An Injury to One (queer) is an Injury to All of us!

An Injury to one is an injury to all.

Indeed you have injured my people.

In americkkka and a world rich in hate and injustice, we believe that education on all matters is one key to unlock justice for all. Nothing is petty or insignificant in this educational process.

We need to break the lies that the dominate culture has used against us. It is critical in these times that all people of a revolutionary nature become aware of these lies and distortions and fight with us against them.  You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man’s freedom. You can only be free if I am free.” —Clarence Darrow

A flyer circulating in Hartford calling for a march and rally on May Day caught our eye last week. We have always loved May Day even before we knew the day as one where the workers of the world were united and marched for justice. We loved May Day more when we found out about its wonderful story (let’s not use the word history here as it everyone’s story not just his) of how it came to be and who birthed this idea. We will stick to revolutionary May Day advancing forward for all workers, together. But imagine our surprise when we looked over the call out flyer for May Day 2012 in Hartford Ct. and saw near the bottom a quote from Paul of Tarsus. Any queer worth their queerstories can tell each and everyone of you that Paul of Tarsus is amongst the long line of those who have persecuted our people. Just imagine our revulsion when we saw the contact info be of a small band of revolutionary people who operate here in Hartford. (1) Good folks friends and comrades of ours and that is why it hurts so bad. “An injury to One is an Injury to All,” the flyer says but by even quoting a person such as Paul it injures queers and then if one is to believe the flow of the quote injures everyone else .(2)

We can not accept the use of any quote by Paul of Tarsus on a leaflet calling for the celebration of May Day. (3) A sad day indeed when a man who is perhaps directly responsible for any and all persecution  of those who love a same sex person, by religious folks for a couple of centuries,  is quoted on a leaflet in celebration of May Day. This quote however meaningful to some can not be found to be the inspiration for the IWW saying, “An Injury To One Is An Injury To All.” (4) We would sincerely hope that even if it was the basics for the quote that by now in 2012 all of us would have learned by using anything by a rabid biblical homophobe, misogynist person is not only insulting to ourselves but to all others who work for a world free from such tyranny. We have never thought it wise to use biblical quotes on any secular leaflet. As soon as it’s out there it becomes a separator, and perhaps an unwelcoming to anyone not of the same religion or of no religion.

The words of Paul of Tarsus are still used today by religious zealots, Christian Fundamentalists, the Catholic Church, Paulists and others whose main objective is to put down our people in any manner that they can is not only wrong but gives power to hate. It drives wedges between our community and others, demonizing our lives, condemning us and yes in many times killing us, while screaming in our face the words unrighteous, ungodliness, wicked, and unnatural at our people.

Now it may be one thing if this Paul of Tarsus was regulated to the dustbin of history but he is not, he continues to give weight to the hate that that comes forth from small minded bigoted people. The trouble with these small minds is that they are powerful, able to raise armies and influence against queers and will stop at nothing as the long list of our dead attests to. Today in Uganda the Christian Right raises the armies of the government to pass death laws on homosexuality. Who do you think these murders quote?

It is almost heartbreaking that anyone would have to fight back against folks who do indeed care about revolutionary goals and revolutionary nature. Folks who should know better and should hasten to omit and correct their mistakes. Folks who say, an injury to one is an injury to all but commit injury to queer people.

Here is a little reminder for all queer folks fighting the good fight. There is an old saying which is a Creole proverb from British Honduras, “If you make yourself a floor cloth people will wipe their feet on you.” Well that is one thing in my life I have never shied away from, that of pulling the damn floor cloth out from under folks feet. Rising up from ones knees is a wonderful experience. That lesson, queers learn the first time we said no, the night a queen flung a cup of coffee at a cop, a brick at the windows, a Molotov cocktail to burn the bar down, a punch and a kick in the air are lessons that even the liberal lgbt amongst us know.  On our knees subservient to straights or the dominate culture again, no way!  No we are never going back to that place even if some folks who consider themselves to be the revolutionary thinkers of these times in their own little subtle ways try to wipe their feet on us. Wiping ones feet on queers and queers being quiet about it is a big no no in our book. No nothing is petty or insignificant on the road to liberation. Everything is worth fighting for.

We invite all straight revolutionaries to join us on the road to liberation by education in these matters and to jump off the bandwagon of the haters and misguided bigots who are clothed in the clothing of revolt but with nothing more.

You know 2 more queer people were killed in Detroit this past week. One Coco Williams was a transwoman who was compared to garbage by the local TV station.

Notes:

1. Here is a quote that all young revolutionaries had better consider if they use any of Paul’s writings in any of their revolutionary work. Get it.  I don’t know honey as an anarchist with a twist I got to say burn Paul’s books chase his followers into the sea and begin your journey on the road to liberation.

“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities; for there is no authority except from God, and those authorities that exist have been instituted by God.  Therefore whoever resists authority resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.  For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.  Do you wish to have no fear of the authority?  Then do what is good, and you will receive its approval; for it is God’s servant for your good.  But if you do what is wrong, you should be afraid, for the authority does not bear the sword in vain! It is the servant of God to execute wrath on the wrongdoer.  Therefore one must be subject, not only because of wrath but also because of conscience.
For the same reason you also pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, busy with this very thing.  Pay to all what is due them–taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due. “…Romans 13:1-7

So if you do the revolutionary tango remember the above.

(2)  Just to set the record queer, we have since found out that the loose knit group as a whole that met to plan for May Day left the making of the flyer up to reps of one of the groups that was participating. This being a religious organization (as told to me) they used the quote by Paul of Tarsus. We would have to argue that when the leaflets were shown back to the group those who opposed using such a person’s quote on the leaflet  should have demanded that the secular revolutionary groups contact info be removed from the bottom of the leaflet. When anyone sees contact info at the bottom of a flyer one would assume that this is the organization sponsoring the event.

(3)The quote on the May Day leaflet is mild compared to the despicable man that Paul of Tarsus was. Don’t get us wrong we are not against this quote as is. But I am sure if we all searched we could find some very lovely quotes by Hitler. Here is the quote from the flyer we have also added the full story of where the quote is from and what it is talking about:

“if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it. If one member is honored all members rejoice with it. 1 Cor. 12:26.

We can fully understand why some would think that this quote is okay to use as it could speak to the unity of a body of people. 1 Cor. 12 speaks about our own bodies, and how all parts make up the whole.  The full discussion goes like this:

1 Corinthians 12:12-26

New King James Version (NKJV)

Unity and Diversity in one Body

¹² For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. ¹³ For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into^[a] one Spirit. ¹⁴ For in fact the body is not one member but many.

¹⁵ If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body? ¹⁶ And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body? ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling? ¹⁸ But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased. ¹⁹ And if they were all one member, where would the body be?

²⁰ But now indeed there are many members, yet one body. ²¹ And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²² No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary. ²³ And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor; and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty, ²⁴ but our presentable parts have no need. But God composed the body, having given greater honor to that part which lacks it, ²⁵ that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another. ²⁶ And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.

(4) An injury to one is an injury to all is a motto popularly used by the Industrial Workers of the World who are also known as the “Wobblies.” In his autobiography, Bill Haywood credited David C. Coates with suggesting a labor slogan for the IWW: an injury to one is an injury to all.^[1] The slogan has since been used by a number of labor organizations. The slogan reflects the fact that the IWW is “One Big Union” and organizes skilled and unskilled workers. Despite the reduced number of organized Wobblies today, the slogan is still popular with Wobblies, other unions and organizations.

The expression is similar to, and may be derived from, a slogan popularized in the prior quarter century by the Knights of Labor, “that is the best government in which an injury to one is the concern of all”. Someone said that the Paul quote was the inspiration for the quote An injury to one is an injury to all. Check them out and tell us what you think.

Check out the Knights of Labor Here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_Labor.

Other thoughts to share.

From Paul vs. Everybody.  A must read.

1.)There are many wonderful, perhaps even “inspired”, passages in Paul.  On balance, it may even be possible to defend Paul, by quoting other passages which he wrote.  But the fact remains that his writings contain many passages that have provided and continue to provide biblical justification for some of the worst of Conservative bigotries.  And bigots don’t look for the total picture.  They take what suits their evil purposes wherever they can find it, even when the context shows that they are misinterpreting a quotation.  Knowing that, how can anyone imagine that God would allow his name to be attached to the treasure trove of bigotry found in the writings of Paul of Tarsus?

2.) The ONLY passages in the New Testament that are offered as evidence against equal rights for homosexuals are those taught by Paul (various passages have been construed to oppose homosexuality, but the most direct reference is in Romans 1:26-27). Jesus himself never uttered a single word against homosexuals and, given his affinity for sinners, lepers, tax collectors, and other outcasts, it is likely that in our modern times it would be Jesus who would be embracing the homosexuals rejected by those who claim to be his followers. Just as it was Paul’s words that were held up in the mid-1800’s to justify slavery, so Paul’s words today are still used to persecute others.
Ironically, Paul is the one who asserts that the Law of Moses is no longer operational, yet he echoes the Law on homosexuality (see Leviticus 18:22). Ironically, many of the same Christians who eat pork, shrimp or rabbit (forbidden in Leviticus 11) because the Law no longer applies, still also cite Leviticus 18 when they want to oppose homosexuality — trying to have it both ways. Paul vs. Jesus, Davis D. Danizier. http://danizier.wordpress.com/2011/04/22/paul-vs-jesus-and-james/

Let me leave you with a very good quote from an essay Paul vrs. Everybody.

‘Unlike Jesus of Nazareth, however, who was a Liberal who built up the weak and the poor, while tearing down the mighty, Paul of Tarsus was a Conservative who did a great deal of putting down the weak: women, slaves, Jews, homosexuals and the poor, while empowering those in power, as I will spell out in Paul’s own words below.  Paul has proven himself the dream theologian of Conservatives, who for centuries has provided them any number of bible passages to help white, European, male, prosperous, heterosexual “Christians” keep the rest of mankind under their feet.”

** watch for a future posting calling all queers out for the May Day March and Rally in Hartford.