“If you are a musician you know how hard it is to get a good, paying gig. Now imagine having to choose between your ethics and your gig. That’s the position in which Mark Smith was placed. As the guitarist for One Floor Away, a Christian rock band, Smith found himself on the brink of success. But his bandmates forced him to make a choice: playing in the band or standing up for what is right. Smith chose the latter.”

Read more over at Addicting Info: http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/04/13/bigoted-bandmates-kick-out-pro-equality-guitarist-video/

Pi Patel: So which story do you prefer?
Writer: The one with the tiger. That’s the better story.
Pi Patel: Thank you. And so it goes with God.

- The Life of Pi

Of course I preferred presents to boiled eggs. Who wouldn’t? But still: Easter was better, no question. Maybe it was just a fact of growing up a Southern Baptist in rural Louisiana, since the weather was nearly always great for Easter, and the Easter music was always lively. The Sunrise Services out by the lake were happier by far than the bleary-eyed, tense Christmas mornings pretending Santa had brought the very gifts my parents had literally fought to afford mere days ago.

But, more than all of that, as a devout boy, I could always count on Easter to affirm my certainty about the nature of the world. The resurrection of Jesus wasn’t just an ancient version of E.T.—a nice story about an unusual visitor who has a miraculous recovery at the end–it was a singular event that re-ordered the very structure of the Cosmos. Those bright, energetic, springtime Easter Sundays were a yearly reminder to a faithful child that, because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, there was no longer a veil between a righteous God and a wicked Humanity. This was not a world doomed to be choked to death by religious and government tyrants; it was a world where, in the end, love wins.

But something happens as we get older, as we become aware that love is up against some tough competition. We start to learn, sometimes intimately, of violent people, control freaks and power-mongers, manipulators, deceivers, and legalistic pedants trying to use our love to their advantage. We learn that these people often go unpunished, that happy outcomes are all too rare, that people—even us—can live and die beaten down, oppressed, victimized. From what we can see, no, love does not win, not always–hardly ever.

Eventually, in the face of overwhelming empirical evidence, some of us stop saying that we believe in the Resurrection, while others of us, in defiance of the world’s injustice, proclaim our belief with greater fervor each year, often deferring love’s victory to the afterlife or the end of days. Love wins, sure, but not before we ruin everything. We—even the atheists and agnostics–make broad doctrinal statements about what we do or do not believe, so that our religious discussions become little more than declamations of varied color and weight lobbed back and forth at one another. It becomes a matter of Fundamentalist vs. Progressive, Spiritual Individualist vs. Church-Goer, Atheist vs. Christian, etc.

Well, luckily for all of us, how we actually live has little to do with what we proclaim out loud. It’s like Jesus said: talk is cheep*.

Well, he didn’t say it in so many words, and he would have spelled it correctly, but Jesus viewed public proclamations of faith with a great deal of suspicion. Remember? Some “greatest hits”:
When you pray, pray in sackcloth and ashes. If you love me, feed my sheep. Woe to you, hypocrites, you clean the outside of the cup, but the inside is filthy. You can tell a tree by the fruit it bears. Peter, despite your proclamations, you’ll deny me three times before morning.

In fact, every time a disciple made a loud statement of faith, Jesus rebuked him, sometimes harshly, and demanded not words but humble deeds.

And it seems the disciples managed just fine without public proclamations of belief even after Jesus was gone. The Nicene Creed wasn’t invented until: 325. Christianity was older than America before it had its “profession of faith”. Without “benefit” of public agreement on doctrinal specifics, they somehow managed. In fact, without their legalistic litmus tests, they seemed to thrive simply on telling and retelling the story of Jesus.

Stories matter. How we tell them matters. And how we tell them changes. Indeed, our evolving way way of looking at events often supersedes the events themselves.

As I continue to prepare for this summer’s New Orleans premiere of my new musical Upstairs, I’m constantly blessed with new, untold stories surrounding the very real crime and subsequent disaster at the Up Stairs Lounge. To be sure, the deadly gay bar arson fire that inspired my play is a story of death, destruction, and unspeakable loss, but there are other stories surrounding it, as well. In the immediate aftermath, some people told it as a story of “those people” getting their just punishment. Others told it as a story of a narrow escape, or the church’s indifference to suffering, or a city’s conspiracy of silence, or an activist’s attempt to motivate social change. And there are still more stories about the fire—stories rarely told–of bravery, love, survival, and hope.

How we view an event depends not just on the facts, but on the stories we tell about the facts, the stories we ignore, the stories we give a deeper meaning in our lives, the stories that point us to a larger truth.  Don’t you know atheists, agnostics, or people of other faiths than Christianity who live as if the world is abundant with love and compassion? Don’t you know many, many Christians that live selfishly, cynically, and without compassion?  It’s not the ability to claim belief in a set of events that changes our point of view, it’s ordering our lives and our thoughts toward the larger truths that the story (among other stories) reveals.

Don’t the lines separating us seem less about creed than point of view? Do we say we believe in the Resurrection or do we actually live it out?

The Supreme Court listened to arguments last week on the Constitutionality of laws prohibiting Marriage Equality. Different prognosticators have predicted different outcomes, but, if we do have a win in court, it won’t be because of some genius legal argument, or some bit of sudden logical clarity. No, it will be because, for decades, now, thousands upon thousands of people have decided to simply live as if same-sex marriage were already a reality. We didn’t wait for government approval before we could love and commit to one another, and our allies tossed legalism aside and accepted us as they would accept any other couple. Together, we tossed legalism aside and simply started living into the world we wanted to see. We didn’t just proclaim a doctrinal believe that love wins; we acted as if it has already won! Now, whether they do it in June or a few years hence, the courts will have to catch up.

It’s been inspiring to see.

So, on this uncharacteristically grey SoCal Easter morning, I return again to the faith of my childhood, if not to the doctrine. I choose again to order my life toward the Resurrection ideal that love wins, to recognize that I needn’t be stingy with my kindness, as there is plenty to go around, to eschew the nihilism and despair that seem to constantly infect our art, our ideas, and our politics, and to continue discovering and retelling the great stories of faith, hope, and love that remind us, even in the midst of tragedy: love wins.

Happy Easter!

A United Methodist church in Winston-Salem, N.C., has vowed to stop performing weddings until same-sex marriage is made legal.  Read more about it and watch a video over at HuffPost “Gay Voices”:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/18/north-carolina-methodist-church-stops-straight-marriages_n_2901075.html

Same-sex couples may soon be able to legally tie the knot in Illinois, but several conservative Christian churches aren’t having it… read more from our friends over at HuffPo Gay Voices:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/08/chicago-clergy-gay-marriage-politician-ban_n_2839927.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003

by Zach McCallum

Dear readers,

Before I was ever a writer and editor, I was, and continue to be, a theatre professional. Specifically a director and stage manager. I’ve been immensely privileged to work on all three of Wayne Self’s original musicals, including his latest work, Upstairs. (In case you missed it, you can read playwright Wayne Self’s editorial about the Upstairs project here.)

Thank you to everyone who has already contributed or bought tickets to Upstairs. For those that haven’t contributed yet, I am asking for three things:

1. Donate to the Upstairs Kickstarter. We need to raise $10,000 by February 17, or we get none of the money pledged so far. Every little bit helps, even just a dollar or two. 

2. If you will be in the San Francisco Bay Area 2/12-2/14, come see one of the three workshop performances of Upstairs.

3. If you know anyone who might be interested in helping us make the New Orleans 40th anniversary performance and an L.A. production a reality this summer, pass along the Upstairs website and Kickstarter information to them. Signal Boost this everywhere you can.

What’s this about?

For the last month I’ve been in Los Angeles, staying with my dear friends Wayne Self and Cody Braswell, and directing a workshop production of Wayne’s new dramatic musical, Upstairs.

Upstairs tells the long-forgotten story of a tragic arson fire in a gay bar in New Orleans in 1973. Thirty-two people, many of them members of the then-fledgling New Orleans Metropolitan Community Church, which had been meeting at the Up Stairs Lounge, were killed, in what remains to this day the single deadliest crime against an LGBT population in US history. At the time, the story was almost completely ignored by the news media. Though a suspect was identified, no arrest was ever made.

Wayne’s play is an elegant, haunting tale of damnation and salvation, telling the stories of several of the victims of the fire. The characters  include Buddy (based on the real Buddy Rasmussen), a bartender who led 35 people to safety, and Buddy’s partner Adam. Mitch, the associate pastor of the NOLA MCC, and his partner Horace. Drag performer Marcy and her dresser Reginald. And Agneau, a tormented and self-hating gay man. It is a morality play with a twist, told with sensitivity and dark humor, with a catchy and modern jazz and blues influenced score.

The cast is amazing: professional, insightful, and just tremendously talented. This Q&A with some of the cast members will give you an idea of the caliber of people I am working with.

In two weeks we will be premiering this workshop in the San Francisco Bay Area. Performances are scheduled for 2/12 in San Mateo, 2/13 in Berkeley, and 2/14 in San Francisco, and tickets are still available.

We hope to bring an expanded production to New Orleans this summer, in time for the 40th anniversary of the fire, and to bring the show to Los Angeles for a two week run after that. But that will only happen if the workshop performances and our Kickstarter are a success.

As I said at the opening, here’s how you can help:

1. Donate to the Upstairs Kickstarter. We need to raise $10,000 by February 17, or we get none of the money pledged so far. Every little bit helps, even just a dollar or two. 

2. If you will be in the San Francisco Bay Area 2/12-2/14, come see one of the three workshop performances of Upstairs.

3. If you know anyone who might be interested in helping us make the New Orleans 40th anniversary performance and an L.A. production a reality this summer, pass along the Upstairs website and Kickstarter information to them. Signal Boost this everywhere you can.

Thank you so much for any support you can give.

Zach McCallum
Managing Editor, Owldolatrous Press
Director, Upstairs

by David Gerrold

George Takei is everywhere these days. He’s all over Facebook with some of the funniest memes of all. He’s always in the news. And he seems to be getting work everywhere—he’s been on The Big Bang Theory, Hawaii Five-O, The New Normal, Pound Puppies, and a dozen other shows, all in the preceding year. Look him up on IMDB and you’ll see he’s getting more work than a Republican spin-doctor.

I’ve known George since 1967. We met in the unemployment line. We were both collecting benefits because Star Trek was not then in production. I had written a script for the series, but the dialog I had written for him had gone to Walter Koenig instead because George was off making a movie with John Wayne. Oh my!

George is one of the most versatile actors in Hollywood, capable of an enormous range of character. He’s also a great guy in person. He has an unfailing good nature. (His husband, Brad, is also a sweet guy and the two of them are blessed to have each other.)

Where I give George enormous credit is that when he came out, he came out big. He used his personal celebrity to take the point on a lot of issues important to LGBT people. Instead of, “That’s so gay!” he encouraged people to say, “That’s so Takei!” As in: “That’s fabulous!”^*

And if I had to choose one word to describe George Takei and his great personal success, then fabulous would have to be it. George Takei is the personification of fabulous. And that’s good for everybody. His joyous pride in being Takei goes a long way toward disarming the uncertainties that many Americans might still have about LGBT people.

Having said all that, I want to put it into a larger perspective.

America loves stereotypes—and American television is telling us that gay men are sissies: Jack on Will And Grace, Bryan on The New Normal, Cam and Mitchell on Modern Family, Kurt on Glee, and a host of other characters from various TV series that have come and gone. American television seems incapable of recognizing the gay soldier, the gay doctor, the gay accountant, the gay truck driver, the gay anything at all if he isn’t in drag. According to television, gay people are still sex-obsessed sissies who love to prance and have encyclopedic knowledge of Broadway show tunes. (Okay, yes, in the spirit of full disclosure, I do have CDs of the original cast recordings of A Chorus Line and Les Miz. But I don’t prance. Ever. A hippo in a tutu would be more graceful.)

Actually, I’m in favor of all of us being unashamedly fabulous. Glitter, rainbow, unicorns, whatever. As Oscar Wilde (allegedly) said, “Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.” Being unique is the only adventure that is entirely your own. But not just LGBT people—straights should have the right to be fabulous too, and we can be great role models, showing them that fabulous isn’t fatal.

But…as much as I love fabulous, I also want more than fabulous. I want meat and potatoes. I want Harvey Milk and Bayard Rustin. I want Vito Russo and Larry Kramer. I want Michelangelo Signorile and Dan Savage. I want Barney Frank and Harvey Fierstein.

I want political leaders, too. I want leaders who aren’t afraid to speak up and speak out and speak to the heart of the matter. I want leaders who aren’t afraid of controversy. Yes, ruffle feathers, rock the boat, rattle the bars of the cage—whatever metaphor suits—once upon a time we were dangerous. I don’t want to lose that.

We are a minority. We will always be a minority. And yes, as a minority, we will always be out on the fringe. To be blunt, that’s a good place to be. It provides the most interesting perspectives.

Our value to the national conversation is that as outsiders we can see things that the mainstream isn’t conscious of. We can say things that will make people pause and think. We are moving toward a time when we will be accepted, when it will be safe to say, “I’m gay.”

But in my never-humble opinion, safety and acceptance are not enough. We are different than the majority. We need to use that difference to be responsible voices not just for ourselves, but for our entire culture. We need to be something more than what the culture thinks we are.

George Takei gets it. He’s put himself on the front lines enough times to prove that. I hope that every other LGBT person in the spotlight will also recognize the larger responsibilities that come with fame.

It’s okay to be Takei. It’s even more important to be gay.

^*In 2011, when the Tennessee Legislature was considering a bill to ban the use of the word “gay” in Tennessee schools (it passed), George Takei created this video, offering his name as a substitute for the banned word.

You can buy “It’s Okay to be Takei” merchandise here; all proceeds go to charity.

by Wayne Self

The tragic nightclub fire in Santa Maria, Brazil this weekend is one in a long, painful history of such incidents. As of this writing, 233 are known to have lost their lives, and it will certainly be remembered as one of the deadliest nightclub fires in history. We mourn the loss of lives and pray for the Santa Maria community.

In June of 1973, an arson fire destroyed the Up Stairs Lounge in New Orleans, killing 32 of its predominately gay male patrons. Despite its grim status as the most fatal crime against LGBT people in U.S. history, the event remains obscure, its victims largely unknown and unremembered. Their stories were silenced years ago by an uncaring media, an uncomfortable church parish, a city’s economic imperative to protect its reputation, and a cowed gay community’s desire to avoid a fight. No one was ever convicted of the crime.

As we close in on the 40th anniversary of the fire, two new works appearing this year will endeavor to break the decades-long silence around this act of unspeakable violence, bringing new light to the tragedy and a new voice to its victims: my own new musical play, Upstairs, and Clay Delery’s forthcoming book, Nineteen Minutes of Hell, a history of the fire and its aftermath, on which much of my play is based.

In this conversation with Delery, we discuss violence, the South’s history of silence, and the reasons the Up Stairs fire still matters today.

Wayne Self: Most of the relatively short histories one reads about the fire today focus on the aftermath, and the silence, indifference, and even ridicule that followed the tragedy. Why do you think that is?

Clayton Delery: There were no proclamations of outrage or sadness from politicians at any level. There were no arrests. There’d have been no memorial service if the Metropolitan Community Church, a primarily LGBT Christian denomination whose New Orleans church counted many of its members among the dead, hadn’t sent their founder, Troy Perry, into town to organize one. Troy Perry and the other clergy and activists had a difficult time even finding a location for a service. When they asked for cooperation, they were turned down by clergy and leadership from the Catholic, Episcopal, Baptist and Lutheran churches. Only one Unitarian congregation and one unusually liberal Methodist congregation were willing to cooperate. In the end, they went with the Methodist church, because it was in the French Quarter, and close to the scene of the fire.

Wayne Self: The spirit of the Stonewall Riots, which had happened only three years earlier, almost to the day, had not yet come to New Orleans, where some LGBT leaders (who, let’s admit, were mostly G at that time), joined political and religious leaders in a conspiracy of silence around the fire. We are both Southerners. Do you find that the South was slower to embrace the “coming out” movement? If so, why?

Clayton Delery: In a way, the whole city was staying in the closet about the fire. This arrangement protected tourism for the city, protected religious leaders from having to choose between compassion or condemnation, and protected New Orleans’s gay community from “coming out” of the quiet arrangement they had with the NOPD and entering a political and legal fight for equality that they didn’t think they could win. Many people were comfortable with homosexuality being thought of as simply another vice in a city known for profiting from vice in myriad ways.

Wayne Self: Of course, today we still find lots of very good reasons to stay in the closet. I don’t just mean the celebrities and other notables who don’t come out, but our refusal as a community to discuss our own problems with the larger society. Drugs. Health concerns. Our own racism and internalized homophobia. We still keep quiet about these things.

Clayton Delery: And, in some other countries, of course, the closet is still very much in effect. Sometimes with good reason.

Wayne Self: We tend to think of history as moving toward progress, but that’s just not the case. It moves in fits and starts. It’s easy to get comfortable.

Clayton Delery: In New Orleans, at that time, things on the surface weren’t as bad as they had been in New York in 1969. It had been several years since there had been a mass raid of a bar or a gathering place. Gay people lived in relative peace. So, in some ways, people were comfortable. There was no immediate reason for a Stonewall type event. But the fire revealed a deep current of homophobia.

Wayne Self: Did things change after the fire?

Clayton Delery: Some people say it was a galvanizing moment for the community, and some say that it was completely ignored. The truth, I think, lies somewhere in the middle. It did reveal a need for a more organized, more vocal community, but the New Orleans response was never going to be like a New York response. It was quieter, and more in line with New Orleans sensibilities.

Wayne Self: Why do you think the fire still matters today? Is it a cautionary tale? Is there anything inspiring or motivating in the tragedy?

Clayton Delery: I think there is inspiration to find in the tragedy. Some of the stories of the night of the fire are so heroic and profound. So many responses are compassionate and brave. Seeing these victims as individuals, I think, reveals a great deal to respect, admire, and be inspired by.

Wayne Self: I think every victim of violence should matter. It’s an error to fail to honor the victims at the Up Stairs Lounge while we honor so many others. What we choose to remember, what moves us to action, says something about ourselves. Do we want it said, for example, that the hundreds dead each year from urban handgun violence mattered less than the suburban children killed at Sandy Hook? Or that the soldiers who died in Afghanistan mattered less than the soldiers who died in Iraq? Of course not. The same is true here. It’s right that we honor Matthew Shepherd, for example, but some of the victims here were no less young, no less active, no less wonderful.

Clayton Delery: I also think it matters because of its place in context. The Up Stairs Lounge was a known meeting-place for the Metropolitan Community Churches, and the leaders of that organization saw it as another in a series of fires at their churches. There was a great deal of concern at the time that the fires were part of a conspiracy, or at least a trend.

Wayne Self: That’s certainly relevant today. We deal with domestic bombings and shootings and other acts of mass murder on a more frequent basis. There’s no conspiracy, but it sometimes seems worse than a conspiracy. There’s the sense that something bubbles up from our primordial soup. Something swells in the zeitgeist that provokes these men to what they think is revolutionary zeal or psychic self-defense or protection of some perceived birthright, or a primal scream at a perceived cosmic injustice.

Clayton Delery: No arrest was ever made, but there was a suspect who died before he was arrested. If he was indeed the arsonist, and if the suppositions we can make about his motives are correct, then a straight line can be drawn from his act of violence to the mass gun violence we see today: angry young men with severe depression who for some reason come to feel terribly slighted by life, or by their communities, or both. In this case, it may have been homophobia, but homophobia turned on oneself.

Wayne Self: I wonder if what we call homophobia is really “femophobia,” some fear of losing one’s manhood or being thought of—or thinking of oneself—as a woman. As not masculine enough. As a failure as a man. Certainly that would have been in play for the suspect.
We continue to grapple with violence—with why men (and it always seems to be men) turn into mass killers. The history of the Up Stairs lounge provides few answers, but it does remind us that the history of mass violence in the U.S. is not a short one. It gives us an opportunity to reflect on what messages we send to our young men and boys as we raise them.

Workshop performances of Wayne Self’s Upstairs will be staged Feb. 12-14 in the Bay Area in preparation for a June premiere. Tickets are still available to all three of the workshop productions.  You can learn more about the history of the fire, and the cast and crew of Upstairs here.

An effort is underway to help bring the production to New Orleans in time for the 40th Anniversary of the fire. Help fund the production through Kickstarter.

Clayton Delery’s book, Seventeen Minutes of Hell, is currently soliciting publishers.

Wes Breedwell, a former employee at Rocketown, a Christian-owned music venue, was purportedly fired for wearing a t-shirt in support of same-sex marriage.  Read more about it over at The Blaze: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/01/23/christian-concert-venue-allegedly-fires-staffer-for-wearing-pro-gay-marriage-t-shirt/

I was not alone in the alcove long.

It wasn’t Elisabeth who returned. Sivar came back in with someone in tow and she gestured towards me. “As I said, a form of justice has been served. I hope this assuages your suspicions, Inspector General Michael?”

Legion Inspector General Michael was clad in a burnished electrum Legion breastplate, flowing black robe/skirt cloaking his lower body, and leather-like material sheathing his arms and hands. He seemed Indian: matte brown skin and rounded features, with expressive black eyes.

“I thank you for your cooperation, Prelate.” He was perfunctory, even irritated. “But this is not justice. There is no question that Lord Vycta is the victim in this breakdown of Legion discipline.”

“They are young Michael, only a year or so dead at best.” She did not touch him but her voice was still intercessory rather than conversational. “At that age, they are so happy to be alive and are still filled with zeal at the opportunity to serve.”

I broke in with acid tones. “Paulos isn’t even dead. She snatched him away at the last moment. No one truly died here today.”

Sivar was not put off rhythm by my surly interruption. She picked up my conversational line as if she expected it. “I sincerely hope that death is not required for lessons to be learned about what battles to pick.”

Michael’s jaw dropped momentarily and Sivar smiled with cool self-congratulation. “Vycta, if you wish, you can retire to your old chambers here in the palace. However, I understand if you wish to get a breath of fresh air or, rather, fresh vacuum.”

Shadow clothed me, shredding the rest of my ruined tux and I stalked out of the alcove. The shimmer let me through and I reentered the ball with no gown and no glass slipper.

A familiar coifed, rough-and-ready, leonine brunette in a tan brushed silk pants suit surged out of one of the small knots of people loitering about the massive antechamber near the entrance of the alcove. She held a thin, shiny rectangle maybe twice the size of a credit card in her left hand.

“Myrna Moy, with CNAP Today. Care to answer some questions?”

“No comment.” I said not breaking a step.

She fell into step next to me, and half whispered, “Come on, you owe me!”

“For what?”

“For putting me and my fellow journalists in the path of the Crown Princess Qin,” she replied.

I shrugged. “I told you where she was. No one made you go.”

“Where have you been for the last year,” she redirected.

“In suspended animation, by order of Primate Pepin, under watch of the Inquisition,” I replied.

“Are you really a demon,” she continued.

“I’m not a fallen celestial!” I seethed. “So I can’t be a demon! It’s so stupid. Our so-called authorities know what demons are, but they can’t be assed to use an actual definition.”

Claxons blared through the chamber, followed by a clipped stern female voice. “An enemy battle group is threatening the command sphere of the Central North American Principality. CNAP Legion Command believes this to be a sign of eminent attack. Legionnaires, citizen defenders, and militia, report to battle stations; everyone else to the shelters.”

I pivoted on my heel and ran back to Sivar.

“They are here for him, you know,” Michael was saying as I arrived. “Thiessen will not care if Paulos is dead or alive.”

“Michael, you are relatively young so I can excuse your focus on the obvious.”  Sivar was briefly surrounded nimbus of power, as her own Legion armor wove itself into reality on a loom of light. “Thiessen knows better. Thiessen knows the rules of formal Challenge. So he is borrowing authority through the fear of others to try to unseat me through the Panacea project.”

“They just think…” Michael started, before she cut them off.

“They think I am a silly woman under the spell of a mutated demon penis.” Sivar’s voice flitted from light banter to steely disdain. “All they have revealed is their own lack of actual intelligence gathering.”

He frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“I have been Vycta’s patron, sponsor, and guardian, but I have not had sex with him. Our relationship is as chaste as those who partook in Courtly Love in the neo-dark ages wished their interaction could be.” Sivar smiled and I felt chilled. “It’s a trap. And this attack, I guarantee you, is not what it seems to be.”

Michael’s head whipped back in my direction and I shrugged. “She is my morning star, the most beautiful woman I know, for I do not see only her flesh. I feel her presence. I see her core and the corona of her pattern, and all others pale beside her. When I thought I had been blinded, I was most stricken that I could not gaze upon her true form.”

She beamed. “And that’s why I keep him around.” She turned to me. “What did you need?”

“I want to help,” I replied. “Where do I need to be?”

Michael reacted, sharp disapproval haloing his words. “Have you been in space combat before?”

“A couple of times,” I replied. “I sliced off the wing of a mercenary transport making off with Primate Dion.”

Sivar took up the string. “When Pepin had Dion kidnapped by mercenaries to be brought back to the Northern Observatory, Vycta demonstrated that he learned Legionnaire Paulos’ lessons very well indeed. And Michael, if you leave now, you can intercept Dion and convince him to let Paulos fight. It’s the only way he’ll overcome his trauma in any reasonable period of time. Make certain he is in a battle group with Herakles. His husband will provide him with motivation not to descend into melancholy.”

Michael saluted. “I am yours to command. I swear this on my Name and life. I should never have doubted you.” He jogged out of the room.

Sivar watched him leave and gestured for me to be quiet. We were both quiet for about a minute when a breathless and slightly wild-eyed and fully armored Horace bolted into the room. “Your Excellency, Ondi is preparing his suit and installing the programs.”

“Good,” she smiled. “Go.”

Horace nodded and turned to me. “Come on, stumpy!”

We did not run; we flew as we did in Sin City. Doors opened preemptively, allowing us to pass. Horace navigated us through a maze of relatively empty back halls. He paused to land before proceeding through the last door, motioning for me to join him. It was an empty locker room.

He carefully looked around the room before barking an order. “It’s clear, Ondi; come on in.”

A petite but muscular, bald, dark skinned woman strode into the room with a roughly folded bundle under her arm.

“We need to dress him,” Horace said, moving towards her. “We need to get spaced as soon as possible.”

“He shouldn’t be coming with us at all,” She commented. “We can’t be distracted babysitting him!”

“He is tougher than he looks,” Horace said as he took the package from her. “Trust me; the Inquisition and Sivar have been examining him for the last year.”

My eyebrows shot up. Examining?

“Examining?” She retorted an audible echo of my thought. “I thought they were de-spooling him to see what grew back after everything was torn away?”

Horace froze and gave her a dark look.

Which she, in turn, relayed to me, “You didn’t know? Wow, you are smitten and stupid.”

I did not respond, and it did not look like an intentional evasion because Horace shoved a suit into my hands. “Get dressed.” He retained a slim helmet and a bulkier wrist computer that seemed more like a forearm vambrace. So much for getting help to dress.

The suit reminded me of a heavy scuba suit, except white with plate reinforcements in the torso, legs, arms, and neck.

“Have you ever flown in space before,” Ondi asked

“Yes,” I said neutrally and then firmly. “A lot actually.”

She scowled. “But not in a Chakram-class assault craft?”

“What?” Now she had my attention. “I’ve been in space craft before, but Paulos said military space craft are just for convenience and to hold bigger guns. I thought you wore that armor so you could fight in space unimpeded.”

By the time I finished, she was on the verge of an outright oration and Horace interrupted. “Get out, Ondi! Now is not the time!”

Irritation boiled off of him, and seeped into me as he fastened the computer onto my right arm. “I want you to know that I think this is a terrible idea. You will be putting me and my people at extraordinary risk.” He put the helmet on my head. “But I will obey my Prelate.”

I wanted to say something brusque and full of bravado, but he was right. For all my flight time, I had done relatively little formation flying and no “dogfighting.”

I wanted to dwell on this “de-spooling,” but Horace commanded my immediate attention.

“There are only telepathic interfaces in this gear.” Horace said thickly. “Your password is ‘burden.’ Change it as soon as possible.”

The transparent front of the helmet became a heads-up display. “Legion Integrated Navigation Application” scrolled briefly across the front and I was immediately allowed the option to change my password. The acknowledgement message displayed, “Callsign: Herokiller, verified and acknowledged.”

I stiffened violently. “Herokiller? Is this some kind of joke?”

“It is what you wanted to be.” Sivar’s voice drifted over the radio. “Horace, are you ready to depart?”

“Yes, Prelate.”

“Excellent. Go quickly.”

“Come on,” Horace beckoned irritably. I followed.

We raced into yet another set of halls. Sivar’s voice returned. “Horace, hold your launch until my command. I am sending Paulos and his wing out first.”

Horace stopped dead in his tracks. “What? He’s dead!”

She did not elaborate. “I intervened. Proceed to your craft and wait on my order.”

He whispered, “Gods of my ancestors.”

“Oh, come now, Horace, don’t go plebeian and blubbery on me. I have done things like this before. Who put this shell into orbit,” she chided gently.

“That… that’s just brute strength,” he said. “This is Primate level delicacy.”

She laughed, and then said, more seriously, “Rally your people.”

Even with the immediate impetus removed, we still ran, the sounds around us changing. The claxons had faded to dimness, and only intermittently flashing yellow and red ceiling lights indicated a state of alert. I heard ntermittent bursts of wall-muted chatter followed by a loud whine that cut off abruptly after a few seconds.

“We are near the launch ports,” Horace supplied.

I kept walking, nerves singing with anxiety, feeling claustrophobic in my new suit, feeling like a tagalong. I just wanted to go out into space and gut things.

We stopped at a hangar, where six strange circular craft bigger than busses sat. Each ship had a thick outer ring. The pilot’s seat sat inside a hexagonal sphere that bloomed out of the thick wing-like cross-shaped inner assembly, connecting to the outer ring. The outer ring-really, it was a circular wing-was studded with thruster ports. Some sort of engine directly behind the cockpit was integrated into the rear arc of the outer wing, with additional anchoring attached to the cockpit’s cross spar.

The craft were all white, with a black knight’s shield insignia at the cardinal points of the wing. Names were etched into the hull beside each cockpit. Each ship was occupied, except for an empty one labeled, “Green Knight.”

Horace gave me a channel number, and said tersely, “Be quiet and listen in. When we launch, you will be last.” He gestured to an area where people in blue helmeted jumpsuits were working next to consoles and other unfamiliar tools. “Until then, stand over there and stay out of trouble.”

Horace sealed his helmet and the channel he gave me crackled to life.

“We have a brief reprieve people,” he announced. Somehow, L.I.N.A, had my settings from my wrist computer back at my room. I heard the audio, but it was also instantly transcribed in a small window in my heads-up display.

“How is the sleeping bower-boy doing?” L.I.N.A. identified him as “Antov Yaragov, callsign: Hammer.”

“He’s inconsequential,” Horace replied.

“He’s going to get us killed, Green Knight.” Ondi’s voice replied. L.I.N.A. registered her callsign as “Oya.”

“Sivar is sending out another group to help clear a path,” Horace replied. “We are going to be part of the main assault on the Atlas.”

Atlas? I thought.

In response, L.I.N.A. brought up a brief paragraph and picture of a lozenge-shaped craft. According to the data, it was roughly a mile long.

“Fucking awesome,” Kent Clarkson aka Farmboy, exclaimed. “I don’t care if the whore is with us; we get ground action!”

“That is going to be quite a hustle,” Kova (Sextant), mused. “I will have acceleration profiles ready by the time we launch.”

“Hrm, I guess we’ll see how well-trained Thessien’s so-called ‘elite guard’ really are,” Marius Octavius, or Gladius, chimed in.

“Who named him ‘Herokiller’?” The last voice, deep male, was Quahotoc, callsign: Gilgamesh.

Horace’s voice was clear. “Sivar.”

“Hmm. Oh well,” Gilgamesh replied. “If he had chosen it for himself, I would have suggested he change it if he survives the battle. It sounds… anti-social. Since the name is effectively a gift, he is stuck with it.”

“How in the hell is he supposed to live up to it,” Farmboy piped in.

“He already has,” Horace seemed edgy. “Sextant, what is the current status of the battle?”

A new window opened in my display. An opaque shape in the silhouetted briefly dominated before pulling back, and a basic scene etched into view. Dots appeared with small descriptive flags and then triangles, and far off to the side was a larger sausage-shaped opaque shape labeled “Atlas.” Then it all animated.

Sextant narrated. “The Atlas has committed its standard complement of assault craft to the initial attack. However that is not nearly enough to take a fully powered modern Principality, particularly if it detaches from its umbilical.”

“What about sabotage,” Horace asked. “It has been considered in light of the happenings at the Prelate’s party and the kidnapping of Legionnaire Herakles to blackmail Paulos into fighting Herokiller,” he added. “The Legionnaire has been retrieved. It seemed that the routing of the assassination squad put the conspiracy into confusion.”

“I guess that eliminates the Inquisition as a direct conspirator,” Oya replied. “They supervised the de-spooling. They would know the most about what he could do, especially if they did it to him.”

“They did not do anything except pull him apart and let himself put himself together a few hundred times,” Horace replied.

“I’ve heard things,” Oya replied. “Like they used him to make more Panacea until he was all used up… then they let him loose. It was just a coincidence it happened when the Atlantean Corps returned.”

“How do you know this, Oya,” Farmboy asked.

“The rumor mill said he was too damned powerful,” she replied. “The demon essence was metastasizing within him. They had to force him to develop a resistance or he would have been a danger. Most of the other donors are in hiding, exiled, or dead.  So, he thinks that he’s going to go out there and make a big show and be a big hero, but he isn’t what he used to be.”

“The rumor mill seems to run rampant here,” I snarked. Unspoken, I thought that the rumor mill also doesn’t know anything about the Green Blessing.

“Shut up!” Horace replied.

Octo intervened telepathically. “This is one of the reasons I forced you into a new… expression of existence, Herokiller. The Legion and Sivar had been using you until nothing was left. You exist now because of your training and your faith. They expected you to die from their secret experiments. They expected you to die in that fight at the party. You proved them wrong. You are stronger for it all. There is nothing left for you to prove. Now, all you have to do is honor our agreement and fight.”

I was scowling, grateful for the helmet to hide my face. Octo continued. “Horace only said something because Ondi brought it up. They would not have told you otherwise. I am telling you to make you angry. I am telling you these facts in order to remind you: none of these people are your friends.

“The only thing you are obligated to do is fight for this space station. Then you will be free of me; however, you have to be alive to enjoy that freedom. So win and do not die. It is simple.”

by Wayne Self

Among the many inspiring, tear-inducing, beautiful speeches and photos memorializing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. today, one is apt to find this video:

Martin Luther King, like all of us, is a product of his time. His language in this video is what it is, and the larger point he’s making is a worthy one: we must realize that it’s not the government’s role to give us freedom or take it away, and that belief in oneself as worthy of equality is right, good, and necessary.

“… he must sign with an ink of self-assertive manhood his own emancipation proclamation. Don’t let anybody take your manhood.”

But it’s worth reflecting on how the ethic of “don’t let anyone take your manhood away” informs the way we think and act when it comes to equality. What do we think of when we think of “manhood”? Physical traits that read as masculine? Physical strength? Fortitude? Self-reliance? Are freedom and manhood identical?

The obvious problem with collapsing freedom and manhood in this way is that the formulation excludes women. Even correcting for the the common use of “manhood” when “personhood” was meant, back then, we still have to contend with the context of the word’s use within the speech. Normally, if “personhood” is meant, then “womanhood” would also make a fine substitution. Go ahead. Rewatch the video and imagine Dr. King saying “womanhood”. It doesn’t work. Dr. King means what he says: there’s something masculine about striving for freedom, which means that allowing someone to take your freedom is emasculating, or perhaps even feminizing.

In this formulation, it’s a man’s job to win freedom, and it requires masculine traits. If a woman wants to win freedom, she can, of course. All she has to do is man up.

In this speech, Dr. King notes that, in the language of the day “everything white” was considered pure, while “everything black” was considered dirty. Alas, it’s also true that everything male is considered strong, self-assertive, and everything female is considered weak and unworthy.

But there’s a deeper concern with Dr. King’s formulation, as well, and it has to do with the unspoken, assumed corollary: if your freedom has been taken, and you’ve acquiesced, you’ve lost your manhood, which means you’re not a worthy of freedom anyway. Feminine traits, whether exhibited by men or women, are disqualifiers for freedom.

We’ve grown up with this thinking, and it permeates our culture. We are each of us, in some way, that skinny boy getting sand kicked in our face by the muscled bully at the beach. Now that we know the answer to our dilemma (Charles Atlas’s muscle-building plan, of course, or a march on Washington), failure to act is our own fault, a result of our own lack of manhood.

When freedom is inextricably tied to a trait that only some of us share, whether it’s whiteness, maleness, straightness, ableness, or wealth, then freedom is no longer freedom. It’s privilege. Dr. King is a personal hero of mine, and it’s right and good that we honor his memory and legacy. But on this day, at this time, Dr. King was talking (to the under-privileged) about male privilege.

Don’t let anyone take your privilege away.

And it sure can slip away, can’t it? Manhood, the way we’ve decided to understand it, is an unstable thing. It can be taken away by anyone at any time. Don’t gawk at boobs enough? Not a man. Don’t like sports? Not a man. Don’t like beer? Not a man. Not sufficiently conservative? One commentator essentially makes her living questioning the masculine credentials of non-conservative candidates. It takes about 20 minutes of football watching to get the message: using our product makes you a man. Not using it? Well. You do the math.

So we get to this awful place where it’s not mere privilege that’s at stake for the man who thinks his job was taken by immigrants, or for the married straight man who sees gay men getting married, or for the man who thinks his children got passed over for college due to affirmative action—no, not just privilege: manhood.

Don’t let anyone take your manhood away. Defend it.

How easily can a well-meaning message to the disenfranchied about dignity become a message to the privileged about debasement?

On this special day, when our first African-American President so eloquently gave gay and lesbian equality its first acknowledgement in his inaugural address, let’s remind ourselves that the drive toward dignity and freedom is not a masculine trait, or a feminine trait. It’s a trait we all share.

I believe Dr. King. There is an Emancipation Proclamation in each of our hearts. In order to sign it, we each have to know that we are somebody, worthy of dignity, worthy of liberty, not because we’re young, or male, or female, or straight, or rich, or able-bodied, but because we are who we are.

With apologies to Dr. King, put that in your pen and sign it.

Wayne Self is a composer and playwright. His newest work, Upstairs, is now in production in the Bay Area, and is a musical memorial to the 32 victims of the 1973 arson fire at the Up Stairs Lounge in New Orleans, the most deadly crime against LGBT people in U.S. History. For ticket information, visit: http://upstairsmccsf.brownpapertickets.com/