
Opinion:Film resonates with gay rights debate in HK
By Katherine Wu

Milk film poster
Being a gay activist means making yourself a target of people who are “insecure, terrified, afraid and disturbed”, said the first openly gay elected public official in the US, in the 2008
award- winning film Milk.
Milk’s message is as true today as it was in the 1970s – that society still fears empowering homosexuals. Hong Kong can learn from the film, which won two Oscars for best actor and best original screenplay, about the man who campaigned for gay rights.
The Hong Kong Legislative Council voted down a sexual orientation discrimination ordinance consultation in November last year, despite the voice of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community growing louder than before. The issue has raised tensions in society.
Sean Penn plays Harvey Milk, who campaigned for gays rights in 1970s America when the community was hostile to LGBTs.
“My name is Harvey Milk, and I am here to recruit you” – this was the first line of every public speech he gave. Despite failing twice, he was elected as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977.
In Milk’s journey from a 40-year-old casually dressed businessman into a white- collar politician, he pursued rights at the cost of his freedom, love and his life. He was assassinated in 1978.
It is true that the revolutionary road is lengthy and agonizing, but compared with a life without hope, Milk said this,“If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door.”