Monday, March 16, 2009

Ali Moinzadeh's Letter to Frontiers In L.A.

March 8, 2009
Dear Editors:
I am writing you this letter to express my serious dismay regarding your recent coverage of the Radical Faeries protest that took place at the ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives on February 15. I am appalled and outraged by your complete and utter disregard of any standards of fair and balanced reporting in presenting the facts regarding the protest and your blatant lack of objectivity in upholding ethical journalistic standards. The article headline, “Radical Faeries Talk Marred by Protests,” implies that the protesters used violent tactics to somehow spoil or tarnish the talk, when in reality the protests were held in a very civilized and friendly manner, and protesters, of which I was one, encouraged all who came to the talk to make up their own minds by questioning the speakers, Mark Thompson and Dr. Don Kilhefner, about important elements and vital perspectives in the history of the Radical Faeries that have been distorted and erased as demonstrated by Dr. Kilhefner’s recent series of articles in Frontiers magazine on the origins of the Faeries where he single-handedly aggrandizes his own importance in the development of the Faeries movement and at the same time belittles, befuddles, and denigrates the crucial role played by gay psychologist and activist, Dr. Mitch Walker, who was essential in instilling from the beginning a vibrantly energizing and psychologically empowering philosophical foundation and practice to support and promote Harry Hay’s vision of an authentic and indigenous gay spirituality.

Although the early organization of the Radical Faeries, as led by Harry Hay, was successful in sparking a worldwide interest in the development and promotion of a genuine gay spirituality outside the confines of organized religions, Dr. Mitch Walker, along with Dr. Don Kilhefner, both ultimately left the Radical Faeries leadership circle in 1981 because of serious philosophical differences that arose related to the importance of individuals, and especially the leaders, taking personal responsibility for their unfinished family business and psychological woundings so as not to inflict these unconsciously onto others, specifically those who might be unaware or incapable of standing up for their own rights. Since that time, Dr. Mitch Walker has more actively espoused and advocated, both personally and politically, a gay-centered perspective that encourages and promotes all individuals to take on the task of owning their own unfinished business, known in Jungian terms as the shadow, so that they stop scapegoating and blaming others for their own mishaps and ultimately stop dumping their baggage onto society and the planet at large.

This protest was not about a single man, nor his exclusion from gay history by Dr. Kilhefner, although that by itself would have been a noble cause worthy of protesting. The issue at hand is that Dr. Walker, in speaking up against the bullying and dominating tactics of Harry Hay, was demonized, attacked, and blamed for “spoiling the party” and, thus, his unique perspective was ignored and rejected at a time when it could have offered a necessary counterpoint to sustain a vision of embodied gay spirituality through the many years of AIDS, homophobic violence, mental illness, and collective ignorance and scapegoating that have plagued our gay community over the past thirty years. Even more importantly, Dr. Walker continues to this day to uphold personally and promote politically the liberation of gay and lesbian, as well as all other peoples, from the unconscious domination of tyrannical forces of oppression that have ruled rampant throughout the past several millenia and have especially exploited and destroyed same-sex loving peoples and ways of being in the world.

Your article by Karen Ocamb ignores all of this history. Neither did she talk to myself or other participants in order to obtain “the other side of the story,” nor did she attempt to present the protest in the context of the history in which it arose. Your complicit support by referring the reader to her personal blog in which she viciously engages in personal attacks around some of the participants in the protest is unconscionable and reminds me of the way protesters are defamed and vilified in totalitarian states by authoritarian governments. And it feels to me qualitatively the same as George Bush’s famous dictum, “you are either with us or against us,” a tactic that leaves no room for dialogue or rational discourse.

The history of gay liberation arose in individuals protesting the unfair practices of police and other governmental agencies and societal institutions. Even today, we gay and lesbian people are involved in a pivotal fight for our very civil rights with the larger mainstream culture. That you, as editors of this magazine, would see protesters only as spoilers who “mar” a talk, instead of a vital element to engage and enliven debate and discussion in our community regarding matters of personal responsibility in the face of enormous global crises is a serious lack of vision on your part . I hope that now that you are the sole provider of news to the local gay community here in Los Angeles, you take more seriously your journalistic role in presenting the facts objectively and not succumbing to the petty squabbling and unfinished psychological issues of your staff.

Sincerely yours,
H. Ali Moinzadeh, M.D., Ph.D.

No comments:

Post a Comment