From: robertl@luciano.Stanford.EDU (Robert Lodenkamper)
Subject: Re: Gayspace
Organization: Stanford University
	<ROBERTL.92Jul28023505@luciano.Stanford.EDU>
	<l7b8j4INN31o@mizar.usc.edu>
Date: 28 Jul 92 14:20:16

In article <l7b8j4INN31o@mizar.usc.edu> adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson) writes:
   [...]
   Now we come to the tricky part.  In a fit of irritation, I suggested 
   that homophobes are welcome to leave West Hollywood if they don't 
   like the fact that the city government is responsive to the needs 
   and concerns of a vast number of its citizens.  Jess called me on it, 
   and I responded that I wasn't concerned if I sounded like I was bigoted
   against homophobes.

   Jess replied:
   | > >Well, perhaps you should be.  How can you have such a
   | > >callous disregard for the results of bigotry as to feign
   | > >being unconcerned at the same time as you complain about
   | > >being discriminated against?  Being unconcerned about it is
   | > >to have no moral stature at all.  You're surely not that
   | > >much of a cynic nor a nihilist, Arne.
   | 
   | > I will not cmpromise when it comes to gl issues.  Quite simply,
   | > in fact, there *is* no compromise.
   | 
   |[Bob] Who said anything about compromise?  My point (and, I
   |think, one of Jess's) is simply that our demands for rights are
   |not based on the meagre political power we have in a few isolated
   |cities (even though that power is necessary for progress to
   |occur).  Our demands are based on the ethical absolute that
   |invidious discrimination is wrong.

   I couldn't agree more with you here.  But I think you misunderstood
   me about compromise.  By refusing to compromise, I mean that I will 
   not let homophobes set the terms of the debate.

Yet you seem willing to engage them on their turf and play by their
rules.  You also take a position later on that is equivalent to the
claim that ethical considerations are irrelevant.

   I do not and will not accept the homophobic premise that AB 101,
   say, would have afforded us special rights or privileges.  In this
   instance, I do not and will not accept the homophobic premise that
   the attention my city government pays to gl issues is unseemly or
   wrong.  The city government is doing what city governments *should*
   do: it's responding appropriately to the needs and concerns of a
   huge number of its citizens.[...]

I agree that in this case the actions taken by the city seem
appropriate.  But the above actions are quite different from the "love
it or leave it" rhetoric you've used.

Also, this business of "responding to the needs and concerns of a huge
number of its citizens" is troublesome.  What about those citizens who
don't fall into one of the three political power blocks?  I agree that
in fact the government will be less responsive to their needs.  Do you
think that this is right?  Or are questions of right and wrong
irrelevant in the political arena?

   | So only a hypocrite would complain about discrimination against us and
   | then spout this "West Hollywood aka Queertown --- love it or leave it"
   | bilge.  
   | 
   | Avoiding hypocrisy is hardly a compromise.

   What can I tell you?  Is it irrational of me to want to fight homophobes
   tooth and nail?  What would you have me do?  Turn the other cheek?
   Let them exclude me -- us -- from the body politic?

False dilemma.  

   | > There is nothing to argue about; phobes have no position worth
   | > listening to.  [...]  Nothing is being taken *away* from said
   | > homophobes -- their protest is that we exist and that the city
   | > treats us like human beings.  I say "fuck you" to the phobes and I
   | > invite them to leave town on the next available bus.
   | 
   | Callous.  Maybe, just maybe, some of the phobes deserve that.  

   Oh, but there are some phobes who are really pretty nice?  Phobes
   you can do business with?

Phobes that have committed no crime meriting banishment.  Or is this
impossible? 

   | But what about those of us who are family and who cannot or will
   | not live in such areas as West Hollywood.  You've just said "fuck
   | you all" to us as well.  Your vicious, amoral, power-based
   | argument cuts both ways very nicely indeed, and quite literally
   | gives our enemies a license to kill (just as long as they don't
   | do it in West Hollywood).  Thanks.

   Fine, you can live in your dream world where nice things always happen 
   to nice people and where the justice of an argument alone is
   enough.  

Heh.  I've been called an idealistic dreamer --- first time for
everything, I suppose (callous cynic is a more common epithet).
You've just described the extreme of impractical idealism.  The other
end of that spectrum is a blighted, cynical realism that offers no
real hope for improvement.  Perhaps there is something better to be
had working between the extremes.

   Maybe I'm too cynical for my own good, but I firmly believe that the 
   justice of an argument counts for nothing without some power to back
   it up.

Then there really is no difference between our arguments and the
arguments of our enemies that is not due to the different power
levels of the respective groups?  How can you possibly believe that?
You say earlier that we are involved in a fight between good and evil,
which is true to a certain extent.  But here you deny the existence of
good and evil --- there is merely power.  

   Don't forget that I just lived through the riots here which were,
   in some sense, an explosion of rage by people who had legitimate
   grievances but no power to make anyone listen to them.

And here there is an appeal to justice for the powerless.  If there is
no justice, if there are no ideals, if the only good is power, then
the powerless deserve what they get.

Somehow I don't think that is what you mean, even though it is
basically what you've said.

- Bob
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