Most in LGBT
Community Don’t Even Know of Bradley Manning
Chicago “Free Bradley
Manning” Contingent (photo:
ChicagoGeek)
San Francisco Pride Bradley Manning Contingent
In San Francisco, New York and
Chicago, support contingents for Pfc. Bradley Manning, the accused
WikiLeaks whistleblower, participated in Sunday’s gay pride parades.
Those who marched in contingents aimed to make the LGBT community more
aware of Bradley Manning.
Andy Thayer, co-founder of the Gay
Liberation Network and Bradley Manning Support Network Advisory Board
member, says he and others in the LGBT community organized a contingent
because Manning is a gay man and “we think it is important to stand up
for those in our own community who are being victimized.”
The Bradley Manning Support Network
finds Manning is “being increasingly hailed by LGBT activists as a
hero.” Lieutenant Daniel Choi, an active and well-known gay rights
advocate who helped contribute to the movement that ultimately results
in the repeal of DADT, recently announced he was “proud to stand by side
with Bradley Manning” and on the day of the pride parades tweeted, “I
dedicate this Pride to American Hero Private Bradley Manning, our fellow
gay freedom fighter currently locked up in Ft. Leavenworth, KS.”
The pride parade in Chicago was one
of the first major events for the Chicago chapter of Bradley Manning
supporters. Here in Chicago, activists are confronting the fact that
many do not know of Manning.
“I thought that we need to do more
work in Chicago to make people more aware of Bradley Manning and the
fact that he’s been in prison for over a year now and he hasn’t had a
trial,” shares Stansfield Smith, an antiwar organizer and someone who
has done work to defend twenty-three activists given subpoenas to appear
before a grand jury. “He was in solitary confinement and he’s basically
being framed up because President Obama’s already said he’s guilty for
leaking this information to WikiLeaks. I [feel] some obligation to
defend this young guy.”
An organizer in San Francisco,
Stephanie Tang, who is with World Can’t Wait and other groups, reports
up to a million crowded the city’s Market Street to watch the parade.
Around forty to fifty marched in a contingent. Orange and pink Manning
stickers were handed out. The contingent was able to get pockets of the
crowd to cheer and join chants like “Free Bradley Manning! Stop These
Wars!” In some instances, it was clear people didn’t know Manning and
the contingent would inform the crowd and then those they were talking
to almost always wanted stickers and flyers so they could learn more and
perhaps even begin to support him. [Photos
of the SF contingent.]
Up to this point, there has been
hesitation and division among the LGBT community over whether to support
Manning. Thayer suggests this has to do with class and party
affiliation.
“[We] have a whole section of
leadership of various LGBT organization, which is like leaderships of
other minority organizations that try to curry favor with the
politicians,” explains Thayer. They are “loathe to do anything
controversial.” He believes that can be turned around “once the majority
of LGBT people know what Bradley Manning” has allegedly done.
One aspect of the Manning story that
carries particular resonance is the abuse he experienced at Quantico.
Thayer says what he was subjected to was “very reminiscent of the sexual
humiliation that was tinged with homophobia that we saw the US conduct
against prisoners in Abu Ghraib and other prisons in that country.” He
doesn’t think the sexual humiliation he was subjected to was an
accident.
The key for LGBT people (and all
other activists) appears to be convincing Americans that what he did was
a “signal service.” Thayer recently participated in an illegal pride
parade in Moscow, Russia, with LGBT people from the country and Eastern
Europe. They all know Bradley Manning’s case unlike many LGBT people in
America.
Making Americans aware of how
WikiLeaks cables he allegedly released helped contribute to the Arab
Spring and communicating to Americans how he has helped to expose the
most serious war crimes committed by the US in Iraq and Afghanistan
could potentially help grow the community of supporters here in the
United States.
*For more, here’s
a “This Week in WikiLeaks” podcast I produced that features Stan
Smith and Andy Thayer.
Update
Dido Rossi of the Lesbian Bi Trans
Queer (LBTQ) in the Global Women’s Strike and Dean Kendall of the Payday
Men’s Network have signed on to
a letter to the LGBTQ community. The letter calls attention to the
silence of LGBT organizations in North America. It declares:
We say “There’s no pride in the
slaughter of others!”
We take pride in our LGBTQ sisters
and brothers who refuse to be killers, such as gay
Filipino/Native-American Stephen Funk, the first US soldier to be
convicted and jailed for refusing to fight in Iraq; Mehmet Tarhan, gay
Kurdish military refuser in Turkey, whose torture and imprisonment were
ended by an international campaign in which grassroots LGBTQ
organizations were prominent; and now Bradley Manning.
Similar to Thayer’s comment, the
letter points out:
The campaign against the punitive
conditions of Bradley’s confinement at Quantico has likewise shone a
light on the solitary confinement and other torture endured by many tens
of thousands of prisoners, not only but especially in the US. [3] The
blueprint for Bradley’s treatment at Quantico, for Guantanamo, Abu
Ghraib and Baghram, is the US gulag of civilian prisons, where most
prisoners are people of color, and where especially those perceived as
LGBTQ may endure endless sexual violence.
UK Bradley Manning supporters are
preparing a contingent for the London Pride parade that will take place
on July 2.
Here’s a photo from
@payamtorabi of the banner for the upcoming parade:
http://my.firedoglake.com/kgosztola/2011/06/28/most-in-lgbt-community-dont-even-know-of-bradley-manning
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