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[1] Today’s Anaheim LGBT Flag Resolution
I would generally hesitate to accuse someone of “politicizing a tragedy” — but it does happen. Deciding to respond to an atrocity like the recent massacre of gay men (and some allies) in Orlando, for example, is fine. It’s how one does it that can make the difference between a heartfelt and admirable tribute and the gross and cynical appropriation of tragedy. Someone’s doing it wrong if they try to gin up controversy that doesn’t actually exist just so as to give themselves an apparent political victory.
I don’t know, at this moment, whether Jordan Brandman, who has a resolution on the ballot to have the City of Anaheim fly the Gay Pride flag annually during June, is acting out of a sense of honor or political gain. I’m inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. True, he never proposed this during his first three years on the Council, but both his coming out last year and the tragedy in Orlando make this a good idea — and I don’t expect that more than one Councilmember (a Brandman ally) is likely to oppose it, unless perhaps it is not something that is done as a matter of City policy for any demographic group. (If not, there are plenty of ways to honor LGBT people during June and the city should pursue them — as should others. I wish that it had been proposed in time for this June, but that’s OK.
Here’s the resolution:
DATE: JUNE 21, 2016
FROM: OFFICE OF THE CITY MANAGER
SUBJECT: AUTHORIZING THE ANNUAL DISPLAY OF THE PRIDE FLAG AT CITY HALL
ATTACHMENT (Y/N): NO
ITEM # 25ACTION: That the City Council, by Motion, authorize the annual display of the Pride flag at City Hall during the month of June to commemorate Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month.
DISCUSSION: At the June 14, 2016 City Council meeting, Council member Brandman requested that staff bring back an item for council consideration that would authorize the annual display of the Pride flag in front of City Hall during the month of June in honor of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Pride Month.
Since 2013, the City of Anaheim has annually proclaimed the month of June as LGBT Pride Month via Resolution. This recognition is currently part of our list of recurring annual recognitions that is adopted by Council before the beginning of each calendar year. If the action outlined above is approved, the Pride flag would be displayed beginning no later than June 25 of this year and then each subsequent June during LGBT Pride Month. It is anticipated that the flag could be added to one of the existing flag poles in front of City Hall.
IMPACT ON BUDGET: There is no material budgetary impact.
Respectfully submitted,
Greg Garcia
Deputy City Manager
[2] Possible Objections
This resolution seems pretty reasonable — especially since it’s “cabined” (that is, has its scope restricted) by reference to a Council-approved list of recurring annual recognitions each year. I can see three objections to it, in ascending order of legitimacy.
- First, a whole category of objections are ones grounded in bigotry and prejudice: not wanting the city to give any reasonable recognition to LGBT persons due to animus or fear of public anger. I don’t anticipate that objection coming from a majority of this Council, at least towards LGBTs. The others don’t involve prejudice.
- Second, some objections grounded may be grounded in political ethics. Council members may think, with some justification, that this is essentially a campaign stunt to give Brandman fodder for the glossy mailers that Disney and their partners will buy for him this fall. (That becomes all the worse if that ton of money is used to distract voters from real and significant abominations like the huge new bed tax rebate giveaway that Disney is supposed to get on July 12. Even politicians not likely to reject such a proposal on substance may choose to do so but capitalizing on a tragedy for a political gain is a lousy and unfair thing for a sitting Councilmember to do.I hope that, whatever their ethical objections to the process by which this came up when it did, no Councilmember will oppose this resolution on those grounds. First, after some initial reaction to the contrary (before I had looked at the actual resolution, when I had read only a deeply mistaken blog account of what was happening, as we’ll see below) I think that Jordan has to be given the benefit of the doubt that his initiative is entirely (and unusually) sincere. The Council ought to suck it up and vote entirely on the merits. If the worst is true and this is essentially a political stunt, then let Jordan reap what credit from it he can. It’s a pretty obvious trap for other Council members — they want flyers that say that various people on the Council voted against LGBT rights in the wake of Orlando (which is both a completely unreasonable and totally inevitable glodd to put on such a vote) — and they should avoid it.
- The only argument against such a motion that may have some legitimacy in fairness and equality. LGBT legislation is always attacked as imparting “special rights” towards LGBT — and it is almost inevitably twaddle. (Or, for people who don’t need this to be cleaned up for them: “a sack of horseshit.”) In this case, though, there’s a case to be made for it — at least in part. It’s entirely legitimate to fly a rainbow flag as a gesture of defiance to the Orlando shooting and keep it up there all summer, if the Council wants. But that’s not what this resolution is about! It’s about establish a permanent designation that the flag will be flown every June — and that raises the question of whether other groups on the list — Latinos, Asians, Women, Muslims, etc. — are being treated equally. Flying a flag of tribute is a significant honor — if not, why should we care about it? — and the divisive question will surely crop up from other groups on that list: “how come LGBT people get to fly a flag and we don’t?”The best answer to that may be that “it’s because LGBT people have a flag and you don’t!” — but that only pushes the question down the road, Should Anaheim fly the Mexican flag to honor all Latinos — when not all Latinos in the city are of Mexican descent? What flag should be flown to represent women — and who decides? What about for Muslims? (Please, not the Saudi flag!) For Asians or for African Americans? For veterans? For the disabled? And, uh, what happens when some whites want their equal recognition and come with a lawsuit in hand? This is not a theoretical problem; it’s the sort of problem that usually crops up on university campuses rather than in municipalities — precisely because deciding who gets a certain honor raises headaches.
This is in some ways the standard “if we do this for you, don’t we have to do it for everyone?” concern. The Council should be familiar with this: it’s largely the same problem that led the same Council that provided giveaways to the GardenWalk Hotel and other businesses to now believe that it has to show consistency by giving similar giveaways (pardon me, “inducements”) to every applicant who wants to build a “four-star equivalent” hotel, even if those inducements make no sense on their own. (And at the July 12 meeting, this will reach the height of absurdity when the Council will consider giving a hugest “inducement” for the Disney Resort to build its own four-star hotel that makes sense even without any subsidy — because if someone gives you free money, even its other people’s free money, it takes more moral fiber to turn it down than the House of Mouse apparently has.)
The solution for Tuesday’s meeting is pretty obvious: bifurcate the issue in a substitute motion. (1) Approve a resolution to fly a rainbow flag as a gesture of defiance to the Orlando shooter for a certain number of days — 49 might be a good number, as might 102 — and then (2) refer the larger question to the City Staff with a direction to come up with a policy on whether and how to use whichever flags are deemed to be appropriate to honor those groups on the “honoree” list. In that context,”rainbow flag every day in every June” seems likely to be part of a good result — but it won’t be marred by concerns about equal treatment under the law. Anaheim will still have problems to address, such as whether it is prepared to fly the Palestinian flag the next time a massacre occurs in Gaza — I’d say “yes, and good luck with that one” — but once the city gets involved in doling out flag flying honors that’s its burden to shoulder.
[3] This is What Disgusting Politicization of Tragedy Looks Like
For an example of the disgusting politicization of tragedy, though, we need look no further than another local political blog. I’m printing the story from Dan Chmielewski, now again to be known generally in my writings as Chumley or other names that have been tossed onto the stage from the peanut gallery, in full to avoid any question of my leaving out needed context. But today I’m going to call him Idiot Boy and I’ll take his article apart paragraph by paragraph.
It seems hard to believe that Orange County’s largest city actually has to put it to a vote to have a public commemoration honoring the victims of the Orlando Pulse Nightclub Massacre. Santa Ana has already lit up the water tower for Downtown Orange County in rainbow colors, and Council member Jordan Brandman is leading an effort to get Anaheim to follow suit.
Idiot Boy doesn’t understand that this is not a resolution honoring the victims of the Orlando Pulse Nightclub Massacre. One reason he should know this is that event is never mentioned in the resolution. The other is that, as noted above, it’s about a permanent observance of having a rainbow flag fly at City Hall every June. It is not like an ad hoc lighting change of a water tower as a gesture of defiance — although, as I mention above, that is what it should be, for now. (If Anaheim wanted to do something cool, it could put colored gels over the lights in the plaza in front of City Hall to create quite an impressive rainbow effect this summer.) But, in any event, that’s not really a Council decision — it’s something that should be done by City Manager Paul Emery and his staff. (The Council could create a committee of Brandman and anyone-but-Kring to work with Emery to come up with a good plan, if it doesn’t trust his judgment. Just ask him to do it in Council Comments or something; he’ll go along. And if he messes it up, the Council can fire him.)
The “Council member Jordan Brandman is leading an effort to get Anaheim to follow suit” sentence is pretty much a lie. If it were true, Brandman would have said during Council Comments at last week’s meeting “Mr. City Manager, is there some display that it’s within your authority to authorize to honor the victims of the Orlando shooting with, oh, rainbow-colored lighting?” Emery would probably agree that he could do so as a temporary measure. (I mean, hell, he’s thrown his weight around a lot more than that before!) He couldn’t make a permanent policy, but the permanent policy would be in place to honor LGBTs generally; it would have been appropriate even if the Pulse massacre had never happened! So — what’s “leading the effort” mean? That would have been a phone call or visit to Emery — trust me, the Council majority can get through to him — or a request that he ask the Mayor for authorization for such a response. (Tait had already posted an expression of grief on the City’s official Facebook page.) I’d like to presume that Brandman didn’t describe himself as “leading an effort” without ever indicating the impediments to such an “effort” and why he was doing so in what was almost the most circuitous way possible.
The Council will vote to authorize the annual display of the Pride flag at City Hall during the month of June to commemorate Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month. But let’s note, June has another 9 days to go. Brandman’s efforts to formally agendize the flying of the flag by many LGBT individuals in response to the heinous act in Orlando. We urge the council to approve Brandman’s efforts.
“Brandman’s efforts to formally agendize the flying of the flag by many LGBT individuals in response to the heinous act in Orlando” is not an actual cogent English sentence. It’s unclear what Idiot Boy is trying to say, but he seems to concede that the annual display of the rainbow flag is not itself directly in response to Orlando. Or maybe he doesn’t — again, it’s unclear. Whatever display Anaheim does now is in proper response to Orlando — and it needn’t be restricted to June. And, not being a direct response to Orlando, the larger policy that treats the honor equally for all can be given time for Staff to come up with a recommendation that treats all honored groups equally.
Most of that is not politicizing tragedy, though — in the interest, if anyone is unclear, of supporting Brandman’s campaign in District 3 against Dr. Jose Moreno and various intended Latin@ vote-splitters. The concluding paragraph is.
Perhaps its a consequence of a conversative Republican mayor in Anaheim that the council has to formally act. In this case, Anaheim could have taken a tip from Santa Ana in lighting up the rainbow.
Oh, perhaps — and perhaps it’s something that Idiot Boy thinks because he doesn’t understand what the resolution says, although he transcribed it mostly well for about half of the previous paragraph. So, here’s a remedial course for Idiot Boy:
- Anaheim’s Mayor doesn’t determine City policy the way that, say Eric Garcetti does in Los Angeles
- In fact, as part of a minority on the Council, he can’t even block City policy
- If the City Manager asked him for informal position to take an action, he can respond. There’s no allegation that Emery ever did so.
So what’s Idiot Boy’s complaint about Tait? “Politicizing a tragedy,” that’s what.
Actually I heard yesterday (from LeTourneau at Amin’s service) that it’s Tait and Vanderbilt – the two we usually agree with – who are reluctant to support this – based on “Where would this stop? Every other group is gonna want this!”
“Where would this stop?” is a perfectly legitimate question — just the sort that a legislator is SUPPOSED to ask. I wish that the Council had asked it with respect to hotel subsidies!
Cynthia’s proposal below answers the question that Jordan doesn’t even bother to ask pretty well. It’s still not perfect — again, the decision as to “which flag represents Women’s History month and who decides?” is still a problem — but it’s on the right track. They need some sort of coherent policy — and that policy will have to answer the exact question of “where does this stop?” Being willing to ask that question is the difference between a legislator and a demagogue.
Your bifurcating motion sounds good.
Politicization of tragedy… that reminds me of right after the Newtown mass murder, when Mayor Tait called some kind of event and Kris Murray was all butt-hurt she didn’t think of doing it first.
Vern, the complete PR whoring of dead children by Murray, Brandman, and Eastman was SO blatant and disgusting that I won’t go there, and the Mayor asked that we not go over it, even though the truth vindicates him, he didn’t want it used to dirty the event itself. THAT is what a gentleman looks like and the rest of them might want to take notes.
I would have preferred that this be brought up with the actual schedule of recognitions, it is simple, if there is a flag or banner that coordinates with the issue being recognized we fly it on the minor flag pole outside City Hall below the City flag. That covers ANY groups being honored. Cherry picking which of the issues already being recognized also gets to be “more equal” than others smacks of pandering. Standard Kleptocracy.
NO SHAME.
Well, Anaheim is about to give away $200,000,000 to Disney in exchange for exactly nothing.
I’m glad to see that the Council has found something else to discuss instead.
In the meantime, hundreds of employees are forced to live in motels because Disney cares deeply about the quality of life of its workers.
Great stuff.
Yeah, there is that.
“The Council will vote to authorize the annual display of the Pride flag at City Hall during the month of June to commemorate Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month. But let’s note, June has another 9 days to go. Brandman’s efforts to formally agendize the flying of the flag by many LGBT individuals is in response to the heinous act in Orlando. We urge the council to approve Brandman’s efforts.”
Chumley has added a verb to the paragraph that I had copied and pasted above. Now the sentence is grammatical — though still nonsensical.
Chumley accused me of not being able to read — without acknowledging that he had left out the word “is” initially, rendering the sentence (as accurately cut-and-pasted above in the story) incomprehensible.
Publish something wrong, and when called on it edit it and claim that the OTHER person couldn’t read it. That’s “being a PR professional,” Chumley-style, in a nutshell!
Well, that was one dramatic meeting! Long story short, Mayor Tait, after long visible struggle with his scrupulous sense of logic, joined the other three in a unanimous City of Kindness vote, yes on Jordan’s motion. (Vanderbilt, of the reserves, joined the meeting by very caterwampus teleconference, and had to “go into formation” right when it was time to speak on the motion, and so didn’t have to vote either… or did he just not want to go on record against it?)
Both Mayor Tait and Lucille Kring gave Jeff Le Tourneau credit for changing their minds with his simple “What’s different about this issue, this community? 49 dead bodies.” Speaking of the 49, their faces were prominently placed up and down the walls of the chambers on huge posters, which I just found out was partly the handiwork of Latino Oak View activists from my hometown of HB!
Jordan looked happier than he has in months, and got praise from all sides.
So now the Rainbow Flag, or Pride Flag, will fly over Anaheim every month for years to come.
Mr. Nelson – Speaking from my experience in the Marine Corps Reserves, I’m giving Mr. Vanderbilt the benefit of the doubt about having to go to formation.
During the council meeting, I had the unfortunate experience of sitting within earshot of William Denis Fitzgerald and another individual (some homeless advocate). Their boo’s and hisses may not have been loud enough to disrupt the speakers in favor of issue#25, but they were disruptive for the rest of us.
I pity those two.
I was highly impressed with the Pro-25 group donating a pride flag to the city. I hope the city makes that a requirement for any other groups that want their flag flown on the city flagpole.
This will discourage someone like Fitzgerald from using the city flagpole as another tool for ranting. (ie. trying to force the city to purchase and fly a flag with a candidate’s picture and the phrase “= criminal” next to it.)
Finally, the Beatles ‘Love, Love, Love’ is still stuck in my head. 🙂
I look forward to Anaheim hoisting a Palestinian flag the next time we see a reprise of the thrashing of Gaza in the Summer of 2014.
And no, I’m not kidding.
I think that Tait made the right call because of the emotions in the room and the community. But I frankly hate the narrative that the rainbow flag will fly each June becomes some closeted asshole shot up over 100 people, almost half of them to death. Far better if this hadn’t come out of emotional extortion, but because it was simply and in calm estimation the right thing to do.
Tait mentioned that Anaheim could, for example, light ARTIC’s shell (he presumably meant in a rainbow pattern) to commemorate the murders in the short term — and that would have been a *perfect* short-term response, unusual and visible to thousands of people an hour on the 57.
But once things devolve to “you do exactly what we propose or you’re a bigot, creativity follows logic and proportion right out the window. Anaheim will wish that it actually had an overall policy in mind before it did this — and probably sooner rather than later — but that will happen down the line.
It will be good to see the rainbow flag flying; it’s just sad that people in future years will recall largely that the City Council was stampeded into it rather than embracing the justice of the cause — which would be just even in the absence of this tragedy..
Greg, you give the people of Anaheim far too much credit for paying attention to anything happening at City Hall. If folks were watching that carefully, we would not keep seeing the election results and spending decisions that we do.