Posted on

Queer Wisconsin, Queer Work, Queer Rights

Bilerico has had a couple of good pieces about the connections between how what’s going on in Madison connects to LGBT political organizing.

Susan Raffo’s recent piece mentions the history, references queer historian Allan Bérubé:

In 1919, the labor movement’s successful fight for a 40-hour workweek bought us the time and the space to start coming together as queer people; to come together and take a deep breath and just plain notice ourselves. And in the noticing, we started to ask questions and in asking those questions, to dream of how things could be different. That’s what economic justice creates for us. It creates lives where there is the space to talk to each other, to feel like we can turn our gazes away from making sure there is enough food and a place to sleep and instead begin to act on our dreams.

Caitlin Breedlove commented recently on the unusual alliance she’s experiencing as a queer Madisonian in the midst of what is often white working class organizing:

I believe that in Wisconsin I am in the midst of many working class white people who voted conservative in the November elections based on rights to their guns, or because they don’t like the idea of gays getting married, or because they don’t like that Obama is Black. I am standing next to them in struggle. This is an unusual position for me. I am standing with them as I am watching parts of them being transformed. Many of these people have realized their guns are not as important as having a job, a house, decent public schools for their kids, or healthcare. They are figuring out that, as Michael Moore said from the Madison Capitol this weekend: “America is not broke…the country is awash in cash…it is just that the wealth is not in our hands.” Many of my comrades here have said that it is amazing how many people realize this fight is about capitalism and corporate greed.

Her larger point, about the reclaiming of public space as essential to LGBT people, immigrants, & the working class, is vital information. Our public sector has been under attack for a few decades now by people who want none of us to be empowered in the way our government treats us:

She points to the fact that the Capitol occupation is very much about reclaiming public space. As LGBTQ people, we are systematically pushed out of public space – discouraged from being ourselves at our workplaces, our kids’ schools, at the grocery store, and in our local and state governments. Why do so few of us run for public office? Why are so many of our activists who do not work in LGBTQ-specific areas closeted? Because we have been sent a clear message: public space is not our space. We are not “the Public.”

We are not the only community sent this message.

Immigrants are told something similar every time we open our mouths and speak a language that is not English. The systems of our towns are set up so that on every street, every bus, and every glittering downtown poor people are sent the same message: you do not belong here, this place is not for you.

This week people in Madison are saying that class warfare is real, it needs to be faced head on, and to do that we must reclaim public space. This month, people all over the Middle East are saying this, and so much more. Are we ready to recognize that this struggle (like so many struggles) is our struggle?

I can’t imagine a message that queer people have heard over & over again but her “you do not belong here, this place is not for you.” We know exactly what that means, and we know exactly how it feels, and the queer movement has for years resisted being told where and when we get to exist and have our lives be visible. Without public spaces, without the people’s insistence on government accountability and the right to assembly, both of which are being denied in the state capital of Wisconsin, queer organizing will also be shut out.

Please, queerios, pay attention to what’s happening here. The right to bargain collectively is not just about economics, nor about work. It’s about the right to BE counted as persons and citizens: We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it is a little more like We’re here, get used to it just now.

Posted on

No, Really.

This is amazing. The rabid (not in the good way) governor of WI has effectively locked up the state capitol, so state reps have moved their desks outside to meet with voters.

How incredible is that? Honestly, I feel at home here in a way I never expected; the WI response to this governor’s powergrab tells me WI has got bigger shoulders than Brooklyn or Chicago. Damn.

And by the way, it wasn’t more than 20 something degrees out today. These folks are not kidding around.

(h/t to my friend Matty for the photo)

Posted on

Back from Madison: No Riots, No Thugs

Okay, it’s a shoo-in for my favorite of the day, but there were plenty of others I loved:

What Would Bob Do? (reference to Fighting Bob LaFollette)

Dread Scott

I Blame Favre

In Russ We Trust (alongside Feingold for Governor)

If You Can Read This, Thank a Teacher

It’s too bad the people who could run this state are too busy teaching

You can’t scare me, I teach Middle School

Don’t refudiate our education

The Superbowl was won by a union

Unions: thanks for the weekend

This private sector bitch supports unions

. . . & for me, seeing the wildcat emblem of the IWW, a portrait of Joe Hill & calls for a General Strike = priceless. Seeing so many unions out was amazing too:  AFSCME, Iron-workers, Fire, SEIU (my grandma’s), and an immigrants rights’ group were shouting Si Se Puede until they were hoarse. My favorite chant? What’s disgusting? Union Busting! But the much more direct kill the bill was chanted to drown out the other side whenever they started trying to defend Walker’s power grab.

The attendance by Tea Partiers is greatly exaggerated. I’d say it was maybe 1:100. Really, they weren’t even a blip: a lone guy with a sign here, a group of five there, & then a kind of gauntlet on the way into the building, but that was it. The mood was peaceful, celebratory, determined, and full of joy and music. The 4PM rally started with the singing of “God Bless America”.

No riots, no thugs.

Posted on

Paging Senator Kohl

I received an email response from Senator Kohl:

Thank you for sharing your concerns about Governor Scott Walker’s Budget Repair Plan.

As part of his budget approach, the Governor has proposed significant changes in how the state government will interact with some unionized public employees.  Throughout Wisconsin, citizens will continue debating the most appropriate distribution of shared sacrifice necessary to help balance our state budget. At the federal level where I serve, we are having a similar debate about budget priorities and I will continue pressing for meaningful, fair, bipartisan solutions.

Governor Walker’s proposal is a state, rather than a federal matter, and will not come before the United States Senate.  As such, I have no official role. Therefore, I encourage you to contact your Wisconsin State Representative and Senator.  There is a toll-free number you may call to leave a message for your state elected officials or to find out who represents you. The number is 1-800-362-9472.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact me. Even though I am not directly involved in matters before the Wisconsin State legislature, I will keep your views in mind. Please contact me again about issues that concern you.

First: of course he has no official role. I wrote back:

Respectfully, I would like to suggest that any public statement made by Democratic leadership in favor of yesterday’s walk-out and in favor of collective bargaining – especially those from the state of Wisconsin – would be very valuable in this debate. I urge you to speak out for the workers and citizens of WI.

Thank you very much for your response.

Please do contact your own Senators, state and federal, to get them to make a public statement in favor of the walk-out and the protests in Madison and Ohio.

Posted on

Go Wisconsin!

I’m wearing red today in support of Wisconsin’s public school teachers, specifically, but also in support of its many other public employees. You know, those pesky firemen and paramedics, the diversity coordinators, the mayor’s support staff, the everybody that keeps civic society going.

Our new governor is a tight-minded, tight-fisted and logicially-challenged egomaniac who has decided that he will not negotiate with the unions of WI, that he wants the right to alter the state’s healthcare plan, also without negotiation. Sadly, he ran on a platform of being this much of a jerk and he won.

So we could use your support.

Ron Johnson & Herb Kohl are our Senators. (That has to be the saddest sentence in the world, since one of those names should be Russ Feingold’s.) Contact them & tell them you’re in support of the public employees of Wisconsin.

If we don’t win this one, you can count on this bullshit’s coming to your state.