Yes, voting in the election is a small step, but we can still celebrate it. Let’s develop our own rituals so that as a growing community we can see and feel our vote counting toward the government we need.

Most likely you’ve never thought of Trump as a teacher because of the negativity that he stirs up. This is especially true if you are concerned about the environment, human rights, income inequality, good government…., i.e. what are being called “progressive values.” However, I ask this question in the spirit that one would ask about a life-threatening illness like AIDS, or an addiction such as alcoholism. How do we turn this situation around into a life changing transformation?

We affirm our shared concern for a cause when we come together; we are no longer separated and passive. We connect with the collective power to define who we are rather than who we were taught to be. This power amplifies when we march. When I marched for gay liberation, I dropped my guilt and passivity and felt the truth and power of my love. I could see if enough of us came together we would not only empower ourselves but also change the attitudes in the larger society.

It was in the summer of 1969 when Henry Wiemhoff showed me the Village Voice article about the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar where the patrons fought back at a police raid. The article also mentioned that a group of gays and lesbians was forming in New York. Henry had reached out to me because he knew that I had tried to form an informal gay group at the University of Chicago-quite a revolutionary thing for that time. The resistance against the police at the Stonewall Inn had a special resonance for me. When I was starting to come out into my sexuality in 1965, I was arrested at a gay party and marched passively into a paddy wagon, filled with the fears of losing by first real job and exposure to friends and family.

Influencing your circle begins with…

It all begins with an idea.