[Ppnews] Bradley Manning Blows Chance to Have Gay Wedding

Tue May 21 11:31:56 EDT 2013

*Bradley Manning Blows Chance to Have Gay Wedding*
by Susie Day

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2013/day200513.html

Gay greetings, LGBT-town!  I'm your out-and-proud lesbian pundit.  You 
may recognize me from my latest blog entry, "How Gay Was My Condo."  
Today, I bring you a hard-hitting work of in-depth political analysis 
re: Private First Class Bradley Manning 
<http://www.bradleymanning.org/>.  It seems some malcontents on the 
Board of San Francisco's Gay Pride Parade have suggested Private Manning 
for Grand Marshal 
<http://www.bradleymanning.org/news/lgbtq-leaders-uphold-initial-selection-of-bradley-manning-as-sf-pride-2013-grand-marshal>.

Private Manning is a 25-year-old, low-ranking intelligence officer 
facing a 22-count federal indictment -- including one count of aiding 
the enemy -- alleging he leaked the largest number of classified U.S. 
military records in history.  Indeed, Manning admitted in court 
<http://www.bradleymanning.org/news/bradley-mannings-statement-taking-responsibility-for-releasing-documents-to-wikileaks> 
last February to feeding confidential data to the whistleblower website 
Wikileaks, thus stunning the world with over 700,000 items revealing 
heretofore unguessed-at diplomatic corruption, military malfeasance, and 
war crimes.  These revelations, according to Bill Keller 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/20/opinion/keller-wikileaks-a-postscript.html> 
of /The New York Times/, played a role in launching the 2011 Arab 
Spring.  Although prosecutors say they will not seek the death penalty, 
Manning, if convicted, faces a possible 150 years in prison.

If Private Manning were some straight dude, we of LGBT-town would just 
keep shopping.  But Bradley Manning is gay.  Therein lies our shame.

Thankfully, SF Pride Board President Lisa Williams 
<http://sfpride.org/about/board.html> has already yanked Manning off the 
roster, "repudiating" his selection as a "mistake" by an unnamed staff 
member 
<http://lgbtweekly.com/2013/04/26/sf-pridebradley-manning-will-not-be-a-grand-marshal/>.  
For making that announcement "prematurely," wrote Ms. Williams, this 
person was -- in what will prove an historic salute to the S/M community 
-- "disciplined."  (Interestingly, Ms. Williams did not mention the use 
of a "safe word.")

Lisa Williams, who organized campaign offices for Barack Obama and works 
for other Democratic politicians, wrote, "[E]ven the hint of support for 
actions which placed in harm[']s way the lives of men and women in 
uniform . . . will not be tolerated by the leadership of San Francisco 
Pride."

Right on, Ms. Williams!  I share your Obama-driven anger!  For is it not 
President Obama who finally abolished the military 
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kenyon-farrow/post_1732_b_824046.html>'s 
infamous "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy?  Is it not Mr. Obama who is the 
first president to support, while in office, our right to legal marriage 
<http://sfonline.barnard.edu/a-new-queer-agenda/beyond-marriage-democracy-equality-and-kinship-for-a-new-century/>?

Bradley Manning has done something horrible to LGBT-town -- far worse 
than revealing war crimes.  He raises the question: Do LGBT people, in 
some way, owe our improving legal status /to those very war crimes 
Manning revealed/?

We of LGBT-town are oppressed enough without having to ponder that, 
thank you!

Besides, the fact that we have ignored the U.S. invasion and occupation 
of Iraq and Afghanistan, and rarely if ever bother to protest, /as /LGBT 
people, foreign policy abuses, suggests that Bradley Manning wouldn't 
even /want/ to be our Grand Marshal.

The best example of Private Manning's leaks is the video 
<http://vimeo.com/63389575> that PC thugs entitled "Collateral Murder." 
<http://vimeo.com/63389575>  If you're bored enough to click on the 
link, you'll see a U.S. Apache attack helicopter in 2007, hovering over 
a public square in eastern Baghdad.  Soldiers piloting the copter dryly 
-- yet with a certain patriotic panache -- target and shoot down two 
Reuters employees and about 12 Iraqi civilians.  A minivan carrying 
several children then arrives, attempting to rescue the wounded, and is 
fired upon.  All those on the ground, including the children, are 
killed.  We hear a soldier say, "Well, it's their fault for bringing 
their kids to a battle."

It's known that Private Manning, as a gay man, faced abuse in the 
military 
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/wikileaks/8616397/WikiLeaks-Bradley-Manning-endured-army-homophobia.html>.  
In fact, homophobia 
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/wikileaks/8616397/WikiLeaks-Bradley-Manning-endured-army-homophobia.html> 
has been advanced as a motive for his leaking information in the first 
place.  But think, LGBT-town!  Those shooters had been instructed by 
enlightened U.S. military personnel /not/ to be homophobic.  In fact, 
all during that helicopter massacre, you do not hear one antigay slur!

At his February court appearance, Private Manning 
<http://www.bradleymanning.org/news/bradley-mannings-statement-taking-responsibility-for-releasing-documents-to-wikileaks> 
explained that he had wanted to "spark a debate" on U.S. policies 
concerning Iraq and Afghanistan, saying, "The most alarming aspect of 
the video to me . . . was the seemingly delightful bloodlust of the 
aerial weapons team.  They dehumanized the individuals . . . by 
referring to them as 'dead bastards,' and congratulating each other on 
the ability to kill in large numbers."

Is this the type of person we want as our Grand Marshal?  I'm all for 
outing people, but classified data is just TMI.  Yet Bradley Manning 
brutally ripped the door off the U.S. Army's closet, thus placing in 
harm's way the troops who daily and heroically place innocent civilians 
in harm's way.  He has betrayed our deep psychological need not to know 
anything about what our government does in our name.

In June 
<http://www.bradleymanning.org/featured/rally-for-bradley-manning-at-fort-meade-june-1-2013>, 
Manning will begin his trial 
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/09/bradley-manning-trial-delayed> 
-- much of which will be, thank God, /secret/ -- a trial that will 
revive the homophobic stereotype LGBT-town has worked for years to 
erase: the commie fag.  To counter that stereotype, it's important for 
us to surround ourselves -- as does SF Pride -- with peppy, stalwart 
capitalist sponsors like Verizon, AT&T, and Wells 
<http://npa-us.org/files/wells_fargo_-_banking_on_immigrant_detention_0.pdf> 
Fargo 
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/17/immigrants-wells-fargo_n_1016339.html> 
(the latter, a proud investor in the private prison industry; take 
/that/, commie fag).

In conclusion: DUH?!  It is impossible for Bradley Manning to be the 
Grand Marshal of any Gay Pride event: He's in prison, you idiots. /He 
can't really be there/.

Furthermore the UN special rapporteur on torture 
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/12/bradley-manning-cruel-inhuman-treatment-un> 
alleges that Manning's been subjected to "cruel, inhuman, and degrading 
treatment," 
<http://www.salon.com/2012/03/07/un_top_torture_official_denounces_bradley_mannings_detention/> 
so he probably doesn't feel a whole lot of "Pride" these days.

Let that be a lesson to every LGBT-town queer who seeks acceptance in 
President Obama's US of A.  When it comes to government-sponsored mass 
killings and human rights abuses, maybe "Don't Ask Don't Tell" isn't 
such a bad idea, after all.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Susie Day is a writer.
-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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