Voice in the wilderness

Where do we go from here?

As I sit in my office, the rain and gloominess outside my window are the perfect metaphor for how I feel today. Many San Franciscans have expressed bitter disappointment and a sense of alienation with the results of the election. Already, the election is being played as a victory for "Christian values" against people like us. I have no doubt that the next four years will be even more difficult than those we have just come through. Bill Bennet and others in the culturally conservative movement have declared this a victory for morality. And I read a blog today that suggested queers should now shut up and sit in the back of the bus.

Building community and connection – in our own communities and with our allies – is more important than ever. Enriching ourselves with social interaction and political activism will help us keep our sanity. We are the voice in the wilderness now. We must continue to shout out the values that we hold dear – our values of inclusiveness, multiculturalism, equality, and fairness for everyone. San Francisco, in particular, must continue to be the thorn in the side of religious and cultural intolerance.

When I spoke last night in the Castro, I pointed to all those LGBT people in those red states that need us to stay strong, for they are watching us. We don't have the numbers, or the money, or the churches that the forces in opposition to us have. But we have our community centers, our social organizations, our religious leaders, and our values.

Thom Lynch
Executive director
San Francisco LGBT Community Center
San Francisco

Kerry's next election

OK. So John Kerry didn't win. That stinks. We have to deal with another four years of Bush-Cheney. What we don't have to deal with is four year of ineffective and weak "leadership" in Congress. But that is the direction things are heading now. With the loss by Tom Daschle, the Democrats don't have a minority leader in place. The name being tossed around as the likely holder of the post is a relatively unknown and uncharismatic senator from Nevada, Sen. Harry Reid. Who is this guy? Why should I care about him? Why should he lead the senators?

If you don't want your vote for Kerry wasted, if you don't want his 16 months of effort thrown in the garbage by brain-dead cowardly Democrats in the Senate, write to Sen. Barbara Boxer and Sen. Dianne Feinstein and demand that they nominate and choose Kerry as the Senate minority leader. Here is a man who just got 49 percent of the country to vote for him to lead the country. That makes him the minority leader! If this were a parliamentary system, he'd automatically be the minority leader now. Don't let the dunces in Congress give Bush four straight years of strength. Don't let them put ineffectual "leadership" in place. The Dems in the Senate need to learn what the Republicans already know. Support your strongest, most well-known figures.

Michael Luque
Oakland

The Hsieh agenda

Your recent article (Trail Mix, 10/20/04) on the Democratic County Central Committee left out key facts and any critical analysis of who Tom Hsieh is and what his real motives were. Hsieh is a key political consultant for Mayor Gavin Newsom and was working to defeat Sups. Jake McGoldrick and Gerardo Sandoval and supervisor candidate Robert Haaland. He was trying to undermine and stop the Democratic Party endorsements from being mailed out, because in contrast to the old days, they're pretty progressive endorsements, not all that different from the Bay Guardian's. The DCCC endorsed Tom Ammiano and Haaland, Sandoval and Aaron Peskin, the housing bond, the revenue initiatives, noncitizen voting rights, and the antiwar initiative. These endorsements were the biggest threat to the mayor's agenda of electing more moderates and regaining control of the Board of Supervisors for downtown interests, and the effort to stop them was especially aimed at unseating McGoldrick.

Greg Shaw
San Francisco

Art way out West

Thank you for recognizing Bruce Conner with a Lifetime Achievement Award (Goldie Awards, 11/3/04). Kudos to the Bay Guardian staff for choosing both older and younger artists, and especially to Johnny Ray Huston for his words of praise.

When I left for the West Coast, some of my New York-centric artists, who should have known better, tried to intimidate me with "You'll be bored" and "There's no one to talk to."

Au contraire! Here, as I began to see some more examples of work, I was able to discover the brilliance of many extraordinary West Coast artists.

Remy Charlip
San Francisco

For the record

Last week's Super Ego incorrectly stated the name of the Unisexy DJ. He's DJ Chicken.

Due to a copyediting error, last week's 8 Days a Week incorrectly listed the date of the Mika Miko show. It was Nov. 8.