Heaven & Hell ©1995 Jerry Kott

Heaven & Hell ©1995 Jerry Kott

Saturday, November 13, 2010

A WASTE ?????

Our mailbox on  the ground next to Road







We were so bewildered by all these events. Like deer caught in the
headlights of an oncoming car on a busy road. This was all during the
period when the Rt 78 bypass was being built...Route 78 has a
Hellertown exit. You could drive to NYC in as little as over an hour.
There seemed to be this mantra of "the outsiders are coming, the
outsiders are coming". It was a real education and a bit spooky to
see how ready the Natives were to demonize the Outsiders. The
Outsiders, us included, were portrayed as unscrupulous and shifty.
Often, in the local mindset, those were code words for Jews, Italians
Black and Hispanics or anyone being different, since the natives were
all a
Paragon of Virtue. There were actually articles in the paper on how
to spot Credit Card fraud that would be rampant when the highway
opened. It was scary to hear and read the xenophobia in the local
newspapers. However a
snicker turned to smiles when the Locals saw their property values go
up to an astounding level. What was expensive in Pennsylvania was a
bargain to New Jersey and New York people. We sort of fell into the
category of the all of the above. We were Outsiders, we were Gay and we
were Artists. Pick one category to dislike us on! So the Outsider thing
wasn't a big deal but it did effect how we were treated and it did help
our neighbor enhance his victimhood of the big bad rich outsider
queers picking on the poor grieving widower...and it worked.

As I said before, the sense of vulnerability wasn't going away. Our
neighbor's obsession was in overdrive. He saw the settlement as Victory
and
he was on a mission to humiliate us more. We decided to write our then
U.S. Senator Harris Wofford to assist in having those held accountable
for the mailbox harassment . We wrote him describing the events. We
heard back and he referred it to the US Attorneys office in
Philadelphia. We heard back from the US Attorneys office in
January-1992. We hadn't heard anything from them since that time. We
wrote Wafford's office again in Oct.-93, almost a year later and he
must have contacted the US Attorneys again on our behalf. Well,much to
our surprise, the Attorney was very hostile on the
phone. I suspect we pissed him off because we had an expection, as US
citizens, that he would take our complaint seriously. I had spoken to
him by phone, I believe he was hostile and recall him saying charges
were a waste
of tax dollars. I had asked for a follow up letter. His written
response , I believe, made us look foolish . So much for resolve and
accountability. So holding people accountable for Harassing Gay folks is a waste of money?

Any suggestions or opinions?






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