Monday, June 18, 2018
From Us Gearboxes
The next morning began with Joe and I heading over to the laundromat to do piles and piles of laundry. The web site had been wrong about the opening time so we were there an hour early. I rolled down to the flags intent on taking a picture. We both chose not to make it a 'selfie' because, well, we couldn't. Just couldn't.
I know we are told to live in the present but any thinking, reflecting human being knows that the present has echoes of the past that will reverberate into the future. Joe had been horribly bullied in school with a nickname so vile I won't even record here, except to say that it targeted his sexuality and his masculinity and his right to belong. I met Joe in CARIHI the high school here in grade 12, and that's were our relationship began.
CARIHI apparently has done things to be more inclusive to lgbt2sqq kids now, but, then, violence, social, verbal, psychological and physical were to be expected if we were ever caught. Other kids, the straight ones were dating and making very public displays of their love, their orientation and their expectation of welcome. Everywhere you looked the constant celebration of heterosexual pride and privilege was on display.
The most common word linked to homosexuality back then was one we still don't understand to this very day. It was 'gearbox' or more accurately 'fucking gearboxes.' People we knew, were never people who knew us, we couldn't allow that to happen, we learned to pretend in public and live in private, but those we knew threw that word, and others around all the time, fully confident that there were none of 'those' here.
CARIHI was a place of welcome for most and terror for us. There were so many ways to slip up. So many opportunities to be suddenly seen. Every single day, every single moment, was one of either fear or terror or anticipation of social violence. High school was a dangerous place, high school should have been full of memories - happy ones, not the ones we carry.
Campbell River, too, was a mill town. Men were men and, when people say that as a good thing, I tremble. Those good men would turn evil at the suggestion that a fucking gearbox might be in the vicinity. Campbell River did not value diversity in a variety of ways, and so we lived on the margins trying desperately to exist without notice. Our love made us vulnerable. Think about that.
And now, there's the Pride flag.
And now, there's a Pride celebration.
We're glad of that, the both of us, but ... how can anyplace embrace Pride without the acknowledgement that Pride is not something gifted by city council, Pride was something that people fought to have, in places like this, and against all odds.
How can Campbell River celebrate Pride now when in inflicted Shame then?
Where is the apology?
Where is the acknowledgement of the damage done?
If you actively participate in smashing someone's windows, you apologize and then you fix.
But if you actively participate in smashing someone's soul, you look up at a flag and wonder at how far you've come.
We both wish the citizens, all the citizens, of Campbell River a happy Pride celebration. However as people who come from before, we know your hearts, show us that you've changed. Not by flying a flag, but by acknowledging your history, and pledging, no more.
No.
More.
Well said.
ReplyDeleteJust as there are lots of excuses for bad behavior but no 'good' reason, there are lots of apologies but no making of amends in a real or symbolic way to groups or individuals who are dehumanized ('othered" as you put it) in the present, the recent past, and the distant past.
Talk is cheap..and your actions speak louder than your words. And the actions you take when no one is watching to praise you or ridicule you for your act are the ones that speak loudest.
It's easy to 'talk the talk' but much harder to humbly 'walk your talk.'
And to get up and keep walking even when you stumble.
It takes a long time for anyone who has been dehumanized to begin to lose some of that wariness and mistrust...and it takes at least a full generation for the damage done to human psyches heals enough so that the following generation will not suffer the effects of the terrorism of verbal abuse.
Thanks for letting me borrow your microphone for a few minutes, Dave.