Let’s Get Loud

Greetings readers, Robby from the Block here, basking in the post-Atlantis cruise glow. It was a glorious week sailing the gay seas along Mexico. We had such a great trip we already signed up for another cruise next year. Honestly, one of the unseen benefits of this vacation was just being out of the country – and the never-ending news cycle – for a few days.

Some quick background on me and news: every morning at the gym at 5 am I am usually watching the Kimmel and Colbert monologues from the night before. I also watch Lawrence O’Donnell. Throughout the day on the subway during prep periods at school and waiting for friends I am watching reels of the Abby Phillip show, the I’ve Had it Podcast and Brian Tyler Cohen. Throw in The View, and that’s my daily news intake.

And the news keeps getting worse and worse. I have been saying hopefully for months “the house of cards is starting to fall,” but Teflon Don keeps standing strong. As of press time, some of the headlines we are dealing with –

*We are 3 months into a war in Iran we supposedly won 2 months ago. The war has cost upwards of $50 billion dollars. (there is always money for war but never for feeding the poor)

*While Trump initially stated the East Wing ballroom project would be financed entirely by private donors, Republican lawmakers recently proposed a $1 billion taxpayer-funded package for broader White House security enhancements, causing debate about ultimate funding sources.

*In exchange for dropping his IRS lawsuit regarding leaked tax records, the DOJ agreed to end past and present government audits and tax claims into Trump, his family, and their businesses. The DOJ transferred $1.776 billion from the Treasury’s Judgment Fund into an account for alleged victims of political weaponization. The money is to be governed by a five-member commission appointed by the Attorney General. (Ex Proud Boys member leader Enrique Tarrio who was sentenced to 22 years in prison believes he is owed “tens of millions of dollars.”)

These are only three major news stories, three of dozens and dozens that leave us disheartened and despondent. This is an odd line we weave every day. We go about our lives, we have fun, have good times – just saw “The Lost Boys” on Broadway, and danced it out at the “Unspeakable Joy” party at 3DB in Brooklyn – but each morning I do wake up with a sense of dread that I didn’t have when Biden was President.

The one bright spot I can see is finally here: Pride month. I love Pride month. Always have always will. I am famous for saying each year, “Pride still matters. Maybe now more than ever.”

Be forewarned, though, each night we get to hear “Why do they need a whole month?” from Conservative pundits like Piers Morgan and Scott Jennings. The more conservatives bitch about Pride month, the more obnoxiously queer I plan to be! Absolutely loved when the @thedemocrats Thread handle clapped back at Stephen Miller writing – ‘shut up you ugly f*ck.’ YES MORE OF THIS ENERGY PLEASE. Its time to fight fire with more f***ing fire!

The last Sunday in June is revered in NYC. It is when Heritage of Pride launches the NYC Pride Parade as it has been doing since June 28, 1970 in what was then known as the Christopher Street Liberation March. This year’s Grand Marshalls include drag performer Peppermint, SNL comedian Bowen Yang, and the activist group Gays Against Guns (GAG).

I will be front and center, marching alongside GAG, a group I have worked with, been a member of, marched with, and protested with for many years. What an honor it is for the group to be named Grand Marshalls.

Kimberly Miller, GAG Art Director, spoke about the honor to me, saying,” When the Pulse massacre happened, I was on tour in Miami, having just been in Orlando the day before. I had lost an uncle to gun violence in 1979 and a softball teammate in 1995, so I had been a gun violence prevention advocate for decades, and when I heard about Pulse and heard that a group called Gays Against Guns was forming I thought, well, that’s exactly who I am; gay and against guns. I was at the very first meeting and I’m very proud of the work we’ve done in the past 10 years to inform Americans about the insanity of the gun culture in this country. “

So this June, my fellow readers, it’s time to get loud. March, Protest, Donate, and most importantly, VOTE VOTE. VOTE in every single election. As cheesy as it sounds: it always is the darkest before the dawn, good does prevail over evil, and we might have lost the battle – but we are gonna win the war.

Even though lately I sometimes waver and sometimes feel disheartened and despondent, thinking these mantras might not actually be true, I do believe in them more days than I don’t! And I believe in Pride every day of the year! Happy Pride month, bitches!

(this column was originally published in the June edition of “Letters from Camp Rehoboth.”)

MEMORIES OF THE NYC GAY PRIDE PARADES

BY GUEST WRITER VINCENT POMILIO

On Saturday June 14th I took part in the No Kings rally in Hudson, NY. Every small town in the
Hudson Valley had some sort of No Kings event. Being Hudson, there was a strong LGBTQ
presence with very creative outfits and signage. The feeling of change in the air was mixed with frustration, anger and fear. A feeling of hopelessness pervaded. Yet with so many people gathered together to express these feelings, it also gave one hope that we can change things, make them better, topple the evil empire.

There was the same feeling in these rallies as events in the 1970’s when I took part in anti-Vietnam War marches and early Gay Rights demonstrations. How little things have changed. We made such progress and yet, here we are again. The gains we have made over the last few decades now seem so fragile and tenuous.

The rally in Hudson, NY reminded me of the first Gay Rights March I attended. It was 1973.
It was only four years after Stonewall, yet much had changed in those four years. I had just graduated college and had an art teaching job lined up at Conestoga Valley High School in
Lancaster, PA. I had come out the previous summer while working as a cook in Cape May, NJ

My coming out was traumatic as I had been outed by a fellow student who saw me at a gay bar in Reading, PA called The Green Door. She was a waitress at the restaurant attached to the bar. Within days, news of my gayness spread on campus. I was shunned by some fellow classmates and a couple of my roommates were forced to move out by their parents so as not to be associated with me.

I soon had a boyfriend, Tim Riley, who lived in Philadelphia, my hometown. It was Tim’s idea to go to the Gay Rights March in New York in 1973. One month before the march, I had been interviewed by the principal and another art teacher at the
high school in Lancaster. Mr. Kennedy was the principal and Mr. Dreibelbis was the art teacher. Turns out, Mr. Dreibelbis was gay and really wanted me to get the job. The principal appealed to me to get a haircut and lose my beard before he agreed to hire me. I refused but got the job anyway.

A month after getting hired for the job, with a big chunk of the summer still ahead, Tim and I headedto NYC for the Gay March. That year it started at Columbus Circle and went down Fifth Ave to Washington Square Park. As we were lining up, a small crowd gathered along the sidelines to see what was going on

As we were waiting to start moving , I spotted Principal Kennedy with his wife and another couple watching with looks of horror on their faces at all of these freakish homos. I tried my best to be inconspicuous and to this day never knew whether or not he saw me with the other gay marchers. The march was so amazing. It was homespun and incredibly upbeat and we all felt so proud to be a part of it. I couldn’t believe how many people took part. There were people as far as you could see up and down Fifth Avenue. Washington Square was a giant block party with great music and dancing and a collective feeling that were doing something important and that it might make a difference.

In 1976, I moved to NYC to do graduate work in painting at NYU. I loved my new life in New York
City; it was a great time to be young and gay in NY. Tim and had broken up but remained close friends. Tim and I took part in the Pride March each year until his death from AIDS in 1988. In 1978 I met a guy who I had been lusting after for the last couple of years, Tom Hinckley. Tom and I hit it off, fell in love and began a life together. Tom was handsome and brilliant. Tom was seven years older and came from Massachusetts Mayflower stock. The Hinckleys spent summers in Maine; I was an Italian American kid who spent summers at the Jersey Shore.

I am recalling Tom here along with the Gay Pride Parades for many reasons. We spent 16 years
together until his death from AIDS in 1994. Tom had been very involved with ACTUP. He wrote for the Treatment and Data Digest, a bi-monthly publication that presented news of HIV drug treatments and research from the CDC. His work here was very important as he was great at translating medical information into laymen’s terms so we could all understand it. Tom’s death was the Friday before the 25th anniversary of Stonewall and the big Pride March was to be held on the last Sunday of June 1994.

That whole week I had been going back and forth with Tom’s family to Saint Vincent’s
Hospital. They had left before he died. He slipped into unconsciousness and died right after I had left the hospital for a few hours to try and get some sleep. I was able to return to the hospital and be with him along with a few friends to say our goodbyes. I have never felt so alone.

While walking back to my apartment on Morton Street, there were huge crowds of gay people fromall over the world gathering for the 25th anniversary of Stonewall. Celebrations were happening all around me which made my grief that much harder to bear. I took refuge in my apartment but could hear music and partying going on all over the West Village. I got through the night and on Saturday joined friends to watch a movie at their apartment and try to cheer up. Tom would have wanted me to go out and join in all the partying going on. I just couldn’t get into it. His death wasn’t sudden. It was a year of pain and suffering and adjusting to each tragic stage of Tom’s physical decline. The worst stage was when he could no longer walk. Yet Tom was so emotionally strong through all of this and was determined not to make my plight worse than it already was.

There was one incident that is so painful to recall. We were going to the M and O market on the corner of Thompson and Prince Streets. Tom was in a wheelchair. A car load of thugs with Jersey plates rolled down their windows and hollered, “I hope you all die of AIDS, faggots.” Tom hollered obscenities back at them, never backing down.

The Sunday of the Pride Parade was a gorgeous late June day. I was not sleeping well and didn’t know what to do with myself and my profound sadness. There was also some sense of relief knowing Toms suffering was over and my caretaking responsibilities were also over. I got a call from my friend Art McGuire inviting me to attend the parade with them. It felt inappropriate, but what else was I going to do that day? Sit in the apartment and be horribly depressed?

I met Arthur, his partner Alistair and our friend Steven Weinstock for breakfast at LeBonboniere, a greasy spoon diner on Hudson Street. The March met downtown and moved up to Central Park that year. It turned out to be a great idea to be around friends and take part in this major event. Tom was there in spirit. The mood of the crowd was jubilant with streets packed with onlookers cheering and dancing.

We reached the

park and there was a pause before entering the park for the big after party. One of the speakers
announced that there would be a moment of silent meditation to honor those that died of AIDS. My friends all gathered around me and gave me a big collective hug. There was never a more moving, heart breaking and deafening silence. Never was silence more meaningful. So many of our friends had died in the last four or five years. I remember the feeling of despair turning into hope during that moment of silence. You could hear many people crying. The silence seemed to last an eternity. In the end there was a feeling of love, community and collective grief. We had all been touched by this. It brought us closer together.

Over the years, the parade has changed. It has become a big block party with corporate sponsors. It’s a great opportunity to have fun, but don’t let your guard down. Times are changing. Many battles have been fought and won but there are many forces that are working hard to take it away.

my husband Bob Bohan, my cousin Heather Brown, her girlfriend, and me. This is at the Parade on 6th avenue.

KNOW YOUR GAY HISTORY

GRID. Oscar Wilde. Friend of Dorothy. The Mattachine Society. Edie Winsor. If you know who or what all five of those mean…congratulations you know your gay history!

Gay history is American history. Queer history is American history. Gay people have always existed – we have always been here. And, as it has always been throughout history, it is up to us to teach others our collective history. As I have said in this column before – the queer community takes care of itself.

It is my honor and privilege to announce the beginning of a monthly class at the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Community Center (The Center) in NYC called – none other than – “Know Your Gay History.”

In creating this class and working on the curriculum I started reminiscing about my own personal gay history. Growing up gay in the 1970s-1990s was a completely different experience than growing up gay in the 2000s-2020s. Like night and day doesn’t even begin to cover how different it was. For me growing up in the 80s anything gay was honestly non-existent. There was NO ONE one for me to look up to or look at and see any sort of representation.

Yes, there were blips here and there. Billy Crystal in “Soap,” Harry Hamlin, and Michael Ontkean in “Making Love,” (also starring the beloved Kate Jackson.) The television shows “Maude” and “All in the Family” each introduced a gay character and started the dialogue. But I wasn’t even born when those episodes aired. I had no frame of reference or way to find a movie like “Making Love.” Remember this was a full two decades before the glorious World Wide Web existed.

Slowly the world evolved – the USA eons slower than a large majority of the rest of the civilized world – and change happened. “Will and Grace” and “Queer as Folk,” debuted on our television screens. Movies like “Trick” and “The Broken Hearts Club” spoke to us and made us feel seen. Sean Penn, Christopher Plummer, Cate Blanchett, Jared Leto, Eddie Redmayne and Mahershala Ali all won or were nominated for Oscars playing queer characters. After decades and decades of marching and protesting, marriage equality was finally passed in 2015. (If the current Presidential Administration plans on taking it away from us they are gonna have to pry it from my cold dead hands…and I ain’t even married.)

Queer culture has changed throughout history as well. Case in point, we have reclaimed the word queer – “Queer Nation,” “Queer Eye” – it’s no longer a slur. We have adopted it as our own with members of our community identifying as queer.

These younger generations came up in a more accepting world. The world that we created for them. We wanted them to be able to live openly and freely. We wanted their youth to be different from ours — and we achieved that. As Billy Eichner famously says in “Bros,” the first queer led romantic comedy, “Of course they are happy. They had Glee. We had AIDS.”

With that happiness and change, sometimes there is pushback or backlash. And some of that comes from within our own community. I mean we only have to look back to the “No fats, No Femmes, No Asians,” that used to be littered on sex apps to know that gay on gay discrimination exists. (Now it’s “No Total Bottoms” but that’s a discussion for another time.)

Different pronouns and guys wearing nail polish are just two examples of how queers in different generations express themselves. “It’s just not for me,” “I don’t get it,” or “They don’t even know who Judy Garland is,” are frequently heard phrases from some 65-year-old gay men talking about a 21-year-old gay person.

Of course they are different. Forty four years is a lifetime! There are so many aspects of gay culture that Gen Z has no frame of reference for including – who Harvey Milk, Harvey Firestein and Divine were. Or why Anita Bryant is so rightfully despised and why Cher is so universally adored. Cue the “Know Your Gay History” class.

Even with generational divides and differences we have to remember, as members of the queer community, we have MUCH more in common than different. Let’s celebrate those differences! And we can never forget that we are stronger together. Our umbrella needs every single letter LGBT and Q. Two trans women of color – Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera – are credited with throwing the 1st brick at Stonewall. Although neither have said so personally. The lesbian community stepped up and served as caregivers to the countless gay men dying of AIDS in the 1980s.

Our queer history is long and rich. It’s time we all Know Our Gay History, aka American History!

To register for the Gay History class – tinyurl.com/knowyourgayhistory

(This column was originally published in the April edition of “Letters from Camp Rehoboth.”)