Wasilla Gays to Levi: We're here

Levi, honey, we love the photos and interviews, but what's all this talk of never seeing any gays in Wasilla? We're here, we're queer, and we live on the Last Frontier, even in Wasilla.

Perhaps you don't think you've seen us because you don't know what we look like: We look like Alaskans. Really.

Did you expect us to shop at the Wasilla Fred Meyer looking like Adam Lambert at the AMA's? Did you expect us to kiss in line at Home Depot? We have strong survival instincts and know better than to look, act, or talk queeny in a town like this. You might not know we're gay, but I'm sure you've seen us.

We live here and shop here and work here. We even have a Mat-Su LGBT Community Center in Palmer and hosted Wasilla's first drag show fundraiser at the Best Western on Lake Lucille. We have all kinds of jobs, including work you probably don't think of as gay. We raise children and run dogs, gather round the bonfire, barbeque in the summer and shoot off fireworks in the winter. Some of us go to church, but not the anti-gay churches. We keep a low profile because of people like this Wasilla pastor who says we're the anti-christ... and the people who like Sarah.

We do appreciate the way you keep reminding everyone that she's a liar. She tried to use you, to control you, but you stood up for yourself and forged a different path. Good for you. Hopefully, the rest of the country will see through her lies and choose a different path as well.

If you ever want to meet the local gays, come join us for drag queening down at the ... well, we'd better meet in Anchorage at Mad Myrna's, we don't want any trouble from the local yahoos. You're not a gay icon in Alaska, but you're sure to get a warm welcome at Myrna's.

Kisses,
Your gay Wasilla homeboys

video of Levi on the Joy Behar Show:


18 comments:

Anonymous said...

One factor...he still isn't old enough to get into Mad Myrna's yet.

Anonymous said...

I hope you didn't mean to be too sarcastic. Levi means well, and in a manner is being a "spokesperson" for the gay community, as a straight person, on national media. I think he is doing a great job considering what he has had to go through.

Vicky said...

That is a nice post.

Melissa S. Green said...

ADN News Reader posted a link to this post today. Congrats.

(But why does it take a Levi or Palin connection to bring ADN's attention to ongoing LGBTQ issues?)

Anonymous said...

I regret that you said you feel the need to hide from people who 'like Sarah'. I like Sarah a lot, and I also like gays. One does not tie to a dislike of another. Just as I do not group all gay people into the uber flamboyant drag queen section of people, you should not assume that people who support Sarah Palin dislike gays.
You love who you love - I don't understand why anyone has a problem with that concept.
Sincerely,
A Sarah and Gay Loving Wasilla-ite

PS - Levi is enough to make me puke, you seriously like him? He looks like a scrawny little boy in those pictures!

Melissa S. Green said...

Anonymous, you must have decided to ignore the fact that the Anchorage equal rights battle was partially fueled my homophobic Valley churchgoers imported imported into the Anchorage Assembly hearing by Prevo & company because (1) they share his homophobic views and (2) Assembly chair Debbie Ossiander thinks that non-Anchorage citizens should be able to testify on Anchorage issues. You must also have chosen to ignore Bent Alaska's refence in this story to the Wasilla pastor who claimed that gays are the "antichrist." The fact that you're not a homophobic creep doesn't mean that being openly gay in Wasilla isn't one of the most dangerous things that a gay person could do.

As for Sarah Palin, she's a supporter of antigay bullshit like "ex-gay" therapy. She's just as homophobic as the whole rest of the Christianist movement to which she belongs.

Anonymous said...

Oh, yes. Sarah hates gay people. That's why one of her best friends is gay. Oh, wait.....

Anonymous said...

Don't be too hard on your local boy. Learn to recognize an ally when you see one, huh? Levi has had nothing but positive things to say about gays. Now you're going to shame him when he claims he hasn't seen you? Maybe you should pop your heads up from time to time instead of reverting to your "survival instincts". Maybe then he'd see you. And I don't think that means you need to, "look, act, or talk queeny," or invite him to the weekly drag queening. My guess is that even though you think YOU have seen all the gays in Wasilla, there are still some that don't do gay quite like you.

Anonymous said...

Go Levi!!! We love you! I don't care what the haters say.

Anonymous said...

Mel - In my comment I mentioned nothing about the Anchorage assembly. How can you turn my post simply reminding you that just as you don't think that you can characterize gays as super flamboyant - you can't characterize all Sarah fans or Republicans as gay haters. That is not the truth.
Do you believe in EVERYTHING that democrats support? Most likely not. Just as although I am a registered Republican and support most of their ideals, I support gays and their rights as a couple.
I don't quite understand your attack on me either - I posted a message of support and I got a bunch of bullying in response. I am not a member of the Baptist Temple, nor do I live in Anchorage - so that doesn't even apply to me. Just because some people don't like gays doesn't mean that we all feel the same way.

Anonymous said...

I personally extend an invitation to Mr. Johnston to attend Anchorage's Friday Night Diva Variety Show at Mad Myrna's Gay Cabaret and Nightclub.(as long as he is old enough,per the law) There are many varied performers of different ethnic, religious and sexual orientations, and I want to personally extend this opportunity to you. Consideration can be made for your entourage and you can request a reserved table if you have a larger party. The show admission is free, but the door cover charge is $4. Please consider this as an open invitation to see Anchorage's most outrageous live act weekly performance show.
Sincerely,
Scott M. Koeller
aka: Daphne DoALL' LaChores - FNDVS Dj, performer and Co-Host.

Melissa S. Green said...

Anonymous @1:15 PM:

I agree that just because someone likes Palin, or just because someone is a Republican, doesn't automatically mean they hate gays. (Notice that Bent Alaska said nothing about Republicans; nor did I.) My parents were both Republicans, & my dad liked Palin (my mom died before she came onto the scene); they both still loved me. My brother-in-law in Spokane loves Palin; he likes me & I like him & I've never felt reason to hide from him.

But you completely missed the point that I made: the fact that you, a Wasilla-ite who likes Palin, don't hate gays does not mean that Wasilla is in any way a safe place for gays or lesbians, or for that matter transfolk, to be out. And while there are no doubt many Sarah Palin fans who are not homophobic, the fact nonetheless is that homophobia & Sarah Palin fandom are closely correlated, especially among those who share her Christianist religious values.

(Christianist meaning: those who adhere to Christianity not just as religion, but as political ideology.)

I know you didn't bring up the Anchorage Assembly. I did: because the innappropriate presence of so many Wasilla residents among those testifying this summer, bused & carpooled in at the behest of Prevo & his allies, shows just how motivated many Wasilla residents are to enforce their own flamboyantly antigay bigotry & prejudice by interfering with the governance of a jurisdiction of which they are not even citizens.

Of course gays are going to be wary in a place like Wasilla, with neighbors like those.

Jesus said...

Mel,
A Christianist is someone who claims to be a Christian (most of the "Christians" in the public eye these days are Christianists) but whose behavior is very un-Christ-like. Christianists tend to exclude groups of people, force their values on others, promote hate and division, express hatred of people, and act as though they are above reproach. A Christian would be someone who is loving and forgiving and tolerant and who works daily to live up to Christ's ideals. Christians tend not to be showy about their faith. It is actions over words. Look closely at Christianists.....their words and their actions do not match. A Christian doesn't throw stones at others because he knows he lives in a glass house.
Another word for Christianist (which many of them should understand) is CHRINO - Christian In Name Only.
And good for Levi.........Palin has the power here...and Levi is fighting back.........using her methods. God be with you, our little David, going after the big bad Goliath.

Anonymous said...

Don't understand the hostility towards Levi in that letter. It was unnecessarily shrill & combative.

Melissa S. Green said...

Wowza, now you've really hit the big time Bent Alaska:

Quote of the day on Andrew Sullivan's The Daily Dish blog.

Congratulations!

Melissa S. Green said...

Jesus:

Speaking of Andrew Sullivan: I take my use of the term Christianist from Sullivan's use of it, his differentiation between Christianity as a religion, vs. Christianity as political ideology, i.e., Christianism. See his May 2006 essay in Time magazine:

the term "people of faith" has been co-opted almost entirely in our discourse by those who see Christianity as compatible with only one political party, the Republicans, and believe that their religious doctrines should determine public policy for everyone....

So let me suggest that we take back the word Christian while giving the religious right a new adjective: Christianist. Christianity, in this view, is simply a faith. Christianism is an ideology, politics, an ism. The distinction between Christian and Christianist echoes the distinction we make between Muslim and Islamist. Muslims are those who follow Islam. Islamists are those who want to wield Islam as a political force and conflate state and mosque. Not all Islamists are violent. Only a tiny few are terrorists. And I should underline that the term Christianist is in no way designed to label people on the religious right as favoring any violence at all. I mean merely by the term Christianist the view that religious faith is so important that it must also have a precise political agenda. It is the belief that religion dictates politics and that politics should dictate the laws for everyone, Christian and non-Christian alike.

That is also the sense in which I use the term Christianism: a term which covers the political use of (supposedly) Christian faith by Palin as well as Huckabee, and by Prevo, Falwell, Dobson, & all of those of that ilk. It also covers Bill O'Reilly's stupid annual promotion of the idea that there's any such thing as a "war against Christmas."

I find it a useful term also because while I'm not a Christian, I don't want to lump my friends & relatives who are Christian, with ideologues like Palin, Prevo, etc. etc. who wield their "religion" like a billy club to bully anyone who believes differently from them.

Anonymous said...

Levi Johnston -a male Paris Hilton -famous why? oh yes, famous cause americans have nothing better to do with their time than carry on over nothing.

E. Ross said...

Well, I guess this letter hit a nerve - or maybe a funny bone. It was widely quoted and has almost 7,000 hits!

I'm surprised that people think this post is hostile to Levi - it compliments him several times and invites him to join us at the main gay bar in Anchorage.

Thanks for joining the conversation. Happy New Year.

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