Written: 10/07/2012

The speaker of the house has been using taxpayer money to defend DOMA, a wildly unpopular position, but one that he keeps doing, considering he’s doubled-down on the hate of LGBT people.

His lawyer, in trying to justify the work, has said that LGBT people don’t deserve the same legal protections that blue-eyed people do.

Well I’m both, so I don’t know where I fall on that spectrum.  Oh wait, yes I do, I’m gay so I don’t deserve any rights.  Either way, it’s insulting.

Not that I’m surprised, just saddened that this kind of thing keeps happening.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

A short programming note.  I’ve left the BSA.  At the moment, I’m not officially out, but I’m so relieved to be at a place in my life where I can’t be fired for it.

I want to talk with my family (and that includes both biological and my family of choice), before I announce anything here (so yes, this is kind of meta, so by the time you read this, I’ll have announced it.  So maybe it’s not meta, just time-warpy).

I’ll be going back and releasing the posts that I’ve been writing here at the King of Spades over the last few years.  I’ll need to scrub any personal details (especially some of my coworkers), I don’t want to appear ungrateful for the chance I had, working at the BSA, but I also want to show what it is really like working for such a discriminatory organization.

So look for an announcement over on Yesterday’s Nut, and I’ll release posts here as I go through them individually.

I’m planning on keeping this section up, as much as being a gay man is a big part of my life, it’s not the only thing that defines me.  And I’ve really liked this style of writing, so I’ll keep it up.  Not to say that there won’t be some crossover, but I will try not to push the gay side of things down everyone’s throat over on Yesterday’s Nut.

I’ll be back soon, but for now,

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

At the beginning of the month, I took a new job, leaving the BSA (hence the post, “The King of Spades is dead, long live the King!“)

It is with trepidation of course that I left, it’s a big change, but it really is a good move for me.  I was amazed at how much I was able to accomplish before I left.  In the short term, I was able to close up summer camp in record time, and get everything else in order for the person coming after me, as well as training her.  Now granted, there is a lot that I can’t teach someone else how to do (graphic design and creative), but I did what I can.

In the long-run, I’m super proud of what I was able to accomplish.  Bringing things up to standards in terms of employment for the summer camp kids, the design, the websites and the events that I worked on really are amazing.

I’ve talked with a few of the volunteers, both before I left and after, and it’s nice to hear how much I will be missed, and how I was one of the few people that volunteers liked to call at Flag.

I’m not one to give myself much credit, but I did amazing work, and was one of the best members of the support staff, hands down.

But I have to say, it was a good time to leave.  The BSA was under all kinds of public pressure before due to the discriminatory policies they keep.  But that is nothing compared to what is coming.

And it is absolutely abhorrent that this even happened, but it is now coming to light that the BSA systematically hid child abuse from the authorities.  Much like Penn State and the Catholic Church, the BSA has put their own image in front of the safety, dignity and respect of young people.

I still don’t know where there aren’t riots in the streets (and that applies to all those organizations named).

You don’t hide abuse from the police.  You turn the monsters in and help the victims in any way that you can.  It’s not the organization’s fault (well, it would not have been, had they not moved, hid and otherwise been accomplices to those abusers), but you do what you can to help the victims.  This is not a question or a suggestion.  And if you can’t pass this very, very simple moral test, that why should anyone trust you with any moral question, let alone their children?  My mind simply cannot wrap around these questions.

I have been asked to volunteer with the BSA, to work with the alumni association.  And I love my camp staff kids.  They’ll never know how much I worked behind the scenes for them, as their advocate, and to make our camps safer and more accepting.  But even though there’s no history in these files of anything in the Pittsburgh area, it’s so revolting that I can’t imagine giving time to the organization.

It’s a hard line to walk, I can still do some good, and help so many of my friends here in Pittsburgh, and honestly, I’m one of the few people that can span so many generations of camp staffs to bring alumni together.  But on the other hand, I can’t give any part of the BSA anything until they clean up their mess.

I still don’t know exactly what I’ll do, and I’m not rushing to make any decisions, either.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

In a previous post, I included a reaction from a former Marine about the one-year anniversary of the repeal of DADT.

I want to pull out a large block from it:

You see, this Marine and I were quite close. We’d gone out on the town clubbing, sat on E-tools eating MRE’s in the black of night, and we’d traded jabs in the barracks about newbies trying to pass off jokes as anecdotes for attention. In his letter, he detailed how not standing up for me when discussions got nasty was, in his words, the “greatest regret of his five years in Marines.” People didn’t know for sure I was gay, but most suspected it.

The irony of “don’t ask, don’t tell” was that not telling was itself a giveaway. As a gay Marine, life in the corps was often difficult for me. I like to think I hid it well with smiles and overachievement, but when you know someone well enough, you can always tell when something is wrong.

It was my friendships with Marines like this corporal that kept me alive, kept me going. But, the one thing we never shared was my constant fear of being kicked out or of being killed by one of my own. That I endured on my own. After a few incidents with my Recon company, I even went so far as to move off base because of fear for my safety. It’s an unsettling feeling to be afraid of your own family.

I see a lot of parallels.  Hiding my life behind smiles and achievements, those who probably suspected, but never stood up for their family members and friends who are gay.

And I find it poetic that one of the few people that can easily see through me (and not care at all that I’m gay, it’s a total non-issue) is a former member of the Army special forces.  But he’s one of the only few who has ever looked through me, seen that something is wrong, and given me a safe space and asked what he could do to help.

I’ll be back with more later,

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

I can only hope that those who read this blog, become ally’s for the LGBT community.  I’m not asking you to march, to protest, or even give money.

Understanding I think is just as important.

And I can’t (and wouldn’t want you to) make you feel what it’s like inside my head, to face the daily discrimination that I do, but I think a new resource is a good read, and can supply a good baseline understanding of the daily struggles the LGBT community faces.  It covers a few different areas:

• The Opportunity to Earn a Living and Provide for Ourselves and Our Families, which requires: fair and inclusive workplaces and access to workplace benefits.
• The Ability to Pursue Health and Happiness, which requires: access to health insurance; physical and mental health; access to competent and welcoming health care providers; access to identity documents needed for daily living; and freedom from discrimination
• The Ability to Take Care of the Ones We Love, which requires: the freedom to marry; secure legal ties between parents and their children; and caring for a sick partner or child.
• The Ability to Be Safe in Our Communities, which requires: inclusive hate crimes laws, safe schools, and welcoming faith communities.
• The Chance to Serve Our Country, including military service and public servic

Check it out online here.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

Sometimes I’m a bit self-involved.  I don’t mean to be, but it happens.  And I certainly try not to be, but like I said, it happens.

So I feel bad that I missed this story from before.  But a bisexual woman was fired by the Salvation Army, only because of her sexual orientation.  The story is heart-breaking on so many levels:

She cried the entire time we went through the paperwork, continuously apologizing to me and saying that firing me was “the worst thing [she’s] ever had to do.” Captain Bill said that he was only allowed to say what the Salvation Army told him to and that since he was forbidden from revealing his own personal opinion, he would not say another word.

And for the rest of the time, he didn’t. He just sat there with tears in his eyes.

I said that I greatly respected them both and that I had enjoyed working for them. I told them how much I appreciated the fact that they saw me as the person I am, and how grateful I was for their understanding that my sexual orientation in no way changed, diminished, or devalued, or impacted the great work I did for them in any way. They promised that they would recommend me highly to future employers and would help me and my family however they could.

That was a theme that I felt time and time again, that my sexual orientation had no way changed any of the great work that I did.

But it did, at least for me.  I think that I pushed myself further, to go out of my way to prove that being an LGBT employee didn’t change the fact that I did amazing work.  So in the end, I was easily one of the best employees on the council’s support staff, because I had something to prove, even if it was something that was never revealed.

That may not have made sense.  But I’ll try to explain it more going forward.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

It’s been a year since the repeal of DADT.  I had hoped that it could have brought about a change in the BSA as well, but even though it hasn’t, it’s a great time to celebrate the progress.

Good As You has a great feed of problems reported since the repeal, updated in real time.  Hint, there’s nothing on it.

Opponents screamed and yelled that troops would leave in mass numbers because of the repeal.  So far, the total comes to two.  Seriously.

Even though no harm has come, and the repeal has actually made it easier for the Pentagon to pursue it’s mission, opponents are convinced that the sky is still falling…we just have to wait 20 years to see it happen.

One of the architects of the repeal, and Iraq veteran, former Pennsylvania Senator Patrick Murphy reflects about the anniversary here, and the SLDN reacts here as well and a retired Marine wishes he had been able to serve without DADT, to know his brothers and sisters more honestly.

And yes, it is a big accomplishment, but there is still more work to do, to make it possible for transgendered individuals to serve:

But just remember, those on the other side of the aisle, even though no harm has come, the military is better off and people are living honestly, want to roll back to a time of DADT if Romney is elected.

So I’ll close with this image from Facebook, which popped up in some unexpected places, more proof that the world is changing in good ways, we just have to keep moving forward:

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

This comes as a surprise (granted, I’ve been busy lately, and haven’t been following the information as closely as I should I guess).  Intel has pulled their support of the BSA, after Zach Wahls and his organization petitioned them to follow their own charitable giving guidelines. 

Due to significant growth in the number of organizations funded, earlier this year we revisited our policies associated with the program, and applied new rigor that requires any organization to confirm that it adheres to Intel’s anti-discrimination policy in order to receive funding.

And it appears that almost half of the top 50 foundations have given money to the BSA.  Looks like Scouts for Equality has a lot of work ahead of them.

I think that this is a great angle, and one that I did not think about before.

The BSA has doubled down with the support from the Mormon Church.  The LDS Church controls most of the National Board, and back in the 90s, when the first decision came out, the thinking was that they would lose more chartered partners and resources by embracing equality than by following the LDS church.

Now, the tactic is to make it hurt for the BSA to not embrace equality.  I think it’s a great strategy, a viscous one, and I think with enough time, it will work.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

Here is a good comparison chart of the two new party platforms, recently adopted at the conventions.

Just a reminder, if you’re not a rich, straight, white man, the Republicans don’t like you.

Click on the image for a bigger version.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Written: 9/23/2012

Two quotes to share with you, first up, from the amazing Minnesota kicker, Chris Kluwe:

“Every time you propagate the message that being gay is to be less than human, that same sex marriage cannot be as filled with love and laughter and tears as heterosexual marriage, that gays don’t deserve to pass a legacy on to their family, you quicken that howling storm and sweep away a tiny bit more humanity from the world, drive one more child to contemplating the cold razor’s bite, or the yawning abyss of the overdose because they simply cannot deal with the unceasing assault upon their psyche.  Well I, for one, will not stand for it.

“I will not stand for a world that demeans those it finds ‘different’ or ‘gross’. I will not stand for an ideology that promotes slavish adherence to a single arbitrary standard, that sacrifices children on the altar of oppression and control. I will not stand for one more RED TINGED MUSHROOM CLOUD second of people thinking that they have the right to live someone else’s life for them, for the complete lack of empathy so often shown in our society. I stand for gay marriage. I stand for the end of segregation. I stand for a woman’s right to vote. I stand for equality under the law, for treating others how I want to be treated, for the fundamental human right to live a happy life free of tyranny. I stand for my children.

And from David Halperin

What makes gay people different from others is not just that we are discriminated against, mistreated, regarded as sick or perverted. That alone is not what shapes gay culture. (That indeed could end.) It’s that we live in a world in which heterosexuality is the norm. Heterosexual culture remains our first culture, and in order to survive and to flourish in its midst, gay people must engage in an appropriation of it that is also a resistance to it.

“So long as queer kids continue to be born into heterosexual families and into a society that is normatively, notionally heterosexual, they will have to devise their own nonstandard relation to heterosexual culture. Gay subjectivity will always be shaped by the primeval need on the part of gay subjects to queer heteronormative culture. That is not going to change. Not for a very long time. And we’d better hope it doesn’t.”

I’m constantly impressed with the care and concern our society can pay for our children and their future.

It gives me hope.

All my best,

The King of Spades