Scott Eckern, artistic director of California Musical Theatre, has resigned over his $1,000 contribution to the Prop 8 campaign.

(CMT is the largest musical-theater nonprofit in California.)

Eckern gave money to Prop 8, was outed by a blogger and an email campaign by Marc Shaiman (of Hairspray), and has suffered the (righteous) wrath of pretty much everyone who matters in American musical theater. (I mean, come on. What did he expect?)

Jeff Whitty, whose "Avenue Q" is scheduled to play the Sacramento theater in March, was among those alerted by Shaiman's e-mail. On Monday, he wrote in his whitless.com blog that "like Marc, I'll work to prevent CMT from producing any of my future shows with Mr. Eckern at the helm. To me, he's one of those hypocrites who profits from the contributions of gays ... but thinks of us as ultimately damned."

And that about hits it. It's bad enough to support the majority revoking the rights of a minority¹, but to be at the top of a profession that has long reaped profit from that same minority—that's both wrong and bizarre.

(It just so happens that The Drowsy Chaperone, musical theater's first serious homage to that certain kind of gay man who poured his love, devotion, and savings into musicals, is playing at the 5th Ave through Nov 16. It's excellent.)

Want to see who else donated big bucks for (and against) Prop 8? See here.

(Thanks to Comte for sending the CMT story our way.)

_{¹From a digest of John Stuart Mill's On Liberty, which partly concerns the "tyranny of the majority" and would—if American conservatives weren't blinded by the bigotry of evangelicals—be Republican gospel. Mill demands that conservatives fight Prop 8 on the grounds of liberty:}

The tyranny of the majority is especially dangerous to individual liberty, Mill supposed, because the most commonly recommended remedy is to demand that the recalcitrant minority either persuade the majority to change its views or learn to conform to socially accepted norms.


Mill had a different notion. The proper balance between individual liberty and governmental authority, he proposed, can be stated as a simple principle:


"[T]he only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others." (On Liberty 1)

Which is to say, this idea that that the minority should have to campaign for their rights is in itself a violation of the principle of liberty. Conservatives, as well as liberals, should be appalled by what's happened in California.