Facebook got Stonewalled, but not in the way the term is usually used. As they say, those who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it.
Anybody who knows me knows I adore drag queens because they can be better at being women than women and yet deploy their male physical strength when they choose to. Nobody but a drag queen can dress like Diana Ross, throw shade like Bette Davis, and beat you down like Mike Tyson. As Wesley Snipes said in drag in the movie, "To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything," a drag queen is what happens when you have too much style for either gender.
Clearly someone at Facebook pulled the idea out of their ass that they would enforce their heretofore unenforced "no fake names" policy, and they decided to start enforcing the policy against, of all people, drag queens.
What part of Stonewall did this idiot not know? Did this idiot not know that it was drag queens who set off the Stonewall Riots? Drag queens who beat down police officers? If a drag queen would beat down a police officer, imagine what she would do to Mark Zuckerberg's puny ass?
And not only did Facebook pick the most unlikely group of people with whom to pick a fight -- drag queens -- but they started with one of the most famous drag queens in the world, Sister Roma of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.
What was Facebook thinking? The Sisters are perpetual icons of Pride Parades. If you were going to pick on some drag queens, why oh why would you pick one of the Sisters?
Well, Sister Roma fought back and threw shade, noting that Facebook had picked out drag queens as the first group against which to enforce their policy. Now, I'm not Facebook's lawyer, but I would have imagined that, with Facebook having its corporate headquarters in California and selectively enforcing its policy against a well known San Francisco drag queen, they were ripe for an Unruh Civil Rights Act claim, but hey, I'm not Facebook's lawyer.
That aside, Sister Roma did her thing and Facebook had to back down and, as they say in politics, "walk back" their policy.
So Facebook got Stonewalled.
Learn your LGBT history, Facebook, so you won't be doomed to repeat it. Pick on drag queens at your peril.
Showing posts with label civil rights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label civil rights. Show all posts
Make Black History: Sign The White House Petition to Pardon the Black WWII Sailors of Port Chicago
Two
hundred and fifty-eight African-American World War II sailors were court-martialed,
of whom fifty were convicted of mutiny, because they refused to continue
loading munitions after an explosion at the Port Chicago Naval Magazine near what
is now the Concord Naval Weapons Station in California. They refused to return to work because they
had been relegated to the dangerous job of loading munitions because of their
race. It was the largest mass mutiny
trial in U.S. Naval history.
On July
17, 1944, at 10:18 pm, an explosion occurred at the Port Chicago Naval Magazine
involving 4,606 tons of munitions, killing 320 cargo handlers, crewmen, and
sailors. According to the Navy’s own
historical website (http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq80-1.htm ), African-American Navy
personnel units were assigned to the dangerous work of loading munitions at
Port Chicago under the supervision of white officers. In his book
“The Port Chicago Mutiny: The
Story of the Largest Mass Mutiny Trial in U.S. Naval History,” author and U.C.
Berkeley professor Dr. Robert Allen (http://africam.berkeley.edu/faculty/allen.html) quoted one of the African-American
sailors convicted of mutiny as saying that the officers "encouraged" competition
by the black sailors in loading munitions tonnage and threatened punishment or loss of privileges.
On
August 9, 1944, 258 African-American Port Chicago sailors refused to return to
the work of loading munitions. When
given the chance to reconsider their decision, 208 of the 258 were willing to
return to work. Instead, the 208 were
subjected to summary courts-martial and given bad conduct discharges, and the
remaining 50 were charged with mutiny. After
32 days of hearing, 80 minutes of deliberation, and despite the presence of
Thurgood Marshall and his call for a formal investigation by the government
into the circumstances of the work stoppage, all 50 men were convicted of
mutiny. Marshall filed and argued an
appeal on their behalf with the Navy’s Judge Advocate General’s Office in
Washington, but the convictions were upheld.
Forty-seven of the fifty received clemency, were released from prison,
and eventually left the Navy “under honorable conditions,” but their mutiny
convictions stood. Rep. George Miller
(D-California), who represents the district where Port Chicago stood, sought to
have the convictions of the 50 reversed, with no success. The National Bar Association passed a
resolution in 1998 calling for pardons for the 50 convicted of mutiny, with no
success. President Clinton pardoned Freddie
Meeks, one of the 50 convicted of mutiny.
Now is
the time for President Obama to grant redress of this racial wrong and pardon the
remaining 257 of the African-American World War II sailors of Port Chicago who
were court-martialed and/or convicted of mutiny, many of whom have passed away
with this stain on their record of service to our country. No American serviceman or servicewoman should
be or should have ever been singled out for the most dangerous jobs in the
military based solely on race.
Short URL: http://wh.gov/vQzx
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