The Point: That Thing

Friday, October 26, 2007

That Thing

Hee hee. I saw a magician last week.

If you`ve never had a chance to sit and be enchanted by Final Fantasy, I`d say it`s time you begun. Owen Pallett`s Polaris Prize-winning one-man act can only be described as pure and simple wizardry. The man is capable of spinning the most elaborate, heartbreaking, absurd, funny music out of thin air, right before your very eyes. He stands there with a violin, some equipment to loop his playing and his voice, and a piano. Behind him, his friend Steph makes wondrous pictures dance on a screen projector, of all things. And it works.

But the magic is that it`s all happening right in front of you. You can see all the elements before they`re struck. A bow, some strings. A microphone. And somehow he pulls out his golden needles and weaves it so densely, so delicately, you don`t even realise it before you`re wrapped up in a dirty little technicolour quilt. Oh yes, these are songs about massive genitals. And mistakes. And death by burning, and hope.

I thought about that evening a lot this weekend with the whole J K Rowling kerfluffle about announcing she`d always conceived of Dumbledore as a gay character. I read it, and I do not say a word of a lie, I just said `bullshit` for the next sixty seconds, over and over and over. And then I said it again. Did you say this? Tell me you said this.

It made me cringe to hear Wayson Choy gush in the Globe and Mail about how brave it was for her to 'out' him, about how wonderfully encouraging it would be for every child who ever picked up the books to see the world really is made of a wonderful rainbow of many colours. Bullshit. I read the seventh book. I got my hands on it in Yunnan, and in a city that probably has fewer English speakers than that book has pages. I read it cover to cover in a day, doing my best to shut out noisy intrusions like corn porridge, lychee vendors, and ancient Buddhist temples. There is not a whiff of homosexuality in Dumbledore's story there, fan fiction be damned. Of course fan fiction predicted this. It's a question of infinite, horny monkeys.

Rowling's coy, somewhat self-congratulating announcement of this little tidbit, months after the release of the last book, is completely disingenuous. If she really wanted to show kids that it doesn't matter if you're hetero, homo, poly, bi or house elf to be a great person, she should have put it in the bloody book. Subtext is great for a novel about disappointment, and growing up in Winnipeg and settling for an acceptable husband. Dim, obscure references to a young wizard's possible almost unspoken love do not, however, fall into the category of empowering literature for young readers. If the bloody thing was so important to understanding him, why not put it in the books? If it was better left out and interpreted on our own, then don't announce it three months later at Carnegie Hall. Honestly.

I'm reminded of Final Fantasy when I think of all this because of how casually and comfortably Owen Pallett talks about his own sexuality in his music. A love for boys doesn't automatically mean he has to wear purple disco pants and put pink flags all over everything. Sometimes it's okay just to talk about how all boys you've loved have been digital.

Real bravery this month? Alvaro Orozco. Dedicated The Point reader centavo mentioned him in an earlier post about a woman in a similar situation, Pegah Emambakhsh. Like Embakhsh, Orozco is facing deportation back to a country where he will face certain discrimination, fear, and the threat of violence for his sexuality. Unlike Emambakhsh, the country rejecting his application for refugee status isn't the UK government, it's our own.

The Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board has refused to grant him asylum on the grounds that it cannot be proved he will face discrimination if he is deported to his home country of Nicaragua, because... wait for it... they don't believe he's provided sufficient evidence that he's gay. Among their top beefs? A mysterious lack of sexual promiscuity whilst fleeing across the continent to seek asylum in Canada. Jesus. If you've got to have sex to define your sexuality now, where will that leave our dear Dumbledore?

He's not the only one recently rejected by the Immigration and Refugee Board, as gay rag Xtra reports surprisingly authoritatively here. I think the whole nature/nurture issue of being gay is a moot point. You don't have to be born a Christian to have the inherent human right to freedom from religious persecution. And you don't have to stick your tongue in every orifice that presents itself to have the right to freedom from persecution on the basis of your sexuality.

Typically, I'm going to link you to a petition to allow Orozco to stay in Canada. His deferred deportation date was supposed to be October 4th, but like Emambakhsh, he's currently in immigration limbo. Help him out, friends.

Labels: human rights, literature, music, queer stuff, sexuality