For 20 years, Cathy Abbruzzese diligently dialed the phone for Basic Rights Oregon, raising money the hard way: $20 and $50 at a time. Her efforts funneled more than $2 million to Oregon’s largest LGBTQ+ rights nonprofit over the course of her career, and her persistence built the organization’s financial base and relationship with hundreds of people who still support it today.
While many activists featured in this series became public figures through the organizations they founded or the headlines they made over the course of their lives, Abbruzzese represents another category of change maker. She’s the boots on the ground, representing those who do the less glamorous, often repetitive and sometimes grueling work that’s needed to get the job done. She’s knocked on thousands of doors and stuffed thousands of envelopes — and she’s left a lasting impression along the way, inspiring a younger generation of LGBTQ+ activists.
For Abbruzzese, activism is all about the people. She’s leaned on her team when times were tough, and she continues to serve as a mentor to her many “young’uns,” as she calls them. (Full disclosure: One of her “young’uns” is Street Roots Development Director Andrew Hogan.)
She’s marched on Washington, D.C., played an important role in defeating anti-gay ballot measures in Oregon, and has an arsenal of colorful war stories from her activism in New York during times when the LGBTQ+ movement was swelling in the wake of the AIDS epidemic. She won the Basic Rights Oregon Hero award in 2006, and a GLAPN Northwest Queer Hero in 2017.
A Brooklyn native and daughter of second-generation Italian-Americans, she moved to Oregon nearly 30 years ago with her then-wife. Now, at age 71, her Brooklyn-Italian accent is still thick, adding flavor when she explains what it means to give a person “the right respect.”
“You invite an Italian over for dinner — that’s respect,” Abbruzzese said. “The right respect is, you make meatballs — that little extra — that’s the right respect.”
It’s a lesson Gov. Kate Brown thanked Abbruzzese for bestowing on her when she sent her a letter of commendation upon her retirement from Basic Rights Oregon in 2016, and it’s an expression that serves to illustrate Abbruzzese’s approach to her work and relationships with others.
What’s the most difficult lesson you learned in your activism?
Cathy Abbruzzese: Realizing and experiencing firsthand, the hatred. Marching past St. Patrick’s Cathedral in the Gay Pride Parade in New York City — I was a Catholic nun for five years — cops in their storm trooper clothes in the front. I don’t know what they thought we were going to do to the church, but that hurt. And right across the street, in the passageway that goes to Rockefeller Center, that’s where all the homophobes were with their signs and all of that. You see it in their faces.
What kept you going at times when winning seemed impossible?
Abbruzzese: The people around me, working on the same campaign as me. You develop a camaraderie; you’re fighting for the same thing. And what you do is you look out for one another, and that’s the most wonderful thing.
When you’re doing these campaigns, to me, making it your focus is important. Everything else in your life is on hold. Especially during the last six weeks. Until you get to that point, OK, enjoy your life, but once you get to that point, it has to be your complete focus.
Another thing that I do is just breathe. Sit, do whatever, but feel your breath, recognize your breathing. Clear your mind of everything, and just sit with your breath and vision winning. Make that real in your head — the vision of the victory.
What do you think young LGBTQ+ activists today are doing right?
Abbruzzese: Everything! I’m so proud of the young ones that are out there. I met many of them at Basic Rights Oregon, and many of them are working for the unions now, and I think that’s great. I think if we’re going to change anything in this country for the better, that’s a base of our strength, when we have a voice in labor. And nowadays, it’s dangerous work.
I don’t see anything wrong with what they’re doing. I’m like their mother. I see more and more young people, even ones I don’t know, all over the country getting involved, and that’s what’s going to save this country — if we can win in 2020. If we don’t win in 2020, we’re done. I shouldn’t say “if.” When we win in 2020, then we can get started. It’s not over when we get rid of this guy and the Republicans. We gotta fix it. That’s the real work.
SR EDITORIAL: Defense of LGBTQ+ rights falls on all of us (from Dec. 8, 2016)
What advice would you give them?
Abbruzzese: The important thing is that they get the people out. That’s something that I hope people are realizing. You look at what people power is, look what happened in London when the people came out. … Look at Hong Kong; that’s big! Now you’re dealing with China. They got China to back down. But there were a million people in the street, and that’s what’s different here. We gotta wake up these people.
These rallies, they’re getting bigger, but they’re not nearly as big as they need to be. We gotta be in the street — because that’s how they know we’re paying attention. That’s how they know: We’re willing to not go to work today, to not go spend time at the beach.
Whatever your plan was, you’re setting that aside to do one of the most important responsibilities you have as a citizen of this country. You have two: One is to vote; two is protest. Two is stand up and say, “That’s not right!” Democracy is not a given. There were people in North Carolina who didn’t know there was an election (on Sept. 10). The election people should have sent out something, but their polling places were closed, and the reason they could cheat was the turnout was so low. If a lot of people show up, they can’t fix the numbers.
How do you suggest young activists “get the people out”?
Abbruzzese: Doing the work. That’s how you get the people out. You gotta plan, whatever organization you’re with, whatever campaign you’re on, that campaign has a plan. You got to do your piece — knock on a hundred doors, stuff a hundred envelopes, whatever it is that you gotta do. It’s an important piece, and you’re being directed to do that — and it’s scientific. It’s numbers, basically. And you have to be willing to do your part, and each piece is so important to the whole. And that’s another thing: Take time to look at the sky, look at the big picture. Sometimes we think that we’re so small, but in the big picture, we’re very important because we’re part of it all.
It’s important that we inspire one another. My stories I want to inspire you. Your stories I want to inspire me. Building each other up. Telling each other, “You’re a light. You’re a blessing.” Being positive with people around you — and being respectful.
And, reaching into your past, because sometimes we look around. Like today, I look around and I say, Where are the heroes today? Where is the Martin Luther King Jr. and the John Kennedy — and they’re here, but sometimes if we reach back and bring them forward, that will help you feel stronger. Going back and seeing what Martin Luther King Jr. did, and how he stood up to it.
MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.: 50 years after his assassination, his Poor People’s Campaign re-emerges
And nowadays, I think we have to be willing to give our lives for this, because it might come down to that — they’ve got all the guns! And my advice to our side: Do not throw the first punch, because we’re being egged on to do that, especially in Portland; they send them in, the white supremacists. They want to make antifa look bad. I’m antifa; are you for fascism? You’re antifa! We’re all antifa, unless you’re for fascism. The same thing for racism. I’m anti-racist. And someone else isn’t. You’re either racist or you’re anti — you’re either for it or against it.
When you look back over your years of activism, can you describe a moment that you feel defined your legacy?
Abbruzzese: Winning the first “No on 9” campaign in 1992. I was a field manager in the CLEC Network, and they (her employer, Oregon Fair Share, which is now Oregon Action) donated me to the campaign. And they sent their best canvassers from all over the country to be my team. Our job was going into Washington County to persuade voters. And Washington County voted no on 9, and I feel like that’s because of the work my team did. We persuaded them, and we really needed them to vote no! Just the feeling of how my own personal stuff helped to generate that victory — knowing how important it is that I continue doing this. It’s important.
(Measure 9 would have amended the state Constitution to, in part, require that public schools teach homosexuality is abnormal and wrong and prohibit governments from using their resources to promote or facilitate homosexuality. It failed, with just 56% voting against it.)