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While it may sound like I am shooting down every suggestion of how to outreach and create a more diverse, welcoming environment for POC within FORGE, it is not my intention to be negative. Each argument/suggestion for how to outreach, in and of itself often has built-in assumptions and prejudices. If our goal is to be as unprejudiced as possible, how can we move forward with integrity and implement the outreach methods suggested? Who are we missing by outreaching in these ways?

Perhaps I have an altruistic notion that color doesn’t matter (when I know it really does matter). Perhaps I have fallen prey to my own "white male privilege", and have been blinded by all of the possibilities available to me. However, I doubt that I have been negatively (positively?) influenced by any of the words within "white male privilege". While I am white, part of my racial heritage is Hispanic, so that word isn’t necessarily even true, even though my appearance is Caucasian. Male is rarely a word that I used to define myself, even though others may choose to define me as such based on my visual appearance. Privilege is hardly a word that I associate with myself – at least in relation to being perceived as white or male. Do I have privilege, and how does it related to my other identity labels?

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sense as many white Lesbian and Gay men about who our natural allies are. Integrating these radically different perspectives into an existing group means that the older members must be willing to abandon many of their traditional goals in order to make room for the priorities of the new, minority members. I know of few groups that are willing to make these wholesale revisions in their purpose.

Instead, what usually happens is that the older members put implicit or even explicit pressure on the minority members to make only small demands for incremental changes in the group’s agenda. Sometimes the minority members are convinced that once the organization’s chief goal is met, the group will then focus on the minority’s goals. So they put their priorities aside and concentrate on the majority’s priorities. Not only does this compromise defeat the purpose of having "diversity", it also doesn’t serve the community as a whole.

Human energy is finite. Each day, it only lasts so long before we have to collapse into bed. It is also a strangely classic commodity. We have more of it when we’re doing something we love, less of it when we’re doing something we don’t want to do. When people work in groups or on causes that they don’t feel passionate about, the community as a whole loses twice. We lose because they’re not giving their best to the job, and because the job they could put their heart and soul into is going undone.

As Gay people, we ought to understand right down to our toenails that one size never fits all. We know that one brand of sexuality doesn’t work for everyone. Why is it so hard for us to accept that one organization, one set of priorities, will never meet everyone’s needs? Instead of trying to make our existing organizations internally diverse, we would be better served by fostering a diversity of organizations.