Regarding the article: “Thirty Years of Faeries,” Issue #1025, April 2009, p. 24
Dear Editors,
I would like to thank you for honoring the 30th anniversary of the seminal Radical Faerie movement (“Thirty Years of Faeries,” Issue #1025, April 2009, p. 24), and also complain that in doing so, your article extends an apparent campaign now going on to manipulatively rewrite the early history of the Radical Faeries, most notably in demoting one of the pivotal cofounders of that movement, Mitch Walker, by consistently referencing only the others by name, and, in the case of your article, also prominently picturing a likeness of that founding person now most-so involved in pushing this malodorous revisionist effort. In case you may not be aware, the Radical Faerie movement was historically started by a collective of three equals, or four if Harry Hay’s partner, John Burnside, is included (see Stuart Timmons, The Trouble with Harry Hay, 1990; also see Will Roscoe, Radically Gay, 1996), yet there has been a growing controversy, mainly centered in Los Angeles, the residence of both Mitch and Don Kilhefner, the other surviving founder (Harry and John are now both dead), because Don has been actively and effectively promoting himself of late, through his position as a regular columnist in the L.A. region’s only locally focused, “mainstream” LGBT publication and in other venues, with a Faerie “origin story” which portrays only himself and Harry (and sometimes John) as the central cofounders of the Radical Faerie movement, whereas Mitch is omitted entirely, or on the few occasions he has been mentioned, it is in a most dismissive way.
As someone who has been seriously personally involved for very many years in a community activist fashion with all of the principal figures I am here individually referencing, it seems to me that this new twisting of early Faerie history under the guise of deservedly recognizing an important milestone, is not at all about competing egos or arcane details, but points to a much larger concern, a signal matter about our historical gay memory. What is at stake is not particular names per se or the relative merits of who remembered what, but the otherwise-hidden issues being struggled with and disputed by the original Faerie organizers then and now, powerful theoretical and practical questions focused on what it means for better gay liberation to be psychologically-minded and gay-centered. It is actually a fascinating and fecund debate, I believe, with serious implications for the health and well being of all gay and lesbian people today and into the future, though you’d never know this if you talk to Don or his allies about it. I feel very strongly that as we honor the Radical Faerie movement, this core Faerie debate should not be forgotten about by our community, because it goes to the heart of nothing less than fathoming what it takes to more practically and fully realize the unfolding nature of the sacred essence in being a valuable gay person.
As I see it, the problem of distorting Mitch’s role in Faerie history (and presently) arises from a negative reaction to his insistence all along on addressing the ethical necessity for everyone to take up better psychological responsibility for one’s own psychological and emotional defensive maneuvers, which are universal and often relationally operative co-dependently with those of others, particularly while seeking better gay liberation. Mitch learned early on, starting with himself, that if homosexual potential is to become more fully actualized, the unresolved traumas and family issues practically all gay people suffer from terribly in growing up and living within an endemically heterosexist world must be upfrontly accounted for and ongoingly psychologically addressed, or else attempts to enable that potential’s better procreative fulfillment will be consequently undermined by covert problematic impulses. In this way, Mitch has been pioneeringly trying to address a fundamental human problem as it has appeared in his gay activist life and work, that is, the moral problem of the disowned side of the conscious personality, that trouble-making function in the mind which C.G. Jung[1] called the shadow, and which, as Jung urged, must be integrated, rather than split off and “cast out,” so as to make the entirety of the personality more whole, more “individuated,” as he described it.
Since well before the founding of the Radical Faeries, Mitch was cultivating and exploring the notion of homosexual individuation as holding the seeds of an invaluably treasurable possibility unique to same-sex-loving peoples, and he long ago began to emphasize the further idea that to better actualize that gay spirit potential requires seriously learning to be psychologically literate and ethical in an appropriately gay-centered fashion. It is precisely because he has spoken and written persistently about this great homosexual challenge with vigor, integrity, and moral insistence that a lot of psychological resistance has been provoked in those with something big to hide. Too often is it the case that when matters of the unconscious, and especially the gay unconscious, are openly addressed at all in our still overwhelmingly repressive culture, even among the Radical Faeries, much less to the well-considered extent Mitch has been attempting, many peoples’ ego defenses will be vigorously activated, particularly against the one delivering such a provocatively relevant message, which then results in regressive and homophobic oppositional reactions, such as personal demonizing, scapegoating, and history-changing. From my perspective, Don and some others[2] primitively project into their picture of Mitch that which they self-protectively refuse to responsibly address within themselves, accusing him of what in actuality they are thereso enacting, i.e., menacing maliciousness.
Silencing opposing views is an age-old power strategy, and is currently being waged in the matter of rewriting Radical Faerie history, but is not healthy. To participate in its promotion not only renders a disservice to members of our community who might be interested in knowing more accurately how we have come to be where we are, for good and ill, but also to those who may benefit from becoming better informed about the still-living and developing effort by a growing number of people arising from the early Radical Faerie schism to become sincerely psychologically gay-centered, what I believe history will eventually record as actually a remarkable phenomenon in our community, an indigenously developed, psychologically responsible tradition of making better effectively real the Radical Faerie vision of transcendent Gay Spirit and its actualized fulfillment on earth.
In regard to future articles, I hope The Advocate will more carefully research the relevant background and issues involved, particularly in a case like this where fateful matters of gay liberation and historical memory are concerned. If we can’t effectively seek to honor and understand our own gay and lesbian past fair-mindedly, who will?
Sincerely,
Chris Kilbourne
ENDNOTES
[1] Among many reasons for the suitability of Jung’s ideas for affirmatively and expansively addressing psychological concerns involving the Radical Faeries and gay people generally, once the homophobic bias in his work has been appropriately accounted for, is his comprehensive focus on depth, meaning, and spirit within a broader psychodynamic appreciation.
[2] such as Stuart Timmons in his biography of Harry Hay, where he includes all the Radical Faerie founders historically, yet attempts to manipulatively demean those of the pro-psychology camp in the deepening Faerie schism of which he was also a partisan participant, people like Mitch and myself, as malevolent and vicious spoilers.
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