THE GAY CONSPIRACY

a manifesto

utrage is dead.  Forms of protest once fueled by genuine injustice are now co-opted by the elites in power. Once, African-American activists protested their second-class treatment by actions ranging from peaceful sit-ins to the inflammatory rhetoric of the Black Panthers.  Gay activists responded to the decimation of loved ones through the bracing rage of groups like ACT-UP.  Now we see the likes of Ann Coulter and Bill O'Reilly -- mouthpieces of the conservative elite -- foaming similarly at the mouth, but at villains made of straw: often at the very same people who coined this rage, who invented its power.  That power is now everybody's.  Just raise your voice, and you, too, can feel like a victim.

        Anger is no longer the answer.  The conservative elites have stolen its power, and their role, now, is to forever whip people into a froth.  And whether one gets into a liberal froth or a conservative froth means nothing to them.  As long as we're frothed, they've won, because through their vicious sleight-of-hand, discussion is dead.  The shrillest one wins, and it's always them.  A closed heart is unassailable, while an open heart must take its arrows.

         I write this to the open-hearted.  I want to open a vein of discussion that runs utterly parallel to the enraged chatter that fills our lives.

         Are you loving as much as you can?

        "Love" is a horribly maligned word.  It's been dragged through all sorts of mud, and in terms of political protest (which is ultimately my topic), the idea of love reeks uncomfortably of the 60's.  The counterculture movement of the 60's began with a very good idea, this idea of love, but soon the idea of love became a battering ram in what would eventually be known as "the culture wars."  It got ugly and trite and oversimplified by Right and Left alike.

I refer to a love more aligned with the sort Christ was talking about.  (The real Christ, of course, and discussion of how He was co-opted is another matter entirely.  Choose your deity, because they all get back to the same thing.)  This kind of love is nuanced, unsimple.  It requires work.  Anger and fear do not.

Scratch that.  Anger and fear need a constant, heart-killing maintenance.  Love requires a chilling out, a reluctance to rush to judgment, an ability to fully embrace life in its complications.  It requires vigilance, yes, but not the same sort of effortful propping-up as anger/fear.  Because an open heart is right.  It is correct.  And it is forever at risk.

To have an open heart is only for the brave.

The political movement I propose is not for the professional activist.  It's not about the thrilling vigor of raising your middle finger to the powers that be.  Outrage is dead.  And I warn now that embracing such turmoil and drama only makes you a quantifiable commodity to be reduced.

The Gay Conspiracy cannot be reduced.

et's begin with the "Gay" part.  In full disclosure, I write this as a gay male.  I've always been amused by the idea, less popular now but still in existence, that there's some secret cabal of gay people who are attempting to overthrow society through secret meetings and such.  In truth, it's one of the virtues and downfalls of any assembled group of gay people that we could never agree on the basic ground rules of a meeting, much less fulfill some complicated, diabolical plot.  But the idea of a "gay conspiracy" strikes me as a good start.

But I wouldn't want to exclude people who don't prefer members of the same gender.  I want all of my friends around.  So I've decided that the Gay Conspiracy is all-inclusive -- and to be Gay, from now on, one does not have to have any homosexual preferences whatsoever.  If you want to be Gay, you're in.  I thus offer a hearty welcome to any and all interested straight people.  You are now Gay.

Life is a teetering balance of masculine and feminine energies.  And it is in the interest of the conservative elite that these two energies remain as separate as possible, because when the two combine, nuance happens.  The carefully constructed social order spins out of control.  The one exception, where the two energies may mix, is heterosexual sex, where male and female gloriously combine and new life emerges, especially if one has no access to birth control.  And even this procreative act is carefully policed by the religious arm of the conservative elite. 

In their world, you must exhibit the appropriate energy assigned to your container.  Otherwise, mockery will ensue, at the very least.  At most, assassination.

            But creativity emerges from the friction between these two energies.  And so does, I believe, a certain level of understanding.  Gay people contain both of these energies by our very natures, and if God has any special children on Earth, I strongly believe we are they.

            But like I said, I throw open the doors to Gay.  It has nothing, really, to do with one's sexual ideal.  It's a willingness to honor both the masculine and feminine in one's self and others.  That notion, more than anything, terrifies the conservative elite.  Which leads to anger.  Which leads to fear.  Which leads to fostering anger and fear in good people.

            An open heart must take its arrows.  But the Gay Conspiracy breeds people strong of heart.  Mockery, withering condescension, reductiveness, we invite them.  When we are disparaged, it only increases our karma, so it's like getting a present.

            The Gay Conspiracy is not a Gay rights organization.  The Gay Conspiracy seeks to cure the tenor of discussion that's befouling America.  Our aim is to relieve this country of the anger and fear promoted by the conservative elite.  Anger and fear will be seen as what they are: trifling emotions for small people.  In the frenzy these emotions foster, genuine discussion perishes.

            Everyone is pointing their finger at "values" as the big persuader these days.  But when did "values" come to mean stopping other people from behaving?  Isn't loving one's neighbor as we would like to be loved a value as well?  In most religions, from non-Fundementalist Islam to non-Fundamentalist Christianity, isn't it precisely the axis?

             If we can encourage a mode of thinking that will allow for open-hearted and honest discourse, every single issue that concerns us will move toward a rightful and honest solution.  The environment, women's rights, economic injustice, foreign affairs, war, gay rights, education, healthcare.  We cannot be activists for these one at a time, because the underlying sickness is not being addressed, and concerned people become just another shrill voice.  The entire nature of discourse must be thrown out.  A new language must be invented.

cratch that.  We know the language already, but lost it.  Today, all discussion of life in America begins with the assumption that feeling charity toward others is completely lame, well worth the scathing mockery of the Rush Limbaughs of the world.  Today, the proper way to begin discussion is with the assumption that all decisions in life must have as their axis the accumulation of money.  That's the manly, hairy-chested way to think.  It's frankly difficult to imagine an America where discussion could begin any other way.

            The Right has long trafficked in a sepia-toned nostalgia.  So as they now traffic in an outrage that rightfully belongs to the minimized, I will traffic in their territory as well.  Fade to sepia:

            Let us look back to a simpler time, as the past always is because the people there ignorantly know nothing of what the future holds.  A time before television and its reductive capabilities.  I look to a time when people did not seek elected officials who resembled themselves as closely as possible -- all too often, ignorant, uncurious, fearful.  I reflect on a time when beauty of thought was valued, when articulation, nuance, and generosity were admirable qualities.

            So sip on your Ovaltine and imagine these words crackling over your new-fangled radio:

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much.  It is whether we provide enough for those who have little.

True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence.  People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

That was FDR.  May I note that time has proven him a popular president.

Let's look even further back:

This [all men are created equal] is the sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independence.  Now, my friends, can this country be saved upon that basis?  If it can, I will consider myself one of the happiest men in the world, if I can help save it.  If it cannot be saved upon that principle, it will be truly awful.  But if this country cannot be saved without giving up that principle, I was about to say I would rather be assassinated on this spot, than surrender it.

That's Abraham Lincoln.  May I note that he, too, is much-admired?

Having sorted through hundreds of quotes by our current President, I realized that to include his words is like shooting fish in the proverbial barrel.  This is not to say he has not uttered beautiful phrases or made generous overtures -- indeed he has, lovely utterances regarding the cleanness of our air, the value of family, the sad position of the underprivileged.  But to say good words and screw one's face into the appropriate position while saying them will not satisfy the Gay Conspiracy.

The conservative elites in power labor to come across as folksily as possible.  While their actual deeds are sorely punishing to the minimized and underprivileged, their folksiness provides a nice comforting cushion, their monosyllabic words as soothing as a sultry breeze drifting over a Texas savannah.  "How could that plain-spoken fella want to hurt us?" people think.  "He's just like me.  He wants to protect me and my family."  That they're getting their wallets raped, their jobs raped, and their children's futures raped raped raped, doesn't add up somehow.

Meanwhile, the "liberal elite" is a buncha highfalutin', un-American evildoers.  We, the ones who give a shit about the less privileged, the ones who note that nothing practical has been done to secure our nation from another terrorist attack, we are snobby snots laughing from our Soho lofts at the poor and undereducated.

Bullshit.  How did we let this happen?  Because our hearts are open and we didn't fight back.  We didn't call the mockery of the conservative elite what it is: a lie, a bullying tactic, and a distraction.  And having thus vanquished them, we'll get back to discussing the actual beneficiaries of those tax cuts.

hat is strength?  Is this perhaps the most essential question of all?

     The Gay Conspiracy wants to reestablish the very nature of strength.  Mr. O'Reilly, what is more cowardly than shutting down a controversial idea before it can be fully articulated?  Ms. Coulter, what makes you more of a sissy than discounting the suffering of good, honest people?  Why erect those walls of rage unless you're a lily-livered jellyfish inside?  You emotional infants, are you loving as much as you can?

         The Gay Conspiracy is a group of spiritual warriors.  We will bravely lead with our hearts and call appalled attention to those who don't.  Our work does not necessarily make good television, because in the midst of the vitriol TV fosters, the best one can do is to make sure one is still breathing.

        The Gay Conspiracy does not foster a specific political agenda.  It's a movement of the spirit, and our refusal to specify will make us difficult to reduce.

        Beneath everything we do lies a deadly seriousness.  Love.  Thy.  Fucking.  Neighbor.  Or we will all die.