What Will The Gay D-Day Bring?

Out of clutter, find simplicity.
From discord, find harmony.
In the middle of difficulty, lies opportunity.

- Albert Einstein

Backlash can create backlash can create backlash can create backlash until someone steps in to stop the cycle... or everyone is dead. Cyclical backlash is a very close relative to revenge killings in the Middle East. When a member of one family or tribe kills someone from a different family or tribe, the different one has an obligation to kill someone from the first tribe. Then the first tribe has an obligation to... and on and on and on. Unless there is some sort of formal truce, the vengeance killing can go on for centuries.

We're looking at two different sides of a cultural and cyclical backlash: same-sex marriage was proclaimed legal by the city of San Francisco. Politicized religious groups began to object by making some states ban the practice. Gay rights groups made marriage equality their marching banner.

Then came the Christian Right's backlash: California's Proposition 8.

The campaign saw both sides shouting about "freedoms" and "rights". The Christian Right kept saying that they had God on their side. In fact, they blamed God ("God WANTS us to do this!"). The humanists (yes, including Christian homosexuals) said that their marriage rights were basic human rights.

On Nov. 4, the campaign for Proposition 8 was won after one of the most vicious, misleading and unbelievably criminal campaigns ever experienced. It involved extortion, out-of-state money and manpower from churches, outright lies, and, most of all - mongering of hate and fear.

So now a counter backlash has been set in motion: Saturday, Nov. 15th will see a NATIONAL protest against California's Proposition 8. A protest of epic, if not historic proportions.

(From the blog by gay journalist and activist Rex Wockner)

Maybe Stonewall was Activism 1.0, ACT UP was Activism 2.0, the failed corporate activism of HRC and No On Prop 8 was Activism 3.0, and now we are witnessing Activism 4.0 being born....

And on this Saturday, in California alone, it is set to happen in Bakersfield, Chico, Colton, Costa Mesa, Delano, Escondido, Eureka, Fairfield, Fresno, Irvine, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Moreno Valley, Napa, Oakland, Palm Springs, Pasadena, Pomona, Riverside, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, Stockton and Ventura. And that's just as of today. With the speed of "viral" organizing, the list could be twice as long by Saturday.

Question: how will people view this kind of "activism"? Will some see it as a kind of anarchy? Will it cause another, more virulent backlash? How many Christofascists will be counter-protesting? Will this new activism cost lives?

It might.

Just a thought.