Mitchell Gold speaks in Fayetteville
Level-headed awareness of the country’s sexual minorities has gotten better in the media. Compare today to 1967 when a closeted Jewish teenager caught an odd interview on the “60 Minutes” news show. Newsman Mike Wallace found a homosexual to interview but the subject was so afraid of being identified that he agreed to speak only while hidden behind a potted plant. Such a view didn’t seem like much to aspire to, thought Mitchell Gold, watching on his family’s TV in New Jersey’s capital city of Trenton. Mitchell felt more warmly and awarded his first emotional crush to the medical show of “Dr. Kildare.” Actor Richard Chamberlain was better eye candy than any of the nurses, the captivated viewer thought.
Now approaching the 50-year mark, Mitchell Gold seeks media or public attention himself with the recurring message of “end the harm from religion-based bigotry and prejudice,” a slogan played up by a group he co-founded, Faith in America.” In mid-December, Gold brought his speaking campaign to the Fayetteville Public Library. A supportive audience of perhaps 75 people took in his message of winning for LGBT individuals the same rights as all Americans. “This is a noble mission; we can build a better world together,” his final remarks went.
A good many of the December 12th crowd took his longer, written thoughts home. He is editor of a book two-years-old now, “CRISIS, the personal, social and religious pain of growing up gay in America.” Copies of the work were brought to the lecture by Nightbird Books on Dickson Street. All of the book’s revenue goes to a cluster of LGBT-related non-profits such as a suicide helpline, homeless shelters and PFLAG. Gold has seen and also given away far more cash after helping cold-start the Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams furniture company in rural North Carolina, now a $100 million effort with Lulu the English bulldog advertising mascot snoozing around the manufactured leather corners.
Mitchell Gold presents a leather chair to 10-year-old Will Phillips
Gold insists he’s not anti-religion but religion should not be anti-civil-rights. His speaking style remains almost gentle but in the book co-edited with his sister-in-law, he remembers seeing Bible Belt families bringing their kids to hear some anti-gay preaching. What if some of those youngsters later prove to be gay? Shaming those kids qualifies as nothing less than child abuse, Gold wrote.
His book of 366 pages is an easy read. Nice big print, pulled-out quotes from the 40 essayists and all the writers get their photos shown. Some of the contributors are celebrities such as Richard Chamberlain, the TV heart throb; Episcopal bishop Gene Robinson; tennis star Martina Navratilova. Others are everyday folks such as a college kid in Texas who admitted to cutting himself with self-hating words such as “fag.” The Texan in his 20s eventually found himself in a better spot, an open-minded workplace where several gay co-workers were accepted as no big deal. Eventually, Jared Horsford realized that “God always loved me.” Another of the book’s writers has a similar take: “The story of Christ is all about embracing outcasts, not creating them.”
A member of Gold’s small road-crew says the author speaks two or three times monthly in venues such as arts centers and libraries.
The Fayetteville visit was sponsored by Temple Shalom.
For more details vist crisisbook.org or FaithInAmerica.com
Written by Art Beeghly
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