March 23, 2010 News & Views » News Feature

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Bill James' and James Forrester's war of words 

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In other cities, comments that Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James and State Sen. James Forrester are infamous for would undoubtedly mean the end of their careers. But here, these two officials -- who have offended gays, women and blacks on numerous occasions -- don't seem to have anything to fear.

And while the groups James and Forrester have marginalized with their rhetoric are concerned about what the elected officials say, no one has launched any serious campaigns to remove them -- they just want to present their side of the story.

Forrester -- who represents Gaston, Lincoln and Iredell counties and is an outspoken critic of gay marriage -- offended many last month when he said, according to The Gaston Gazette, "slick city lawyers and homosexual lobbies and African-American lobbies are running Raleigh."

James most recently caused a stir in Mecklenburg County after sending out a mass e-mail saying that black women were "being more promiscuous than other races," because a study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that 48 percent of black women between the ages of 14-49 are infected with herpes. This latest swipe came less than two months after James called fellow County Commissioner Vilma Leake's son a "homo" during a meeting.

James said in an e-mail to Creative Loafing, "As to what Vilma or others call me -- no one cares -- I certainly don't."

In Mecklenburg County, groups like Charlotte Rainbow Action Network for Equality, have reached out to James since 2008. "There are a couple of things that go on," said Lacey Williams, an organizer with CRANE. "When you have public officials saying things that are damaging, it is always important to present the other side. It is important for a group to stand up and combat that."

And that's what Willie Ratchford, director of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Community Relations Committee, did in an e-mail exchange with James that was posted on the Web site QCityMetro.com. In the e-mails, Ratchford told James "this is exactly how racist bullcrap gets out by the likes of you," among other things. Ratchford told CL that, "My hope is that if others in this community say things that are not true and appear to be racist that all of us, black, white and Latino, will speak out against it and not allow the community to be swift-boated."

Williams said that it's important to maintain an open door with people like James on the off chance that there will be real dialogue one day.

"It's important to meet them on that in a place that is not about them getting a podium to say hateful things, but coming to an understanding," she said. "So if Bill James ever said 'I want to understand the other side and I know that some of the things that I have been saying have not been well-informed ... I would like to enter into a respectful dialogue,' then CRANE would say: 'Let's talk about this.'"

Williams admits, however, that finding someone to run against James would be difficult. "People like Bill James ... represent their constituents well. What Republican is going to run against him and win? We couldn't get a Democrat to run in Bill James's district," she said.

Robert Kellogg, co-founder of Gaston County's chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, said though Forrester's words and actions are offensive, PFLAG is interested in the human rights aspects of what Forrester -- who didn't return calls to CL -- said and not politics.

"PFLAG would like to speak with him and have a meeting to find out his side of those comments and what he was thinking. I believe it needs to go beyond that, but that isn't PFLAG's role," Kellogg said. "But I can see a group of like-minded people who believe our politicians need to be held accountable, starting out of some of the things that have been said and done recently."

Matt Comer, editor of the Charlotte-based LGBT newspaper Q-Notes and a grassroots activist also with CRANE, said there is a belief that radical people like Forrester and James should be ignored, but he doesn't agree with that position.

"I believe there is some merit in the old 1990s Act Up slogan that silence equals death," he said. "When people are allowed to marginalize groups of people without any accountability, that rhetoric can mount up over the years and over the decades and lead to communities that are full of oppression."

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