Milk

CAUTION: Contains spoilers, but it was based on a true story, so how much of a spoiler can this post really be.

Last night I watched the movie Milk. It's about Harvey Milk, the first openly gay politician elected to public office. It takes place in San Francisco during the 1970's. As gay men began flooding into the Castro, Harvey decided they needed someone in office to represent the issues important to all minority groups, not just the homosexuals. After many years of trying to win the election, he finally succeeds; unfortunately a short time into his term, he is assassinated by a fellow county supervisor, Dan White (which is the trial that coined the phrase "The Twinkie Defense").

Overall I really enjoyed this movie. Sean Penn did a fantastic job portraying Harvey. To recreate the atmosphere of the 1970's in San Francisco, a lot of old real life footage was used. I loved all of the real news reports, interviews, and home movies that were used. While I watched the movie, it got me thinking. Even though this all happened in the 70's, it is still so relevant almost 40 years later. It makes me sad that we are still fighting for basic civil rights. Milk was fighting a repeal of the law stating that one could not discriminate due to a person's sexual orientation and in this recent election, we are still fighting the same thing. it angers me to know there are still these ignorant bigots out there who think it's okay to take away someones basic human rights. Anita Bryant, was villain in this movie. The things she said were just appalling! She was trying to get people fired from teaching if they were gay or supported gay rights. Her reasoning was that gay teachers would use their position to "recruit" children into a gay lifestyle. What???? How can someone with this type of thinking seriously think this is okay? And you wonder why I don't want anything to do with religion. I know there will always be people out there who believe these type of thoughts are okay, but I can always hope that just maybe one day, they will see how discriminatory they are being.