I have heard this same drumbeat all my life with respect to gay and transgender rights and equality. Even as AIDS was killing us in horrifying numbers, fueled by societal and government apathy about our deaths, people told us to calm down, stop being angry, just get along and be nice.

Today, as an unexpected anti-LGBTQ backlash roars in that's fueling government persecution and random street violence, we hear the same thing from all quarters, left and right — Calm down and stop being so angry. (That's when prominent voices on the right aren't literally calling us perverts.)

I wrote an article yesterday that wasn't angry at all, but I implicitly compared anti-LGBTQ persecution with antisemitism as I discussed meeting Corrie ten Boom, a childhood hero of mine.

Predictably, I'm already getting comments on social media that I should tone down my "angry" rhetoric.

That's discouraging, to say the least.

The fight for LGBTQ equality isn't exactly the same as the fight for women's equality, but we share a lot in common, especially the struggle to overcome patriarchy and traditional male dominence.

I think you're right to invoke Martin Luther King, and the real King, not the over-processed pablum version white children learn about in school.