As the storefronts reverted back to the businesses that had closed their doors long ago, I found the streets lined with pristine cars from the 60's and 70's, and passers by wearing long hair, beards and clothes that went out of style somewhere around the same time the King finally left the building.
Just a few doors up the street from me, my friend Vlad's house was the center of a new universe: A Hollywood movie set. Vlad, you see, lives in the apartment once occupied by the owner of the camera store below. A man few outside of the LGBT community had ever heard of. The man named Harvey Milk.
Milk was one of the first openly gay men ever elected to a political office. Not only was he an engaging conversationalist and savvy politician, he also became a symbol for the community across the nation. His presence during what was one of the ugliest political campaigns against gay rights in the nations history gave hope to a community desperate for a leader.
That hope was lost to us in November of 1978. Only eight months after taking office Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone were assassinated in their offices of city hall by fellow Supervisor Dan White. White was put on trial for the double homicide and thanks to what can only be described as one of the grossest miscarriages of justice in our history, he was given only six years in prison. If you ever wondered where the phrase "twinkie defense" came from, it was White's lawyers who concocted it to explain why White wasn't responsible, the sugar in the twinkies he ate made him do it.
When the all white heterosexual jury came back with their verdict and sentencing, the city went a little mad. The retaliation came swift from a community who was done being pulled out of bars in cuffs for being gay, done being treated as diseased lost souls and criminals, done being blackmailed and threatened and beaten because of their love. That night came to be know as the "White Night Riots".
Moscone and Milk were memorialized in city landmarks, The Harvey Milk Civil Rights Academy, busts in city hall, and until a clearly non-supportive Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed the bill, there was almost a day of remembrance. But for me, I felt like I was watching it happen all over again, only this time Harvey looked quite a bit like Sean Penn.
Director Gus Van Sant and Sean Penn came to the Castro district to honor one of the only true leaders the LGBT community has ever known, and sitting in the famed 1400 seat Castro theater this Monday night at the premiere of their movie MILK, I have to admit, they did a damn fine job.
Telling this story from the view point of Milk himself, and utilizing several of his most famous speeches, Van Sant has created an honest and moving look into a man few people (even in the gay community today) ever really knew. A man driven to better the corner of the world he occupied even as he foretold of his own assassination by saying: "If a bullet should enter my brain, let it destroy every closet door." Sean Penn is not in this movie. The man you see on the screen IS Harvey Milk. Flawed, inspired, silly, passionate and most importantly human.
This is the story of an American Hero. A man who stood up for what he believed was right and gave his life so that we could have the freedom to be. Coming on the heels of California's anti-gay Proposition 8, it is impossible to grasp the fact that we were more able to defeat discrimination thirty years ago than we are today.
It is just as difficult to watch someone step up and face down the hate spewing "Moral Majority" in 1978 by using logic and reason. It makes it all the more obvious what type of leader Milk was and how his eloquence had the power to unite our community like no one before or since. And it leaves us with the knowledge of how sorely he is missed and how desperately he is still needed.
This is not a "gay" movie. This is not a civil rights movie. This is not a political movie. It is simply the story of one Americans pursuit of happiness. Watch it and be inspired. If your really interested in the this story I highly recommend renting the 1984 Oscar winning documentary "The Life and Times of Harvey Milk".
Lastly, remember, change takes time. Until then, "You gotta give 'em hope".
1 comment:
I'm so moved by the video of Keith Olberman I want to cry. He has completely expressed my feelings and I know I could never say it as eloquantly or succinctly. You don't have to be gay to know that what he says is the truth - you just have to be human.
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