This happened recently, and it is a fine example of what the lack of historical knowledge can reap.

I had expressed my disappointment in a recent event on Facebook that those few in attendance had found disappointing as well. It was billed as a Tea Dance, but there was little advertisement and when I arrived, no DJ, but a very large radio playing country music with accompanying ads, and a bartender not sure if the dance was still happening since it was so dead and the establishment had not heard from the organization as usually happens before a scheduled event.

 I had sat reading a book for a good twenty minutes after the start time and was joined by a few people who had shown up because of a personal invite to get together with friends from a friend, not the organization. There was no visible organization presence beyond the small information table with the organization’s name on it. 

Other than that, you were in a bar that could be any bar on any day. There was nothing welcoming or community about the event, just a few people awkwardly first wondering if we had the right date and then filtering out as the drinks were expensive and the event for all intents and purposes an after thought that the organization wasn’t interested in.

Added to some previous occurrences, this appeared to me to be another example of an attitude I had seen before that if not dealt with could cause more damage than anticipated. It might not be a blind ignorance but, rather, a case of familiarity not noticing what fresh eyes can see.

Those at the event questioned why it was not more widely advertised, where the DJ for dancing was, why we were hearing ads at a Tea Dance, and where everyone was, especially members of the hosting organization. It came across as an event that was on the calendar and only happened for that reason whether anyone showed up or not.

Initially I received a defense and vacuous response ignoring the concern that was one of those non-apology, I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I? irrelevancies of a defense, “We’re sorry that yesterday’s Tea Dance – which was organized in large part by volunteers and offered our community free entertainment in a beautiful safe space – did not meet your standards, Joe”

The guilt trip attempted by mentioning volunteers was a nice try based on ignorance of my past that might have worked in my twenties, but not now.

A few days later I was asked to meet with two members of the organization to discuss my concerns. I did not ask for the meeting, but was asked to attend. So, as if it was just part of union and Gay Rights advocacy, I spent the days before the meeting preparing with emails and other documents to show my concerns were legit and were not just complaints to be ignored when I got to talk to the manager.

I have been in organizations for decades and have seen patterns, both good and bad, develop which in some cases can go against the purpose of the organization, undoing existing and potential good. As I did not call the meeting, I wanted to present my concerns logically as the meeting could only be to deal with them, and since it was basically coffee-with-friends to hear one friend’s concerns.

I had only gotten as far the first detail that was part of a larger concern when that which I feared happened. 

Instead of dealing with the whole picture, disagreement with one detail, one that could not be fully explained as the person objecting would not allow for clarification but seemed to demand we stick with his first false impression, had that detail become the one controlling detail from which we could not move. No matter what else was presented the response was consistently to that one detail that was only illustrative of a larger problem and not the substance.

Whether or not an event was on a Monday or a Tuesday, it is the event that is being discussed that is the point, not the day. In this case, it was as if nothing was legitimate because of the day mentioned, not the details.

At this point I am giving up. 

After perseverating on a single detail in the first concern apparently deemed important, one symptom being treated in a multi-symptom situation as if dismissing that is a complete cure,  when mentioning that of those present at a poorly promoted, attended, and carried off dance, the majority came because of a personal invite from a mutual friend asking we all meet up since circumstances have temporarily removed a community meeting place for the local Gay Community, the concern was not someone outside the organization having to be the one who had people show up and not the organization that had set up the event, but who this person was.

Who the person was is not the point unless dismissing the person or making an ad hominem assessment is the planned approach, perhaps, somehow getting the person to water down the story or be the victim of a form of character assassination so the onus would be placed on his shortcomings not that of the organization. The name of the person is irrelevant while the person’s having to do what should been done by the organization is what should concern them.

In passing on other comments made at the event by people who showed up and then left to have a good time elsewhere, comments made by those people who, although supportive of the organization were disappointed and freely expressed this over drinks after the event, I was asked to name the people who had concerns which I refused to do first because the names were irrelevant and, second, I did not have anyone’s permission to use their names. This being an informal gathering over coffee anyway, I thought, letting people who are friends know, but may not be aware, that they had a PR problem in the community and there were ways to undo this was why I had been asked to meet.

However, it was made clear that unless I attached a name to a concern, that concern would not be heard.

Two messages were sent.

While I was attempting to be helpful at a meeting I was asked to attend and did not have to, not only with concerns but cautions and suggestions, I was told I would no be listened to unless I gave the names of the person sending the invite and those responsible for some of those things I was passing on, apparently, although we were friends, and I thought my opinions and person were respected by them, it was obvious there was a surprisingly lack of trust that made even a conversation over coffee require verification of things I said rather than just accept them as what a friend was offering to be helpful at a meeting he was called to for that.

The second message was more direct. An old Gay man was told by a younger Gay man and head of an LGBT support organization that he would be ignored and the concerns unheard unless he named names.

No names=no attention to concerns.

Yes, I could have given the names of the people who have expressed concerns and disappointment. I know them. However, in the past I have been asked to name names and I know what would have happened to those so named.

This was an informal meeting over coffee and not some formal legal setting.

Take the concerns now and if you decide to address them those unnamed can decide if they would come forward into the light and make their concerns more formally. Considering the concerns without names can be done.

History is rife with examples of the negative consequences from being required to name names.

Long and short is that the meeting was a waste of time as nothing was accepted and consequently nothing discussed after the refusal to name names, except for one detail, the attempt to have a dismissive non-apology be accepted as sufficient while all else was ignored.

You do not tell an old Gay man to name names if he expects to be listened to.

Whatever concerns could have been addressed and then considered for the purpose of improving the organization’s reputation among those who are not members but seem to be paying a lot of cover charges to support them were swept aside, along with any benefits to the community because I did not name names.

World War II was a fight against fascism and before and during it there had been those who colluded with the enemy. In the aftermath, having just defeated a major threat, it was important, too important to some, to establish who were real Americans and who were enemies of the people.

This led to a great degree of paranoia and let those with warped values take control.

Think MAGA if you do not know this sort of thing happened,

The major actors in establishing patriotism and exposing the enemy was the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA) that had been established just before World War II, in 1938, to investigate alleged disloyalty and subversive activities on the part of citizens, public employees, and organizations suspected of having ties to the enemy and its philosophy. There was a war coming and this was a way to have some control over events, at least domestic ones.

It became a permanent committee in 1945 when the war ended because, obviously, those who had aided the enemy were still around and needed to be found to face consequences, was renamed the House Committee on Internal Security in 1969, and finally abolished in 1975. It is now the House Judiciary Committee and watching Jim Jordan run a hearing gives a good idea how they had been conducted in their 1950s Communist hunting days.

Although he was not a member of this committee because he was a senator, Joseph McCarthy was the chairman of the Government Operations Committee and its Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the U.S. Senate.

Because Klan activity was on the rise after the War HUAC was considering opening investigations into the Klu Klux Klan but, because “After all, the KKK is an old American institution”, according to a Mississippi Senator, it chose to go after Communists in the government. 

Getting right to the point without a full summation of all aspects and consequences of HUAC, there was one procedure of the committee that caused the most problems for the most people.

If someone was accused of being a Communist, by giving over names of “fellow Travelers” a person could gain freedom from the charge, but not its consequences. You quietly lost your job and the public didn’t know why.

You could buy your innocence by turning in names.

The list a person handed over could have been a legitimate list insofar as the people on it had been known to attend meetings, but it also allowed the unscrupulous to include names of those whose higher position might go to the person presenting the list while being totally innocent. A person might want revenge for some work or off-hours slight. A person could have just been scared and presented a list of random names to be let off without any idea of the damage this list would cause to innocent people, or a person, feeling patriotic, went overboard in spying on his neighbors to force the Pinkos out.

It may be a Constitutional thing that a person is innocent until proven guilty, but in this case, the accusation was enough.

I remember as a child, the FBI came to my house to talk to my father. The man down the street who had been a drill sergeant in the army during and after the war was hit by a speeding car when directing convoy traffic and had to leave the army, taking a job as a salesman for a company that turned out to have a few government contracts. The FBI was interviewing the male adults in the neighborhood about Charlie’s allegiance to the country. No Commies could work on government projects if at all. A veteran who had to be discharged because of the accident, who had fought in both WWII and the Korean War, remained to train troops after both, and here the FBI was asking my father and the other men if they had seen any un-american activity on his part. My father refused to answer questions that impugned this man as did the other men questioned.

This was one major reason why, when the FBI would show up to surveil the home of a famous Boston gangster who had moved to the ‘burbs for invisibiity, and did so by being one of the nicest people in the neighborhood who was really good to the kids, the kids in the neighborhood let everyone know the FIBBY were here. Punchy might have been a gangster in the truest, Sopranos sense, but he was to us a much better person than the FBI that questioned Charlie’s allegiance to the United States.

In 1947, HUAC went after the movie industry to weed out Communist propaganda and influence in Hollywood. Eventually, more than 300 artists, directors, radio commentators, actors, and screenwriters were boycotted by the studios either because their names were on someone’s list or they refused to name names.

This became the famous Blacklist from which 90% of those accused never recovered.

Part of this panic was The Lavender Scare which, equating Homosexuals with Communists, led to their mass dismissal from government service during the mid-20th century and continues today, although to a lesser and more subtle degree.

Gays and Lesbians were said to be a national security risk and communist sympathizers, which called for their being weeded out of government service not based on performance but bigotry.

This was justified with a logic loop. 

Since Gay people could lose their jobs because they were Gay, they might do everything to keep their “perversion” secret to keep their jobs, even betray the country. This made us susceptible to being manipulated and easily blackmailed to reveal secrets.

Of course, if you removed this artificial deterrent to keeping your job, this would not happen. They created an easily blackmailed segment of the population, put them in a position to be blackmailed, and held them responsible for the creation.

It was similar to the logical fallacies used to oppose Gay Marriage claiming that gays should not be allowed to get married because they are incapable of it. How would you know that unless you allowed for marriage and judged from that?

Otherwise it is just your parent keeping the good dessert for himself claiming you wouldn’t like it anyway.

.The Lavender scare normalized persecution of Gays through bureaucratic institutionalization of homophobia. 

A person “accused” of being a homosexual whether true or not, could get the charge dropped if they handed over the names of other homosexuals. Like with the HUAC hearings these lists could be true, and horrible to have assembled, or, again, there could be an advantage to ruining someone whether it was social or work related. 

Naming other Gay people, especially without their permission and knowledge became a common practice since the government sanctioned it.

It became common practice that, if a Gay person felt threatened, they could collude, or if an employer just did not like the employee, an accusation about homosexuality was all that would be needed to fire them..

One of the worst things to do and one of the worst positions to put a Gay person in is to require they hand over names before anything will be considered and done.

In the early years of this millennium while advocating for the inclusion of Gay students in school policy, the administration saw no need to deal with Gay kids in school as there weren’t any. They became Gay later as a result of poor decisions and recruitment after a very confusing adolescence, so there was no need to accept they existed when in high school. 

I was told that I would have to give the name of one Gay and one Lesbian student as proof that there were Gay kids in the school and so the principal could talk to them. I had to explain the dangers of outing others without their knowledge or permission, disregarding where they are on the scary passage to coming out. I was being told I would have to subject a student to the consequences of being outed before prepared and then dealing with the reactions of others that a kid is not prepared for yet, especially as the forced coming out would have happened in the Buckle of the Bible Belt.

Naming names often has very negative consequences.

During the advocacy, no names were given.

The advocacy was successful.

Needless to say that at the recent meeting no further concerns were passed on, and the status quo can continue.

It was bad enough when this was done by non-Gay people to use ourselves against our selves, but to see that Animal Farm has reached this city as a Gay supportive organization refused to deal with real identifiable problems because the names of other Gay people were not put forward by the one they asked to attend a “friendly” meeting, is beyond the pale.

Have we so lost touch with our own history, that we have comfortably taken on the tools used against us in the past and using them against ourselves now?

Because I, a Gay man, did not give names, I was not listened to even though what I had to say was important and beneficial. 

But they would not know that because they went with the farmer not the animals.

.

.

.

.

.