Frontlines: The Latest from OutServe-SLDN

Nick Kelly, Dells Country Progressive Voices, WI

I’ve been a gay activist for 38 years now - from the 1969 beginnings of gay liberation to the very current fight against the marriage amendment here in Wisconsin. I lived in Chicago for many years and it was easy to be involved in many different community activities. But now, I live in Baraboo which is a town of 11,000 people and the chances of being a gay activist are limited. And this atmosphere is quite often a challenge but I do find ways to do something for the larger gay community. And one way recently was to find a speaker on the DADT topic for the Dells Country Progressive Voices peace group which I work with. At first,I thought that getting a speaker from this big national organization might be nearly impossible but I went ahead and contacted SLDN anyway. I knew about their work, have sent them contributions and thought they could help. My email request went out and the very next day I got a response from Jason Knight who is a Communications Associate at SLDN. This was truly the “power of one” in action. He informed me that SLDN did indeed have a speaker’s forum and that if I could meet the fee and the plane fare we would be in business. Well, my Voices group does not have a budget for much of anything and we get a lot of services for free. I told Jason this and he said he’d work on it anyway. And much to my amazement he did come up with a speaker who would drive up from Chicago to speak to our group with no fee attached. And so it was, after many emails and much organizing that Jean Albright came to the Wisconsin Dells on October 18 to our Voices meeting. I was really amazed that she was there, in person, and a Board member of SLDN and we were sharing Chicago stories together. Voices had gotten quite a bit of publicity on this event. There was a PR news release and then a feature article in the Baraboo News Republic and a picture of the steering committee of Voices with myself included on the front page. But I’m afraid we didn’t attract the size of a crowd I was hoping for. Last year when a debate was sponsored about the marriage amendment the double room was filled to over-flowing with interested folks. And it was a hot topic. But after some reflection, I now feel that the issue of gays and lesbians in the military has a “soft” interest to the people around here. They don’t understand how important it is not only to the gays and lesbians who are forced to leave their military service but that it’s also a loss to our country and our national security. We lose some very talented and dedicated service members and the members lose their careers in the military. Overall, I thought that Jean did a fine job of explaining the situation and what SLDN is trying to do to rectify this gross injustice against a particular group of people – and especially since these are gays and lesbians who want to willingly serve our country in military service. But have been denied the opportunity to be honest about who they are as part of that service. Or kicked out because of it. All in all I feel the evening went well and it gave me re-newed energy to want to be involved with SLDN. I feel this organization did an excellent job of meeting my needs to get the word out to parts of rural Wisconsin. I think we gave it a good start that evening. And I look forward to being able to contribute more toward the goals that SLDN sets and working with Jean on projects like this piece I have written. It feels great to finally, after all these years, be doing something that serves the gay-lesbian community and my country as well. Nick Kelly Baraboo, Wisconsin

Labels: DADT, guest blogger, other blogs, Wisconsin Dells

10-31-07