My new SWG character, dancing at the cantina and cruising for Dean.

Although the revolution will not be blogged, gay pride 2003 will be!

Afraid to go out to gay pride events without a notebook, because you may forget bloggable events? Worried someone is going to blog something bloggable before you blog it?

Starting with this year's gay pride, all events of interest will be covered with wireless internet access.

Gay Pride Blogstations have been setup, at the ratio of 1 for every 3 gay bars.

So go out! You can blog and celebrate gay pride at the same time.

Part of those crazy outfits people are wearing this year include a fully-functional interface to your own blog!

And All Day Permanent Red will give a very special prize to the first bar to create a drinkable blog-themed drink.

I've noticed that a number of people have found my site searching for "American Sodomy Day," which was the title of this short post.

I was more surprised to see that, as of this morning, All Day Permenant Red is in fact the only site listed in the search results for "American Sodomy Day."

Do I get the trademark then? Do I get to formally propose American Sodomy Day as a national holiday?

(Ug...I guess that would have to be an international holiday, otherwise the name would be redundant.)

Just voted for Dean in the MoveOn primary, but there was no cruising involved. I feel so...empty

So I'm going to volunteer to Cruise for Dean during gay pride.  But I've been asked if I want to be a "street captain." Especially at night.

I have no idea what that is. Images of wearing an eye patch with a parrot screaming "Howard Dean! Howard Dean!" on my shoulder. And something will have to get pierced.

Will it help my chances with the blokes?

I've actually seen an increasing number of guys walking around the Castro with parrots on their shoulders. Piercings, no eye patch. No idea if they've trained them to scream "Howard Dean" yet.

Funny comment in the discussion on on Matthew Yglesias's site about Cruising for Dean. Someone wrote

I know I'm opening myself up for criticism as being queer-unfriendly, but I don't like the "cruising" thing.
1) It seems inaccurate of the actual activity.
2) It plays to negative stereotypes.

I don't know what it says about the state of my life when someone is telling me that I'm not cruising the way it's supposed to be done. Anyone want to give me any pointers?

Matthew Yglesias writes about my continuing Cruising for Dean saga:

Mostly I've been linking to these posts just because they're funny, but it occurs to me that Dean's strong support from the gay community has been seriously under-noted in the coverage I've seen of the campaign thus far. It's something worth paying attention to, though, because it looks to me like the 2004 primary could mark the emergence of gays and lesbians as a distinct and at least somewhat influential interest group within the Democratic Party alongside the unions, racial minorities, feminists, lawyers, etc.

Unsurprisingly, I'm inclined to agree. Some of the comments on Matthew's post are skeptical: aren't gays already voting democratic, etc. (this seems to miss Matthew's point a bit).

On the ground, as a gay democrat, things certainly feel different now. Not log ago, back in college, we were excited when Democratic candidates would send, almost in secret, minor functionaries who would express some kind of broad support for gay rights. This didn't do much to inspire us to go out and campaign.  Sure, we it, but halfheartedly.

Nothing like what I felt watching the video of Dean speaking at the Howard Dean Meetup.

Certainly, the social atmosphere has changed fantastically in the past ten years: I don't really like Will and Grace, but I'm glad that it's on. Coming out in high school, while not always easy, is enormously more common than it was just ten or 15 years ago.

As one of Matthew's readers remarks:

Um, the days of mere "tolerance" are ending. The climate of public opinion on gay issues and gay relationships is shifting to acceptance and even celebration. Polling data on the opinions of young people is especially encouraging. Republican opponents of gay rights are looking increasingly like Republican opponents of civil rights. Republican opponents of gay marriage are looking increasingly like Republican opponents of interracial marriage. Gay marriage is now a reality in Canada. Gay marriage will likely soon be a reality in Massachussetts. It's pretty obvious which way the wind is blowing. Anti-gay Republicans, which is most of them, are increasingly being seen for the bigots that they are.

Posted by: Don P at June 18, 2003 03:32 AM

But why does this mean, as Matthew claims, that gays are now emerging as as "a distinct and at least somewhat influential interest group within the Democratic Party"?

I agree with this hunch but it's hard to say why. Simply because they have not before been tapped for campaigning and outreach efforts? Does it have something to do with the recent research, cited in The Emerging Democratic Majority, about the positive correlation between the prevalence of out gay people in an area with economic growth, perceived quality of life. and the general desirability of living there?

Perhaps it's simply that politicians can now embrace us fully, much of the stigma associated with homosexuality having eroded over the years -- and that we worry about the possibility of the clock being rolled back. The embrace of the democratic party no longer seems forced, and we feel it.

We are more enthusiastic about democratic candidates. Ready to campaign, write, organize, contribute ideas. And as we become more evolved we do indeed become a more influential group -- because of the value of what we are contributing and it is recognized that we are needed.

Crap: a non-comic post in my Cruising for Dean thread. Hope people will still read. Skip to the next post for the pratfalls.

 

Had to give Cruising for Howard Dean another try this weekend.

 

Decided I'd try it at The End Up, a long time San Francisco institution, where you can, ah, end up spending 12-14 hours from the time you get there to the time you go home. It's been going since 1973.

 

My first sally for Dean didn't give me a lot of hope. I was talking to a few of the younger guys -- this time, "May I talk to you about Howard Dean" wasn't the first thing out of my mouth, but I did get around to saying it eventually.

 

They had, I think, enjoyed talking to me until then, but they became wary. Was this a religious thing? Some damn survey and I'd spent time ingratiating myself so they'd have to fill out forms for 20 minutes fighting the urge to run away and dance?

 

They didn't know who he was. I explained and they said "well, if I haven't heard of him, he doesn't have a chance of winning." I asked who they did know about, and, well, they couldn't name anyone. "So now that you know about Dean do you think he can win?" This made them run off dancing, not bothering to give me a phone number, not even a fake one.

 

I was discouraged, so I had a shot and then tried to find the sticking place to screw my courage to. So there he was...

 

The next guy I walked up to I just asked directly, without introducing myself, may I talk to you about Howard Dean. He did a double-take, his eyes going wide.

 

"Yes, yes, yes! Oh my god yes!" (Howard Dean's own Molly Bloom) "I fucking love Howard Dean! He so pro gay and he doesn't want me to have to wear a stupid wedding dress! So talk to me about Howard Dean!"

 

Ah, he's just great, I replied.

 

I'd never gotten this far before. I wasn't prepared for it. Where had I left my talking points?

 

Besides, he knew more about him than I did.

 

I told him about the history of Cruising for Howard Dean--my first joke was that I was going to form a committee. Well, now I have. He was to become its second member.

 

The bastard--he was better at it than I was. Not just a little better, either.

 

Right away he ran off to a gaggle of boys and talked about Dean. The gaggle grew. In 5 minutes, they not only wanted to vote for Dean, but thought that Dean was sexy. I realized that I hadn't formed an opinion on that matter, another example of how badly I had prepared.

 

Then he recruited them to cruise for Howard Dean.

 

I kept up my efforts, and did meet a few attractive and smart guys. A few phone numbers for my efforts.

 

Oddly I kept running into people who said "that guy who's married to the ketchup lady--he's much better than Dean! This, er, happened more than once, so I've clearly underestimated the importance of condiments in political cruising.

 

Eventually, however, my committee had grown and I was falling far behind.

 

Every time I tried to cruise a guy for Dean now, I found that he has been pre-Dean-cruised.

 

"Oh, yeah," I was told "this guy over there told me everything I need to know about Howard Dean. Not only do I want to vote for him, but now I also think he's cute. Why don't you go talk to him to find out more about Dean?"

 

Well, I'm afraid, my initial convert may be the cruising for Howard Dean man now. I asked him to remember details of his Dean cruising so I could add them to my blog -- but, you know he's probably just going to start cruisingfordean.org now.

 

I caught up with him and we went to the bar. He asked the bartender "Can I talk to you about Howard Dean?"

 

She screamed. Her sister was working on his campaign. Many free drinks ensued. ("Cruise for Dean! It will lower your bar tab!") Well, that made me more talkative at least.

 

I just hope that he'll leave some place for me in this organization I formed that I never thought I'd really form. At least I did get those phone numbers -- and an offer for the most amazing haircut, for some reason.

 

So Lonewacko may not be right after all. But you know what they say about the End Up...

 

I've noticed that people are now finding my site by searching for "Cruising for Howard Dean" on google.

 

I suspect that I have other people at the End Up to thank for that.

 

So, who wants to sign up now and join us? I'm afraid it may be too late to stop us now.  

I continued Cruising for Howard Dean on Saturday, and, boy, did the idea catch on. Everyone was doing it. More to follow.

Cruising for Dean. The saga continues at All Day Permanent Red.... [Matthew Yglesias]

This weekend I'll try to refine my approach. I'm open to suggestions, of course.

Lonewacko appears to be correct in writing about the cruising for Dean proposal:

Good luck, but I don't think it's going to work unless someone is either crazy, drugged, or otherwise already fairly pro-Dean.

But what the hell: I had to give it a try. This Sunday I went to Lalos, which, as Young Bradford has described, "is a small, Mexican restaurant in the Castro that has miraculously turned into a throbbing hotspot on Sunday." (Especially throbbing last week, when the temperature went way hot.) I decided I might have more luck with the more inebriated boys, so I followed the tequila shot guy around and talked to the people who seemed to like him the most.

Starting off with "could I talk to you about Howard Dean," predictable, makes people just a little bit scared. They probably think you're some kind of plant for an ex-gay organization. Most of them, it seems, had never heard of Howard Dean, or were too drunk to remember.

My friends, however, would not let me stop. So I tried some other kind of opening line ("hi, I'm originally Southerner, and by nature hyperintroductory"). After striking up a conversation, I tried to change the subject to Howard Dean, but things got confused when I said "oh my god, I can see my bedroom from here!" (It so happens that I live across the street, just having moved to the Castro recently). I really could see my bedroom, but the comment, coming out of nowhere, confused our conversation beyond any possible recovery.

(Note: I'm in no way officially connected with the Howard Dean campaign.)

It turns out that "let me talk to you about Howard Dean" is not really a great pickup line. But I'm working on it, and the bar is just across the street. I can see the boys waiting out there now, just hoping that I'll chat them up about Dean.

After I attended the Howard Dean meetup this week, I wrote about it in one of my first blog entries, which got obliterated when I tried to blog from home. The meetup happened at The Metro, a gay bar in the Castro. I had a great time and became a Howard Dean convert (at least for now), and signed up to volunteer for a ton of stuff – ok, can’t really remember what, since I had quite a few beers. (Hey, it was at a bar.)

I did agree to do “outreach” activites, including, apparently, going to gay bars and talking to people about Dean. Well… a genuine excuse to up to strange guys without having to worry about an opening line. Perhaps I could organize some kind of “Cruising for Dean” committee. Just how far to you have to go get someone to promise to vote? Better not to speculate. I’m the sort of guy who can take one for the team from time to time.