I originally wrote this as just a comment to a comment to John Wright’s post immediately below this. But I wanted to make sure more people read it.
What passes for “pro-gay” these days:Â
Before readers like Anna bend over backward in praise of Jackie Floyd’s homoliberalism, here’s a reminder. When “Brokeback Mountain” came out, Floyd wrote a piece for the DMN with the cringe-inducing headline, “‘Brokeback ignores plight of spouses.” Her take: A love story about two closeted men was deeply flawed — she claimed to be “annoyed” — because the screenplay had no sympathy for the wives of Jack and Ennis.
Let’s overlook for just a moment that she was downright wrong about that; in fact, Ennis’ wife is portrayed as something of a victim herself, cuckolded and brokenhearted when she discovers the truth (Michelle Williams justly received an Oscar nomination for the performance). But the movie touches, as much as it needs to, the tragedy to EVERYONE resulting from social norms that didn’t (don’t?) permit people to openly love whomever they love. But I wonder if Floyd is “annoyed” that “Romeo & Juliet” “doesn’t give enough space to why Lord Montague hates Lord Capulet; after all, children can’t be expected to know as much as their parents — there are probably decent reasons for the family feud — why does Shakespeare give short shrift to the real victims of the doomed love affair, mom and dad?”
In Floyd’s own words: “One of the characters sums up the bleak reality of his marriage when he says, ‘I guess I’m stuck with what I’ve got here.’ He makes it sound like jail.” Anyone who DOESN’T believe that being required to hide your identity is WORSE than jail doesn’t “get” being gay. If that makes FLoyd “pro-gay,” god save us from those who are just indifferent.
The DMN is lucky Floyd isn’t their film critic. I think we’re all lucky she’s not the HRC’s spokesperson, too.
At the risk of turning Instant Tea into a tagteam against Floyd, I would agree that we need to be very careful about whom we’re willing to accept as allies. We’ve been let down too many times before, and what’s that old saying about how friends can be the worst enemies?
Perhaps there was a time when we were so desperate for acceptance that we would have worshipped Floyd for what she wrote the other day. But that time has passed. What we are fighting for now is not just freedom from anti-gay bigotry, but full equality.