1 Oct 2010 22:43
Kathleen Parker Is a Travesty
Posted by Steve under News , Outrage , Sarcastic and Bitter[2] Comments
Let me get this right. Writing for the Washington Post about the tragic suicide of Tyler Clementi, Kathleen Parker (“Decency plunged when Tyler Clementi jumped”) doesn’t “want to play down the gay aspect of this travesty [sic], but there isn’t space in a column to tackle everything.” Then she goes on to recommend solving social problems by making people “feel ostracized” and “targeted as pariahs.” She wants to go back in time to when it was “bad manners to display oneself — or one’s affections — in public,” and she thinks people should “make it unattractive and unacceptable to intrude on others.”
Malicious intrusions of privacy are wrong, but Parker’s idea of “respect for privacy” rings loud and hollow. It rhymes with that facetious definition of “privacy” bigoted homophobes want from gay people when they say (not quoting Ms. Parker now), “Just don’t shove it in my face.” Like, by getting married. Or holding hands in public.
How hard is it for people to understand that gay kids suffer, and some of them kill themselves, because the shame of being gay is so painful to bear. Society ostracizes homosexuality. Straight kids might be embarrassed about their sexuality, but so ashamed to love someone of the opposite sex that they take their own lives to escape the pain? Who can imagine that?
Parker writes, “Although Clementi was filmed with another man, one can imagine as easily a roommate spying on a heterosexual encounter.” Sure, but what one can’t imagine is that the unwitting video star would then jump off a bridge.
By the way, I don’t want to play down Kathleen Parker’s callousness in calling this a “travesty” (does she know what that word means?), but there isn’t space in a column to tackle everything. Fortunately there’s just enough space left for me to say “fuck you” to Kathleen Parker and to mention that I do believe ostracism has a place in the world, but not where she wants to put it.
In contrast to Parker, Bloomberg columnist Ann Woolner (Sex Video Suicide Leaves Shared Guilt Behind) is not a travesty. She understands.
October 2nd, 2010 at 11:29 pm
Bullshit. Being spied in a hetero sex act spread on the internet would be also be horrific — and would cause too many shy young people terrible damage, even leading to suicide. Stop stating that being gay gives you a monopoly on being terribly hurt.
October 4th, 2010 at 9:24 am
Kathleen Parker begins “The suicide of an 18-year-old Rutgers student following an unimaginable invasion of his privacy has launched an overdue examination of casual… disregard for other’s personal space.” Subsequently Ms. Parker claims ”there are several dimensions to the story, complicated by the fact that the victim was gay.”
I take issue with the columnist’s contention that Tyler Clementi’s homosexuality was merely a complication– that the real issue is one of invasions of personal space. “How did we get here?” she asks, “How could anyone think that another’s most private, intimate moment was fair game?” While she leads her readers through the evolution of the word “friend” from noun to verb, and the ostracizing of smokers, groping for her own answer, I feel compelled to provide the obvious one: homophobia. She appeals to the good old days, when “respecting others’ privacy was a matter of manners” oblivious to the fact that the privacy of homosexual acts was legally recognized only in 2003 with the case Texas v. Lawrence. Before that, the video would have been evidence of a criminal act and made that Tyler Clementi vulnerable to prosecution (and presumably within the bounds of good manners of law enforcers, at least) Ms. Parker’s strained attempts to ignore the obvious answer actually provide her readers with a subtle yet effective endorsement of homophobia; dismissing it as a complication that can be ignored or minimized even when that requires rewriting history. Her essay exposes a certain lack of scruples on her part, and as she instructs: “When others are victimized by another ‘s lack of scruples, be outraged.”