I’ve been regularly chronicling the mayor’s voicemails from citizens, because Sam Adams’ inbox is a hilarity goldmine. But every once in a while, amid the angry rants about compost and bicycles, a voicemail makes my stomach churn. These are the ones where a constituent’s tirade against sewer devolves into a tirade against “that queer.”
Mayor Sam Adams, as the New Yorker recently noted very awkwardly, is openly gay. Just as the chance to leave an anonymous voicemail for the mayor can be a revealing window into the vocal portions of the city’s views on transportation and police budgets, it’s an occasionally disturbing glimpse of the true feelings of Portlanders about homosexuality. We think of ourselves as living in a progressive haven, but take away the face-to-face accountability and all sorts of dark things can come bubbling up.
So how homophobic are Portlanders, given the chance to rant anonymously at a powerful, openly gay person?
I went through and counted up all the voicemails from September, October, and November and then picked out all the ones with homophobic language. The tally? Of 397 voicemails, only seven were homophobic. That includes ones with outright homophobic slurs (“You need to shut down the protestors. Watch your ass, you faggot!”) to more subtle slurs against his sexuality (“You have to take time out from chasing boys and worrying about plastic bags!”). Another two voicemails had sexually derisive language that wasn’t specifically homophobic (“Grow some balls!” etc). All in all, that’s just over two percent of voicemails slandering the mayor sexually.
They may rag on Sam for all sorts of reasons, but 98 percent of irate Portlanders won’t call out his sexual orientation as one of ’em. Is that good or bad? Clearly, zero percent homophobia is the goal here, but I think this is surprisingly low. Then again, I’m a cynic.
We are the 98 percent
Do we even know if these people are any more from Portland than, say, the typical O-Live commenter?
Just ignore Andy From Beaverton. He needs the outlet.
People who leave VMs for the mayor are insane. Not sure why anyone cares what they say for anything more than entertainment value. I don’t think they have any valid sociological use whatsoever.
@4, Exactly. I don’t think the 2% of crazy people, that are also homophobic, necessarily translates directly to 2% of all Portlander’s are homophobic, i.e. the sample population is biased and the sample size is too small.
But I get what you’re saying. I think Sam gets a lot of crap, even from people who aren’t consciously homophobic. The “grow a pair” comment especially. What does Sam’s pair have anything to do with policy?
The most ignorant are usually the most vocal. No offense, Blogtown.
“All in all, that’s just over two percent of voicemails slandering the mayor sexually. “
I don’t think “slandering” is the correct word to use. The voice mails may bash his sexuality, but calling him a fag or saying he chases boys are true.
I think that Andy represents the 99% of Beaverton.
I was thinking along the same lines as theterminizer: in that they don’t sound too different than the commenters on KATU’s website, where a general fixation on Adam’s sexual orientation borders on obsessional, regardless of the degree to which Adams is in the story.
By the way, is there any way we groundlings can hear the actual audio of some of these calls?
Would make an interesting Blogtown reader remix project, y’think?
So just to summarize the sentiment of Blogtown: if you have any type of complaint about how the city does business you are either a) crazy, or b) homophobic.
Have you guys ever entertained the idea, even just as a mental exercise, that our local government isn’t particularly well run?
They just announced that they can’t afford to repave any streets for the next five years, but they’re busting their ass to build a new “sustainability center” downtown for tens of millions of dollars. They’re currently being sued because water rates are going up by 50% while they use the money on neon roses and water demonstration houses. Don’t things like that cause cognitive dissonance for any of you?
Well, so now we have proof – Blabby is one of the crazy ones.
Leaving a voicemail for the Mayor is just a stupid way to push for changes. Do you think he listens to all the messages? Do you think that he takes them to heart, and adjusts his polices based on them? There are a lot of effective ways to encourage changes in city policy – but really believing that you can just casually ring up the mayor is crazy.
So criticizing the city isn’t crazy, but using the voicemail line to do it is ineffectual. I guess I could agree with that. (No, I have never called the city to bitch.)
I think that my main point is that Blogtown (editors, writers and commenters) has become so invested in defending Adams against “the homophobes” that most of you have failed to notice that he is not actually a good mayor.
@Blabby…anyone with common sense has, but that excludes several on here. I am ambivalent towards mr Adams sexual orientation, but the fact is he has not done a very good job in office.@ Andy…..the first is, although there are less offensive ways of wording that…….there is no proof of the second. I would not call a 19yr old a “boy”
While I might agree with the sentiment that most voicemailers are probably crazy, I also think that leaving a message is probably at least as effective as voting for getting your point heard. (~1600 VMs / year v. ~200,000 voters / local election) In addition to recording/transcribing all the VMs, they certainly pay attention to the pothole hotline, as that has resulted in repairs within a week.
@Blabby – don’t know if you noticed, but there has been a rough couple of years in Portland, and elsewhere for that matter. Maybe the funding gaps aren’t all Sam’s fault?
Finally, isn’t Beavertron where the middle 25% go to pretend they are the 1%?
Leaving a voicemail is so 20th century. He’s really good at replying to tweets!
“I would not call a 19yr old a “boy””
Showstomper, he was 18 when Sam was caught molesting him in a bathroom stall. That makes Beau a juvenile (a boy) and Sam a pederast.
@Andy – Um, 18 is also not a juvenile. You’re thinking of 17. Idiot.