LGBT anarchists like Denver’s ‘Ariel Attack’ don’t represent the ideals of the majority of the LGBT community — and we need to make sure the mainstream knows that
Just a reminder, the right wing doesn’t have a lock on the lunatic fringe. Recently, the Democratic headquarters in Denver was attacked by vandals who smashed windows and generally tore up the outside of the building.
I admit that my first suspicion was a "right wing whacko," and given the level of rabble-rousing at recent Town Hall meetings by Republican activists, it seemed like a no-brainer.
Then Fox News announced that the person arrested was a Democrat, and perhaps the attack on the headquarters was a bid to win sympathy for the Democrats.
What the heck?
Well after a little — and I mean very little — digging, it turns out they are not telling the full story. Go figure?
The problem is the alleged attacker is part of the LGBT community — and that made me cringe.
Maurice Schwenkler, aka Ariel Attack, is a transgender person from Colorado, and her only involvement with the Democratic Party is this: Ariel had worked as a paid canvasser for a 527 organization, the Colorado Citizens’ Coalition, on behalf of a Democratic candidate for state representative last year.
Aside from the paid gig, Ariel has no affection for Democrats. In fact, she often writes for a blog with the title "Queers Against Obama."
That is hardly the kind of person Fox characterized in their stories.
Her connections with anarchist groups seems confirmed by the pleas on anarchist Web sites to aid in Ariel’s legal defense. In fact, according to the Denver Daily News, these groups managed to raise the $5,000 bail for Ariel online.
So while the right wing has a heyday with this alleged Democratic plot, the cold reality is this: A transgender radical is accused of vandalizing the Democratic headquarters because she was mad at the president. More troubling is that she was affiliated with a local group called Denver Bash Back.
The Fox News folks have yet to paint the LGBT community with their broad brush. They are too busy trying to blame this on the Democrats. But you can be sure they will get around to it.
Does this bother me? You bet it does.
I have often spoken of the need for LGBT people to shake off their complacency when it comes to obtaining their rights. I still say that. I still support marching in the street and making our demands for equality crystal clear.
The problem with this kind of activity is that it muddies the waters. How many people will be able to separate those protesting an unjust system by exercising their freedom of speech from these angry anarchists whose agenda includes bringing the entire system down?
I know African-Americans faced the same problem when the civil rights movement was at its height. Where the Southern Christian Leadership Conference marched in protest, groups like the Black Panthers took a much more militant stand. For a lot of white Americans it was tough to see the difference.
I know this because I watched my family in heated discussions late into the night about supporting civil rights but not wanting to be seen as supporters of violence.
Others were less thoughtful. It was easy to see scenes of violent riots juxtaposed with nonviolent marches being disrupted with fire hoses in the same newscast.
For many the difference was indiscernible — and that is what may happen now.
Once the words "violent transgender activist" start popping up in the mainstream news it won’t take long for some folks to begin seeing all LGBT people as dangerous. Confirming their fears, the actions of a small handful of LGBT anarchists could do big damage to the quest for equality.
Some might conjecture now would be a good time to slink back into the shadows until this all blows over. I don’t share that view.
I think now more than ever is time to be visible. America needs to see more and more of us. Participating in nonviolent protests and making our voices heard should not stop. It is part of our rights as citizens.
We must continue our longtime involvement in politics both national and local. We must be a visible presence in the public’s eyes as good citizens and good neighbors without disguising who we are.
We have to live as proud, out LGBT Americans who are everywhere in all walks of life.
If we don’t, the images of a few violent anarchists will look like the only face of LGBT people.
We can’t ignore the anarchists. They, too, are part of who we are.
But we can put them in perspective and that will take some soul searching on the part of all of us.
Hardy Haberman is a longtime local LGBT activist. His blog is at https://dungeondiary.blogspot.com.
This article appeared in the Dallas Voice print edition September 4, 2009.
You’ve shown a great deal of ignorance in this article. Instead of playing on stereotypes of anarchists, why don’t you do some research on anarchism? It’s not a unified movement – some of us believe in property destruction and some of us don’t. Some of us are violent (which does not include what Ariel Attack did) and others of us are not. Much of anarchism is not on the fringe. Housing co-ops, the IWW, and Food Not Bombs are all anarchist organizations – none of which are criminal organizations.
While I can understand your view point, and to some degree even agree with you, I must defend the “lunatic fringe”.
Much of what is taken for granted today was once considered impossible. Yet it was the lunatics that first raised the questions. The right to vote, racial and gender equality, trade unions to mention but a few. They were all considered outrageous and often illegal. Sure the lunatics can often be very wrong but in the end it is they who are the spearhead into the future.
Ariel Attack has the right idea, if we’re willing to settle for the Left now than what’s to keep us from settling for them later.
The Republicans are shit, we all agree, but Obama has made promises and so far has been more than hesitant to adress our needs.
We need to stop looking to politicians to help us and get in the business of helping ourselves. More action and less faction about fringes and what-not.
As someone who’s only been out of the closet for half a year, I expected to see an active and resistant community when I found out about Oak Lawn. Instead, all I’ve seen are liberals who do nothing but suck Obama’s dick.
If getting fringe gets us some results then let’s be a fringe. In every one of us there is an Ariel Attack waiting to come out. It’s not enough just to leave the closet, we gotta burn down the fuckin thing.
she is not part of the LGBT movement at all! she is a radical queer!
it’s not like the mainstream “LGBT” movement is really anything other than the heteronormative white lesbian and gay movement anyway!
“Muddying the waters?” I am not concerned with people muddying your waters when the mainstream LGBT movement has successfully overcrowded nearly every other worthwhile LGBT cause with MARRIAGE! MILITARY! ADVERTISING! and other things that simply don’t appeal to every queer person out there. Who started muddying these waters?
You are an amusing little clone, Hardy. Thanks for giving us some grist for the mill over at Queers Against Obama though.
I think it takes more courage to do what Ariel did (i.e., risked jail- as a trans person no less- to make a statement…one that clearly got heard, cuz you are writing about it) than to be an amateur white “gay Christian” male “journalist”, lol!
You keep fighting for your rights (the holy trinity of marriage, military service, & adoption) , you brave gay activist you!
As a long time queer activist I stand in support of Ariel 100%. How many years ago did I snuff out my candle light vigil stuff I don’t remember. I am happy to consider myself to be a part of the “lunatic fringe” rather then spend my time monkeying and wanting to have what the straights have. My goodness why would anyone want to pale their genes and be just like mommy and daddy is beyond me.
Coming from this 62 yr. old queer let me tell you I will never embrace what the straights have to offer and get under their thumb. Think about that Hardy.
You are perpetuating stereotypes and prejudices yourself, here, Hardy. One angry young woman does not a movement make. Queers Against Obama has a both a right and responsibility to employ it’s Free Speech to address the fact Obama has failed his promises to forward equality, has failed in his promises to move toward engotiation and peace instead of war, has utterly failed in using his immeasurable oratory skills to sell single-payer to a Nation that wants it.
You are the coward, the “house boy” of the tribe. Shame on you.
You are perpetuating stereotypes and prejudices yourself, here, Hardy. One angry young woman does not a movement make. Queers Against Obama has a both a right and responsibility to employ it’s Free Speech to address the fact Obama has failed his promises to forward equality, has failed in his promises to move toward engotiation and peace instead of war, has utterly failed in using his immeasurable oratory skills to sell single-payer to a Nation that wants it.
You are the coward, the “house boy” of the tribe. Shame on you.
And shame on you for deleting comments that disagree with yours. How positively predictably “Christian” of you.
Apparently you haven’t read any of my other work. I am highly critical of the Obama administration and feel he hasn’t delivered any of his campaign promises to the LGBT community.
Join me in Washington DC on October 11 for the March on Washington for Equality.
As far as being a “house boy” of the tribe, you also apparently don’t know protocol, that would be “Sir” to my friends.
Two versions of this same page huh? The first, which the Dallas Voice no longer links to, had too many responses critical of your article I guess, so you created a new one.
Very 1984 of you.
Hardy, I want to commend you for the professional reply to Diane’s comment. On the ORIGINAL page where she left this comment, you (almost wittily) replied,
“Apparently you haven’t read any of my other work. I am highly critical of the Obama administration and feel he hasn’t delivered any of his campaign promises to the LGBT community.
Join me in Washington DC on October 11 for the March on Washington for Equality.
As far as being a “house boy” of the tribe, you also apparently don’t know protocol, that would be “Sir” to my friends.”
If you are going to the Million Moron March in DC- and there’s a good essay about it in the blog that linked to the original page for this article and whose readers you tried to trick by creating this sanitized version- you are more of a house boy than Diane could ever imagine.
Oh, the page that originally hosted this article with the comments that you found SO objectionable that it caused you to violate the spirit of the 1st Amendment?
It’s at https://dallasvoice.com/artman/publish/article_11781.php.
So, will you censor this as well?
“Sir” would imply respect, and if you have friends, I have no idea how you earned that respect. Certainly not by asking them to be good little queers, be polite, not protest too much and definitely not upset the whitey homophobosphere.
You have evidently not read enough of QAO’s work, nor Ariels to brand them with the broad brush you have employed.
These should be your natural allies, and you have thrown them under the bus without ever questioning the why of any of it. You have reported without doing your research homework.
While I can think of many other more mature types of protests than the one Ariel is accused of, I have to be inspired by her willingness to take the consequences for her 24 yr old self’s actions. She is brave, if not perhaps carrying the brashness of youth.
(my reply in the unsanitized version to Hardy’s reply-how very christian of him to delete any dissenting views, yes?)
“Sir” would imply respect, and if you have friends, I have no idea how you earned that respect. Certainly not by asking them to be good little queers, be polite, not protest too much and definitely not upset the whitey homophobosphere.
You have evidently not read enough of QAO’s work, nor Ariels to brand them with the broad brush you have employed.
These should be your natural allies, and you have thrown them under the bus without ever questioning the why of any of it. You have reported without doing your research homework.
While I can think of many other more mature types of protests than the one Ariel is accused of, I have to be inspired by her willingness to take the consequences for her 24 yr old self’s actions. She is brave, if not perhaps carrying the brashness of youth.
cut the pussy shit
the old complacent farts who want to hide the fact that their kids are acting up need to reevaluate —- get out of your dimly lit loft sometime and hang out in a high school. see how long it takes you to get a fist pushed through the roof of your skull and how long after that you wanna call your fag buddies and put some baseball bats in the trunk next time you go to the club. see how well your reasoning tactics work when the person you’re reasoning with has nothing to gain from being friendly with homos i.e. votes and that wild prop-8-kinda money.
ariel rules and, for the record, bash back kicks ass. what you label as extremist dysfunction does NOT happen in a void; it happens because this shit doesn’t work for us anymore.
my 2 sense
Do a google search on trans violence over the past two weeks and let your heart touch the reality of what you find.
Thanks Hardy – I can always count on you to present a well reasoned and rational point of view even if I may not agree with your opinion 100% of the time, I always respect your take on things. Yes, there will always be a lunatic fringe who want to “act out” just for the sake of acting out.
I might even understand the acting out
IF it accomplished anything worthwhile and concrete however often these types of sporadic displays either result in property damage, personal violence, or other “displays” that turn other people off and these things play into the GLBT stereotype that some of the public has of our Community. If we want the respect of the broader public, we need to act like rational, civilized adults
that treat other people with respect even when we disagree with them.
This goes both ways, how many times have conservative lunatics been reported as angry MOBS and the norm of the conservative mentality.
The truth is that both sides are defined by thier most radical associates as well as assumed associates.
I am a Conservative Democrat and Veteran. I fit in very few categories, but have been accused of representing all of them.
Sometimes details are foggy, and it is a task for the accused to supply clarification.