Coretta Scott King: Beloved ally to gays and lesbians

Gainesville Sun - Feb 11, 2006
by Katina Parker
http://www.gainesville.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060211/EDITORIALS0102/60210027/1098/editorials&template=printart

A black mother propelled against a concrete wall by high-powered fire hoses. A kindergartener shrinking back from the snarling teeth of a police dog. A teenage son's dramatically bloated body pulled from the Hallatachie River, his family, horrified.

From dawn until dusk, people progressing across the horizon in protest of such abject, legalized racism. Dr. Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King bravely forging into the projection of an unknown peace with thousands behind them, challenging the disenfranchised to assert their dignity.

When I think of Mrs. King, these are the images that populate my memory. During my teens, I spent hours studying the work of photographer Flip Schulke, who followed Dr. King and other civil rights leaders.

Schulke insightfully documented the innocence, vulnerability and purposefulness of common citizens who risked their physical safety in hopes that the world would know as intimately as they did what racism in America really looked like. They made these sacrifices because they understood the power of media to rally allies to their side.

Another image seared into my memory is that of a young Matthew Shepard, bruised and beaten beyond recognition, tied to a fence and left to die. Having experienced so many forms of hate-based cruelty, Mrs. King reached out to Matthew's family in a letter. She supposed that Matthew — a gay, white college student — must have been "a kind and open-hearted person who believed in human rights and the dignity of all people." She wrote, "Americans of conscience must work a lot harder to eliminate this sick culture of violence that threatens even our best and brightest."

Mrs. King's compassionate words to the Shepard family were not the first time she vocalized support for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people.

During the 10 years prior to her death she backed a federal bill prohibiting anti-gay discrimination and fought against a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage. She was passionate about promoting a radically inclusive vision of equality — peace and justice for all people, not only the privileged, the educated or the straight.

In a 1998 Chicago Tribune article, she wrote: "Gays and lesbians stood up for civil rights in Montgomery, Selma, in Albany, Georgia and St. Augustine, Florida, and many other campaigns of the Civil Rights Movement. Many of these courageous men and women were fighting for my freedom at a time when they could find few voices for their own, and I salute their contributions."

She was bold enough to stand up to dogs, hoses, death threats, and public criticism with an otherworldly sense of decorum and grace. Her courage made it safe for me, an African American bisexual woman, and others like me to set our sights on full equality.

We cannot thank Mrs. King enough for her brazen willingness to take an unprecedented stand against homophobia. It would have been easy for her to cave in to public pressure from clergy, activists and even some members of her family who publicly opposed her views. But she held close to her convictions and thereby emboldened the cause of equality for all.

As she once shared in a public statement, "(My husband) believed that none of us could be free until all of us were free, that a person of conscience had no alternative but to defend the human rights of all people. I want to reaffirm my determination to secure the fullest protection of the law for all working people, regardless of their sexual orientation ... it is right, just and good for America."

And let the people affirm, "Amen."

Katina Parker is the People of Color Media Manager for Communities of African Descent at the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation.