Friday February 17, 2006 SGN.org |
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Volume 34 Issue 07 |
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Monday, Mar 22, 2010
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SEATTLE'S GAY HISTORY: JUDAS GAYS (1943) |
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| SEATTLE'S GAY HISTORY: JUDAS GAYS (1943) | |
| by Don Paulson
- SGN Contributing Writer
Some believe the biblical Judas was set up - he only did what Jesus wanted him to do, lest he become just another religious zealot who died tragically. But betrayal is betrayal. The old sad story continues for those who would betray a Gay brother or sister for their own gain. Stephan Blair was a Gay Seattle Democratic Party activist: "When I was old enough, I joined the U.S. Army during World War II. I so impressed the Brass with my leadership qualities that I was their candidate for West Point, but I wanted to be a Medic. I can't kill another person. My commanding officer looked at me with disgust and anger. 'Why do you want to be a medic? There's no one there but cock suckers!' "I then became a field trained paramedic which is somewhere between a doctor and a nurse. You've got to suture, give blood, etc. and you've got to be right with everything. But the doctors stopped it because it was 'too much power in our hands.' So, then, the nurses didn't want you because you weren't 'qualified,' and what are you anyway, some kind of girl? Girls don't get to be nurses. Medic's were put down a lot. Some thought it was just a way to get out of fighting, but you were right there on the front lines with the infantry. Your job was to save and get the solider back. It made no difference if you got back or not. "The R.N.'s could really get down on the medics and we'd have to do all the work. They didn't have to give one enema, one hypo, stand watch in surgery or have to stop bleeding or anything else. Of course, the doctors treated the nurses like shit - except when they hoped to score with one, so, the nurses took it out on the medics. But I tried to put all that aside and do my job. I was good at medical things and [could] be nurturing at the same time. I like to help people in pain. I had a promising career ahead of me, or so I thought. "But I was also gregarious and I made people laugh. I was good looking, could sing and dance well and no woman was a wall flower when I was around. I was not out at the time - I'd heard about homosexual things but I was ignorant about it. "One Saturday night a closet friend of mine and I were drinking and horsing around, skylarking, cracking jokes and impulsively kissed on the lips. We never thought anything about it. It was nothing overt, just off duty soldiers having a good time. In the meantime, blankets and food [were] stolen from the base and the two guys who did it blamed Cannon and I. All of a sudden, we were the scapegoats and our innocent kiss sealed our doom. "The next morning the sergeant came into the barracks and yelled, 'These two men had sex with each other and swapped ends [69]. If I had caught them. I'd have killed them on the spot!' We were not only ruined in the barracks, but placed under guard. Waiting for the kangaroo court to begin, my best friend was made to guard me on work detail. He cried worse than I did. "Before my court date I went over to D Company and said to one of the guys who turned us in, 'Come outside cocksucker!' I tried to kill him. I got him down and choked him until his tongue turned blue before I was pulled off. Then, I went looking for the other guy but he fled. This did not look good on my record. "Officer 'Miss O'Conner,' as I called him, was the prosecuting attorney - no one would touch the case as it was a set up [an excuse to get rid of two homosexuals]. Major O'Conner, an evil queen, loved it. She was out to make rank. This is when I learned about the treachery of Gays in high places, Gays who sell out their own kind like 'J. Edna Hoover,' Ray Cohen and Miss O'Conner! "[Miss O'Conner] was so hauty and grand at court in her white gloves pointing at Cannon and I and accusing us of theft and deviant behavior. Only the Devil knows what kind of trip she was on. ...Cannon and I were kicked out of the army on a section eight, which means mentally ill[ness]. That was on your record for life! We had just turned 18. We were just kids! I felt my life was over. In the 1940s, such a label as ours spelled total disaster. Who would want us, no one. "My Father and a neighbor came to visit me in the stockade and was told that I was not allowed visitors because I was a 'pervert,' a 'Queer.' My poor father who knew nothing about such matters was stunned and retreated like he had just been whipped. The neighbor told everyone in my hometown so I was ruined there too. All doors seemed closed to me. I couldn't take it any more and drank a bottle of poison. Fortunately, two loving Lesbians rescued me and nursed me back to health. "Maxine Davis owned 'A-1 Nurses Registry.' She made a lot of money and some of it was from hiring men who were kicked out of the armed services for being Gay. She was smart enough to recognize a ready workforce who would be more than grateful for the work. I don`t know if she had any humanitarian motives but she did bail out a lot of exiled Gays and we loved her for that. "I slowly pulled myself up from a bottomless pit. It was a terrible struggle, but at age 80 I am pleased with how my life turned out, socially and politically. But deep down I still feel the scars of Miss O'Conner, the Army and all the people who looked at me with homophobic disdain. If there is a hereafter, and I believe there is, what will these people say to me - if they're not burning in hell." Stephen is best known as a political activist in the Seattle Democratic Party and his appearance in Filmmaker Drew Emory's 'Hidden History' Project of Seattle's GLBT community. In 1997 Stephen died a survivor and a renaissance man. |
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