The entire concept of civil rights is that they apply to groups of people you might be uncomfortable with over their identity. It’s a civil right because it’s a right that is due every human. “This doesn’t apply to x group” goes against the very essence of what civil rights really are.
In an effort to attack me last night, commenters on the hate website File 770 have shown that they will literally say anything just to take an opposite stance of me. One stated:
“Attending a public event in a bar is not at all related to “cviil” [sic] rights”
I think Rosa Parks would disagree with you here.
The entire civil rights movement in the 1960s was because blacks were forced into separate restaurants, separate schools, made to sit separately from whites, made to drink from different fountains than whites, etc. A black man couldn’t walk into a white bar without getting harassed and removed, similarly.
Being able to go to a public event at a public bar is very much a civil right, as is attending a conference (i.e. worldcon) that is open to the public. It doesn’t matter if you like the group who wants to attend, in fact, if you like them and there’s no issue for them, there is certainly no civil right at stake there because they are an accepted group.
Civil rights are necessary to uphold for unaccepted groups. The outcasts. The people who you are not comfortable around because of their identity. The whole necessary factor about that is to remove the identity from the equation legally, so that we all can come together as Americans. We all bleed the same red blood, after all. And that goes for you, File 770 commenter, as well as anyone who identifies as conservative-libertarian. They have the same rights to assemble in places open to the public as you do. Especially in California where our laws are a lot stricter in that regard, in an effort to put a stop to the kind of bigotry displayed from the File 770 commenter above.
My fight is for what’s right, for diversity, and for inclusivity. We’ve seen how conventions act in the past toward conservative-libertarians. They can get kicked out of conventions under false pretenses. They can threaten to frame people for crimes. They can ban conservative-libertarians over associations with other conservative friends. Or they can get pre-banned for being concerned about their own safety. People on the left don’t have to fear this sort of harassment from convention staff and members, which is why the civil rights need to be applied to people on the right.
Conventions need to take extra steps toward the safety of conservatives, and need to tell authors who are in the minority identity “we have your back if someone is going to harass you.” A lot of conservatives have given up conventions all together because they don’t want to have to deal with the harassment, the scorn, and the inhuman treatment from the in crowd, like is on full display at File 770. This is what this is all about. And this is what I will continue to push for until Worldcon does the right and legal thing.
If you appreciate my fight for civil rights, check out my book, The Stars Entwined. It’s about individuals standing up for what’s right in the face of an epic galactic war between civilizations. It’s available here.
This is what the leftist don’t get: one day they will be on the other side of the power structure. They will be excluded for not thinking as The Ones In Power say they should. When that happens, and it will eventually, they better hope that the conservative-libertarians have more compassion than the leftists have shown.
Of course they get it. That was the case 40 years ago.
That might be true, but for the leftists that are causing the problems at cons today, 40 years ago may as well be 400 years ago. It’s ancient history to them. They’ll always be in power, don’t you know? That is, until they’re not.