Thank a Breeder

November 19, 2012 7:12 PM

In the wake of historic victories on marriage equality in Maryland, Maine, and Washington state, and the defeat of an anti-equality constitutional amendment in Minnesota, LGBTQ people are thanking their straight family and friends for their contributions to the cause.

Dan Savage (of Savage Love and the It Gets Better video series) talks about the site in his column and podcast.

posted by jeoc (36 comments total)

This is super awesome. Thanks, jeoc!
posted by trip and a half at 7:18 PM on November 19, 2012

You know, some people are just good people. Thanks for posting this.
posted by HuronBob at 7:21 PM on November 19, 2012 [5 favorites]

The thing that blew me away the first time I ever went to a pride parade was all of the LGBTQ allies. For someone who was only just peaking my head out of the closet, it was very encouraging and inspiring. Thank you to all those people who have made it better.
posted by jamincan at 7:27 PM on November 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

This is really nice. Just...nice. It's heartwarming-- and strangely just as entertaining-- to browse through pages of Look At These Kindly Loving Everyday People instead of Haha These People Are Dumb or Get Yer Snarky Anger Here.
posted by threeants at 7:43 PM on November 19, 2012 [9 favorites]

There's more nice people out there than we think. The nice people are winning, incrementally yes, but the tide is turning.
posted by arcticseal at 7:53 PM on November 19, 2012 [3 favorites]

This made me really happy. Thank you.
posted by purenitrous at 7:54 PM on November 19, 2012

Not everyone was pleased by his gesture.

(Read from the bottom upward.)
posted by tapesonthefloor at 8:00 PM on November 19, 2012 [2 favorites]

Clicked through from the tumblr link to this. Thanks again.
posted by trip and a half at 8:01 PM on November 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

Awesome. Even awesomer was seeing people I know on the blog.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:12 PM on November 19, 2012

as a straight individual who did a minuscule amount of GOTV on behalf of Ref 74 in WA, i think celebrating the straights is probably counterproductive this soon after the success.

i'd really much rather learn more about GLTB happinesses in the wake of our state's decision.

quite happy to be part of a neat little footnote in a much bigger story!
posted by striatic at 8:25 PM on November 19, 2012 [3 favorites]

Joe "Happy Warrior" Biden gets it (from August): "Vice President Joe Biden thanked gay rights advocates for advancing civil rights for all citizens on Sunday, telling attendees at a campaign stop in Provincetown, Mass., “You are freeing the soul of the American people.”

Biden spoke in the morning at the Pilgrim Monument and Museum in the popular LGBT destination at the tip of Cape Cod. Around 300 people listened to his hour-long speech, which “focused heavily on civil rights,” according to the pool report. The vice president credited the crowd, many of whom wore signs of LGBT pride, with  advancing the “civil rights of every straight American.”

The LBGT rights cause, like the African American civil rights movement, is most productively viewed as ultimately about expanding and advancing the rights of all citizens , rather than purely a set of rights issues for a minority.
posted by Bwithh at 8:34 PM on November 19, 2012 [19 favorites]

I really understand where people are coming from who are against this sort of thing (the person in tapesonthefloor's link; striatic; etc) but I think it's worth noting that this is not some sort of THANK YOU STRAIGHTNESS moment, but expressions of appreciation from individual queer people to their individual loved ones. Really it's erasing their experience to criticize how they go about commemorating these recent landmark victories. It's not like this tumblr feed is some sort of hegemonic splash page that you have to click through before accessing any other part of the Internet.
posted by threeants at 8:38 PM on November 19, 2012 [2 favorites]

Minority rights should never be up for a vote, but where they are, support from those in the privileged class is definitionally necessary.
posted by threeants at 8:40 PM on November 19, 2012 [3 favorites]

"Really it's erasing their experience to criticize how they go about commemorating these recent landmark victories."

that's true.

i guess what i am trying to say is that i get a super happy warm feeling in my chest when i see happy couples in love getting married and i want to skip to that part. so impatient!

the time we are spending waiting for everything to be officially, officially legal and the weddings to start probably is a pretty good time to do the thanking of parents, friends and volunteers.
posted by striatic at 9:02 PM on November 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

Not everyone was pleased by his gesture.

I say ignore the cranky stupid jerk lady, and celebrate the good things and nice people. Huzzah!
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 9:26 PM on November 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

Ignore the cranky 'stupid jerk' lady who thinks it inappropriate to show gratitude for being granted what should have been hers, without question, all along. You shouldn't have to thank someone for not shooting you, not beating you, not refusing to accept that you exist and are just as human as anyone else.

You shouldn't have to thank anyone for not castrating you and locking you up in a mental hospital for the rest of your shortened life.

Yep.

The cranky stupid jerk lady has some very valid points. To invalidate her is to shit on everyone's human rights.
posted by Goofyy at 9:51 PM on November 19, 2012 [4 favorites]

EVERYONE KISS EVERYONE I AM DRUNK
posted by nathancaswell at 9:53 PM on November 19, 2012 [3 favorites]

Goofyy, Savage already addressed that. I was being perhaps overly irreverent. I'm happy to respond to you, but I think it would be a derail here. Memail me if you want.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 9:54 PM on November 19, 2012

So, you plead that Dan Savage made it okay for you to call her a "stupid cranky jerk lady"? That's even more limp than my wrist.

Regardless of whether her timing is correct, or whether you view her as raining on someone's parade, her points are just simply too basic and valid for you to come along and dismiss in such vulgar fashion.

I'm a native of Michigan. When I was young, the law of Michigan provided for the castration and commitment to mental hospitals of anyone found guilty of homosexuality. So while I'd not rain on the parade, I sure as hell am not about to denigrate someone who points out the questionable nature of thanking folks for not being evil.
posted by Goofyy at 10:08 PM on November 19, 2012 [4 favorites]

You shouldn't have to thank someone for not shooting you, not beating you, not refusing to accept that you exist and are just as human as anyone else.

Yea, but if someone else did start beating you up, it's pretty reasonable to say thanks to the other guy who jumps in to help you fight him off, and doing so does not imply that being beaten up was a normal or acceptable thing in the first place.
posted by jacalata at 10:31 PM on November 19, 2012 [15 favorites]

I'm a straight guy who did a fair amount of fieldwork for Ref. 74 here in WA State and, yeah, it made me kind of uncomfortable when LGBT folks would acknowledge and thank me for being a straight person involved in the cause. Because I didn't deserve it. And I still don't. I got a lot out of the campaign for what I put in: a picture in a major newspaper, some time to think and work on my own feelings about love and commitment, and far more importantly, lots of strong friendship and support. These were some very love-filled rooms to be in these past few months, and they filled me up with hope. When Joe Biden says "You are freeing the soul of the American people", I read "You are feeding the soul" because my soul was fed. No question.

So, yeah, on top of doing what is unquestionably the right thing, I got a ton of value back. And so nobody deserves praise less than me. But I don't think, in retrospect, thanking me was all they were expressing, or all they were trying to do. Lots of these veteran activists, many who'd been around since Stonewall, were not at all accustomed to seeing straight people in those rooms. From what they told me, there weren't straight people in those rooms ever until very recently. Which again, is to our fault, not to my credit. But talking about the straight people in the room was one way of acknowledging that love and support. It's the sort of thing that gives you energy, knowing that people stand with you. And yeah, who the hell am I as a person of privilege to tell them those feelings and emotions aren't important or worth expressing.

So, the last time someone said "Thank you," and "It means a lot," instead of brushing them off, I said "It was an honor." Because it absolutely fucking was.
posted by Apropos of Something at 10:57 PM on November 19, 2012 [18 favorites]

Oh, this is just getting ridiculous.
This whole thread seemed, at the start, to be about nice people thanking other nice people.

"I am no better and neither are you
We're all the same whatever we do
You love me you hate me
You know me and then
Still can't figure out the bag I'm in
I am everyday people"

At least arcticseal, above, had it right: "The nice people are winning."
posted by TDavis at 11:02 PM on November 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

Goofyy: Dan Savage went over this at length in his podcast where he announced the project. He explicitly said that this wasn't about thanking straight people for 'granting rights'. You are finding offence by ignoring the stated intentions.

It's nice to see people celebrating the support they have. That support can be celebrated while still acknowledging that it shouldn't be required.
posted by aychedee at 1:14 AM on November 20, 2012 [3 favorites]

So, you plead that Dan Savage made it okay for you to call her a "stupid cranky jerk lady"? That's even more limp than my wrist.

For fuck's sake. Now you're just putting words in my mouth; I did not say this, or anything even close to it.

Savage was beyond polite to negropeggy. I doubt he would, in any context, insult anyone in her position or espousing her views.

My opinion (irrespective of what Savage may or may not think or say) is she was utterly unreasonable, for the reasons set out by aychedee and jacalata above. Savage created a space for gay people to thank their friends and family for supporting their right for equal rights. Not to 'thank' a majority class for not oppressing them. negropeggy and Savage were talking at cross purposes, because her premises were wrong.

You shouldn't have to thank someone for not shooting you, not beating you, not refusing to accept that you exist and are just as human as anyone else.

I agree. Feel free to point out where anyone in this thread or the links has done this, or proposed that this be done.

However, I probably shouldn't have called her a jerk.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:13 AM on November 20, 2012 [1 favorite]

Everyone else; sorry about this stupid derail.

This is a nice thing - thanks for posting about it, jeoc.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:14 AM on November 20, 2012

This is lovely.

My favourite part is that it's not simply LGBT folk thanking straight folk for generic reasons: these are people thanking family members and friends specifically for standing up to their bigoted relatives, spending hours canvassing, marching, and generally being allies who carry the message of equality to more conservative grounds.
posted by third word on a random page at 2:40 AM on November 20, 2012

Hey homos--yr super welcome. But really, it's all our fault in the first place. Well done. You built this one!
posted by Joseph Gurl at 5:52 AM on November 20, 2012 [1 favorite]

I think this isn't about thanking people for not being evil. It's thanking straight brothers and sisters for joining their gay friends, neighbors and relatives by joining their fight. We're comrades. We're allies. It's like the UK and the US. We have a special relationship.
posted by inturnaround at 6:18 AM on November 20, 2012

Yeah I have no idea how this could be controversial.

One of the nice parts about the MN marriage amendment going down, for me, was thinking of all the straight people that had to vote no for it to happen. We're between 2-5% of the population depending on who you ask - if LGBTQ people were the only ones voting against, it absolutely would have passed.

So I'm grateful that so many people who weren't directly affected voted to help me, and I'm personally grateful to every one of my family and friends that have made my life so charmed in comparison with the lives of so many others.
posted by kavasa at 6:31 AM on November 20, 2012 [2 favorites]

As soon as I saw Savage post about this, I thought "How long before someone shows up on Metafilter to complain about it?" Slightly longer than I thought!
posted by ThatFuzzyBastard at 6:44 AM on November 20, 2012 [1 favorite]

So I'm grateful that so many people who weren't directly affected voted to help me

I 100% appreciate your sentiment, and you are of course very welcome, but we are all directly affected by this, whether gay or straight. Living in an open society is our common goal.

I was very pleased (and in the end, relieved) to help stop this discriminatory amendment in Minnesota. Now for actually legalizing it...get it done, newly democratic MN legislature!
posted by mcstayinskool at 7:15 AM on November 20, 2012 [1 favorite]

I live in NC, and was so, so disappointed at the outcome here back in May.

Where I work, we sometimes talk about the importance of recognizing and celebrating accomplishments, particuarly interim accomplishments that are part of a large, ambitious goal. Simply recognizing that we have done well, and the others that worked along side us, can help maintain our energy for the continued work ahead.
posted by jeoc at 10:00 AM on November 20, 2012 [1 favorite]

kavasa: Yeah I have no idea how this could be controversial.

Check the domain in the url atop this page. EVERYTHING is controversial.
posted by IAmBroom at 10:41 AM on November 20, 2012

I live in a county that voted something like 76% to support the consitutional ban on gay marriage in MN. I wore the same shirt to work every single day for two weeks before the election: a t-shirt with the word NO! painted on it. Most people were reluctant to engage me on the issue at all, but I did have a few conversations with people, possibly changed a few votes, and definitely expanded people's understanding of the issue. When I heard Savage's podcast where he thanked straight folks for joining the LGBT people in their fight for their rights, I didn't feel at all as though I'd done something worth thanks, but it did remind me that my actions and my conversations are important. It made me feel good and made me want to do more.
posted by hannahelastic at 3:00 PM on November 20, 2012

We're between 2-5% of the population depending on who you ask

Or 10. Or 20. Or more. There are those (I suspect add up to a much larger number, as Kinsey pointed out in 1948, 60 years ago) who'll not ever admit ... to themselves or anyone else ... what they're feeling. Like the R. Kelly thing and the Frank Ocean thing I was reading earlier today.

A lot of those people (who don't really qualify as straight family and friends -- because reality isn't black and white) helped out with the vote as well. I say thanks to them.

I say thanks to them. And I say: I hope that some day you'll find it possible to be what you are. When the rabid tire of telling you how to be you.
posted by Twang at 5:21 PM on November 20, 2012

(I'm psyched about all this, of course, but it does once again remind us that Savage has always been fundamentally conservative, with a relatively heteronormative view of love and sex relationships--leading to, of course, marriage--rather than a view of queerness as a force for change and critique of those traditional values and their unquestioned pervasiveness)
posted by Joseph Gurl at 8:56 PM on November 20, 2012