04/23/21, Vol. 12 Issue 3

APRIL 23, 2021 • THEGEORGIAVOICE.COM

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georgia VOL.12 • ISSUE 3

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EDITORIAL

Deputy Editor: Katie Burkholder

EDITORIAL

The Revolutionary Power of Mutual Aid Katie Burkholder

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Editorial Contributors: Cliff Bostock, Melissa Carter, Jim Farmer, Buck Jones, Mark King, Dave Mulryan, Dante Rhodes

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With so much happening politically, it’s easy to become overwhelmed.

Black people are murdered by police and victimized by mass incarceration. Immigrant children are kept in cages. Trans people are subjected to violence and discriminatory legislation nationwide. Time and time again, our most vulnerable citizens continue to be attacked instead of protected.

How do we get out of this mess? How do we liberate the most marginalized among us when the systems of our country have worked against them for years? Outside of voting and the occasional protest, what power do I have to make the change I know we need?

Are we powerless?

Luckily, the answer is no. In fact, there is a huge power potential available to us: community organizing. Building people power is the key to pursuing the revolutionary change we need, and at the center of people power is mutual aid.

On its surface, mutual aid can look like charity. However, there are critical distinctions between the two — distinctions which are the key to the liberatory potential mutual aid holds.

With charity, there are criteria implemented to determine who is deserving of assistance.

There are also differentiations between those who give and those in need, and with this differentiation comes a hierarchy: the giver has the power to dictate how to meet the takers’ needs. By comparison, mutual aid is, surprise, mutual. There is no distinction between giver and taker; help is offered to all who need it and provided by any who can. Members of mutual aid projects and organizations can provide and receive

PHOTO VIA FREE99FRIDGE.COM

support simultaneously.

Because of this lack of distinction, mutual aid is based in solidarity, not sympathy. Your fellow members are your equals, people with whom you are interdependent in the pursuit of community sovereignty and autonomy.

With solidarity comes trust; there are no criteria for receiving support. If someone says they need help, you help them, no questions asked. Mutual aid is cooperative, and cooperation is fundamentally necessary to liberation.

However, mutual aid does not erase the fact that needs differ based on marginalization.

Most mutual aid organizations, while available to anyone, are designed to target systemic inequality. Free99Fridge is a grassroots mutual aid project where community refrigerators are built and stocked across Atlanta; anyone can leave food and anyone can take food, but the organization was designed to address food disparities by giving impoverished and unhoused people access to healthy food.

Two Instagram accounts, @newwxrldnetwork and @ideamutualaid, are mutual aid/ wealth redistribution projects that platform Black and Indigenous LGBTQ people and undocumented, disabled, and/or queer

students of color who need financial support.

Metro Atlanta Mutual Aid Fund financially supports marginalized communities impacted by COVID-19. Organizations like these work on the understanding that there are particular groups of people who are more likely to be in need than others because their needs aren’t being met systemically and prioritizes these people.

The goal of mutual aid organizations is to empower the people and address inequality by building each other up and providing the support for each other that isn’t being provided by the state. While mutual aid itself won’t fix the problems of our society, it is the first and most crucial step toward ending reliance on the government for help it won’t provide, organizing around our communal interests, and humanizing those who have been historically dehumanized. In truth, mutual aid is an act of radical love in the face of oppressive hatred. Now more than ever, it’s crucial we stand in solidarity with those in our communities whose struggle was written into the fabric of our society. It’s time we take care of each other.

Learn more about Free99Fridge at free99fridge.com and Metro Atlanta Mutual Aid Fund at atlantamutualaid.org.

April 23, 2021 Editorial 3

(PHOTOS VIA FACEBOOK)

NEWS BRIEFS Staff Reports Atlanta Pride Committee Planning In-person Pride Festival The Atlanta Pride Committee (APC) announced that they are currently planning to hold an in-person Atlanta Pride event over the festival dates in October.

“Dreamgirls” PUBLICITY PHOTO

“The NCAA Board of Governors firmly and unequivocally supports the opportunity for transgender student-athletes to compete in college sports,” the statement reads. “This commitment is grounded in our values of inclusion and fair competition… Inclusion and fairness can coexist for all studentathletes, including transgender athletes, at all levels of sport.”

“At this time, the City of Atlanta, Office of Special Events, is accepting applications for only Class E Events. We are hopeful this means that our event class, Class A, is in queue and they will begin accepting those applications over the next few months.” said Jamie Fergerson, executive director of the Atlanta Pride Committee. “We are planning accordingly and as a result, we will open both the vendor market and parade for reservations next week.”

“A market or parade reservation and deposit will hold your place in line and ensure that you can participate once we receive approval,” she continued. “Once that approval for our festival permit is processed and confirmed by the city, we will then reach out to everyone with a reservation to make their final payment so their participation in the 2021 festival is confirmed.”

APC is working closely with the City along with public health officials to plan a COVIDsafe festival. Current guidelines include social distancing and mask mandates for everyone on festival grounds; hand washing stations to be placed throughout the park for the duration of the festival; along with the addition of a COVID compliance officer added to the event staff. APC will update health and safety plans as guidance changes to remain in compliance with city ordinances and CDC guidelines.

More detailed information about the festival will be announced as it is available. Market and Parade reservations will be announced via APC newsletter and will be available beginning on April 19. To sign up for the APC newsletter, visit atlantapride.org or email info@atlantapride.org.

Anti-LGBTQ Bills Pass Legislatures of Four States Four state legislatures have passed antiLGBTQ legislation in the past week.

The state legislatures of both Arizona and 6 News Briefs April 23, 2021

Just days before the two bills were passed, the NCAA Board of Governors released a statement in support of transgender participation in collegiate sports.

Tennessee passed laws that ban teachers from mentioning LGBTQ people without parental approval.

Tennessee’s HB 529 requires schools to notify parents if sexual orientation or gender identity will be mentioned in class 30 days prior, and parents have the ability to opt their children out. The bill was passed by the state senate on April 14 by a vote of 64-23. The bill has yet to be signed by Republican Gov. Bill Lee. Arizona’s bill is much stricter; SB 1456 requires parental permission to opt students into any lesson or discussion on gender identity, sexual orientation, or HIV/AIDS. The bill passed the Republican -controlled House along party lines and has passed the state senate. Republican Gov. Doug Ducey has yet to sign it into law.

The legislatures of Alabama and North Dakota passed laws banning transgender girls from participating in school sports.

North Dakota’s senate passed a ban on students from playing on K-12 sports teams that don’t match their assigned sex at birth.

The bill passed the state senate on Thursday (April 15) by a vote of 27-20 after passing the state house on Wednesday with a 69-25 vote. A similar bill was passed in Alabama on Thursday by 25-5 in the house and 76-13 in the senate. Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey has not yet said whether she would sign the bill into law.

The NCAA further insinuated that championships may not be held in states with anti-trans legsilation: “When determining where championships are held, NCAA policy directs that only locations where hosts can commit to providing an environment that is safe, healthy and free of discrimination should be selected.”

Out On Film and AID Atlanta Partner for Outdoor Screening of ‘Dreamgirls’ AID Atlanta and Out On Film are partnering up for a one-night-only outdoor screening of the Oscar-winning musical “Dreamgirls” on Saturday, May 8th.

The event will be held at the Springs Cinema and Taphouse, home of Out On Film’s successful screening of “Fame” last fall, and will mark the 15th anniversary of the film, an adaptation of the Broadway hit about the ups and downs of a 1960s girl group. Jennifer Hudson won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar® for her role as Effie White.

In addition to a costume contest and raffle prizes the night of the event, Out On Film will conduct an interview with the film’s Oscarwinning director Bill Condon the week of the screening to launch on social media platforms.

Other events will be announced soon.

The event will begin at approximately 8pm on May 8th. Tickets are $50 for a car of two and $25 for each individual attendee. All money raised will go to support each organization.

Tickets for the screening are available at: aidatlanta.org/dreamgirls. More information on each organization can be found at aidatlanta.org and outonfilm.org.

TheGeorgiaVoice.com

NEWS

LGBTQ Organizations Nationwide React to Georgia Voter Suppression Bill Katie Burkholder

national boycotts] in protest of this voter suppression law, and there’s the potential for more of that to happen as companies understand their corporate responsibility,” Paulk told Georgia Voice.

Once again, Georgia has drawn national attention. This time, it’s for SB 202, a bill signed into law by Gov. Brian Kemp back in March that applies restrictions to voting. In what effectively suppresses the right to vote, the bill shortens the absentee ballot request timeline, extends voter ID requirements to absentee ballots, enables new restrictions on drop box locations, and criminalizes “line warming,” the practice of giving food, water, or aid to voters in line so they can withstand long hours or inclement weather — with an exception for poll workers.

Similar to the ACLU and NGMA, Georgia Equality believes SB 202 targets marginalized people and inhibits the right to vote — which could seriously impact LGBTQ rights in Georgia.

The bill also expands the state legislature’s power over election administration, which means that the Republican-controlled General Assembly has effective control over the State Board of Elections and thus, local county boards. According to Zack Beauchamp from Vox, this means that Republicans will be effectively empowered “to handpick the people in charge of disqualifying ballots in Democratic-leaning places like Atlanta.”

In Kemp’s own words, the bill was passed because of claims of voter fraud in the Georgia presidential elections: “President Biden, the left, and the national media are determined to destroy the sanctity and security of the ballot box,” Kemp said after signing the bill. However, multiple investigations into potential voter fraud were fruitless; there was no evidence found of widespread voter fraud in the election.

The bill has attracted the attention of national organizations, especially after the arrest of State Rep. Park Cannon at the State Capitol. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) together filed a federal lawsuit against Georgia for the law.

8 Local News April 23, 2021

Eric Paulk COURTESY PHOTO

According to the ACLU, the new provisions will disproportionately impact voters of color and other historically disenfranchised communities.

“This law is driven by blatant racism, represents politics at its very worst, and is clearly illegal,” Sophia Lakin, the deputy director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, said in a statement. “We urge the court to act swiftly to strike it down.”

The National LGBTQ Media Association (NGMA), which encompasses 12 LGBTQ publications across the country — including Georgia Voice — announced that it would be boycotting Georgia. NGMA resolved not to hold any of its future meetings in Georgia due to the passage of the law.

Opposition to the law expands beyond LGBTQ and social activist organizations; the Major League Baseball All-Star Game, which was originally scheduled to be hosted by the Braves, was moved to Denver after the bill passed. “Ford v Ferrari” director James Mangold and Star Wars actor Mark Hamill both have called for a boycott on filming future projects in Georgia, and production on Will Smith’s new movie “Emancipation” has been relocated from Georgia to Louisiana.

According to Eric Paulk, the deputy director of Georgia Equality, these boycotts are evidence that SB 202 “really puts Georgia in the spotlight for the wrong reasons” and could spell trouble for Georgians.

“We’ve seen some early impact with [these

“As LGBTQ rights and combatting discrimination continue to be priority issues on the ballot, removing barriers like the ones created by SB 202 is important to ensure communities who see these issues as important can cast their vote,” Paulk said.

“The ability to cast a vote has always been a mark of equal citizenship in this country … The attack on voting has subtly been ramping up over the years. I think the success that was had during the last election definitely motivated folks to figure out ways to suppress the Black and Brown and LGBTQ vote, because those are the folks that really turned out to the polls to help Georgia elect two Democratic Senators.”

Paulk lauded the work of queer Black women, who have historically been at the center of the fight against systemic oppression and have been instrumental in enfranchising marginalized Georgians.

“I want to take my hat off to Rep. Park Cannon,” he said. “She is in the continuum of Black queer women who have led the charge towards liberation. I want to honor her making the sacrifices she’s made to ensure folks have access to the ballot.”

While regressive laws like SB 202 are scary, the fight for voting rights is not hopeless. With the national backlash, lawsuit, and organizing efforts led by people like Rep. Cannon, hopes are high that SB 202 can be overturned.

TheGeorgiaVoice.com

COMMUNITY NEWS

The Gay Men of ‘Jerker’ Escape AIDS Through the Phone Line Mark S. King

“Jerker” COURTESY PHOTO

When the monumentally important play “Jerker” begins screening online as the latest virtual offering of Out Front Theatre, it might be easy to reduce it to a titillating play about two gay men talking dirty to one another.

That would be a mistake. This playful, candidly sexual, and ultimately searing piece of theater is so much more than a phone sex gimmick.

“Jerker” transports us to the 1980s (the play was written in 1986), when gay sex had become so terrifyingly dangerous that the bars emptied and sex venues closed. There were no online apps (there was no “online,” at all, for that matter), and any sexual prospects carried with them an unnerving amount of anxiety.

But that doesn’t mean our collective libido as gay men disappeared altogether.

We craved sexual connection as much as emotional intimacy, and we are nothing if not resourceful when it comes to getting our needs met.

And so, we turned to the phone, a very simple instrument at that time that was decades away from becoming a supercomputer. It was still anchored to the wall by a coiled cord and capable of nothing more than connecting us to a voice on the other end of the line.

But, oh my, that voice. As the two characters in “Jerker” discover, there is a thrilling intimacy in revealing your most private desires to a disembodied voice on the phone.

In the course of the one-act play, these two men share their secrets and then, slowly, their hopes and their fears, spoken through furtive cries and whispers.

TheGeorgiaVoice.com

It is only fitting that a special screening of “Jerker” will be held on Wednesday, April 28 at 7pm to benefit AID Atlanta. At the time “Jerker” was written, AID Atlanta had already been serving Atlanta’s ravaged gay community for several years.

As part of the special screening, I will have the privilege of hosting a talk with the “Jerker” cast and crew directly after the performance.

Besides being an HIV activist and longtime survivor myself, I share an unusual degree of connection with the autoerotic theme of “Jerker”.

In the early ’80s, I owned and operated Telerotic, one of the largest gay telephone fantasy companies in the industry. Business was brisk during the AIDS crisis. It was the golden age of phone sex. Customers called from all over the country to speak live to one of our team of “phone fantasy men,” and learning about their preferences and desires was never less than fascinating.

What did speaking to thousands of gay men teach me over the years? I learned that everyone wants to be taken care of. Everyone wants to feel safe. Everyone wants to know they are wanted and valued.

In calls with specific customers that sometimes spanned years, I heard about their heartache and their loneliness, I knew their hopes and aspirations, and I shared their grief over of the rejection of family or the pain of gay bashings.

It might be easy to reduce the calls to something frivolous, but I refuse to do that. The customer’s need to be treated as a complete human being, capable and worthy of affection and sex that wasn’t perverse or ugly or pathological, was desperate in the 1980s, particularly for men who were isolated in small towns around the country.

Trust me, in those days, sexual fulfillment and genuine self-love were a lot harder to come by.

I sincerely hope that the dreams my customers had for themselves came true one day, that they found someone who would care for them in the way they deserved, and that they somehow managed to get out of the 1980s alive.

And I remain haunted, today and forevermore, by the sound of woeful longing in their voices.

Mark S. King won the GLAAD Award for My Fabulous Disease, his ongoing blog as a gay long-term survivor. For tickets to the special virtual screening of “Jerker” on April 28, visit OutFrontTheatre.com.

The virtual screening will be available to regular audiences from April 30–May 2.

MORE INFO Virtual Screening of the play “Jerker” Wednesday, April 28 at 7pm A Special Benefit for AID Atlanta Visit OutFrontTheatre.com for tickets

April 23, 2021 Community News 9

YOUR VOICE

Voter Registration: Why It Should Be More than Registering Voters Dave Mulryan, founder of Everybody Votes

both register the voter and to give the person registering a reason WHY to register and why they need to vote. That is asking a lot, but it seems to be the requirement to have a successful encounter.

The 2020 elections saw a massive surge of voting, drawing the largest number of voters since the election of 1900. This huge increase in voting showed, with some unexpected results, that the care of the world’s oldest and most important democracy really does rest on just one thing: voting. This map shows what happens to voting when we look only at the young vote: Arizona, which birthed Barry Goldwater and has long been a conservative bastion, turns blue. Texas turns blue.

We have a huge task ahead of us. We have proven, as evidenced by the turnout in the 2020 elections, that voting is the key. The election saw the best turnout in 120 years. We need to continue, and to train and make sure that the people doing voter registration are prepared. They need to know when the next election is. They need to be able to explain the role of the voter in the democratic process. They need to be able to rebut the conventional wisdom that “my vote doesn’t count” and explain how their vote DOES count.

The 2018 midterm elections saw an uptick in voting, as many people, especially the young, voted at higher rates. Although this uptick was welcome, we still have a crisis of voting, in that not enough of us do it.

Why? The Founders, the white men who wrote the Constitution, and who muscled the adoption of it through the warring factions that made up the original 13 colonies, made compromises to get votes from the two thirds of the colonies needed to allow its adoption. These included the compromises that there would be no federal oversight of voting and that the states would be in charge of all elections, even federal ones. The small colonies were concerned that they would be overwhelmed by the large states, so they insisted on equal numbers of Senators, two per state, and used the House of Representatives as a body for proportional representation. They also restricted voting to white men with property, and state legislators were to choose Senators (direct election of Senators would not take place until 1913).

Voting was designed for elites, and echoes of that resonate today.

There has been progress — women got the vote in 1920, people of color got the vote 10 Your Voice April 23, 2021

PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / RAWPIXEL.COM

when President Lyndon Johnson pushed through the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act — yet voting remains anemic.

Most federal elections are decided with 50% of the eligible voters voting, and some elections, like mayoral races and school board elections, can be decided by as little as 6% of the eligible voters.

Everybody Votes and The New Mexico Voter Group have established organizations to focus on registering voters. We are focused on the nuts and bolts of registering voters: setting up tables, getting forms, getting the young voters to register, getting the forms to the county clerk. Yet, we despair that we’re not doing enough. Many eligible voters, especially the young ones, breeze by us, muttering something vague about “no voting.” We have registered a huge chunk of

voters, with few resources, and so we know that it can be done. Clearly we could use resources — money — but we also believe that we need a revolution in the person who registers the vote, the voter registration agent. How do we do this?

In short, we need to move voter registration from a passive endeavor to an active one.

Oregon, with its automatic voter registration, is showing how this can work. Vote by mail elections seem to increase participation, but the adoption of these nationwide seems to be a ways off, and we need to register these voters now.

The person who registers someone to vote is the very first contact that people have with the mechanisms of democracy. The voter registration agent needs to be prepared to

None of this will simply happen. We need a complete curriculum that teaches people to register voters. We need to teach the registering voters what they need to know: facts, how the process works, and what is coming up in the near term that the new voter will vote on. Stacey Abrams, who led a group that registered 800,000 voters in Georgia, shows what can be done with leadership and political will: she and her group have helped decide the balance of power in Washington.

We need resources, we need direction, we need to scale. We can and have identified the problem, and we need to quickly implement the solution. We can do it if we want to.

Do we, as citizens of the world’s oldest and most important democracy, have the will to do this? I hope we do. I believe we can.

Dave Mulryan is the Co-Founder of Everybody Votes, a group that registers high school seniors to vote. He is the president of Mulryan/Nash Advertising, Inc., an LGBTQ marketing company.

TheGeorgiaVoice.com

Find Your Way Home!

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April 23, 2021 The Pink Page 11

BUCK JONES THE FRENCH CONNECTION

Hello Espadrilles!

Buck Jones A couple of weeks ago here in Paris the weather took a turn. Whereas on Saturday we needed to have several layers on to do a brisk walk, by Tuesday it seemed that the entire city was in search of a patch of grass or a spot along the Seine to sunbathe with temperatures in the upper 60s. My husband and I walked our dog for a long, meandering afternoon along the quais of the river drinking in the sun like all the other Parisians. One could even spy, if they looked hard enough, a brief smile or two from the notoriously grumpy Parisians. It was that kind of glorious warm day.

When walking past the Pont Neuf bridge near the Louvre, my husband pointed to a cluster of shirtless young college students sitting in a group, enjoying their beers and chatting with each other. One particularly cute youth had his legs spread out as he lay back, and my husband said jokingly to me, “Well, hello espadrilles!” in reference to the lightweight summer shoes the lad was wearing.

Indeed, while the shoes were about the last thing I was admiring on the guy, it was true that it had suddenly become an espadrille kind of day. These cotton encased, wedge heeled shoes with a slender rope sole define footwear during the summer months throughout Mediterranean cultures.

Typically they are as ubiquitous among the throngs of vacation-bound travelers as backpacks and crying children at Orly, the main “southbound” airport for Paris.

12 Columnist April 23, 2021

“Now International Male, for those of you who are unfamiliar with this relic from the 1980s, was a men’s ‘fashion’ catalog that featured muscled male models dressed in what could charitably be called ‘exotic’ clothing.”

Parents craning their necks up to look at the mammoth split-flap announcement boards which will periodically update with a mechanized whirl as they quickly flip with new gate changes, while their kids pout or run around near them — they’re all shod in espadrilles.

The first place I saw espadrilles was back in the United States, however. This was long before I had ever been to Europe, and before I had ever explored my sexuality. I was a “questioning” teenager in South Carolina and had somehow convinced my mother to let me get a copy of International Male while at the Augusta Mall’s Waldenbooks.

Now International Male, for those of you who are unfamiliar with this relic from the 1980s, was a men’s “fashion” catalog that featured muscled male models dressed in what could charitably be called “exotic” clothing. Usually the gauze fabric T-shirts were see-through, and the pirate-themed lapel shirts or Australian outback jackets were open to show impossibly defined six-pack abs and perky pectorals. For a

questioning teen, International Male was a near-constant companion each evening when I went to bed.

But while carefully poring over the images in each season’s magazine, I came across this unusual looking shoe that several of the models wore as they posed on a tropical veranda sipping an umbrella-garnished fruity cocktail while clad only in olive colored fishnet shorts, or peering through a telescope as they stood on a sand dune with a billowy white bathrobe left tantalizingly open. Es-padrilles, I slowly said to myself, practicing in my mind how I would one day inquire at the Davison’s shoe department for a pair to try on (I never dared). It wasn’t much later, however, after becoming aware of this somewhat flamboyant sartorial statement, that I was watching “Miami Vice” and noticed that Don Johnson wore espadrilles. Clearly, if the sexy ladies’ man Sonny Crockett could get away with wearing them while fighting mobsters and driving his Ferrari through the hot nights of Miami, it wasn’t just an International Male who might wear a pair while driving through the Castro in a Miata.

Since moving to France and investing in a pair (they usually last two summers and are cheap, costing only $15–$20), I can attest that they are in fact the perfect summer shoes. Not only can they become a perfect accessory, but they also slip on and off easily so I can keep them by the door to wear when I take the dog out for one of his walks or when I need to dash over to the market for a quick purchase. As for vacations, they take up little space in luggage and are ideal for both the beach and street wear. Unlike flip-flops or open-toed sandals, espadrilles generously hide one’s jacked up toes and dirty feet from the discerning judgmental view of others.

Here’s a good rule of thumb: only wear flipflops where there is actually sand or water in the immediate proximity. Otherwise, I don’t want to see your feet. Certainly not when you are pushing a grocery cart through Walmart, or pumping gas at the corner convenience store, or (gasp!) at church on Sunday morning. No, no, and gawd no.

Instead, say hello to espadrilles.

TheGeorgiaVoice.com

DANTE RHODES THE GAYLY DOSE

There’s Unity in Community Dante Rhodes, co-host of The Gayly Dose In a world transitioning into a post-COVID-19 atmosphere, the greater sense of community has become increasingly important, especially as we move back into a space of local and global connectedness. Community is defined as a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals, but beyond that, it means so much more to so many. Community speaks to the core of social homeostasis within various social sectors in society. Community is the embodiment of helping thy neighbor.

It is the reason why we support people we share experiences with without validating them first; we do it because they belong to our community.

constructive manner, with a focus on the common good.

The most important thing to consider, though, is the following question: what does community mean to you?

When I ask myself this question, the first word that comes to my mind is “support.”

The support of others helped me through the past year as I tried to navigate the world during COVID. Like the rest of the world, I felt the pressure of finances, employment, sociability, and mental health, and it felt so crippling. Along with that, the Black Lives Matter movement and the politics that followed it made the perfect equation for someone to feel alone. Rewinding time, and looking at the past year of my life, I sit and think to myself: How did I weather the storm? How did I, a young gay AND Black person, weather the storm of amplified oppression, financial instability, and a world unknown to all? The answer is: with the help of my community.

Be That Person Day in and day out, they made sure that I was okay. Beyond being okay, they made sure I maintained sustainability as a fully TheGeorgiaVoice.com

PHOTO BY ISTOCK.COM

functioning adult. Whether it was helping me apply for new job opportunities or calling me about auditioning for a podcast, I never felt like I didn’t have a community behind me, pushing me to do my best in life. Their support during all of it also helped with my mental health. Feeling loved helped me dodge depression and pushed me into new avenues and opportunities. Grateful is an understatement to describe how I feel about what they have done for me.

But this is a two-way street. I continue to try to provide the same resources, love, and support for those in my community. I want to be that person for somebody in the same way somebody was that person for me. We often become too autonomous in our lives and live in our own lane, forgetting that there are people out there who feel alone or without support. Taking a few seconds to lift up the person next to you will only do the same for you in your life.

Focus on the Common Good My community is what brought me onto this great podcast, The Gayly Dose. Bennett, my now co-host, called me and asked me to audition for the podcast. That short call changed my life in ways words cannot describe. In my current role as co-host and creative director, I have been given the chance to express myself in ways I never dreamed possible. For the first time in my life, I feel like I now have the platform to amplify my passions, my values, and my experiences without having to sacrifice the most honest parts of myself.

Speaking about race, religion, real estate and everything in between has not only been therapeutic but has enlarged my sense of civic responsibility. As Elizabeth Larson-Keagy wrote in the Journal for Civic Commitment, civic responsibility means active participation in the public life of a community in an informed, committed, and

Move Mountains The gay community is one that has come a long way, even in the past year. We charge on to fight not only for our rights, but for the rights of all queer people in all places. We have been through so much, and through our struggles, we now have the chance to celebrate the world we have helped create.

Whether it be in the gayborhood, with your closest friends at home, or online in gay social spheres, now more than ever have the chance to unite as community and move mountains for each other. Community is so important, and without it, who knows what the last year would have looked like.

Instead of living in the unknown, let’s move forward into a space where the sense of community uplifts us all. A space where all of us can live our best queer lives.

Dante is the Creative Director and Co-Host of The Gayly Dose, an Atlanta based podcast hosted by an all-gay cast.

Unique in its mission and follow-on format, weekly episodes are known for their real conversations about things that matter to the community and their listeners. Purposefully candid and brutally honest, the cast speaks on a range of topics including monogamy, body issues, coming out, dating apps and growing up gay in the church. Listen at thegaylydose.com.

April 23, 2021 Columnist 13

A&E SPOTLIGHT

Dyllón Burnside Says Farewell to ‘Pose’ Jim Farmer

Dyllón Burnside PUBLICITY PHOTO COURTESY OF FX

Like virtually everyone else, when “Pose” actor Dyllón Burnside found out that the new season of the landmark show, its third, would be the last, he was a bit surprised. He learned the news earlier this year when the cast had a conversation with producer Janet Mock. “I wasn’t totally shocked,” he admits.

“There had been some conversation about it before, but nothing was concrete. I wasn’t totally caught off guard, but it also knocked the wind out of me when I found out.”

The recent social unrest surrounding police brutality has not been easy for Burnside. He dealt with it day to day. “With so much going on with the murder of Daunte Wright and so many others killed and assaulted by police officers, it’s all over the news and social media and the Internet and it’s hard to process when you are inundated with it all the time,” he said.

“I had to unplug. I also needed to find ways to get activated. I marched and protested in Atlanta and in D.C. I also got involved with the People’s Uprising Task Force in Atlanta that is seeking to bridge the gap between the community, the community’s needs and actual change in the political process.”

In the landmark series, Burnside stars as Ricky Wintour, who is Damon’s exboyfriend and a previous member of the House of Evangelista. In the second season he learns he is HIV-positive and starts a relationship with Pray Tell (played by Emmy winner Billy Porter).

The final season of the show, which premieres May 2, started production in March of 2020, but production was delayed because of COVID-19. The actors were able to resume filming in October of last year.

Filming the last episode was emotional for Burnside, especially when he opened the envelope and seeing the script that said “Series Finale” on it. “When I got to the last page, I broke down crying,” he said. “Saying goodbye to [everyone] was bittersweet. It felt like graduation day.”

The new season allows the audience to get to know more of Ricky. The actor says assumptions were made about Ricky when the audience first met him. “Lots of folks, in the first season, talked about him being a playboy. I think by the time we meet him in season three we get to see Ricky as a full human being and not just this playboy 14 A&E Spotlight April 23, 2021

the city. I’m a country boy at heart. I love being able to sit out on the patio and put my feet in the grass. I anticipate spending a lot more time down in the South.”

The actor has some TV projects in development, as well as a single coming out this summer. Burnside might also be returning to Broadway in the fall.

or object of desire for people,” Burnside said. “We get to see him as a young man looking for love who wants to create a life for himself and a family for himself. He’s found a sense of home with Pray. We get to see him maturing as a young adult and understanding his place in the community and as an artist, as a dancer.”

Burnside — who has spent much of his life in Atlanta and is also a recording artist — and his family moved to the area when he was six and lived there until he was 12.

When his family moved back to Florida, they kept their home in Conyers. “We’d

come back, and Atlanta is a city that is a mecca for recording music such as R&B and hip hop. I’d spend time there recording.”

He spent much of last year at his mother’s house in Conyers enjoying some down time.

“It was great, actually,” he said. “I almost feel bad saying that, but it was a time for my mother and I to connect. We spent about six months together, and we had not gotten to spend that much time together in a long time. It was nice to be part of her life day to day during this crazy time. It was also nice to unplug from city life. We live out in the woods in Conyers, so it’s a nice retreat from

It will be hard for him to find another project as gratifying as “Pose,” though. It’s been a fulfilling experience in many ways.

“I have learned so much. I get to work with these amazing artists and amazing human beings who have taught me so much about being a better person and a better advocate for LGBTQ issues, trans issues, Black people issues,” he said. “It’s not every day you get to work on a project that is both artistically fulfilling and challenging but is personally edifying and challenges you to be better.”

MORE INFO The third and final season of “Pose” premieres May 2 on FX.

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April 23, 2021 Ads 15

A&E SPOTLIGHT

Out Conductor Oversees New Take on ‘Carmen’ Jorge Parodi returns to Atlanta Opera for Big Tent series

Conductor Jorge Parodi

“The Threepenny Carmen”

PHOTO BY JEFF ROFFMAN

PHOTO BY KEN HOWARD

Jim Farmer Although the Atlanta Opera’s 2020-2021 season was thrown off track by COVID-19, artistic director Tomer Zvulun has nonetheless found a way to produce. His outdoor Big Tent series, which started in the fall of 2020 at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, has just opened again with the world premiere of “The Threepenny Carmen” on tap, alongside a version of “The Threepenny Opera.” Jorge Parodi, who is gay, is the conductor of the new version of “The Threepenny Carmen” and also worked with Zvulun on writing the adaptation.

The project has been in the works for a few years. Parodi and Zvulun had been thinking of adapting “Carmen,” but put it on hold a few summers ago. When the company had to rethink what it could produce this season, Zvulun reached out again and the two decided the time was right.

In this production, Parodi oversees a cast of 13 performers, down from the usual cast size of 66. In simplifying the show, he knew the normal production could not fit on the Big Tent stage and that the production needed to focus more on the principal characters of the piece. “’Carmen’ is a long show with lots of spectacle and smugglers and townspeople and the bullfighters,” he said. “All those elements are out, and we are focusing on the characters and their development.”

This version is set in a flamenco bar, and flamenco superstar Sonia Olla is in the cast, while Tom Key, the former artistic director 16 A&E Spotlight April 23, 2021

of Theatrical Outfit, is also in both of the pieces. In the bar — the Threepenny Tavern — many of the opera’s numbers became numbers in the show the bar is producing, part of the spectacle of the revised take. This production of “The Threepenny Carmen” runs 90 minutes, in sharp contrast to the three-hour-plus normal run time of Bizet’s beloved work.

Parodi has lived in Manhattan for 22 years and is originally from Argentina. He came relatively late to opera. The first opera he ever heard was at the age of 17. Living in a small town, there was very little available to him in terms of music making. Nonetheless, he was always attracted to music and started studying piano when he was six. He eventually came to the United States and

attended the University of Michigan. He got his first job when he was in his 30s, and since then he has worked around the world to great acclaim. Among his roles now is serving as the Music Director of the Senior Opera Theatre at the Manhattan School of Music, acting as a vocal coach at The Julliard School, and freelancing. Parodi has worked with the Atlanta Opera before, having conducted the popular tango opera “Maria de Buenos Aires” at the company in 2017 and again in 2019.

The company’s Big Tent series is performed in a custom-made tent without walls, where fresh air can continually pass through the venue at all times and still protect audiences from weather. It holds up to 200 audience members at a time.

The cast and crew have rehearsed safely leading up to the run. “Everyone is in masks and we keep a distance,” said Parodi. “There are limitations on what can be done on stage.

No touching. No kissing. No singing to each other’s faces. It’s a challenge to keep the story going without the normal interaction, but we have someone who is making sure the actors are not too close. We have all been vaccinated. The company was able to offer vaccinations to the cast. We feel everyone is being taken care of.”

Parodi feels the LGBTQ community will be entertained by the new take on a classic. “The show itself is very colorful, very dynamic, and there’s a lot of sexual energy,” he said.

“There’s also the element that Carmen herself is a very free personality and wants to exercise her right to choose what is right for her. She is a very self-assured character.”

MORE INFO “The Threepenny Carmen” runs April 23, 25, 28 & 30; May 2, 6, & 8 under the Big Tent at the Cobb Energy Center Performing Arts Centre parking lot. All performances begin at 8pm except the May 2 matinee, which begins at 2pm.

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April 23, 2021 Restaurant Guide 19

JIM FARMER ACTING OUT

Films to Watch: ‘A Love Song for Latasha’ and ‘Moffie’ “When the Beat Drops” hits DVD, Atlanta Film Fest opens

“A Love Song for Latasha”

“Moffie”

PUBLICITY PHOTOS

Jim Farmer When the Academy Awards® take place this year on April 25th, out filmmaker Sophia Nahli Allison hopes to hear her name called out. She is a nominee for her short film, “A Love Song for Latasha,” which she directed, and which is nominated for Best Documentary Short.

“A Love Song for Latasha” is an experimental short documentary that re-imagines the life of 15-year-old Latasha Harlins, a young Black girl who was wrongfully killed in South Central Los Angeles 30 years ago by a store clerk who thought she had stolen a $1.79 bottle of orange juice. The clerk served no time and received only probation and a fine for Latasha’s murder. The film explores Latasha’s life through two people close to her — her best friend and her cousin.

Allison herself is a native of South Central Los Angeles and is interested in making sure the stories of Black women and girls are not erased and pushed into the background.

“I did not want Latasha to exist just in the context of her death,” she said. “I wanted her to be surrounded by life, the dreams she had.

That was important.”

As a Black queer woman, Allison says she is deeply invested in telling stories about Black women, Black girls, and Black queer folks.

“I want to continue seeing us take up that space to tell these stories,” she said. “There is a care we bring to it, that is needed. For me, I am inspired to see us as a community tell 20 Columnist April 23, 2021

our own stories. I am excited to expand as a Black queer woman what it means for my voice and my story to be nourished.”

She was asleep in bed the morning the Oscar® nominations came and woke up to text messages about the news. “It felt like a dream,” Allison admitted. Only nominees are allowed inside the ceremony this year, because of COVID-19, and she is ecstatic about being one.

Now in theaters and streaming, “Moffie” is an extremely well-made look at a closeted gay man in 1981 South Africa who has to complete two years of compulsory military service. It’s the time of apartheid and also a time when being gay was illegal. Director Oliver Hermanus, who is gay, read the book of the same name and decided he wanted to make a film about this generation of men and their experiences in the army. It took about five years to develop the script, write it and cast it.

“The movie is about shame, shame in working through discovering your sexuality

in a context where you immediately assume that that context will not accept you and so you self-shame and you reduce yourself to hide the person you are,” Hermanus said. “That is the thrust of the film for me and that’s part of the reform that was most personal to me.”

Star Kai Luke Brummer, who spent a year and a half auditioning, plays the main character of Nicholas. He sees Nicholas as someone who doesn’t know what he really wants. “All he knows is that he really needs to get away from his family,” said Brummer.

“Through his experience in the army he forms a sort of dysfunctional family, and within that he finds someone who sparks something in him that becomes the driving force for the rest of the film.”

His relationship with Dylan, who he meets in the army, brings up something new in him: “He feels acceptance — Dylan provides that.”

In 2018, the documentary, “When the Beat Drops” — which was made in Atlanta and features Atlanta subjects — appeared

on Logo and hit the film festival circuit, telling the story of the underground dance phenomenon known as bucking. It was a sensation at, among others, Out On Film, where it won the Best Documentary Award.

It’s now out on DVD, as well as streaming.

The subject of the film, Anthony Davis, passed away in 2019, and he is mentioned in audio commentary tracks by both director Jamal Sims and producer Jordan Finnegan.

Finally, the 2021 Atlanta Film Festival is here, running through May 2. Some of the LGBTQ films in the lineup include the Georgia-filmed “Landlocked,” starring trans actress Delia Kropp in a great turn as a trans woman looking to connect to her son, and “See You Then,” about two women who haven’t seen each other in more than 10 years — one of whom has since transitioned.

MORE INFO “A Love Song for Latasha” is available on Netflix.

“Moffie” is now playing in theaters and various streaming services “When the Beat Drops” is available on DVD April 27 The Atlanta Film Festival runs April 22 – May 2 at the Plaza Theatre, indoors and outdoors, Dad’s Garage outdoors and online.

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CLIFF BOSTOCK OLD GAY MAN

The Fallacy of Sexual Addiction Cliff Bostock

Silence. My response was simplistic, but earned my therapist’s admission that “sex addiction” is a vague term. We agreed that many behavioral addictions, better called “compulsions,” are self-diagnosed on the basis of their disruption of our lives. But I’d go further. The term is related to the way heterosexual men have sexually pathologized marginalized people for centuries. Women committed the sin that drove men from Eden, inspiring worldwide myths of the “vagina dentata,” the toothy vagina that beckons and emasculates men with a single bite. Black men were enslaved in part because their reputedly enormous penises were irresistible even to genteel Southern belles. When lynched, their penises were cut into pieces as primal souvenirs. Gay men, unencumbered by sexual boundaries and suffocating family values, required surveillance to protect playgrounds and the sphincters of goats. All minorities have historically been depicted as sex perverts whose bodies must be brought under control of the state, the church, and psychiatry.

Amid the waves of hatred that have drowned America in recent months, one phrase has taken many by surprise. I’m referring to the “sexual addiction” that Robert Aaron Long said compelled him to go on a killing spree at three Asian-owned Atlanta spas. He claims that his motivation was eliminating the women who were the object of his ruinous addiction. It’s something like trying to become sober by killing all the bartenders who “enable” your drunkenness.

Long’s explanation is dismissed by most, who claim he was enacting the anti-Asian violence that has soared since Donald Trump blamed the COVID-19 pandemic on the Chinese.

I’m not going to get into an argument about that. Violence is America’s favorite sport, so it’s not easy to discern individual motivations.

But let’s do talk about sex addiction.

First, understand that sex addiction is not a formal psychiatric diagnosis. It became a popular term in the early ’80s when Patrick Carnes wrote “Out of the Shadows: Understanding Sexual Addiction.”

Understand, too, that this was a time when going to 12-step meetings, primarily Alcoholics Anonymous, was actually trendy. I don’t think I can attribute my own enrollment in AA in 1982 as an act of conformity, since I was escorted to my first meeting by a policeman who offered it as an (unappealing) alternative to jail. AA really did save my life and provided a brighter perspective than the one I had during blackouts.

But, like many newly sober people, I did find myself rather suddenly engaging in what were called behavioral addictions. Despite hating shopping all my life, I began breathlessly racing from cash register to cash register at Lenox Square. I started collecting crap — I’m talking over 300 figurines and pictures of pink flamingos. I decorated my bedroom with religious stuff like a neon crucifix from an abandoned church, old prints of monks draping whips over their Bibles, and little lamps made out of seashells depicting the TheGeorgiaVoice.com

PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK / ELQUEST

Stations of the Cross. It was fairly common when I brought a “trick” home from the Cove for him to insist that we fuck in the living room with the flamingos rather than in the bedroom with Jesus.

My sexual behavior, always intense, became operatic. A new friend in AA had actually gone to treatment for sexual addiction at Patrick Carnes’ rehab facility and invited me to several meetings of Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. Most of the members were heterosexuals. People told stories that charged the room with erotic energy pathetically weakened by Christian guilt. They were amateurs. We laughed uncontrollably at the Shoney’s salad bar where we indulged another new-found compulsion: eating.

One week, my therapist asked me, “Have you ever considered you might be a sex addict?”

I said, “How do you determine that?”

“Well,” he asked, “how many hours a day do you think about sex, masturbate, watch porn, and actually have sex despite AIDS being such a risk?”

“I don’t know … Maybe two hours weekdays — more on Saturdays, of course.”

“Well,” he said, “that is a lot.”

“Wait,” I said. “I know you play tennis. How many hours a day do you play tennis?”

He looked annoyed: “Maybe two, I don’t know.”

“So,” I asked, “what is the difference in your spending two hours playing tennis and me spending two hours recreationally fucking?”

It would be absurd for me to deny the reality of sexual compulsivity, including my own, but I think it’s also absurd to claim there is some objective measurement of that to explain Robert Aaron Long … or Harvey Weinstein … or Kevin Spacey. Long, an occasional visitor to Grindr as well as massage parlors, describes himself as a sex addict on the basis of his evangelical church’s antiquated condemnation of pleasure. Sex once a week with anyone but a wife would be classified as addiction in his church.

Why is this important? Because as long as we pathologize pleasure, the predictably rebellious unconscious will inflict actual suffering on others. It’s the pathologizing, not consensual sexual behavior itself, that is disastrous. Love your dick and your vagina, people. It has things to tell you.

Cliff Bostock, Ph.D., is a former psychotherapist now offering life coaching for creative people. Visit cliffbostock.com or write him at cliffbostock@gmail.com April 23, 2021 Columnist 21

MELISSA CARTER THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID

PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / ROMAN SAMBORSKYI

Housework Hassle Melissa Carter

I had my first party since the pandemic began. Now, I’m defining “party” here as more than two people, since I did have a fellow vaccinated friend visit a few weeks ago.

Because I have secured both vaccine doses and am well past the 2-week period since the second dose, it was time to roll out the red carpet and have a spring gathering. The two guests invited were a house cleaning crew.

I am not a fan of housework. It does not leave me with a satisfied feeling when the chores are done. I do not find the act of vacuuming, mopping, ironing or dusting to be a relaxing experience. I’m tired and frustrated when all is said and done, with a new sense of dread that everything I just accomplished will have to be done yet again in a matter of days. Despite having house cleaning help in the past, as a woman I somehow have a sense that I’m supposed to do these things and can’t help but feel lazy if they are not accomplished. I’d even clean a little before those cleaners would come.

During the pandemic I had the opportunity to sort through some old boxes and found a note from my late mother, Millie Pete, that was written many years ago. It said, Do what you love and hire out the rest. Now, my mother was a homemaker, having retired from teaching early to raise her youngest, and likely favorite, child. No hint on who that might be, but I should mention here that I was the final child she had later in life.

22 Columnist April 23, 2021

She even served as the president of her local Homemakers Association and not only took care of the cleaning, but also served a fresh, personally cooked meal at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. On top of that, she served as Worthy Matron in our town’s chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star. Devoted wife and dedicated mother to all three of her children, it goes without saying that my mother was a badass. But after a year of doing everything by myself, I understand now that she was an exhausted badass.

Even though we all were taught how to do every household job from her, as well as how to set a nice table for a fancy dinner, she never pressured us into being her. I think there was a dormant feminist in there not wanting to repeat the gender pattern of hard work without appreciation. So, when I found her note I first wondered why I didn’t originally pay attention to it, then felt a sense of gratitude for her permission to relinquish joyless parts of my life.

I’m sure the cleaning crew was a little taken aback at my enthusiastic greeting when they arrived. You truly would have thought I was throwing a party, the way I welcomed them in and showed them around. Each hesitantly lowered their vacuums and cleaning supplies to follow me around. All that was missing was champagne and hors d’oeuvres, but I would have gladly served them for the service they were providing me. As they left I finally felt that satisfaction at the gift I had given myself.

Next, Mom, a laundry service....

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April 23, 2021 Columnist 23