There was a "March For Equality" in Washington yesterday. While such gatherings are a good way for disparate folks from all over to come together, to fell not quite so alone, for the most part, I think they are a huge waste of time.
In 1993, I participated in a huge March for Equality. Nearly a million people, lining up on the Mall, listening to speakers, comedians and comediennes, singers, activists while the line inched so slowly up Pennsylvania Ave, past the White House and toward the Capitol. It was a sunny April day, not too hot, with a nice breeze. As the group with whom I was marching made their way from the Metro stop to the spot where we would get in line, we walked past a homeless man, sleeping on the sidewalk, his few belongings pressed close to him. As my group walked on, talking about the need for equality, about working to make the country better for LGBT folk, some actually stepped over the homeless man without looking at him. Later, as we stood around waiting, that image flashed through my mind as I listened to speaker after speaker insist that the march was about protecting individuals, about promoting a more just society, about encouraging diversity. All the speakers, except one, were white. Most of the marchers, not only from my own admittedly limited vantage point, but also from news reports seen after the fact, seemed to be middle to upper-middle class. All looked well-fed, well-dressed, and the biggest inconvenience seemed to be the wait to get water to keep off the effects of standing in the sun.
The image of that homeless man, curled up asleep, while all a group of earnest, impassioned folk walked by without noticing, haunted me. Even as I walked up Pennsylvania Ave, past the White House, past counter-protesters holding signs telling me I was going to hell, I wondered if that man managed to get out of the way before the crowd overwhelmed him. Did he manage to find a spot, maybe under one of the overpasses in SW Washington, or perhaps further up the Mall in some shrubs, where it would be cool and quiet?
Finally, I left the line, around the Old Post Office. When Lisa got back, she asked me why I left. Was I hot or otherwise uncomfortable, she asked.
No, I said. I was angry. I was angry because of the refusal by some who claim allegiance to something they call Divine Justice, not even to see a human being sleeping on a sidewalk even as they went to protest injustice. Who, I asked, was marching for this man? Did he have a mental illness, or an addiction, that made it difficult for him to hold down a job, or maintain a place of his own? Where was the insistence that this man, too, deserved our concern, our support, perhaps even a march of his own?
While not at all denying the reality that we are in need of legal guarantees of protection for sexual minorities in this country, I find marches like this, or any such demonstration to be nothing more than a necessity for the participants. As soon as anyone shows me evidence that they have any effect on public policy, I might begin to change my mind. As soon as organizers develop a march not just for the homeless and neglected, but by the homeless and neglected, I might begin to reconsider. As soon as one of those participants with me that April day so long ago apologizes to that man for refusing to even see and acknowledge him as a fellow human being, of worth and value and deserving of our consideration, I might change my mind.
Otherwise, not so much.
