I’m not sure if this was directed toward me specifically or was just a broadside at a lot of people, but I am going to respond. And I’ll respond publicly because you wrote them publicly and because it is germane to the topic – was Larry Craig righteously busted or entrapped.
you force gay men into closets with your constitutional amendments banning gay marriage and then you hunt them down once you've locked them behind your partitions. this is shooting fish in a barrel and calling yourselves sportsmen.
I don’t believe we’ve ever met or interacted outside of this forum, so I’m not sure what you are basing that statement on, but it is not accurate. A search of my past post failed to turn up anything remotely dealing with same sex marriages. Just for the record, in 2005 I voted against a state constitutional amendment that prohibited same-sex marriages. I don’t think this is the thread to discuss my opinion on same sex marriages so I won’t go into the details here of why I voted as I did.
As for the second part of the quote above – I’m not sure what you mean. If you think that I ever engaged in some kind of anti-gay oppressive behavior then again you’re wrong.
As for the last part of the sentence it almost reads as if you are justifying people having sex in public places. If that is the case then it is utter nonsense. How can you justify the risk of exposing someone’s young child to seeing people having sex in a public restroom? And if you’re trying to say that gay men are forced to have random anonymous sex in public restrooms and that makes arresting them oppressive I call bullsh*t again. I’ve been undercover in certain gay clubs and hetero swingers bars and I know that there are people out there that like to have random anonymous sex with strangers – and some of them don’t care who sees them. But I also know that there are plenty of straights and gays who condemn the activity. I’m on their side. To me there is a simple solution – go get a room.
Prime example of how this works is a real life scenario. We got a complaint of a club where sex acts were open and blatant. An investigation disclosed that it was truly a private club – new members had to be referred by existing members, they paid expensive dues and the general public was not allowed in nor could any indoor activities be observed from outside, and they did not have a license to sell alcohol. Not something I want to participate in, but no law was being broken and we closed the investigation. Six months later things changed – a membership was awarded at the door to anyone with $20, they were serving booze, and there were still blatant and open sex acts being performed where anyone walking inside could see. So sorry, it’s now a public place and people went to jail.
so gays and str8s are treated the same? i suspect you didn't even buy that while you were typing it.
I’m still wondering when we ever met that you gained so much insight into how I did my job or how I think about things. Are you judging me based on cops you’ve interacted with, or stories other people have told you about their experiences? If that’s the case, then do I get to judge you as a gay man based on my experiences with different people halfway across the country who happen to be gay also? Do I get to climb inside your head and know what you’re thinking based on stories that someone has related to me about their experiences with gays?
If you were painting with a wide brush because of the actions of other people that had/have the same occupation, I would have to wonder what category you would place all the gay and lesbian cops that I know. Are they being oppressive when they arrest a gay man for breaking the law? Ultimately I would have to reiterate that you don’t know me and have no basis in fact for making that kind of statement about me – other than what I contribute in this forum.
Now, if you’re judging me on something that I’ve written here – please point me to the place where I wrote anything that sounds like the words you put in my mouth. The only thing I see remotely like what you said was maybe the “fish in a barrel” part. I did write about it being easy to arrest men who want to blatantly break the law by engaging in sex in public restrooms. In my career I also found it real easy to catch people who couldn’t obey the posted speed limit – I fail to see where either is oppressive, or morally/ethically suspect.
There was a gay activist that I used to speak with three to four times a week. It was a working relationship because he was a point of contact for much of the gay community and they paid him consulting fees to smooth out problems with the police department. It was beneficial for me because smoothing out problems without involving the media and/or elected officials made life much easier. If there was ever a gay man who had the right to hate cops it was this guy, and he had spent a lot of his life proving how much he hated them –and he had paid a price many times over. But times changed and so did the police department and he found that along with the advent of gay public officials and gay cops that attitudes had genuinely changed and he got a much better reception than ever before - he didn't have to be confrontational even though he was still capable of it. We didn’t always agree, but it was always civil and practical. Until one day when he called me and halfway through the conversation he just went off on me – accusing me of some pretty terrible things. I was shocked into silence and when he started to slow down a little I realized what he was talking about.
“Are you talking about something that happened in 1972? What the hell Ray, I was in the 7th grade in 1972. What does any of this have to do with me? If I did something wrong, or offended you somehow, let me know and I’ll try and make it right. But I don’t think I’m responsible for anything that someone else did to you in a different time or place. In fact, I’m pretty damn sure that the devils from your past that are tormenting you have nothing to do with me. Go find those people who did you wrong and do whatever you feel justified in doing and let’s you and me deal with the things that involve us.”