A Taste of Power

Reading Elaine Brown's autobiographical A Taste of Power, and it's a fantastic read.  Learning a lot about some history of the Black Panthers, and of my town, Oakland. It's also a bittersweet reminder of how things have changed, and how they haven't, and of how difficult it is to even conceive of revolutionary change.  In her first speech to party members after taking (really, she did have to take it) control of the party, she maps out what revolutionary change could look like:

"We're going to set a revolution example here.  And the example we lay down in Oakland will be the spark that lights the prairie fire.  We will carry our torch to another city, and then another.  Each time, each place, the people will take their lead from us, the revolutionary vanguard.  Just as the people have demanded and institutionalized our Free Breakfast for Children and sickle-cell-anemia programs, they will demand socialized medicine and decent housing.  Soon they will begin to take control of their local political machinery.  Then they will attack the economic structure in each city.  Bit by bit, city by city, they will whittle away at the capitalist foundation.  Eventually, a time will come--not in our lifetimes, Comrades--but a time will come when the people will understand their power and the pigs' machinery will be unable to accommodate their demands.  That is when the people, black people and poor white people and oppressed people all over America, will rise up like a mighty tide and wash clean this beachfront of capitalism and racism, and make the revolution!"

Why Intersectionality Matters, and Why I Am Frustrated With (Some) Social-Justice Xians

This morning I watched with rapt attention the press conference given by Nafissatou Diallo, the person who is risking so much to continue to speak out about the violence that she endured from Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and I'm saddened by her plight, yet inspired to see somebody fighting back against the powerfully corrupt. Volumes have already been written about the violence that happened to her, and I'm not here to discuss the veracity of Dominique Strauss-Kahn's side of the story. It's clear to me that this woman is not in a power position, Dominique Strauss-Kahn is (in *so many* ways), and, because I can't know exactly what happened in that hotel room (though I can make an educated guess), I want at the very least for Diallo to be able to safely tell her side of the story, without being maligned at every turn, and without any additional physical or emotional harm coming to her or her daughter.

Watch the press conference and try to imagine that Dominique Strauss-Kahn isn't a lying douchebag.

And yet, to add to the misery of the situation, Diallo holds the press conference at the Christian Cultural Center, and is introduced by A.R. Bernard, pastor of that church. Unfortunately, Bernard and his church are the types of Xians who think they need to fight a "gay agenda"--and that being gay is like being a thief, or an adulterer. It's the same old love-the-sinner-hate-the-sin bullshit that is hatred masked as love. Jesus, who said not a word about homosexuality, though he did talk about stealing and adultery, would smack these folks silly:

"So, I make a distinction between the lifestyle that the person has chosen, and the person himself. God loves the person, but He rejects the lifestyle, just like He rejects adultery or sex outside the context of marriage." Nor does Bernard elevate homosexuality as a unique or higher degree of sin. "We condemn it just as we condemn lying or cheating," he says. "Our society has elevated the issue because that segment is trying to gain moral acceptance. But that is contrary to the biblical, moral code that we live by. [Because] they can't get moral acceptance, they are trying to earn acceptance through legislation."

Oppressions intersect. Women are oppressed. Queer folks are oppressed. These are related. Patriarchy (or kyriarchy, if you prefer), ties them together, and the more we recognize this, the more feminist work we can do--the more social justice work in general we can do. Standing up for women in a space that hates on gay people is a Bad Plan.