Every comment that anyone adds here to any of the Instant Tea blog posts has to be approved by someone on the editorial staff before it is “published” (made visible to any non-staff reader). We try to be very careful about not approving posts that violate our terms of use, but we also try to be careful not to stifle the free exchange of ideas here on the blog, even when we don’t agree with some of the ideas being exchanged.
As senior editor, it is my job to read all the comments and if one has been approved that shouldn’t have been, then it is my job to delete it.
The reason I said all that is to make the point that I read most — if not all — the comments posted on Instant Tea. And in doing so, one thing that really stands out to me is the number of people who find their way to this blog and who complain because a post happens to identify someone as gay.
Here is a case in point, a comment posted to Rich Lopez’s blog about Judas Priest and gay frontman Rob Halford winning a Grammy: “Who is this fool that just had to add the comment about JPs frontman being gay? Report the fact the the band won the Grammy and keep your personal feelings aside fumbduck! Thanks Priest for all your hard work and your great influence to Heavy Metal music!”
Well, you fumbduck (and everybody else who posts this kind of comment on a GAY NEWS WEBSITE), here’s the deal: We are writing about LGBT news and entertainment stories for an LGBT audience. We write about these people — entertainers and politicians and whoever — because they have some connection to an LGBT issue, and we point out that they are LGBT because that is part of writing about LGBT issues for an LGBT audience.
Got it?
Excuse me, but aren’t gay’s trying to get to the point where their sexuality is irrelevant?
Doesn’t constantly identifying someone as “gay” or incessant specualtion about someone’s sexual orientation keep gays back?
You know, I think that’s a very good question and certainly a valid point. I am just speaking for myself, of course, but this is my answer to the question:
My sexual orientation is – or at least should be – irrelavant to whether I am qualified for a job, to whether I deserve the same rights, duties and responsibilities as any other American citizen, to whether I am a good parent. Just like a person’s skin color, race, ethnic background, religion and so on are irrelavant to all those same things.
By my sexual orientation is part of my identity, it makes me a member of a specific community and give me a common culture, of sorts, with other people in that community. It’s just like how other communities recognize, honor and celebrate – and yes, name – those in their community who have accomplished something special. Like winning a Grammy.
Like I said, that’s just my take on it.
As long as homophobes continue to rant, it will be necessary to point out that yes, there are homosexual metal artists, and sports players, and republicans, and teachers, and on and on.
When the homophobes stop whining, then we will be equal, and then we’ll stop talking about it.
I’m not into rock, so what interested me about the blog comment in question is finding out that the frontman for Judas Priest is gay. Otherwise, I wouldn’t care that they won a Grammy. Instant Tea is a specialty blog for the LGBT community and anyone who’s interested in us and/or shares our interests. So of course sexual orientation is an important element of most items on the blog. Thanks, Tammye!
We’re gay?
Does Kristina know?
Rob Halford is clearly gay, and has said he’s gay. That is where the leather outfits JP fans so enjoy came from.
As long as there are people VOTING on our rights based upon their own primitive fear and their own pea-brained ducked-up fumbed-down lame stereotypes of LGBT people, then it is essential that every LGBT person come out as LGBT. If at some future time we could have a TRUE National Coming Out Day in which all LGBT would reveal themselves to those around them, our fight for equality would be over. Instant(tea)aneously. The massive who/what/where of the sheer numbers would astound and overwhelm. The national gasp from people VOTING against us would be ducking loud as they looked around to see their son or daughter, parent, uncle, grandma, teacher, doctor, vet, coworker, deacon, letter carrier, neighbor, broker, legislator, dentist…and Rob Halford would just be one among millions. And we would WIN.
It’s not Instant Tea or any other entity “constantly” talking about LGBT people and issues that’s holding us back. It’s the fumbducks VOTING against us and the LGBT peeps who do NOT say a damn thing about themselves being LGBT who are holding us back.