I wonder if the governors of Mississippi and North Carolina and other states where gay, lesbian and transgender citizens have been targeted, usually in the name of religion, have any idea that the taxpayers they are maligning have been through many other battles. And survived.
Coming out in the South is no walk in the park. Once you’ve told grandmothers, elderly neighbors, sorority sisters, conservative co-workers and preachers your sexual orientation, pandering politicians are just another hurdle.
The book “Crooked Letter i — Coming Out in the South” was at the Alabama Book Fair recently. Alabama, by the way, so far hasn’t drafted anti-gay legislation like North Carolina and Mississippi and others. It has been busy dealing with a Supreme Court chief justice who forbade probate judges to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, a former speaker of the house convicted of ethics charges and a governor who’s in a marriage predicament all his own. Who has the time to draft a hate bill?
The 16 essays in this thoughtful book are all over the place, because, face it, everyone’s different. You can’t assume too much about any group of people, including LGBTs. But some are fearful.
“I feel like we are quite literally dancing with danger,” contributor B. Andrew Plant said. His words proved prescient as the horrendous mass shootings in Orlando, Florida, made news as I was writing this.
“Hate-driven legislation, especially when cloaked in religion, has fostered a climate in which it is acceptable and even popular to be intolerant. This puts anyone who is disenfranchised dangerously in the cross hairs.”
Plant’s advice to the “disenfranchised” is to become financially independent. “In our culture,” he says, “you can literally buy your freedom in some ways. If you pay your own way, you get to make some of the rules.”
A successful public-relations strategist in the competitive Atlanta market, Plant has followed his own advice, interviewing and writing about everyone from Dolly Parton to Coretta Scott King, including two White House AIDS czars.
The true stories in “Crooked Letter i” have one thing in common: They all are heart-rending. Edited by Connie Griffin, they deal with the moment — or, in some cases, moments — these Southern members of the LGBT community first told kin, friends or the world the truth about themselves.
One Florida native shocked her Brownie leader when, at age 8, she pledged her undying love and proposed marriage to another girl. Another female adolescent was sent to a series of psychiatrists until her parents found one who agreed with their position. One father, when told, patted his son’s hand and went right back to bush-hogging.
Some left home, some returned home yearning for approval. Each case is different — sometimes merely awkward, others tragic or slowly evolving.
Plant thinks recent legislative developments are part of a “continual game of political whack-a-mole, in which we seem to hate one group and then another, which tends to steal focus from very real issues. … What we really need to see is what they’re making us look away from.”
The hate-mongers should know this. Once your grandmother is in the loop, has pulled you to her accepting bosom, then winning the approval of backward, hypocritical, ignorant and often crooked politicians doesn’t much matter.
Those guilty lawmakers will have to live with themselves.
Rheta Grimsley Johnson’s most recent book is “Hank Hung the Moon … And Warmed Our Cold, Cold Hearts.” Comments are welcomed at [email protected].
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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