In just a few months, former (hopefully not for long) Lieutenant Dan Choi has turned the gay rights movement on its head and redefined effective activism in the US. It's not a stretch to say that he has singlehandedly changed the perception of LGBT people and the rights we deserve. Before he announced that he was gay on TV, initiating his firing from the armed services, there was no single face of the gay rights movement. I would say that there was not even a direction.
Some of us were focused on marriage, others focused on ENDA, and still others wanted to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell. And then there were those who focused on more obscure, intersectional issues that affect different segments of the LGBT community but which might not be seen as goals that the majority would get behind. Then Dan Choi said "I am gay" on TV and fucked everything up.
Now, the impossible-to-herd LGBT movement has a face, and it's not an old, rich, privileged white guy who's content with having the people in our government say the word "gay" in speeches from time to time. Choi is a 29 year old Asian Lieutenant in the Army - an Arab linguist who could very well be someone to protect the country from the next terrorist attack. Except he was fired for being gay, with a Democratic president in charge.
And as a recent Village Voice piece on Choi goes to great lengths to prove, Choi is a real person, even if some people may dislike him:
But Choi isn't buttoned-down anymore. There are many across the political spectrum who wish the lieutenant would be quiet once in a while. He angered the right by appearing as the grand marshal at last year's San Francisco and New York Gay Pride parades, where, as he puts it, he was gleefully "breaking 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' all up and down the street!" (In uniform.)
He has angered the left by not being lockstep antiwar enough at times, and by warmly welcoming Ken Mehlman, Bush's campaign manager, to the gayborhood when he came out.
In a movement awash with political correctness, Choi decidedly isn't. He is now speaking out without being asked, sometimes even angering people in his own camp. Rare among gay-rights activists in the national spotlight, Choi mixes an irrepressible sense of humor into his growing militancy.
Choi has inspired gay people, especially the younger generation. His "in your face" style of abrasive activism is much more appealing to people who want to see action taken on our rights. Gone are the days when politicians can pass one minor bill related to gay rights and run on that bill for the next two election cycles. And no longer will people accept speeches or invitations to the White House as a fierce show of equality and solidarity with our LGBT brothers and sisters. It's 2010 and people are starting to see that gays are used as political football, and if we let them, politicians will keep using us and we'll never get access to the rights we have under the Constitution.
But it hasn't been easy for Choi or any other activist who's more concerned with activism than image or a seat at the rich kids' table. Choi is, after all, one of the few militant activists - and he's only just started to spread the message around. Groups who run counter to his style of activism have a lot more money and experience on the scene. These activists are nervous about doing anything to rock the boat:
In a new century that seems far removed from the days of ACT-UP militancy, that makes some of his fellow activists jittery. "They keep saying, 'Don't say anything bad about Obama, or you're going to end up with Sarah Palin as president!' " He resents what he considers a Hobson's choice—Obama or nothing—because he says it lets the Democrats off the hook. To Choi, that scare tactic of trotting out the likes of Palin just shows that the Democrats "can wield fear just as well as a political weapon as the Republicans!"
He says, ""I am destabilizing,"[...]"And it freaks the shit out of people when I tell young activists and soon-to-be activists that they have the power, and they owe nothing[.]"
For all his work, Choi is not well-liked by the Gay Establishment, Democrats, the administration, and a few other groups. Constantly at odds with groups like the Human Rights Campaign, it's difficult for him to make friends. And contrary to the HRC, which regularly sends its people to expensive dinners and luncheons at the White House, or meetings with the President or top officials, Choi is still being ignored by the administration, and he's broke. Really, really broke.
"I am homeless," he tells people. Since being honorably discharged from the 69th Infantry of New York's Army National Guard, he has had no home to go to. He is registered to vote in New York City (and, when he endorsed Mike Bloomberg last year, found himself smack in the middle of a war between lesbian activist lawyer Yetta Kurland, lesbian City Council speaker Christine Quinn, and the city's term-limit supporters).
Choi has broken up with the boyfriend he used to stay with in Chelsea, and he is estranged from his parents in California. He says he has few, if any, friends from "before."
Even on liberal blogs he doesn't get a lot of respect, unfortunately. But he knows he makes people uncomfortable - from Democrats like the Human Rights Campaign to right-wing conservatives who are anti-gay. He has something to say about that, though:
"I think our movement hits on so many nerves," he says, "not just for reasons of anti-discrimination and all the platitudes of the civil rights movement. I believe that it's also because it has elements of sexual liberation. And it shows people that through what we're trying to do, they can be fully respectful of themselves, without accepting the shame society wants to throw upon them."
"Sexual liberation"—that probably won't play well on Capitol Hill. And therein lies the conflict between Choi and the establishment. His bold public actions—from chaining himself to the White House fence (twice) to going on a hunger strike for seven days—as well as his almost complete lack of inhibition about making his private behavior public, unnerve the old guard of both the military and the gay-rights movement.
I'll take self-respect and inclusion in society over some pro-gay declarations and expensive White House dinners any day.