fight Workplace Discrimination: President Obama supports the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, and believes that our anti-discrimination employment laws should be expanded to include sexual orientation and gender identity. While an increasing number of employers have extended benefits to their employees’ domestic partners, discrimination based on sexual orientation in the workplace occurs with no federal legal remedy. The President also sponsored legislation in the Illinois State Senate that would ban employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
• Support Full Civil Unions and Federal Rights for LGBT Couples: President Obama supports full civil unions that give same-sex couples legal rights and privileges equal to those of married couples. Obama also believes we need to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act and enact legislation that would ensure that the 1,100+ federal legal rights and benefits currently provided on the basis of marital status are extended to same-sex couples in civil unions and other legally-recognized unions. These rights and benefits include the right to assist a loved one in times of emergency, the right to equal health insurance and other employment benefits, and property rights.
• Oppose a Constitutional Ban on Same-Sex Marriage: President Obama voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment in 2006 which would have defined marriage as between a man and a woman and prevented judicial extension of marriage-like rights to same-sex or other unmarried couples.
• Repeal Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell: President Obama agrees with former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff John Shalikashvili and other military experts that we need to repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. The key test for military service should be patriotism, a sense of duty, and a willingness to serve. Discrimination should be prohibited. The U.S. government has spent millions of dollars replacing troops kicked out of the military because of their sexual orientation. Additionally, more than 300 language experts have been fired under this policy, including more than 50 who are fluent in Arabic. The President will work with military leaders to repeal the current policy and ensure it helps accomplish our national defense goals.
• Expand Adoption Rights: President Obama believes that we must ensure adoption rights for all couples and individuals, regardless of their sexual orientation. He thinks that a child will benefit from a healthy and loving home, whether the parents are gay or not.
• Promote AIDS Prevention: In the first year of his presidency, President Obama will develop and begin to implement a comprehensive national HIV/AIDS strategy that includes all federal agencies. The strategy will be designed to reduce HIV infections, increase access to care and reduce HIV-related health disparities. The President will support common sense approaches including age-appropriate sex education that includes information about contraception, combating infection within our prison population through education and contraception, and distributing contraceptives through our public health system. The President also supports lifting the federal ban on needle exchange, which could dramatically reduce rates of infection among drug users. President Obama has also been willing to confront the stigma — too often tied to homophobia — that continues to surround HIV/AIDS.
• Empower Women to Prevent HIV/AIDS: In the United States, the percentage of women diagnosed with AIDS has quadrupled over the last 20 years. Today, women account for more than one quarter of all new HIV/AIDS diagnoses. President Obama introduced the Microbicide Development Act, which will accelerate the development of products that empower women in the battle against AIDS. Microbicides are a class of products currently under development that women apply topically to prevent transmission of HIV and other infections.

Like most people I know, I spent the inaugural week weeping more than occasionally with joy for all that has happened.  Here in Portland’s “Q Center” the boxes of tissue were being passed like communion trays as we all watched on Tuesday morning.

My personal “tear jerker” are the words of Dr. King ringing in my head, “I may not get there with you, but we as a people will get to the promised land.”

 I am thanks-filled that so many people, including Rev. Lowery, have lived to see this day.

 Here is the transcript of his benediction, which for me, was the best part of the event. 

Many of you will recognize the last verse of “Lift Every Voice and Sing”, by James Weldon Johnson (a native of Jacksonville Florida) who also penned “The Creation”, which opens this prayer.   

Transcript courtesy Federal News Service  and my friend John Burnett who sent it to me.

************************* 

God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, thou who has brought us thus far along the way, thou who has by thy might led us into the light, keep us forever in the path, we pray, lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met thee, lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee. Shadowed beneath thy hand may we forever stand — true to thee, O God, and true to our native land.

We truly give thanks for the glorious experience we’ve shared this day. We pray now, O Lord, for your blessing upon thy servant, Barack Obama, the 44th president of these United States, his family and his administration. He has come to this high office at a low moment in the national and, indeed, the global fiscal climate. But because we know you got the whole world in your hand, we pray for not only our nation, but for the community of nations. Our faith does not shrink, though pressed by the flood of mortal ills.

For we know that, Lord, you’re able and you’re willing to work through faithful leadership to restore stability, mend our brokenness, heal our wounds and deliver us from the exploitation of the poor or the least of these and from favoritism toward the rich, the elite of these.

We thank you for the empowering of thy servant, our 44th president, to inspire our nation to believe that, yes, we can work together to achieve a more perfect union. And while we have sown the seeds of greed — the wind of greed and corruption, and even as we reap the whirlwind of social and economic disruption, we seek forgiveness and we come in a spirit of unity and solidarity to commit our support to our president by our willingness to make sacrifices, to respect your creation, to turn to each other and not on each other.

And now, Lord, in the complex arena of human relations, help us to make choices on the side of love, not hate; on the side of inclusion, not exclusion; tolerance, not intolerance.

And as we leave this mountaintop, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques, or wherever we seek your will.

Bless President Barack, First Lady Michelle. Look over our little, angelic Sasha and Malia.

We go now to walk together, children, pledging that we won’t get weary in the difficult days ahead. We know you will not leave us alone, with your hands of power and your heart of love.

Help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid; when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around — (laughter) — when yellow will be mellow — (laughter) — when the red man can get ahead, man — (laughter) — and when white will embrace what is right.

Let all those who do justice and love mercy say amen.

AUDIENCE: Amen!

REV. LOWERY: Say amen –

AUDIENCE: Amen!

REV. LOWERY: — and amen.

AUDIENCE: Amen! (Cheers, applause.)

Below is a link to the song that the “Black, Brown, White” part of the benediction was inspired from.  The expression, “If you’re white, you alright, if you’re brown, stick around, if you’re black, get back!” is a very old one in much of this country.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZLw5ahxm-Q

Dear Marty:

 I could see the pain in your eyes yesterday at the inaugural event at the Q Center, and you were not alone.

On a personal level, I’d like to slap Sam into next week for lying, but as a gay man, I understand his fear, and it is very real.

Sam let his fears get the best of him. That part is tragic, but understandable.

About 50 years ago, a black man could be lynched for just looking at a white woman in a sexual way.

These days, gay men still never talk about our sexuality, or express it in any “mixed” setting. Even a public kiss (on the mouth, not in it) can get us beaten to death. Many men here are even fear filled at the thought of hugging in public, the homophobia is that thick in the air.

So as angry as I am at Sam, I also understand why he lied because we (gay men) all live with that fear daily. I might add that there are lots of closeted gay men in Portland who have to lie every day, to family, friends, employers, etc. They do it because they are THAT afraid.

So Sam’s fears do not exist in a vacuum. When I ran for city council, there was an anonymous smear campaign, sent to all of the local press and around many union halls that I was a convicted sex offender, and implying that my campaign manager (who is active in Robotics working with kids) was a pedophile.

I don’t think Lesbians get this sort of stuff routinely, if they do, none of my Lesbian friends ever report it. But gay men get it all the time.

What we should learn from Jews and Black People is that if we don’t stand with our own, then why even have a community?

So while I am disappointed with Sam for lying, I am also disappointed that your editorial board would jump to join the chorus demanding that Sam resign.

It’s easy to love and support people when they are “good.” What really takes character, and guts is to stand by a friend when that friend has messed up and the world wants to lynch him.

We as a community will be judged, not by the mistakes of one of our members, but how we support each other in a time of crisis.

All the facts are not in, a lawful investigation will inform us what has happened. In the meantime, Sam has made his admission, asked our forgiveness, and I’m VERY sure has learned never to act on his fears in this way again.

Regards, Ed Garren, MA, LMFT

This is very sad stuff, and no one wins.

Men try to lie their way out of a lot of things, that part is legendary. All those country & western songs about “cheatin” are NOT about gay men.

Sam was single, Breedlove was single, and probably a bit predatory, after all, landing a handsome elected official in bed is a big deal to an 18 year old. Young women chase older men all the time. Do you think it’s any different with gay men?

If Sam was a single straight man, with a beautiful young woman on his arm, we would all look twice, some would think scandalous, many others would be jealous, but he wouldn’t have to lie about it. Remember Henry Kissinger, who while secretary of state, married a woman less than half his age? Even Chairman Mao admitted he was jealous.

These things happen, but if a gay man does anything overtly sexual, even a kiss, in public, there’s gonna be a lynch mob. Until 40 years ago, a black man could get lynched for just looking at a white woman in most places.

The bottom line is, lying was a really dumb thing to do, but it was sort of understandable.

Jesus said it best, let he among you who is without sin, throw the first stone.

Let’s try to drop this, and move on to getting jobs and other commerce into this city before unemployment hits too many double digits.

Ed Garren

New Hampshire Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson. (Photo: Brian Snyder / Reuters)

    Concord, New Hampshire - The first openly gay Episcopal bishop will offer a prayer at the Lincoln Memorial at an inaugural event for President-elect Barack Obama.

    The selection of New Hampshire Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson for Sunday’s event follows weeks of criticism from gay-rights groups over Obama’s decision to have the Rev. Rick Warren give the invocation at his Jan. 20 inauguration.

    Warren backed the ban on same-sex marriage that passed in his home state of California on the November ballot.

    Robinson said last month the choice of Warren was like a slap in the face. In an interview with the Concord Monitor, he said he doesn’t believe Obama invited him in response to the Warren criticism but said his inclusion won’t go unnoticed by the gay and lesbian community.

    ”It’s important for any minority to see themselves represented in some way,” Robinson told the newspaper for a story in Monday’s editions. “Whether it be a racial minority, an ethnic minority, or in our case, a sexual minority. Just seeing someone like you up front matters.”

    Clark Stevens, a spokesman for the inaugural committee, said Robinson was invited because he had offered his advice to Obama during the campaign and because of his church work. When asked whether Robinson was included to calm the Warren complaints, he said Robinson is “an important figure in the religious community. We are excited that he will be involved.”

    Robinson, 61, said both Obama and Vice President-elect Joe Biden will attend the event, and Obama is expected to speak. As for himself, Robinson said he doesn’t yet know what he’ll say, but he knows he won’t use a Bible.

    ”While that is a holy and sacred text to me, it is not for many Americans,” Robinson said. “I will be careful not to be especially Christian in my prayer. This is a prayer for the whole nation.”

    Robinson said his prayer will be reflective of the times.

    ”I think these are sober and difficult times that we are facing,” he said. “It won’t be a happy, clappy prayer.”

    Robinson’s 2003 consecration has divided the church in the United States and abroad. Last month, theological conservatives upset by liberal views of U.S. Episcopalians and Canadian Anglicans formed a rival North American province.

__._,_.___ 

An Open Letter sent to the Chair of the Democratic Party on January 8, 2009 

Dear Governor Dean:

So, I gave and worked for “change” and now I’m wondering, “What happened?”

First, someone decides to offer an “olive branch” to the new Jerry Falwell, by asking Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inaugural.  Never mind he is a staunch enemy of GLBTQ people and women’s rights.  Never mind he was personally involved in crafting and raising support for Proposition 8 in California, further eroding the separation of “Church and State”, someone in YOUR think tank decided that he should get to say the prayer at the inauguration.   If you wanted to offer an “Olive Branch” to the “religious right” you could have picked Joel Osteen, who is much more well known and Christian enough to stay out of politics.  

But instead you chose “Pastor Rick.”

Then I read my paper this AM and see that Obama is considering balancing the budget by “reforming” Social Security and other “entitlement programs”.  What the hell is THAT all about?

Let’s try balancing the budget by reforming the MILITARY, the most expensive “entitlement program” on the face of the earth.   Let’s try balancing the budget by taxing the energy industry appropriately.    There are lots of things to do other than take bread away from babies and the old.

Balancing the budget on the backs of retirees, and potential retirees (like myself), who now have to work until we are almost 70, and then face a subsistence existence of institutionalized poverty is NOT the way to do it.

Any money you give us will go right back into the economy, making jobs and creating true economic stimulus.  Unlike the well to do, we don’t hoard our money, we spend it.

Did I really vote for a Republican?  Is that the new “Democratic paradigm”?  Is FDR but a nostalgic ghost?

I’m waiting to see, and will give you guys some time to re-think all this.  But if it keeps going this way, this lifetime three generation Democrat, may jump ship to the Green party.   I’ve really had it with the politics of inclusion before the election and the politics of “Wait your turn” after.  

Right now I am feeling profoundly betrayed, twice.  Three strikes and someone is out.

As we used to say “In the Day” at demonstrations and protests, “The Whole World is Watching.”

Regards,  Ed Garren, MA, LMFT

Psychotherapist

Portland, Oregon

Many people have asked me why the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer communities (and our friends) are so outraged about the selection of “Pastor” Rick Warren to offer the invocation at President Obama’s inauguration. 

Inviting one of the principal supporters of a prejudicial political initiative (Proposition Eight) to give the invocation at the inauguration is the social equivalent of inviting an Orthodox (Jewish) Rabbi and his family to dinner and serving ham and lobster.It’s just plain thoughtless, if not insulting and abusive.    

Many straight “friends” say, “just get over it, what’s the big deal.”  These friends miss two points, the first is that the so called “Christian community (mostly evangelicals who have traditionally fought against other social change like the abolition of slavery, women’s rights, racial desegregation, etc.) have been waging this war against GLBTQ people for over 30 years.  It started with Anita Bryant in 1977.  Ballot initiatives such as Prop. 8 have defined our community for most of it’s existence.  Every four years we have to endure another vote on our rights to exist with dignity. 

The second piece is that many people in this country do not seem to understand that anger, and the appropriate expression of it when one has been violated, is a normal and healthy thing.  Our country was founded on dissent.  All civil rights groups utilize dissent as a means of telling the larger community, “your behavior is no longer acceptable.”In most relationships that are healthy, there is conflict.  

It is incumbent upon all parties involved to let others know when they have been insulted, hurt, or otherwise assaulted.  In other words, anger is the emotion we are given by the creator to protect ourselves from being assaulted.  

How we express that anger is helpful in terms of reconciliation, but the anger must be expressed honestly, and significantly enough that the offense is noted and the offensive behavior corrected.

As a Christian, I live for the day when I can embrace “Evangelicals” as fellow the fellow siblings of God that they are.  But first, they need to “get it” that their behavior kills people and we have no tolerance for it.  

This is not about politics, it is about the spiritual and mental health of an entire community.I’m tired of us being passively polite to people who hate us, or at least engage in hate filled behavior.  

There was nothing passive or polite about the sit in’s and marches during the civil rights era.  The demonstrations and other forms of dissent that black citizens engaged were an effective way to deliver a clear message to white people that they were fed up with segregation.   I lived through it, something few on the west coast can claim.

“Back Home” we tell friends when they piss us off.  We don’t pussy foot around about it.   Friendships are based in strength, not weakness.  We need to make it very clear to “Pastor” Warren that his behavior is abhorrent to God, and he owes God, and us a BIG apology.  He can start with dragging Anita Bryant out of retirement and the two of them can go on the stump with their fellow “Bible Thumpers” to publicly convince their fellows to change.  Anything less is window dressing, and I’m over that too.

If we don’t take responsibility for telling Mr. Warren that he’s wrong, will his blood be on our hands at judgement day?

Martin Luther King spoke in Detroit in 1963 and said (in so many words), “We’ve been pushed around so long, and as much as we want to blame them for all that they have done to us, we will never be truly free until we take responsibility for letting them do it.”

We need to make it clear to everyone that we’ve been insulted, and we’re pissed, and we expect either an apology or some compensatory action, like maybe finally lifting the ban on Gays & Lesbians in the military.  We short change ourselves, patronize President Obama, and let the bullies of the world get away with one more assault on us if we don’t express our anger and demand justice.  That doesn’t mean we hate Obama, or Warren.  It just means we’re angry, and will get over it faster when our issues have been reconciled and we are no longer being constantly assaulted in the name of God by people who are mean spirited and are acting very “UN-Christian.”  

That’s what healthy people do in healthy and loving relationships. If we really love “America” then it is our patriotic duty to object when the rights of all Americans are not being honored.