Faggoty Ass Faggot wrote an amusing bit on how the American Press would overreact to this unexpected character back-story that you can read here.
I’m hoping that he is wrong and all of that does not come to pass. I haven’t really noticed anything here other than the initial articles saying, “Wow! Who knew? That’s kinda groovy.” Well. Not exactly that. I don’t think anyone in the British Press would say groovy.
A bit in the LA Times that I think is overwhelming in its vanilla lameness called, Seven Clues that ‘Potter’s’ Dumbledore Was Gay manages to redeem itself with the last paragraph:
“No matter how many ‘clues’ I can put down that Dumbledore was gay, no matter how many millions of people have read these books again and again, Rowling surprised even the most die-hard fans with the announcement that Dumbledore was gay. And in the end, the fact that we never would have guessed is what makes Dumbledore being gay so real. So many times I have encountered friends who are gay that I never would have predicted. It has shown me that one’s sexual orientation is not some obvious ‘lifestyle choice,’ it’s a precious facet of our multi-faceted personalities. And in the end whatever the differences between our personalities are, it is time that our world heeds Dumbledore’s advice: ‘Differences of habit and language are nothing at all if our aims are identical and our hearts are open.’ Today as I write this, I believe that it’s time for our aims to be loyal to what the greatest wizard in the world would have wanted them to be: love.”
Most of my gay friends are out. Darren’s homophobic and conservative parents became huge gay rights supporters after they heard the news. Other friends have had rockier experiences. Scott told me that when he tried to bring up the subject with his mother, she deftly changed the subject and everything was left unsaid.
I know we have a come a long way since Stonewall but there is so much further to go.
My Freshman year in University one of our theatre students was murdered. Tortured. For being gay.
On November 23, 1988, Gordon Church, a 28-year-old a drama student at Southern Utah University, was brutally murdered by Michael Archuleta, 25, and Lance Wood, 19. The murder was one of the most sadistic murders in the history of the state, gay or straight, but only a few people are aware of the torture killing because a judge placed a gag order over the case to shelter a prominent Mormon family in Delta from public humiliation that their son was gay.
I can’t tell you how much that disgusts me. . . the “judge placed a gag order over the case to shelter a prominent Mormon family in Delta from public humiliation that their son was gay.”
We all knew Gordon was gay. We all knew that he was targeted for being gay. I didn’t know until today doing a search for the articles for the links that there was a gag order on the truth getting out.
How I managed to last four years in Utah, I will never know.
A little under ten years later Matthew Shepard was murdered. Tortured. For being gay.
Where am I going with this. Not really sure.
I guess, while I agree with FAF that this revelation should not get the attention of the news cycle that he is afraid it will get. . . I think that one can never underestimate the power of story. Read Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung. . . Stories can change the world. That’s why one of the first people they go after to shut up are the artists.
While I think the Dumbledore back story is interesting and not a big deal to me, I hope that this means that it is interesting and not a big deal to the thousands that have read the books and it is just another step toward the day that when my friend tries to come out to his mother, she won’t cut him off and say, “I don’t want to hear this.” Another step forward to the day when someone won’t be murdered and tortured for being gay.
I supposed they’ll be murdered and tortured for an altogether different reason, but that’s a rant for another day.
