Peace.
The problem with the drama this weekend is that I forgot something very important. I forgot that I cannot allow my sister into my life beyond the superficial, shallow, surface things. I cannot expect her to be aware of the world around her, cannot expect her to rise to the occasion and actually take my side in anything that matters to me.
I forgot about that, what with the lovely visit we had with her not just three weeks ago. I fell into a place where I thought I could rely on my family, where I thought they shared my passion for rights and fighting ignorance wherever they may find it.
It is comforting to know that I have a wife and a bunch of friends who also saw what I saw, that validated my feelings about the ignorance in that “joke”. I have written and re-written a letter to her in my head, even after I decided that I would not respond to her latest email, because I know it would fall of deaf ears and get twisted around and thrown back in my face, much like my comment about how I would hope that my sister would be more aware of gay bashing in her own Facebook.
The one thought that keeps jumping out at me, one that has been echoed in several comments made to me about the exchange, is this:
Hate speech is not always blatant. It doesn’t always come and get in your face with a “God Hates Fags” sign or a “Kill all Niggers” cry with white hoods. It’s a “joke”, a remark, a funny look or a t-shirt with a terrible cartoon on it. Hate comes out in small doses, and those are the ones that end up poisoning the well. It’s easy to fight the large, cartoony giants who stomp around and scream loudly, much harder to take a friend aside and say, “Wow, what you said could be taken in a very hurtful way, and I think you shouldn’t make jokes like that.”
Yeah, my sister has stopped being friends with certain people because of their anti-gay bias, but I doubt she told them WHY she stopped talking to them. For all of her bravado and venom toward me, when it comes to confrontation, my sister is a coward and probably just makes excuses when those friends call her to come over.
And yes, I am sensitive about it. I am sensitive because I have endured slurs and threats, because I have had friends who have been beaten, known people who were killed, because of a “joke”, a look, a comment that led to violence because it was the cork that was bottling up the hate behind it. I don’t hate her friend who made the “joke”, but I know she is certainly not my friend and I don’t care to know her. I don’t go looking for the negative, but I know it when I see it, and when I see it, I call it out.
Whether it’s the guy in line at the gas station harassing the person of color behind the counter, the woman who sneers and pulls her child closer to avoid getting too close to my gay friends, the teenagers who cat call an effeminate male - if I see it, I’ll stand up and say something.
She can keep her friend, whose feelings are obviously more important to her than mine, and I’ll keep mine, thanks. I know if I stand up and say, “This is wrong,” they’ll stand up next to me.
And for that, I thank you.
I’m not upset at her anymore, I’m over it. I got my hand burned again, and no doubt I will again, but for now I’ve been reminded that my sister cannot be part of my whole life, but instead needs to be in her own compartment. It makes me sad, but it is her choice to act the way she does, and my choice not to allow her to poison my well.
