Posted on 12/09/2008 11:22:35 AM PST by radar101
Gay rights activists in San Diego and elsewhere, hoping to sustain a grass-roots protest movement launched after the Nov. 4 passage of Proposition 8, have planned a nationwide boycott tomorrow. The event, called Day Without a Gay, encourages gays, lesbians and their supporters to take off work, refrain from shopping and spend the day volunteering somewhere.
“We're hoping to provide a visual representation of who we are,” said Sara Beth Brooks, an El Cajon bookkeeper who recently formed a group called the San Diego Equality Campaign. “We're your neighbors, your family, your friends. We're everybody. We hope this kind of economic stand will prove a point.”
Organizers said they don't know how many people will participate, but several local employers said they aren't expecting many absences. More than 143,000 people across the country had RSVP'd through Facebook yesterday afternoon. An additional 84,000 listed themselves as “maybe.”
The boycott follows recent street marches in cities across the country, the online “outing” of contributors to the Yes on 8 campaign, and boycotts of individual businesses run by Yes on 8 donors.
“This used to be a pretty complacent civil rights movement,” said Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate. “Not any more.”
San Diego has been a hotbed, with 20,000 people marching in a protest here Nov. 15, and two local firms, the Manchester hotels and A-1 Self-Storage, being targeted by Karger's group for boycotts.
Frank Schubert, campaign manager for Protect Marriage-Yes on 8, said, “I don't think anybody has any difficulty with legitimate protest or freedom of expression. Our objection is when protests cross the line into persecution. People on our side of the issue have been blacklisted, boycotted, harassed. That's wrong.”
He said Day Without A Gay is “really irrelevant to Proposition 8. Our campaign was never about attacking gays or disparaging their contributions to society. It was simply about marriage and how it should be defined.”
Among gay rights activists, some of the emphasis seems to be shifting from confrontation to conversation. Organizers of a Dec. 20 candlelight vigil at six local shopping centers are asking participants not to bring protest signs or chant.
The San Diego Equality Campaign, formed after the election, is creating a speakers bureau and has begun sending volunteers to address public meetings in communities where Proposition 8 passed handily.
Day Without a Gay was originally planned as just an economic boycott, “to remind people that even though we get up every morning and do our jobs, pay our taxes, defend the country in the military, we are still being treated like second-class citizens,” said David Craig, a Los Angeles film producer and co-organizer.
But then Sean Hetherington and Aaron Hartzler, a couple in Los Angeles, suggested adding community service to the mix. “We just thought a boycott was a little divisive, especially with the economy the way it is,” Hetherington said.
In San Diego, Ophira Bergman said she'll be staying home from her job with a video-technology company, and she's canceling the karate class she teaches at UC San Diego. She'll be volunteering instead at the Epilepsy Foundation of San Diego County's annual Gingerbread City fundraiser.
“It's important to me to shed light on gay people and the inequality we face from not having marriages that are legally recognized,” Bergman said. “I don't think people get it.”
Day Without a Gay is patterned after the Day Without An Immigrant protest in May 2006, which featured large marches in several major American cities, including San Diego. Numerous businesses, especially restaurants, were affected, with some forced to shut down for the day.
No major marches are planned for tomorrow. “We've already had marches,” Craig said. “We wanted to do something different.”
Craig admitted it will be difficult to gauge the day's impact. Some boycott supporters are planning to work because they can't get the time off, aren't comfortable “calling in gay,” or have employers who already back equal rights for gays.
Representatives of several large San Diego-area workplaces said that they don't expect a lot of absences, but that anyone taking the day off would need to use personal time and clear it with a supervisor first.
The 800-member Greater San Diego Business Association, also known as the gay and lesbian chamber of commerce, has taken no official position on the boycott.
Joyce Marieb, chief executive officer, said she supports people doing what they believe is right, but also suggested the gay and lesbian community could “leverage our economic power” by supporting companies that “support equal rights for their employees and all marginalized groups.”
Well... how ‘fierce’. You won’t be able to contact your interior decorator or top chef. Bravo!
“Sara Beth Brooks, an El Cajon bookkeeper”
I lived in El Cajon near the old Buck knife factory. A `Richard Simmons’-type would have had his a$$ kicked several times a day in El Cajon.
OHHH PLEASE don't take a quee ... ummm "gay" day off ... Brer Rabbit
TYPICAL: A gay man with hemorrhoids......
Uh ... no, you're not. I have no homosexual neighbors. None of my family is queer. My friends are heterosexual, fairly normal folks. You are not 'everybody'. The vast majority of folks don't identify themselves and conduct life according to what they do in the bedroom.
"... we are still being treated like second-class citizens ... It's important to me to shed light on gay people and the inequality we face from not having marriages that are legally recognized..."
Let's review reality for a moment. Queers have exactly the same rights to marriage that I have. Everyone is allowed to marry one human of the opposite sex. How is that discriminatory?
Homosexuals want special rights due solely to the fact that they do things with their genitals that are against basic human nature. If it were normal, the species would be extinct in a hurry and that's not the way that nature works.
Society and the courts in the US have provided avenues for homos to pass on their property, make decisions for their 'mate' in hospitals, and many other things. But, as always, you have been given an inch and want a foot. Given a foot, you now want a mile.
Does this mean Bahney Fwank isn’t going to show up for work either?
Yep, me too. Once again "the love that dare not speak it's name" won't shut the he11 up!
I wouldn’t know...................
Well, that is one day I am definitely NOT going to be sick.
;)
The only reason anyone knows anything about another person's sex life is because someone chooses to disclose such information. This is but one of the many problems with gay folk's assertion that they are a class of people experiencing discrimination.
you’d a thunk getting things crammed up their collective fundaments would be enough for these bone smugglers.
but NO....they need it all.
Somebody ping me of they really do this. I gotta make sure I get out of the house that day and go shopping or something! Normally I work at home. Gotta get out and show my unilateral NON-SUPPORT!!!
A boycott by 2% of the market.
“Not One Damn Gay” Day?????
What a lovely thought!
Sorry; I guess my comment requires thinking about something most folks never want to think about but especially right before lunch. My bad.
Only a day?
Well, let’s see, I’m not in need of a florist, interior decorator, choreographer, or hairdresser; so I guess I’m gonna be OK!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.