What is a Gay Patriot in Post-9/11 America?

There are issues that bind everyone in this country together. Whether gay, lesbian, transgendered, bisexual, or even straight, we understand all too well the horror of Tuesday, September 11th, 2001. A day that will live infinitely.

A military that has kept gays squarely outside its Pentagon has been attacked, and, notwithstanding Don't Ask, Don't Tell, we can be sure that gays were inside the Pentagon, and certainly gay civilians inside the Twin Towers, and, in all likelihood, on the planes that flew into these mighty buildings.

In premature senseless death, we are, ultimately, just like everyone else.

No other minority group is as prepared as our community to deal with the patriotic unification that grows out of tragedy. Unlike African Americans, unlike Jews, unlike any other group, we are both a minority and yet a diverse gathering of people. We are comprised of men, women, blacks, whites, Asians, Jews, Christians, Muslims, atheists, homosexuals, bisexuals, transgenders. We are military men and women, we are civilians. Our minority status grows out of the simple fact that we are not of the majority, that we are not straight.

We are different, we are diverse, and we are not straight. But we cannot lose sight of the fact that we are also Americans. Loved by some, hated by some, but Americans nonetheless. And we must stand behind America and the freedom that allows us to be different.

Our community is used to standing up defiantly against perceived wrongs. We come together to March on Washington, to celebrate our Pride around the country, and to mourn our dead. We must extend the pride we feel in being gay to a pride in being gay and American.

We must be wary of the very real risk of American turning against American, human being turning against human being. Our community knows too well what it is to be unjustifiably picked on and all of us must ensure that freedom reigns for all people.

Terrorists murdered our American brothers and sisters, destroyed our Twin Towers, infiltrated the Pentagon, but they have not destroyed the American spirit. I've always believed that something positive can grow from any situation, no matter how dire it seems. As an American Jew, this was ingrained into my upbringing even as I was taught about how one-half of my religion was exterminated during the Holocaust.

Everything written prior to this sentence was written but never published immediately after September 11, 2001. Osama Bin Laden continues to threaten America. The celebrity trial of Saddam Hussein may be on the verge of outdoing the circus of O.J. Simpson. The death toll in Iraq continues to mount with American, British, and Iraqi casualties.

Gay advocates and activists have always been divided on whether now is the time to be pushing for gay marriage. As Americans, this debate is certainly a diversion from real issues that we've all but lost sight of - like that beautiful 'We Are Family'-across the line patriotism that bound together everybody by the end of the day, 9/11/01. But the very people most responsible for ending that patriotism and dividing the nation once again is the same guy and staff who today embraces his self-claimed patriotism like a sword in a way that would have made Senator McCarthy proud. If Liberals criticize the decision to enter the war, they can't be patriotic; ergo Liberal becomes a dirty word like Communist or Kennedy.

Gays are no strangers to exclusion, meaningless distinction, name-calling, but the one lesson from 9/11 that no one embraced for long? That Americans stand together and will not rest until Osama bin-Laden and Al-Quaeda had no place on Earth to hide. But, in Iraq, we've given them not only that but a place to flourish, to recruit, to manufacture a steady stream of hate. Gays know hate can have a long shelf-life and that, quite simply, the end result of hate is someone always loses an eye.