As my loyal blog-readers know, I have a history of grass-roots activism, primarily with the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT-UP) and, to a lesser extent, Queer Nation. As part of my work with these organizations, I disrupted a George H.W. Bush speech at the Republican National Convention in Houston, Texas, in 1992. I blogged about that incident previously, prior to my return to Houston a few years ago.
At the age of 36, I think I'm prematurely crusty. Why, you ask? Because the last few days I have heard myself saying "In my day" more often than someone of my age should. In my day, an activist never called attention to herself/himself, we called attention to our causes. When Michael Morrisey and I were arrested at the RNC, we were yelling "WHAT ABOUT AIDS?" We wanted to draw attention to Bush-41's lack of a response to the AIDS crisis, which had reached its fever pitch during his presidency. When the police came to arrest us, we had a simple, rehearsed response: "No violence." We did not resist arrest. We went to jail and were glad to do so. We served time. Period.
It makes me all of the angrier, then, to see YouTube videos of a histrionic person named Andrew Meyer disrupting John Kerry's speech with what is appears to be a self-serving, self-promoting rant. Though one of the points he makes is important (Kerry conceded the election far too soon, given apparent evidence of voter disenfranchisement), his point was lost in his theatrical arrest, and his bizarre subject-switch. Was Kerry a member of skull and bones? What does that matter? Mr. Meyer, in the unlikely case that you actually read this and are open to criticism, let me tell you this: if you were any kind of an activist, you would focus on promoting your message, not yourself. Nobody remembers the names of the people who protested at the 1992 RNC (outside of our circle of friends and compatriots), but many, many people remember the 1992 RNC as a place where GLBT people made a stand that they would not allow themselves to vilified. That's what quality activism gets you. In my day, we knew that.