FRENCH PRIDE!

I wanted to show solidarity for the French and the gay community (and the French gay community), and so I tried to put both the French flag and the pride flag over my profile pic. Somehow I ended up with this:

They Still Do Their Jobs

Thank You Jesus!

Is Kim Davis Annie Wilkes?

Meet Dr. Ben Carson:

Opening the Floodgates (The Meaning of Matthew)

Matthew Shepard, 1976-1998

(Originally posted to my blog, "Late Night: Tales From the Graveyard Shift")

I work weekend graveyard shifts at a gas station and convenience store in Missoula, Montana. The other night a custumor came in who, by appearance alone, let loose in me a flood of powerful emotions. He looks just like Matthew Shepard.

A brief summary: Matthew was a 21-year-old University of Wyoming student who, on the night of October 6, 1998, was brutally beaten, tortured and left tied to an old fence post near Laramie, Wyoming. Six days later he died in a hospital from head injuries. He was murdered by Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson who are now serving two consecutive life sentences in prison.

There are some witnesses who say McKinney pretended to be gay to lure Matthew away from a bar and rob him. Others say the crime was drug-related and based more on greed than homophobia. McKinney's girlfriend first said McKinney became enraged when Matthew made "sexual advances" towards him, but she later recanted her story. In a well-researched article for The Advocate, a national gay right magazine, Aaron Hidling wrote that investigators had "amassed enough anecdotal evidence to build a persuasive case that Shepard's sexuality was, if not incidental, certainly less central than popular consensus had lead us to believe."  But Dave O'malley, the Larmie policeman who led the murder investigation, said: "I feel comfortable in my own heart that they did what they did to Matt because they had hatred towards him for being gay."

Fred Phelps, the hateful leader of the Westboro Babtist Church, certainly believed Matthew died because he was gay, and seemed to credit God for the murder; he organized a picket at Shepard's funeral of ignorant church members holding signs with statements such as, "God Hates Fags!" (Although Phelps is now dead, his Westboro group still maintains a despicable website depicting a photo of Matthew surrounded by flames stating "how many days Matthew Shepard has been in hell.")  In one of the most thoughtful, well-executed anti-protests ever conceived, Matthew's friends dressed as angels at his funeral and surrounded the Westboro protesters, blocking them with giant outstretched wings. (The organizer, Romaine Patterson, has since formed an organization called Angel Action.)

Matthew's murder rallied activists all over the world to raise awareness of abuse and mistreatment of gay people and push for hate crime legislation. Matthew's parents, Dennis and Judy Shepard, became (and remain) prominent gay-rights activists and led a successful battle for passage of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act (commonly called the Matthew Shepard Act) which was signed into law by President Obama on October 28, 2009.

There was a time I did not understand or support "hate crime" legislation. After all, a crime is a crime; assault and murder are already illegal. I've since changed my mind. When a certain segment of people are targeted for and become victims because of who and what they are, such as being gay, it keeps others fearful of being and expressing who and what they are; at times it can keep people afraid of even going out in public. It suppresses freedom and liberty. It is a form of terrorism. The aftermath of Matthew's Shepard's murder helped me understand that better. 

Judy Shepard also formed the Matthew Shepard Foundation. There have been numerous books, plays, songs and films made about Matthew's murder and the aftermath. (I recently read a powerfully moving book called, "The Meaning of Matthew: My Son's Murder in Laramie and a World Transformed," published in 2009, and written by Judy Shepard -- a remarkably strong and courageous person.) 

Sadly and unfortunately, it sometimes takes tragedy to create awareness and action.

I first learned of Matthew Shepard the day he died when I returned from an elk hunt in the wilds of Montana. I was still closeted and married — fighting, denying and suppressing my attraction to men, often leading a secret, shameful double life. The news hit me hard, on several fronts; at one point in my life, I had been the stereotypical homophobe who hated in others what I hated in myself. I broke down sobbing. My wife (now my former wife who remains my best friend) was a bit surprised it hit me has hard is it did. Now she understands.

These floodgates of emotion opened up again when Matthew's look-alike came into the store the other night to buy beer. He looked at me kind of funny.

"Wow, you look like Matthew Shepard," I told him.
"I get that all the time," he said.
"I hope you take it as a compliment; Matthew Shepard was a beautiful man," I replied.
"Thank you," he said. "It used to bother me, but then I learned about Matthew and now I am pretty proud to look like him."

Such is the meaning of Matthew.

Freedom and Equality!

"Honey, One Night With Me and You Won't Be Gay!"

I recently took a part time job working weekend graveyard shifts at a gas station and convenience store in Missoula, Montana. Late one night a very inebriated woman comes in:

INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Are you new here?"

ME: "Kind of. I've been here a few months now."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Oh, I haven't seen you before."
ME: "I only work Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Oh, well you seem nice."
ME: "Thanks."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "And you're very handsome if you don't mind me saying."
ME: "Aw . . .thanks! I don't mind at all!"

INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Are you single?"
ME: "Yes, I am."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Would you like to go out sometime?"
ME: "You mean like on a date?"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Well, yeah!"
ME: "I am very flattered, thank you, but I am gay."

INEBRIATED WOMAN: "I've heard THAT before!"
ME: "I bet you have!"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "What's THAT supposed to mean?"
ME: "Well . . . there's a lot of us around; we're everywhere!"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Honey, one night with me and you won't be gay."
ME: "Well . . .that's a kind offer but I'm quite happy the way i am, thanks."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "You're happy being gay?"
ME: "Well . . . that's the meaning of the word, right?"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Huh?

I ring up her items, hit total . . .

ME: "That will be $12.98 . . . "
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "I'm serious."
ME: "About what?"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "I can help you."
ME: "But I don't need help."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "I've changed guys before."
ME: "What? . . Do you work for a Christian reparative therapy group or something?"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "So now you're making fun of Christians?"
ME: "No. I was kidding."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "It's not funny."
ME: "Didn't mean to offend you."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "You didn't offend me, you're offending God."

ME: "Okay . . .well . . . will there be anything else?"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "I'm serious."
ME: "Okay. Thanks. I appreciate you're concern. Have a good night."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "I don't judge, but God will judge."
ME: "Will he judge you for trying to sleep with gay guys?"
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Fuck you."
ME: "No thanks."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "Asshole."
ME: "Okay, thanks. Have a good night."
INEBRIATED WOMAN: "You need a good ass-kicking."
ME: "I've heard THAT before!"

(To read more, similar stories visit "Noon's At Midnight: Tales from the Graveyard Shift.")

Take Back America?

Being gay is not natural, but talking snakes are?

Freefall: The Last 2,500 Feet?

In 2003 depression, related substance abuse and thoughts of suicide led me to load my backpack, toss my wallet in the garbage, step off my front porch in Missoula, head north, and spend the next 10-weeks by myself hiking through the most remote, wild country left in the continental United States. It saved my life. Here's how it began:  

  “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”

                                                                              -- Helen Keller              

               
As a Force Recon Marine I dove out of planes from altitudes as high as 32,000 feet, night and day, sometimes with full combat gear sometimes without (sometimes right into the ocean, with SCUBA gear attached) from the swamps of coastal North Carolina to the deserts of southeast California, in the scorching heat and humidity of Puerto Rico to the brutally-frigid tundra of northern Norway -- or, as the Marine Corps hymn simply states: in every clime and place. 

And I would tumble, fall, and fly. At least it feels like flying, falling at terminal velocity, speeds of 180 miles-per-hour; a slight tilt of the right hand would turn me quickly right, the left hand would turn me that direction, or I could cuff both hands inward to go forward, or outward to slow my descent. I could hunch up to slow down, or pull hands and legs in to speed up. Place hands and legs together and a missile-like nosedive results, or do flips, or spin, and so on.  By maneuvering in such a manner, a team of Marines can remain together in the sky, and even approach each other and “link up” by locking arms. I once kissed my friend Jim at 10,000-feet above the Earth.   

And as the ground gets bigger and closer, I would check my altimeter on my wrist until reaching a point to “wave off” (a flagging of the hands to warn those above me that I was about to open my chute, so they could move and not crash into me), move my right hand in to the “rip cord” at my chest (making a counter move in and over my head with the left hand, so as to remain in a stable fall and not spin out of control), then pull, rapidly thrusting both hands and arms out, up and forward, like a referee’s signal for a touchdown, tightly gripping the ripcord handle that pulls out the long, thin wire that releases the nylon flaps on the pack, allowing the small spring-loaded pilot parachute to burst free, like a jack-in-the-box, catching wind and pulling the main chute out behind by a cord. The rest, if all went well, happened rapidly – the main chute blossoms open, bringing acceleration to what seems a sudden halt, with such shock at times it once literally jerked me out of my boots over northern Norway  (I got frost bit toes after landing in socks on snow in minus-40 temperatures). And then everything would seem calm, compared to the previous rushing of wind in the ears, and I would gradually steer my way down to the ground, pull down hard on toggles to flare, pause, and land sometimes softly, sometimes hard, depending on the wind, skills and luck. 

At other times, the pilot chute might get caught in the wind pocket in the small of my back (a “snivel” we called it), so I would bang away with my elbow until it caught wind and deployed. Or the main might malfunction, which never happened to me, but if it did, I was trained to “cut away,” or release the main and open the reserve. (“No worries,” my instructor said, “If your main doesn’t open, you have the rest of your life to deploy your reserve.”)  It could sometimes take 1,000 feet or so for the main to open, if everything worked right, and another 1,000 or more to try and rectify things if it didn’t. For this reason, we had a general rule to open at 4,000 to 3,000 feet, and always, always before reaching 2,500 feet; an altitude that shows on the altimeter as red, danger zone – like the “low on gas” signal in a car, only with more severe consequences.   

About the time I was doing lots of jumps, I had a reoccurring dream: I am freefalling, enjoying the ride, when I look at my altimeter and it’s in the red zone, 2,500 feet! I wave off, reach to pull, but I have no parachute on my back. Nothing. At first I am terrified, but quickly calm down. It’s my last 2,500 feet, I figure, I may as well enjoy it. So I smile, and begin doing front flips, and back flips, and then I wake up to the dark silence of the night.

Twenty years later I felt like I finally slammed into hard-packed earth.  My father died. My wife of 14-years filed for divorce. I could no longer focus on the work I used to love, nor any of the activities I used to enjoy. I had spent much of my life feeding secret shadows of shame, guilt, anger and fear until they finally loomed large, like the monsters I imagined in my closet as a kid. I had increasing difficulty trying to resist, deny, hide and suppress my emotional and physical attraction to men. I lost all desire and passion to go on and thought, maybe sometimes it okay to quit, perhaps best to quit. I drove late one drunken night to a trailhead a few miles from my home in Missoula, Montana, to the edge of the Rattlesnake Wilderness, with a shotgun I used to hunt ducks and geese. My plan was to walk a few miles in and blow my head off. Instead, I sat in my car and cried. I thought of my son, then only three, and wondered how he would turn out. I thought of my family. I thought of my friends. I even had the twisted thought; I can hardly hit ducks with this thing. Then I thought of my dream, the last 2,500 feet.  And I thought of my maps. The maps. Maps of the wild country surrounding my home. 

For years I had studied the maps, intrigued by the notion that I could walk off my front porch in town and walk all the way to Alberta through the most remote, wild country left in the continental U.S. and only cross three main (paved) roads. It was a fantasy, a journey of the mind, until that inebriated night I drove to the trailhead with a 12-guage. At that point I thought:   

What the hell. It’s the last 2,500 feet; what do I have to lose?  

Freefall

by Dave Stalling

For years

I fed illusions

Of flying high

Until the ground grew frightenly close

Terrified, I suddenly realize

I am falling

Leaving the womb

Like leaping from a plane

Begins a tumultuous freefall

There are choices:

Remain frightened, out of control

Or get stable, and enjoy the ride

Until we meet the end

(And we will)

As sure as sky meets earth

Best to see it all now

Long before impact

While there is still time

Precious time

To enjoy an exhilarating ride

And make the most

Of the last 2,500 feet

So I will flare, flip and tumble

Through clouds and clear skies

And pretend I am flying, sometimes

Though I know better

But it still brings me joy

It’s my jump, my journey, my fall

I’ll do it as me, not to please others

Critics and skeptics be damned!

Who cares what they think?

They don’t even know

That they too

Are falling fast

For more, read "Grizzlies Made me Gay"

Long Ago Hunter Today: Seeking Humanity in Our Wild Roots

While hunting in the remote Tatshenshini Provincial Park along the British Columbia–Yukon border, my friend Bill discovered the headless but mostly well-preserved remains of a fellow hunter, frozen for more than 550 years, who had been exposed at the foot of a melting glacier. “Kwaday Dan Sinchi,” he is called by First Nations people, “Long Ago Person Found.” His clothes were made from the skins of 100 ground squirrels. He carried dried salmon, a medicine bag and hunting tools. He likely fell into an ice crevice and froze to death. Fortunately Bill didn’t suffer the same fate, but if he did, would another hunter find him 550 years or more from now? Unfortunately few places remain as wild as the Tatshenshini, where humans can hunt as Bill and Kwaday have.

The “hunting hypothesis” of evolution suggests that hunting literally made us human in the sense that the development of tools and capabilities to kill for meat and defend against predators allowed our early ancestors to wander from the safety of trees, expand far and wide, and eventually start walking upright. Scholars debate the details, but I feel no need for evidence. I know I am a hunter and always will be. As Chief Sitting Bull of the Hunkpapa Lakota Sioux said, “When the buffalo are gone, we will hunt mice, for we are hunters.”   

Scholars debate the details, but I feel no need for evidence. I know I am a hunter and always will be. I was born a hunter, just as I was born gay. The two elements of my life are intricately woven together through nature and nurture and anchor me to my wild roots.

I particularly love elk. I spend all the time I can in elk country around my home in Montana, year-round, hiking, backpacking, and snowshoeing, observing and admiring elk. And each fall, I head into elk country with the intent to kill one. I like to think I’m a vegetarian of sorts, living off the wild grasses, sedges, and forbs that grow near my home. Most these plants are not palatable to humans, so I let elk convert them to protein for me. Perhaps someday I shall travel through the digestive system of a grizzly and fertilize the vegetation elk eat: Seems only fair considering all the elk I’ve killed and eaten.

In his essay, “A Hunter’s Heart,” Colorado naturalist and writer David Petersen summarizes it nicely:

Why do I hunt? It’s a lot to think about, and I think about it a lot. I hunt to acknowledge my evolutionary roots, millennia deep, as a predatory omnivore. To participate actively in the bedrock workings of nature. For the atavistic challenge of doing it well with an absolute minimum of technological assistance. To learn the lessons, about nature and myself, that only hunting can teach. To accept personal responsibilities for at least some of the deaths that nourish my life. For the glimpse it offers into a wildness we can hardly imagine. Because it provides the closet thing I've known to a spiritual experience. I hunt because it enriches my life and because I can't help myself … because I was born with a hunter’s heart.

From a young age, I found comfort being alone in wild places. Once, during a ten-week solo backpack trip, I watched a sow grizzly and her two cubs 100-yards or so upwind of me. She was lying down, resting, keeping watch of her young ones as they wrestled, rolled, and chased each other in the grass. The cubs ran and pounced on their mom a few times, and she nudged them away with her snout. When one cub tried to suckle her, she swatted the youngster with her powerful paw and sent the startled cub rolling. Then she got up, walked over, and reassuringly licked the cub until all seemed well in the world.

Then it struck me: I had spent so much time alone in the wilds because in the wilds I could truly be myself. In nature there are no societal-created norms, judgments, and expectations. Everything is what it is. A grizzly might judge me as a threat or feast but doesn’t care who I fall in love with and sleep with. I was drawn to the wildness and freedom of wild grizzlies while denying and suppressing my own wildness and freedom. Like the grizzlies, I am what I am. I accepted myself that day while watching those magnificent and tenacious animals. In a real way, those bears helped save my life. I am truest to my own nature in wild places among wild animals. And the more time I spend in the wilds, the less I want to be just a visitor and the more I want to be intimately connected to the wilds. So I pick and eat wild huckleberries. I catch and eat wild trout. I kill and eat wild elk.

Henry David Thoreau wrote, “In wildness is the preservation of the world.” Wildlife and wild places preserve truth of reality, of life and death, and of our primeval connection to this Earth. To deny that is to deny ourselves; to destroy it is self-destruction. To embrace, understand, and accept it is to embrace, understand, and accept our own innate nature and wildness.

But to think that hunting from an all-terrain vehicle (ATV) armed with high-power rifles, scopes, and other technology resembles our hunting ancestors is akin to thinking that an arsenal of modern semi-automatic weapons resembles our colonial Patriots armed with muskets—and somehow equivalently needed to launch a Tea-Party-like rebellion against the improbable event that our government (armed with aircraft carriers, fighter jets, tanks, drones and nuclear warheads) turns against us. We hang onto the past without grasping today’s differences. As Aldo Leopold once put it, “Our tools are better than we are, and grow better faster than we do. They suffice to crack the atom, to command the tides, but they do not suffice for the oldest task in human history, to live on a piece of land without spoiling it.”

We apply space-age technology to a stone-aged pursuit.

We hunters raise money to fund state fish and game departments overseen by politically appointed commissions (made of mostly of ranchers and hunters) who too often pressure agencies to lead us away from wildlife management to something more resembling animal husbandry, with a focus on producing more elk and deer for hunters to shoot. The good news is that many hunters rally around efforts to protect what little remains of our wild places, which benefits all species—including non-hunted species and fellow predators such as mountain lions, grizzlies, and wolves. But it seems a lot more hunters want roads and ATV trails punched into our wilds; want wolves killed off because they think they’re killing all “their” deer and elk; fight against efforts to protect the wild places that sustain the wildlife we hunt; and deny the human-caused changes in climate that melts glaciers and exposes ancient hunters. Most modern-day hunters are as detached from nature as the rest of society, and so we naively, ignorantly, and sometimes maliciously kill what sustains us.

And that, too, is part of being human.

Hunting is a significant ingredient to what made and makes us human. It is also, in large part, why hunting exposes all aspects of human nature—the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Note: This essay was originally published by the Center for Humans and Nature as part of their series, "Does Hunting Make Us Human?"  Here is the link: Long Ago Hunter Today

Of Hunting, Elk and Sex Lines

I recently pulled a few consecutive all-nighters struggling to write an overdue essay for the Center for Humans and Nature. I had (as is typical of me) procrastinated on far too long. The topic: “Does Hunting Make us Human?” I started the piece with an anecdote about a friend of mine who -- while hunting in the remote Tatshenshini Provincial Park along the British Columbia-Yukon border -- discovered the headless but mostly well-preserved remains of a fellow hunter from long ago who had been exposed at the foot of a melting glacier.  “Kwaday Dan Sinchi,” he is called by First Nations people, “Long Ago Person Found.”  

But I couldn’t remember how old the remains were.  I had written a story about it years ago for the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation’s Bugle magazine. So I decided to call my friend Dan, the magazine’s editor, to see if he could look it up for me. Since I did not have Dan’s phone number on me, I decided to call the 1-800-CALL ELK line to reach the Elk Foundation and ask the receptionist to transfer me to Dan. 

Although I spent ten wonderful years as the conservation editor of Bugle, and I think Bugle remains the finest hunting-related conservation magazine out there, I always feel a bit awkward calling them. I’ve had a falling out of sorts with the organization, and have vocally and publicly had a few strong disagreements with the current leadership, particularly with their harsh stance against wolves. I have since been banished from writing for Bugle and shunned by much of the staff.  When I call, I feel a bit like I need to do the over-the-phone, verbal equivalent of wearing a fake nose and glasses and and disguise my voice for fear they’ll hang up on me (admittedly pure paranoia on my part).  

Nevertheless some good friends I respect work there, such as Dan, and I was desperate for the information.

So I called 1-800-CALL ELK.   

Or thought I did. I was so exhausted I apparently dialed 1-800-CALL EEK.   

EEK indeed! Instead of hearing an expected, pleasant greeting from the Elk Foundation receptionist I instead heard the automated voice of woman seemingly trying to sound sexy:

“Welcome to America’s hottest talk line. Ladies: To talk to interesting and exciting guys for free, please press one now. Guys: Hot ladies are waiting to talk to you! Press two to connect for free now. Ladies: Press one now. Guys: Press two now.”

There was no option to press three for guys wanting to talk to interesting and exiting guys for free. Maybe it’s a right-wing, homophobic Christian sex line. But even so, you’d think they’d at least welcome the closeted ones among them -- and I am certain there are many.  

So I hung up. Likely a good thing; I do not need more excuses and distractions to procrastinate.

I dialed 1-800-CALL ELK again and got it right the second time around, got hold of Dan and he found the number for me. 

By the way: Kwaday died 550 years, presumably from falling in an ice-crevice while hunting -- long, long before there were 1-800-SEX lines.  

Time to Step up and Help the Montana Gay Men’s Task Force: We Can’t Afford to Lose It!

Budget cuts could mean less opportunities
for free and anonymous HIV testing

When I first began testing the waters outside the fortified walls of my closet 13 years ago I felt scared, confused, tormented and alone. I had thoughts of suicide. I thought for sure I would drown. I recall a depressed, drunken night on a trip to Denver when I engaged in unprotected sex. In my naivety, I felt for sure I would die of AIDS. I had no one to turn to; no one to talk to.

So I called the Montana Gay Men’s Task Force.

Based in my hometown of Missoula, Montana, the Task Force is led by gay men – men who had been where I was, had felt the way I did, could relate, emphasize and provide help and support. I felt safe privately and discretely consulting with their professional and dedicated staff; I attended gay men retreats they put on; I learned about HIV and other sexually-transmitted infections and diseases; I learned about safe sex; I felt relieved to have access to free and anonymous testing the task force provides for men like me who have sex with men, conducted by men like me who have sex with men. I trusted them. I still do.

Without them, I would not be as confident and comfortable with myself as I am today. I might not even be alive.

I’m not the only one.

“It’s difficult to measure how many people we have helped, and how many diseases and infections we’ve prevented,” says Task Force Director David Herrera. “But there is no doubt that we have.”

No doubt indeed! Considering that Herrera has been involved in HIV prevention, testing and counseling for nearly 30 years I have no doubt the people he has helped, including me, number in the thousands.

Where would people like me be without the Task Force? Unfortunately, we may soon find out.

A victim of sequestration (automatic federal budget cuts put into law by the Budget Control Act of 2011) Herrera may have no choice but to reduce services such as retreats and outreach efforts. With cuts in federal funding the Task Force budget just took a $20,000 hit. And that’s the second wave of cuts. “We’ve lost 50 percent of our funding in the past 3-4 years,” Herrera says. “And we’re already operating on a bare-bones budget.”

The cuts come at a time when the Task Force has greatly expanded its cadre of well-trained counselors who provide testing, support and community-building throughout Montana, including among Two-Spirited people within indigenous Native American tribes and in rural parts of eastern Montana where diseases such as Gonorrhea are on the rise. Although sequestration is effecting organizations all over the nation rural states like Montana are experiencing the largest cuts.

“This is a time when we should be expanding our efforts, not eliminating programs,” Herrera says. “But there is limited federal dollars, so we are now cutting up the pie rather than adding to it.”

It’s a risky thing to do, and could prove costly.

“The cuts could ultimately cost more than they save in both money and lives,” Herrera says. “It’s a lot more cost effective to prevent HIV and other infections and diseases than it is to pay for treatments for people who become infected.”

What can be done? Herrera has several suggestions: Contact Senators Jon Tester and Max Baucus, and Congressman Steve Daines, and demand that federal funding for HIV prevention, testing and counseling be restored. Also contact the Montana State Health Department and Governor Steve Bullock and demand that state funding be made available for these critical programs. (Two employees of the Task Force, Chantz Thilmony and Christopher Gehring, recently received well-deserved Governor’s Awards for their tremendous outreach efforts to help prevent HIV infections in Montana).

In the meantime, personal contributions from all of us can help keep the Task Force afloat. Donations can be made through the Tasks Force’s website: www.mtgayhealth.org, or mailed to:

Montana Gay Men’s Task Force
P.O. Box 7984
Missoula, MT  59807.

I plan to make a donation as soon as I finish writing this; I urge you all to do the same. 

Let’s step up and support the organization that has long supported us. We NEED the Montana Gay Men’s Task Force!

Coming Out a Hunter

Note: This essay was part of a series of "coming out" stories for the Advocate in celebration of National Coming Out Day. It was published in the Advocate on October 10, 2013.

There is a side to me I don’t share with everyone. It’s certainly nothing I would mention on a first date. I often feel self-conscious about it, and worry others will not understand and will harshly judge me based on stereotypes.

I am a hunter.

I can understand people's disdain for hunting. As the environmental writer and activist Edward Abbey once wrote, "Hunting is one of the hardest things even to think about. Such a storm of conflicting emotion!"

I love elk. They are magnificent, mysterious and powerful animals. I spend all the time I can in elk country around my home in Montana, year-round, hiking, backpacking, snowshoeing, observing and admiring elk. And yet, each year I head into elk country with the intent to kill one.  I like to think I'm a vegetarian of sorts, living off the wild grasses, sedges and forbs that grow near my home. Most these plants are not directly palatable to humans, so I let elk convert them to protein for me. Perhaps someday I can travel through the digestive system of a grizzly and fertilize the vegetation that elk eat: Seems only fair considering all the elk I've killed and eaten. We're all part of this land.

In an indirect way, I became a hunter because I am gay. From a young age, I found comfort being alone in very remote, wild places. In the wilds, there are no societal-created norms, expectations and judgments – everything is what it is. A grizzly might judge me as a possible threat or feast, but doesn’t care who I love and sleep with. The more time I spent in the wilds, the less I wanted to be just a visitor, and the more I wanted to be intimately connected to the wilds. So I pick and eat wild huckleberries. I catch and eat wild trout. I kill and eat wild elk.

I hunt to experience a fundamental connection with nature, because we must all kill to eat, and eating elk nourished on native grasses and forbs has as low an impact on the environment as any of the alternatives. Even eating soybeans and soy-based products supports an agricultural industry that displaces and destroys wildlife habitat to grow a non-native plant, requiring irrigation, pesticides, herbicides, fossil fuels, trucks, roads and industry to be shipped around the country. Not to mention the thousands of deer and other wildlife killed to protect valuable agricultural crops.

Everything we do has consequences. Whether we choose to eat vegetables or meat, store-bought food or homegrown, cattle or venison, we all contribute to the death of animals so we can eat. I choose to eat wild elk. And the money I spend in pursuit of these wild animals, through license fees and excise taxes on hunting equipment helps protect the wild places that sustain them and sustain me. It's the most efficient, environmentally sound and sustainable way I know to live in this somewhat arid western landscape we call Montana. And the countless days and hours I spend pursuing elk through the rugged mountains in the wilderness area where I hunt have provided me with a keen understanding and awareness of these incredible animals and their habitat, which has fueled a passion for the protection of wild elk and the wild places they roam.

I am growing increasingly angry over the ongoing loss of crucial wildlife habitat from human subdivision and development; the people who want to mine and drill our last remaining wild places; the people who deny and evade critical topics such as climate change, and the people -- and a society -- that seems to put greed, profit and money above all else. Throughout the West, homes are rapidly replacing critical elk and deer winter range, calving and fawning habitat and migratory corridors. Not only elk and deer suffer, but all wildlife that depend on that habitat, including everything from wolves and trout to grizzlies and pine martens. My love for wild elk provokes a strong desire to protect their habitat; That desire is fueled, in part, by my passion for hunting and the meat that sustains me.

Hunting has a large ugly side, to be sure, which seems to be growing larger. I sometimes feel like an anti-hunter who hunts. Far too many hunters reveal a disturbing lack of knowledge of, or concern for, wildlife and wild places and actually promote efforts to erode and degrade our wildlife and last remaining wild places. They are as detached from the wilds as most Americans are, and increasingly replace knowledge, skills and effort with technology and other short cuts; They selfishly do everything and anything they can to boost their egos and overcome insecurities by killing other creatures; They fear and hate wolves, they fear and hate grizzlies, they fear and hate wilderness, they fear and hate the wilds; They fear and hate to actually hunt. They just love to kill.

I can think of no better lifestyle than roaming wildlands as a participant of nature, taking responsibility for the deaths I cause, and securing my own sustenance. In his essay, "A Hunter's Heart," Colorado naturalist and writer David Petersen summarizes it nicely:

"Why do I hunt? It's a lot to think about, and I think about it a lot. I hunt to acknowledge my evolutionary roots, millennia deep, as a predatory omnivore. To participate actively in the bedrock workings of nature. For the atavistic challenge of doing it well with an absolute minimum of technological assistance. To learn the lessons, about nature and myself, that only hunting can teach. To accept personal responsibilities for at least some of the deaths that nourish my life. For the glimpse it offers into a wildness we can hardly imagine. Because it provides the closet thing I've known to a spiritual experience. I hunt because it enriches my life and because I can't help myself . . . because I was born with a hunter's heart."

Fanning Flames of Change: A Tribute to Darren Manzella

Perhaps it’s the Marine in me, but I don’t use the term “hero” lightly -- It should be reserved for those who boldly go above and beyond and take extraordinary risks to do what’s right against tremendous odds despite real and potential negative consequences.

Darren Manzella was a hero.

I had the honor and privilege of working with and getting to know Darren during my short time as a grassroots organizer for a national nonprofit called the Servicemember’s Legal Defense Network (now called OutServe-SLDN) which led the battle to repeal the archaic “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT) statute.

In the winter of 2009 we traveled to Boston together to meet with folks working on repeal of DADT.  It was the first time I watched him give a talk he frequently gave to groups, media, and in front of Congressional committees to change people’s hearts and minds about gays serving in the military. He was persuasive. Not just because he lit up the place with his smile, charm and charisma, but because he spoke honestly, humbly and sincerely from his heart based on his own experiences, which were impressively significant.

He enlisted in the Army in 2002, was trained as a medical specialist and served two tours in Iraq. Among many other distinctions he was awarded the Combat Medical Badge.  While witnessing the brutalities of war he wondered, like most combat soldiers do, if he would ever return home. But unlike most combat soldiers, he was saddened by the thought that those he loved most may never know all of who he was. So he came out to his friends and family. “I had kept myself in the closet for years,” he said, “and I didn't want to live like that anymore.”  He started dating. A few photos and videos circulated of him enjoying time with his boyfriend. In some they are kissing. Word gradually got out, rumors spread, and he started receiving threatening, anonymous emails. “Turn down the flame,” said one.  Every day he wondered if and when military police might show up to arrest him. He described it as a time of “fear and deep insecurity.”

Knowing he risked being stripped of rank, losing money and being booted out of the Army he nevertheless met with his commanding officer to discuss his struggles and reveal his true self. "I didn't know how else to do it to keep my sanity," he said. It was the right thing to do; individual emotional distractions can affect everyone in a combat unit, sometimes with severe consequences. An investigation was launched and concluded there was “no proof of homosexuality.”  Darren was told he was “not gay.” That was an order. It was wartime; the Army needed him.

During his second tour of Iraq, he was asked to be interviewed by 60 Minutes as part of a special report about DADT. He knew the risks, but knew it was time to take a stand and help make a difference. He was the first openly out, gay soldier to be interviewed from a combat zone. The report was aired in December, 2007 and led to his eventual discharge in 2008.

After his talk in Boston Darren and I walked the Freedom Trail on a brutally cold day and talked with respect and admiration about those colonial-day rebels who risked everything to stand up against tyranny and fight for liberty and equality. We stopped to warm up at a bar and swapped war stories. I shared my own struggles of coming to terms with my sexuality and coming out. I served before “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” when the unofficial policy – at least in the Marine Corps – was “anyone finds out and you’re dead.”  I was envious yet hopeful when he told me how most of his comrades in arms didn’t care. They fully accepted him. One even invited Darren and his boyfriend to her wedding. The only soldiers within the ranks still holding onto the wrongs of the past were the older ones. Times were changing, and Darren was on the front lines.  

Darren (right) and his husband Javier Lapeira

When he was warned to “turn down the flame” he instead piled on the fuel and fanned flames of change. At a Washington DC press conference he once said, “This is who I am; this is my life. It has never affected my job performance.” Once, when asked if repeal of DADT would negatively affect the military he responded: “I was an openly gay man in the Army, and the Army’s still standing.”

The Army is not only still standing, it’s stronger -- as are all branches of our military; as is our nation -- thanks, in no small part, to Darren Manzella.

This is who he was. This was his life.

On August 29, 2013, Darren died in a traffic accident in western New York. He was 36. A bright and beautiful flame has been extinguished. He left our world too soon, but he left our world a better place. 

Grizzlies Made Me Gay

It happened on a chilly August morning in a high-mountain meadow about seven weeks into a ten-week, 1,000-mile solo backpack trip through the most remote, rugged, wild country left in the continental United States. (I had left from my front porch in Missoula, Montana, and was on my way to Waterton, Alberta, mostly off trail, crossing only three roads along the way.)

I lay safely hidden behind a downed, subalpine fir tree watching a silver-tipped sow grizzly and her two cubs about 100 yards or so upwind of me. She was lying down, resting, keeping watch of her young ones as they wrestled, rolled and chased each other in the grass. The cubs ran and pounced on their mom a few times and she nudged them away with her snout. When one cub tried to suckle her she swiftly swatted the youngster with her powerful big paw, in a seemingly effortless motion, and sent the startled cub rolling. Then she got up, walked over, and reassuringly licked the cub until all seemed well in the world.

I departed on this big, wild adventure deeply depressed and wasn’t so sure I planned to return. A few drunken nights prior I drove to a trailhead with my Remington Model 870 12-gauge shotgun planning to walk a ways into the woods and pull the trigger with barrel in mouth. Instead, I sat in my car thinking of my son, my family and my friends, sobbing so hard I was shook until I passed out. I awoke at sunrise and drove back home.

I still struggled with father’s death the fall before and my wife of 14-years demanded divorce; I had grown too damn miserable to live with. Years of accumulated shame, guilt, fear, confusion and sorrow was rumbling throughout me like thunderous dark clouds ready to let loose a dangerously potent storm. As a leader in Montana's wildlife conservation realm I was commonly praised for my straightforward honesty while secretly hiding a dishonest life. I was living a lie, suffocating beneath a deep internal avalanche, and I hated myself. Turmoil ate away at me like cancer. So naturally, as I have often done in my life, I escaped to the wilds.

When I first I retreated to the wilds of Montana fresh out of a Marine Force Recon unit I developed a particular fondness for and connection to grizzly bears. They’re beautiful, powerful, fascinating, potentially dangerous animals that are gravely maligned and misunderstood. Some people hate them and many fear them because they don’t know and understand them. They’re bears. They are what they are; they do what they do. They want to (and should be) given respect, space and left alone to live and be themselves. I’ve dedicated most of my life fighting to protect wildlife and wild places always with this thought in mind: If we save enough room for grizzlies, which need a lot of space, we pretty much keep entire watersheds and ecosystems intact that sustain an abundance and diversity of species – including us.  As Doug Seus, founder of Vital Ground (a national nonprofit focused on protecting critical grizzly habitat) succinctly puts it: “Where the grizzly walks, the earth is healthy and whole.”

Such thoughts and more buzzed through my brain as I watched that sow and her cubs in that high-mountain meadow on that chilly August morning. Then it struck me: I had spent so much time alone in the wilds because in the wilds I could truly be myself. In nature, in the wilds, there are no societal-created norms, judgments and expectations. Everything is what it is. A grizzly might judge me as a threat or feast but doesn’t care who I fall in love with and sleep with. I was fighting to defend and protect wildness, naturalness and the freedom of wild grizzlies while denying and suppressing my own wildness, naturalness and freedom. Like the grizzlies, I am what I am and do what I do. I want to (and should be) given respect, space and left alone to be myself.

I accepted myself that day while watching those magnificent and tenacious animals. In no small way, those bears helped save my life.  (I often joke with friends that grizzlies made me gay.)

Henry David Thoreau wrote, “In wildness is the preservation of the world.”  Wildlife and wild places preserve the truth and reality of life, death, and our primeval connection to this Earth. To deny that is to deny ourselves; to destroy it is self-destruction. To embrace, understand and accept it is to embrace, understand and accept our own innate nature and wildness.

Everything is what it is; including us. We are part of it all. We ignore that at our own peril. I learned that from wild grizzlies, in a wild high-mountain meadow, in a truly wild place.

Let's keep it wild.    

FACES OF HATE: Americans Behind Russia's Anti-Gay Brutality

Many of us are saddened, disturbed and angry about anti-gay laws in Russia and the related harassment, humiliation, torture and even murder commitment against gay people in Russia, often condoned and even encouraged by government. Calls to Boycott Russian Vodka and the Olympics are definitely bringing needed attention to the atrocities.

But we should also direct our attention towards the people and organizations right here in the United States who are partly responsible for anti-gay hate and violence occurring overseas. We should all do what we can to draw attention to, ask questions of and demand answers from these American citizens and organizations who praise, take credit for, support and even brag about Russia’s brutal anti-gay policies.

Here's some of those faces of hate:

Scott Lively

SCOTT LIVELY: An attorney, pastor, self-proclaimed “human rights consultant,” founder and president of Defend the Family International and the president of Abiding Truth Ministries in Springfield, Massachusetts, Scott Lively conducted a 50-city speaking tour of Russia six years ago and says current anti-gay laws reflect policies that he advocated at the time when he urged Russia to “criminalize” the public advocacy of homosexuality (a policy he has unsuccessfully advocated for in the United States as well). 

"The purpose of my visit was to bring a warning about the homosexual political movement which has done much damage to my country," Lively wrote in an open letter to Russian citizens. "This is a very fast-growing social cancer that will destroy the family foundations of your society if you do not take immediate, effective action to stop it."   

He said such actions would make Russia a “model pro-family society" and suggested that “people from the West would begin to emigrate to Russia in the same way that Russians used to emigrate to the United States and Europe.“ (Lively is also coauthor of a book called “The Pink Swastika: Homosexuality in the Nazi Party,” which claims that "homosexuals are the true inventors of Nazism and the guiding force behind many Nazi atrocities.")

Peter LaBarbera

PETER LABARBERA: Founder and president of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality based in Naperville, Illinois, Peter LaBarbera  has spoken out in support of the atrocities occurring in Russia. When his organization was classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) LaBarbera said, “If you are not on the SPLC hate list, you are not doing enough.”  He frequently tries to link gay men and pedophilia together and has stated that occurrences of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) among gay men are “reassuring” and “demonstrates that God sees homosexuals as an abominations.”  In regards to Russia he recently wrote: "Russians do not want to follow America's reckless and decadent promotion of gender confusion, sexual perversion, and anti-biblical ideologies to youth." 

Austin Ruse

AUSTIN RUSE: "You admire some of the things they're doing in Russia against propaganda," says Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (yes, they actually have the hypocritical audacity to use the words “human rights” in their name), which has offices in New York and Washington, D.C.  He laments the fact that such laws can’t be passed in our nation.  The institute is seeking accreditation from the United Nations (and also claims the U.N. is “risking credibility” by pushing for support of gay rights) and Ruse plans to travel to Russia this summer to meet with government officials and civic leaders. "We want to let them know they do in fact have support among American NGOs (non- governmental organizations) on social issues," he says.

Stefano Gennarini

STEFANO GENNARINI:  Also of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, Stefano Gennarini speaks favorably of Russia’s new anti-gay laws and refers to parades, rallies and protests in support of gay equality as “ludicrous and disturbing behavior on show in the squares and streets of Europe and America."  (I couldn’t find comments from him about the disturbing behavior of stalking, harassing, beating, torturing and murdering innocent gay people in the squares and streets of Europe.) Instead, he says, people in other regions, such as Africa and the Islamic world, might “look to Russia as a positive example when considering laws of their own.”

THE WORLD CONGRESS OF FAMILIES: Based in Rockford, Illinois, The World Congress of Families is planning to hold its eighth international conference at the Kremlin's Palace of Congresses in Moscow next year.  “Russia, with its historic commitment to deep spirituality and morality, can be a hope for the natural family supporters from all over the world," the organization states on its website.

I don’t advocate for violence against these people or organizations, nor deny them their Constitutional rights to free speech and freedom of religion.  But can they, should they, be held accountable in some manner?

What do you think?

GAYS, GUNS AND COFFEE: Protect Your Cappuccino and Defend Gay Rights?

On August 7, 2012, gay rights activists organized a national Starbucks Appreciation Day (later changed to National Marriage Equality Day) in recognition of the company's support for same sex-marriage and to counter the national "Chik-Fil-A Appreciation Day" also held last summer, organized by anti-gay activists (Hate Appreciation Day: A Sad Day in America).

Today, August 9, 2013, gun rights advocates organized a Starbucks Appreciation Day in recognition of the company's policy to let people carry guns into their coffee shops in states where it is legal to do so. (Some of  the gun advocates plan to bring their guns into the Starbucks in Newtown, Connecticut, where 20 children and six adults were gunned down and murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary School on December 14, 2012.)

Bring your guns. Protect your coffee. Support gay rights?  

Starbucks certainly has wide appeal.

Of course, the issues aren't necessarily mutually exclusive; I'm gay, and I own guns. (Although I see no need to have a gun along to enjoy a shot of espresso.) But most gun rights activists I know are not very supportive of gay rights and equality. (The National Rifle Association (NRA) broke ties with a law firm when the firm announced their decision to not defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) on behalf of Congress.)

While attending a work-related reception I once confronted a handful of NRA executives for making offensive homophobic remarks.

I was there representing a conservation organization. When they learned I was a Marine they assumed I was like them, one of the "good ole' boys," and they invited me into their conversation. They were speaking strongly against gay marriage and making crude, sophomoric jokes about it. A little while later, the conversation turned into derogatory remarks about the wildlife protection policies of former U.S. Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt who was there to give a speech later that evening.  One of the NRA guys, trying to be funny, said: "I bet Bruce Babbitt is gay."

"You think so?" I asked.

"Probably," the guy said, shrugging his shoulders and laughing. He didn't mean it as as compliment.

"I hope so," I said, "Because that is one smart, attractive older man I could definitely fall for."  (It's true. I could.)

They all looked at looked at me briefly, seemingly confused and uncomfortable, and then just silently walked away.

It often seems that people who are most vocally adamant about thinking they are patriotically defending the Constitution and the Second Amendment think that the Constitution starts off with, "We the white, male, Christian heterosexuals" instead of "We the people." They're far more comfortable seeing two men holding guns than holding hands.

But today, as they go gun tote'n off to Starbucks, I want to thank them for their support of marriage equality.

Personally, I think I'll leave my guns home and go to Butterfly Herbs.

Is Coca-Cola Killing Gay Russians? (A Misguided Call for Boycotts)

There’s a meme rapidly spreading via social media urging people to boycott U.S. corporations that sponsor the Olympics. The meme has the logos of Coca-Cola, McDonalds, Visa and Panasonic superimposed atop brutal images of violence being carried out against gays in Russia. It makes it seem as if these corporations are directly responsible for and condone anti-gay violence. That’s a pretty serious insinuation.

It’s dead wrong.    

The Olympics should be moved and we should all boycott the Olympics if they're not moved. Calling for an Olympic boycott is helping create much-needed awareness about gay rights and equality issues and the horrific discrimination, hate, violence and murder happening in Russia. We should not be holding the Olympics at such a terrible, backwards place.  

But U.S. corporations who sponsor the Olympics support U.S. Olympic athletes and help our athletes regardless of where they compete. They are not endorsing anti-gay discrimination, hatred and violence. The International Olympic Committee doesn't endorse discrimination, hatred and violence either. But moving the Olympics out of Russia would send a strong message of world-wide intolerance towards Russia's brutal intolerance and would, indeed, hurt Russia. Boycotting those who sponsor the Olympics would accomplish neither, and to insinuate they endorse anti-gay violence as the meme clearly suggests is borderline libelous.

What’s next? Are we going to call for a boycott of any company who supplies Coca-Cola with machinery, packaging, and raw materials for its products? Should we urge folks to boycott all the businesses who supply McDonalds with beef, sugar, straws and cups? Perhaps we should boycott Canada for being the primary source of corn syrup for Coca-Cola and boycott Gavina Gourmet Coffee, Lopez Foods, Keystone Foods and 100 Circle Farms for selling supplies to McDonalds. Then we can boycott businesses who sell farming equipment, fertilizer and other products to 100 Circle Farms because the farm supports McDonalds which supports the Olympics which is planning to hold events in Russia . . .  

How far do we go?  

Boycotts are unfortunately rarely successful even against corporations directly involved in and responsible for atrocities, never mind being several layers down the chain. Quite often boycotts hurt the wrong people. Yet calls for boycotts are popular on social media sites because its easy and they spread rapidly. But they just as quickly fizzle away when another popular meme comes along. It’s easy to feel like we’re doing something by clicking “share” but we should think before we click.

Many U.S. Olympic sponsors fully support and help fight for gay rights and equality. Coca-Cola consistently earns the highest score -- 100 percent -- from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC)'s "Corporate Equality Index" and McDonald's consistently scores a commendable 85 percent. In fact, many U.S. anti-gay hate groups urge people to boycott these corporations because they score so highly with HRC. 

Five years ago a hate group called the American Family Association launched a boycott against McDonalds because the fast-food chain joined and donated money to the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce and placed an executive on the group's board of directors. McDonalds did the right thing and stood its ground. "Hatred has no place in our culture," McDonald's Spokesman Bill Whitman said. "That includes McDonalds, and we stand by and support our people to live and work in a society free of discrimination and harassment." 

Now we want to boycott McDonalds because they sponsor U.S. Olympic athletes who might go to Russia?  

Boycotting sponsors of the Olympics will accomplish nothing to help the situation in Russia. It could, however, hurt our U.S. Olympic athletes and, ironically, gay rights and equality efforts.  

If we really want to make a difference, let’s work to expose and spread more awareness about the U.S.-based anti-gay hate organizations and individuals who are exporting discrimination, violence and murder to places like Russia.  Learn more about them here:  "The Exportation of Hate: Should U.S. Citizens and Organizations be Held Accountable for Spreading Anti-Gay Discrimination, Hatred and Violence Abroad?"