a counter-example…to Hate
Two days ago, I did my annual Rosh Hashonah ritual and spent the day solo on my beloved Mt. Tamalpais, pondering the year that was (oy) and what I might do to help make the following year better. I ran down the Cataract trail to the waters where RJ’s ashes are scattered and made tashlich, the ritual tossing of bread crumbs into moving water while announcing one’s shortcomings with a wish to do better, as the crumbs wash away. I forgot the bread, so I used pieces of nearby bay leaves. It felt similar enough.
The day was also the 53rd anniversary of meeting RJ, my first long-time partner and soul mate. We met at what he always liked to call “the only Gays for McGovern headquarters in the universe.” It was 1972 and the Alice B. Toklas Gay Democratic Club, as it was then called, paid for the store front next to the site of Café La Mediterranée, not quite yet on the scene. I was confident McGovern was going to beat Nixon because everyone I knew was going to vote for him. Ah, to be 23 and full of oneself.
Two days after our meeting, 53 years ago today, RJ and I, accompanied by two of his best friends, one of whom would end up on the Illinois Supreme Court, were excited to attend a rally where George McGovern himself would appear. We went down to Fisherman’s Wharf, where McGovern was being feted by San Francisco political royalty inside Alioto’s restaurant. There was a huge crowd outside, waiting patiently—at first—for McGovern to address the crowd, as the promotional fliers promised. But it soon became apparent that he was there to woo large campaign contributors and the organizers just wanted a big crowd outside for publicity.
Fresh off several years of gay activism in NYC, I had a fun idea of what might work. I started a singing chant to the tune of “Frère Jacques” that went “George McGovern, George McGovern, where are you, where are you? Hiding in the restaurant, hiding in the restaurant, shame on you, shame on you!” The crowd loved it and picked it up with great gusto and started doing rounds. RJ and his pals looked at me with expressions of uh oh, how did we end up with this guy? But very soon thereafter, Assemblyman Willie Brown came out onto the balcony of the restaurant to announce that McGovern wanted to greet us. And he did, and the crowd went wild. And that’s our meet-cute story.
So here it is, more than half a century later, and I look back wistfully on our innocence and optimism and desire for a better world.
In these insane days, with the bad guys promoting hatred and divisiveness, I am buoyed to have a counter-example I am keenly familiar with: the daunting odds we faced and overcame to see so many of the goals of the queer liberation movement achieved.
The hearts and minds of so many of our countryfolk, hardened against us at the start, melted when our message of kindness, individual autonomy, authenticity and inclusiveness resonated with them.
It can happen again.