Excellent (and inspiring) article by Quentin Fottrell in today's Irish Times.
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22 comments:
Unusually, I couldn't disagree more. I thought the article was shocking. So much so that I've published a public letter to Fottrell....
we wont
we wont
I disagree with you Neil. I think you're being pedantic. And I think it's this kind of separatism that sets the gay community back when this should be a time of unity.
It's not about seperatism, and I have quite publicly backed the work of LGBT Noise, MarriagEquality and others, and I'm very good friends with many involved. However, there's a mindset developing that dissent is somehow destructive, rather than being required in any reasonable debate.
Ultimately, I'd rather all of this effort was going into changing our education system, eradicating poverty among queers and tackling the health issues we face. But maybe that's just me....
Fighting for human rights begins with the most blatant inequality at hand.
Lots of people suffer from a shit education system, a shit health system and poverty.
But it's gay people alone who suffer from partnership/marriage inequality.
When we break down that barrier, then other walls will fall.
The observation he made regarding the make up of Q&A's panel is shocking. Are we to believe that RTE could find a single homosexual to be on the panel? Unbelievable. This is Ireland of the 50s and 60s. It's beyond farce, a debate about same sex marriages by people who will never want one.
I'm not sure why he felt he had to 'I would never, ever want to be heterosexual.'
Regarding Quentins comment about not wanting to be straight, i took that to mean that the belief the gays are unhappy, or can be cured or changed of their sexual orientation is a widely held view, and perhaps he was pointing out that he is perfectly content being a gay man. You cant really deny that being gay is seen by many people as something undesirable. Look at the front page of a national tabloid this week that saw fit to splash a story about the footballer john o shea denying rumours that he was gay, as if it was something awful that had to be totally rebuffed.
Not sure I love how it's written ("In recent years they have been growing here too, like meadows of beautiful, hardy flowers resistant to the hungriest greenfly or loudest locusts." Ya wha?) but it does raise some interesting points about the kind of discourse around gayness in Ireland.
Do Q&A have these kinds of debates a lot? I seem to remember a show from a few months ago with that mentaller David Quin from the Indo droning "A child needs a mother AND a father" and David Norris getting madder and madder. DQ's argument loses all logic when you consider that single people can adopt in this country.
Thanks, Una.
I wrote a comment on Neil's blog and, I assume, it will appear when it is "moderated". I wrote it very early this morning when I read what he had written. I wrote "semantic" when I actually meant "pedantic". Thanks for beating me to it, Una! :-) Here is what I wrote to Neil. I also got an email from another man today who thought it was a "missed opportunity" not to talk about ... abortion, so every person wants every food group represented in every 840 words written, and even an article that is designed to be positive and progressive will push all the wrong buttons with certain people, as I suppose we all bring our own issues/agendas to everything we read/write. :-)))Anyway, this is more or less what I sent to him today, as I was disappointed to read his reaction, especially from someone within the LGBT community, and the ill-informed musings on what I should or should not be writing about. Oh, I've also written about HIV/Aids too, since the early nineties. But I'm can't expect Neil to have read that either. I don't usually get down with it on the Blogosphere, but well... See below.
Hope to see you soon, Darlin'.
XQ
P.S. Thanks, Una, for uploading this (if you do!).
"Hi Neil,
Thanks for your “open letter”. Firstly, I do write more about more than just gay issues, maybe one every ten or more for that particular paper, so the gay correspondent tag, while a compliment, is not entirely accurate. But I take civil rights seriously, nevertheless ... and also take that as a compliment, like I said. I was not comparing the two Propositions, nowhere am I saying they were similar issues, I was making the point that there were two different Propositions (6 and 8) impacting the lives of gay people at two different moments in time … one passed, one did not, which have captured the imagination of gay people and helped mobilise them into action.
When I refer to same-sex marriage, take it from me, I have men AND women on my mind. When I refer to gay people having children, again I have men and women in mind. :-) To say my references to gay suicides negates other mental health (or any other issues) and then to go on to say that is “offensive” is disingenuous of you and, frankly, a real cheap shot. You also present a Catch 22 with that fuzzy logic. But you can take any 840 words and pick them apart with a desire for what you want to read about. I am not of the “misguided” belief that marriage is the only issue. Neil, I have written thousands upon thousands of words on other gay-related issues.
I don’t focus on every gay organisation in every article, but I mentioned the Gay Switchboard in that article too. I also believe MarriagEquality is an excellent single-issue group, and have no problem championing it, and make no apologies for that. If you look back at other pieces I’ve written from time-to-time, and I don’t try to tick boxes when I do so (so if that’s what you expect better start writing yourself...), I also mention Gay Pride in other articles, the IQA, GCN, the Gay Prom, the Drag Queens, the Gay Clare Social Group, but I don’t divide my attentions meticulously between all organisations. Please feel to jump in anytime with your own writing on subjects that are dear to you.
Your circular analysis of the “we/they” issue is pretty pedantic [I wrote "semantic" to Neil; it was very early!!! ;-)]. It is explicit that I am referring to those from the majority (on the panel) and minority (in the studio audience) and I refer in the conclusion to hate crimes and fear-mongering and intolerance. Again, if you want to pick apart every reference and say there should be a broader/bigger article on each one, that’s easily done, but an endless task. The piece was generally focusing on gay marriage and, implicitly, how some people use children/the institution of marriage as a smokescreen for other views, again a theme I will come back to again.
Obviously, I can’t expect you to have read everything I’ve written, so here’s a tip: don't make assumptions about other people's work and what they should/shouldn’t write about, especially when you haven’t read it. I’ve written about many issues, including homophobic bullying in schools (many times … including a recent 3,000-word in The Irish Times “Magazine”), gay film festivals, gay sporting festivals, gay theatre festivals, gay-bashing (again from a personal perspective ... pieces in the Sunday Tribune etc.), hate crimes, gays in rural areas, gay literature, the Emerald Warriors, Gay Pride, AMI, gay teenagers, Vatican encyclicals, homophobia in the media/school/workplace, etc.
And that’s just off the top of my head. I’m sure there are many, many more, and nor does it include the countless times I weave gay issues/themes into broader pieces.
Still, clearly, for some people, it will never be enough.
Over ... & Out.
QF"
Thanks again for posting, Una. And ... scene! I'm now moving on. XQ
Nice one Q. It was a great column, and should be taken as that. Pedantic analysis by competing minds in the LGBT community about POSITIVE articles in the mainstream media really annoys me. You cant please everyone, i guess! As i said, the most important thing now more that ever is unity. Divided we fall...
Una... Schweetheart! I couldn't have put it better myself. And I would have saved myself all that rambling. Eheh! XQ
Ah, Jaysus. Now that I’ve started, I quite like this blogging lark. It's better than Facebook!!! I will happily fall on my sword over the purple prose. :-) Just think of it as a little bit of glitter for Christmas...
Gay people don't have a 'right' to marry. You'll only have that right when either the legislature or the courts say so.
Niall is right that Quentin's become a one-trick pony. And both he and Una have a vested interest in being loud proponents of a simple but crude message. They need to make distinct noises or some other two-a-penny columnist will take their slot (and get paid the paltry but essential few hundred quid).
Quentin is being deliberately simplistic when he reminds 'silent' politicians that gays vote. Of course they do, but all my gay friends are not one simple homogenous entity who vote on one issue, and on that issue alone. They care far more about other important issues and right now, like everyone else, they care about the economy 90% and all the other stuff 10%.
As a straight person I too have a vote. So what if there's 10% of the electorate who are gay, as Q insists. Am I supposed to feel threatened.
As one of the 90% of straight voters (though unlike Q and Una I don't think of myself as a heterosexual voter, relatively speaking), I'm as yet unconvinced that homosexuals deserved to be conferred with a dubious 'right' such as marriage and Q's inspirational column will actually inspire the majority of non-gay people to be bemused at his simplistic and seemingly self-serving pleadings in the PD newspaper, the Irish Times.
"But it's gay people alone who suffer from partnership/marriage inequality. "
Um, no. My female partner and I have no right to each other's sick pay benefits, social welfare, pensions or property rights, if that's what we wanted. If this is about unity, I think you may have inadvertently struck one against it.
Anyway, I do not want to distract from the Neil - Quentin discussion.
But Eoin, luckily for you, you could get married if you wanted to. If you wanted those rights, you could walk into a registry office and sign up for them. You have that choice. Gay people arent so lucky.
That's right, gay people are not so lucky. Marriage has a status conferred upon it by historical legacy and the exercise of power by specific groups of people.
It's OT really but, I'm not going to get married and hence and denied specific rights. Just like many LGBT in jurisdictions that allow for civil partnership. There's unity for you.
Well, if the dust is ever brushed off the civil partnership bill, then you'll have your rights too- now THERES unity for you.
"Local man proud, angry, to be gay film buff"
Re: JP's "one-trick pony" remark, see above on other gay issues. I also write every day about corporate finance and economics for Dow Jones, but even on the gays, I'm happy to trumpet this issue as it would be a MAJOR breakthrough. Plus, I never said gays were one homogenous group. I have friends who have no interest in any of this ... except, of course, going to the Dragon every Friday night. And I know others who don't believe in marriage, yet confuse that with having the choice. Though some gays, and those who support gay rights, will take those issues into account when they vote. Everyone has a "right" to equal status in society under the law. If JP doesn't believe that, then that's his bag. And he's welcome to it.
I'm sorry, if you want REALLY inspirational stuff, then read the following:
http://www.independent.ie/world-news/humanity-must-be-saved-from-homosexuality--pope-1583648.html
The Pope needs a good ride.
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