Through the experiences of Belize and Roy Cohn, Tony Kushner shows the importance of self-acceptance with the use of power. Belize and Roy show two very different impacts with their power and actions. Roy as a white, closeted, wealthy lawyer harms marginalized people all while being one himself. His internalized homophobia results in him being especially hateful and dehumanizing towards Queer people even when they help him. When Belize advises Roy to use his connections to avoid being scammed by the medicine trials, Cohn still treats him in a demeaning manner despite Belize helping him with medical treatment. He still calls Belize a \u201c butterfingers sp**k f*ggot nurse\u201d (Kushner 155) and ironically points out that Belize has \u201clittle reason to help\u201d him (Kushner 155). Roy uses the slur as his internalized homophobia separates himself from its dehumanizing impact. Furthermore, it prevents him from empathizing with the experiences and feelings of queer people despite being one himself. This leads to him only looking out for his best interests like in the case of him hoarding medication that would have helped many others. Additionally, with his bias towards marginalized people, Roy is unlikely to help them in legal cases for their rights. This only results in a more oppressive and hateful world.<\/p>\n
Unlike Roy, Belize faces more severe oppression due to his intersectional identity as a middle-class gay black man. Despite the severe levels of oppression making it difficult for him to have power in his life, he still chooses to use what little power he does have to help others. As a nurse during the AIDs Crisis, Belize aims to help all people affected but especially Queer people. As seen through his interaction with Roy, Belize\u2019s kind actions come from a place of empathy and self-acceptance. When Roy insults Belize\u2019s intentions for helping him, he simply responds with \u201c Consider it solidarity from one f*ggot to another.\u201d (Kushner 155) Instead of feeling offended by Roy\u2019s use of the slur, Belize reclaims it by turning it into a fact of reality. For him, his sexuality is not a shameful part of his identity and despite Roy being terrible and ungrateful towards him, Belize still helps him with treatment.
\nThrough this scene, Kushner supports his theme of the state of self-acceptance and it\u2019s impact on the uses of power. He shows us that self-acceptance leads to empathetic actions that change the world for the better while the opposite results in harmful results.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Through the experiences of Belize and Roy Cohn, Tony Kushner shows the importance of self-acceptance with the use of power. Belize and Roy show two very different impacts with their power and actions. Roy as a white, closeted, wealthy lawyer harms marginalized people all while being one himself. His internalized homophobia results in him being … Continue reading Self Acceptance and Power<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5026,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[344620],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall-2022"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5026"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1030\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}