My father grew up in Los Angeles. My grandfather was in real estate there and dealt with movie people. So the whole thing was very personal to my father's family. My father went on a double date with Judy Garland (he was not her date), and he was on Mickey Rooney's football team until he grew too tall (mickey had his own football team of kids to play with, my father told me). Anyway, the blacklists and the atmosphere of the blacklists, affected my father's family, I believe they knew people who were involved, or who were afraid of being involved. My father was always quite the free thinker. He was an atheist in a fox hole, for example- even though it has been claimed there are none.
I am sorry Joe was smeared with homosexuality- although I am even more sorry it was considered a smearable offense. just as i am sorry communism is considered that kind of offense. In a free country we must be able to hold views antithetical to the very freedom we enjoy- or we are not really free, are we? There is always a tension with that. I would protect the rights of those who might wish to institute a theocracy in this country (for example) every bit as much as communists, because even though both would destroy the current freedom we have, without protecting them, we do not have the current freedom we think we have.
I'm not sure this answers what you asked, if it doesn't I'll try to be more specific. |
