"IS THERE A CANOPY IN STORE FOR ME?"

What do the fictional characters of Fiddler On The Roof think about same-sex marriage?

On Tuesday, speaking during the Illinois House of Representatives debate on marriage equality, State Rep. David Harris summarized the acclaimed musical Fiddler On The Roof. He then used its plot points to argue against equal rights for people who are gay or lesbian. Eager to know what others thought of his confusing analogy, I tracked down the residents of the Russian shtetl of Anatevka. The villagers’ comments (translated here from the original Hollywood-accented Yiddish) were surprising and insightful:

Do You Love Me?

“I’m flattered and honored,” kvelled milkman Tevye (who did not provide his last name). “To be referenced by Illinois State Rep. David Harris has been a lifelong ambition of mine, right alongside escaping persecution and building a dream-home for my wife, Golde. And not only that—David Harris said my name on the House floor and he almost pronounced it correctly. What a mensch!”

As she watched the marriage equality debate, Tevye’s wife Golde paid attention to the politicians who explained that her heterosexual marriage was under threat. “After 25 years of cooking Tevye’s meals, cleaning his house, and milking his cow, I was worried that the gays and the lesbians would ruin everything for us. Would our marriage last another 25 years? Would Tevye still love me? But, after the bill passed, my Tevye reassured me that our healthy bickering and kvetching about each other would continue until one of us dies. Thank God. So, now my only fear is that I’ll be expected to invite these newly married gays and lesbians for Shabbes dinner all at once. I mean, where would they all sit?”

Matchmaker, Matchmaker

Golde’s friend Yente, the local matchmaker, was incredibly excited when the marriage equality bill SB10 passed with 61 votes to 54. “Oy, it’s vonderful!” she clapped. “All the boys and boys, and all the girls and girls I can now set up together! They have vebsites and smart phone apps. for hook-ups, I know, but you just can’t beat a good old fashioned shidduch [arranged marriage]. To be honest, with a same sex-marriage, I’m not sure vhich side of the family will need to pay the dowry, but, as I’ve said before, even the vorst husband, God forbid, is better than no husband, God forbid.”

Newlyweds Motel and Tzeitel Kamzoil were somewhat apathetic to the passage of the bill. Motel, a tailor and rising fashion designer who is rumored to appear on Season 82 of Project Runway, explained: “All these Illinoisans are running around calling the vote a wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles, but Tzeitel and I don’t see what all the fuss is about. It doesn’t make a difference to us.” Tzeitel, Tevye and Golde’s eldest daughter, added: “It doesn’t affect us, true, but we’re still delighted that every person in the Land of Lincoln will soon be able to find and catch and marry her or his own perfect match.”

Tradition!

With Tevye and Golde’s fourth and fifth daughters still unmarried, Tevye acknowledges that marriage equality could now double each daughter’s chance of finding a husband or wife: “I’m all about TRADITION!—as David Harris reminded us—but my children and grandchildren come first. As my son-in-law Motel once told me, even a poor tailor is entitled to some happiness.”

“Representative Davis Harris doesn’t get it,” Tevye’s son-in-law Perchik snapped. Perchik is known for his modern interpretations of biblical texts and for insisting on dancing with his girlfriend, Hodel (now his wife), at a family wedding. Perchik argued, with passion in his voice and a camp skip in his step, “David Harris failed to understand that the story of Anatevka is about the history of antisemitism, the roots of prejudice, and the struggle of social minorities to live in freedom and without fear.”

“Exactly!” Hodel agreed, speaking over Skype from Siberia, far from the home she loves. “The central point of the musical is that traditions change over time. As we danced at my sister’s wedding, Russian thugs, encouraged by the authorities, set the venue on fire. Yet David Harris has the chutzpah to use the historically-inspired 1905 story of our Jewish family’s struggle to justify the contemporary discrimination of another minority group that simply wants to live and love in peace.”

Sunrise, Sunset

Tevye’s daughter, Chava, was also unhappy with Rep. David Harris. “I’ve been awake from sunset to sunrise thinking about what he said,” Chava sighed. David Harris cited Chava’s quarrel with her father over her marriage to Fyedka, a Christian man, as an example of tradition stretched too far. “At first, Papa didn’t approve of my marriage to a non-Jew,” Chava explained. “But at the very end of our Tony Award winning play and Academy Award winning film, Papa gave me his blessing. 'May God be with you,' he called out to me. I know it’s a three hour film, but it’s available on YouTube, for goodness sake; there’s just no excuse for misquoting the plot.”

“And on top of that,” Fyedka chimed in, “David Harris seems to not realize that in the United States it’s perfectly fine to marry someone of a different faith. So his analogy was as unstable as...” His father-in-law Tevye interrupted: “You could say his analogy was as shaky as a fiddler on the roof.”

A Blessing On Your Head

On hearing the news of the passing of the marriage bill, a number of shtetlfolk were overjoyed. “To life, to life, L’Chayim!” shouted local butcher and business owner Lazar Wolf and he pledged one month’s profits in support of defending the bill from lawmakers who may try to repeal the new law.

Even voices from beyond the grave shared their elation: “A blessing on your head, Mazal Tov, Mazal Tov,” sang Golde’s late mother, “To see a daughter wed, Mazal Tov, Mazal Tov.” Tevye, who heard her voice in his dream, found himself changing his mind on equal rights for gay and lesbian people: “I’m now certain that her blessing was a sign that full marriage equality will become a new tradition for all of us. As my sweet, gentle child Chavaleh once told me, the world is changing. In fact, if I were a rich man, I’d consider moving to Illinois and running against David Harris in the Republican primaries, biddy-biddy-biddy-biddy-bum.”

Tevye had to cut his interview short. But as he ran off to deliver the last milk cans to his neighbors before dragging his cart home before dinnertime, he called back with a final thought. “You know, there’s a bigger lesson here,” he said, looking up at the beautiful, autumn sunset. “As the good book says, thou shalt not cite a Broadway musical when arguing against gay rights.”

TO MY TEACHER, MR. PASZEK

You were angry. “If you have ever called Dominic a fairy,” you snapped with your arms crossed, “get up right now and stand at the front of the class.”

I’d heard the fairy slur many times. Dominic was a musician. I’m sure you would have remembered him. He was slim and talented and softly spoken. When he sang, he sounded like a choirboy. For a few years at our all-boys-school on the northeastern edge of London, Dominic was one of my closest friends.

Dominic sat at his desk and looked at the floor, all eyes on him. You, our teacher, watched us as the classroom filled with the sound of scraping chairs as some of the boys started to stand.

I once called Dominic a fairy, too. I don’t know why. Dominic was my good friend, but that didn’t stop me from participating in teasing him. Blame high school culture, blame the ever-present homophobia, blame kids saying stupid things without thinking, but bullying is bullying.

And I found myself pushing back my chair and walking to the front of the room to join the majority of my classmates. Only a handful of students remained seated. You, Mr. Paszek, a young mathematics teacher who was new to our school, must have been astounded to watch most of your students standing, the backs of our school uniforms to the chalkboard, looking at Dominic with our collective embarrassment and regret.

That was 1992. I was almost 14 years old.

Today, I think you’d be proud to know, alongside classes on the Holocaust and genocide, I teach about rape culture and sexual health, college hazing and addiction, poverty and homelessness. And I teach about homophobic and transphobic bullying and their affects on depression and suicide amongst young people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT). I teach about the It Gets Better Project, a virtual support community for LGBT youth. The project’s message to its audience is clear: Don’t despair; You can survive the bullying; Your adult life is going to be great; You are amazing.

A week or so ago, I came across a video clip posted to Facebook that changed the way I think about fighting homophobia.

In 2008, in Oxnard, California, 15-year-old Lawrence King asked 14-year-old Brandon McInerney to be his Valentine. Two days later, in front of their classmates in the school computer lab, Brandon took out a gun and shot Lawrence in the head. Lawrence died in hospital and, in 2011, Brandon pleaded guilty to second-degree murder while the hate crime charges against him were dropped.

The recently released HBO documentary Valentine Road deals with the events surrounding the shooting. In one scene, Shirley Brown, a former teacher of murdered student Lawrence King, explains, “I knew his inclination. He had discussed it with me. When he asked me what to do about the situation, my response to him was Nothing, what to do about this situation is nothing, and to keep it private, and to dwell upon it.” Lawrence, it seems, had little support in coming out as gay.

Ms. Brown continues, “I relate to Brandon [the murderer] because I could see my own self being in that very same position. I don’t know if I would have taken a gun, but a good, swift kick in the butt might work really well.” In other words, Brown believed that it was Lawrence’s gay “behavior,” rather than Brandon’s prejudice, that led to Brandon’s violent response. According to his teacher, Lawrence King—the boy who asked another boy to be his Valentine—brought his murder upon himself.

And so, it seems, in schools around the world, the young bullies might not be the heart of the problem. Teachers and administrators, not to mention parents, need to see that their words and actions—and inactions—have immeasurable repercussions. They are the adults. They set the example.

You, Mr. Paszek, looked at us with deep disappointment and sadness as we stood at the front of your classroom in silence. We all returned to our seats knowing that calling Dominic a fairy was wrong.

Two or three years later, you—the young, funny, talented, energetic Mr. Paszek—died. A rumor about you—quietly confirmed by other teachers—spread through the school: “Mr. Paszek was gay; he died of AIDS.”

My high school’s response to your death was minimal. I can barely remember the announcement. There were no big speeches about you from our headmaster. There were no memorial ceremonies for you. There were no plaques for you. No flowers for you. No candles. No silent ovations. Only rumors and inadequate explanations leading to a continual silence. Almost denial.

This was mid-1990s Britain and, under Prime Minister Thatcher’s Conservative government and the 1988 passage of Section 28, all British schools were prohibited from “promoting”—i.e., “talking about”—homosexuality.

And there I was, a gay teenager learning about reproduction and teenage pregnancy with no way of talking to my teachers about my sexuality and my specific questions about safe gay sex and my fears about HIV and AIDS. The British law wasn’t struck down until 2003. I was 25.

Today across the U.S., conservative lawmakers continue to block anti-bullying legislation that would protect LGBT school students from harassment. And in many states across the country, schools continue to fire teachers for being gay or lesbian or transgender while continuing to employ, tolerate, and even promote teachers like Shirley Brown who blame homophobic violence, and even murder, on LGBT youth themselves.

At the time, Mr. Paszek, I was too young and too naive to realize the significance of your presence. When you died, our school did not honor you. Yet, as my teacher, you instilled in me values that I still hold today. You stood up for Dominic and against homophobia and, by doing so, you asked us—your students—to stand up, too.


(Note: The names of Mr. Paszek and Dominic have been changed to protect privacy.)