In his adult life, anyways. Okay, I know he’s said he believes that marriage is between one man and one woman, and that his views now are supposedly “evolving”. But I’ve never for a minute believed that he really believes this. As a recent OpEd in the New York Times puts it, Obama’s stance has “always sounded more calculated than heartfelt”.
You?
Of course it’s calculated, and it’s a no-brainer that he’ll support SSM the day after election day 2012 . . . or sooner, if he thinks it won’t cost him the election. In fact, it probably wouldn’t cost him the election even now.
I’m afraid I don’t know or care.
I am not a liberal nor an Obama groupie, but I did have some hope for an improvement in civil liberties under an Obama administration, especially with Democrats controlling both houses (as they did for the first two years). And I believe there was some improvement. But gay rights (by which I mean, equal treatment of gay people under the law) is not one of the areas where his actions have kept up with his rhetoric.
There are some (libertarian type) gays who harp on the idea that Democrats and liberals view gays as a cash cow who will keep donating to their side because they just can’t stomach the alternative, even without any tangible results; even, in fact, in the face of negative progress. It’s hard to argue with that point of view. They promise a lot, and rarely deliver much or anything at all.
Roddy
Yes–but not recently. He was not most likely not against it for as long as he’s been in office–unless it was for pragmatic reasons.
But it wouldn’t surprise me that, as a kid in a Muslim school, he learned and at one time believed that gay people were not as good as everyone else. Heck, I still think some level of homophobia is innate, and something people have to learn to get over–similar to how we have to get over other biological urges.
And I’m pretty sure he was like most Christians, and bought everything his church told him hook line and sinker when he converted. Only later did he make his own religious path–something we all have to do.
Wait. When did Obama attend a Muslim school? Wikipedia says he went to a public school and St. Francis of Assisi school in Jakarta. That certainly doesn’t sound Muslim. In Hawaii, he attended Punahou, which is most certainly not Muslim or religious in the least.
Obama wrote in his autobiography that he was not raised in a religious household, so I’m not sure where you’re getting your info that he converted. He professes to be a Christian now, but never, as far as I know, professed to be Muslim.
As far as what he believes, I take him for his word, which I find very disappointing. But then my dad says the same thing and I still have a great deal of love and respect for him, although I disagree with him.
Yes, he went to a regular public school in Indonesia (and then a Catholic school, as you point out). The public school had of course a mostly Muslim clientele, it being in Indonesia.
As for Obama, I really don’t know. He may not be entirely for same-sex marriage, but I also don’t think he has anything against gays, and so he probably sees it as a civil rights issue.
He licks his finger and sees which way the wind is blowing.
I’m pretty sure he’s bigoted against homosexuals, including opposing SSM. I’ve felt that way since he invited that homophobic preacher to speak at his inauguration. That’s about as symbolic as it would have been for Reagan or the Bushes to have a KKK leader speak at theirs, even if it isn’t seen that way because open bigotry towards homosexuals is more socially and politically acceptable.
I think he’s probably personally in favor, but I don’t much care. He’s opposed it and he’s been wrong about it, and in general he’s moved very slowly on these issues to avoid political fallout.
I doubt George W Bush was against SSM.
Politicians are very good at divorcing themselves from feelings.
As an adult - probably. He’s been an adult for over 20 years - and 20 years ago gay marriage was a fringe thing. I can tell you the approximate day (October 1992) and where I was sitting (now gone coffee shop in St. Paul) when I realized how stupid limiting marriage to heterosexuals was, and this was AFTER I helped run a GLBT film festival.
As a national politician, its pragmatism. There are other hills to fight for and if he dies on this one, he wouldn’t be able to fight for those other hills. As this hill becomes easier to take, his “personal” beliefs will evolve.
Now that’s a bit different from going to a “Muslim school”, don’t you think? My daughter goes to a public school attended by mostly Christians. Certainly doesn’t make the school or her Christian. Obama went to a Catholic school after the public school. Did that make him Catholic?
BigT didn’t say going to a Muslim school made him Muslim.
I think he’s ambivalent. I don’t believe he really thinks “marriage is between a man and a woman”, but unlike Dio I don’t think he’s personally in favor, either.
I agree, in terms of his personal feelings. I think GWB was a fairly regrettable president, but to give the fellow his due: I really don’t believe there’s a bigoted bone in his body, in terms of sex, race, religion or sexual orientation. Of course, I also think that’s the norm among politicians of GWB’s class - and all kidding aside, let’s remember that he made it to the very top of the game. Winning national campaigns just requires too much sophistication and thoughtfulness to hold on to silly prejudices. (I don’t think GWB was sufficiently thoughtful to make a good President, but that’s very far from saying he was anything less than bright.)
Bachman and Palin probably are genuine bigots - but then, they aren’t politicians in the same league as Obama, McCain, or GWB.
I agree with this and I think it’s a generational thing, rather than a religious thing. He’s about 10 years older than me. I grew up hearing a significant amount of anti-gay commentary, especially when AIDS first started being a big deal, and I can imagine that he probably grew up hearing even more of that than I did. When I was in high school, it seemed like Gay/Straight Alliances were popping up in more and more schools. The year after I graduated, there was a little “scandal” at my school after two girls kissed in the hallway, but the students were much less scandalized than the adults. I think that people who grew up in my era spent their adolescence right on the cusp of when gays started gaining more acceptance in our country.
I think Obama probably intellectually accepts that advocating for equal rights for gays is the right thing to do, but he’s probably not completely comfortable with it on a gut level.
I really think that when we start getting significant numbers of politicians who were born after about 1975 or 1980, equal rights for gays will be inevitable.
While I agree that, on average, people who make it to that type of position are less likely to hold onto silly prejudices, being extremely succesful does not preclude believing and doing silly things. I can think of an LSE-educated Rhodes scholar lawyer who made some very dumb sex decisions.
Some people are very thoughtful and sophisticated on particular issues while showing little thought of sophistication on others.
Matters of gender, sex, religion, identity and politics are often areas where otherwise thoughtful and sophisticated people can’t/won’t apply the level of thoughtfulness and sophistication they usually do.
You might be very good at thinking things through and calculating but if you’re not willing to think things through and calculate on a particular issue, it’s as if those abilities were absent.
He’s a politician. He is for and against whatever will get him elected. None of them have any beliefs at all.
He’s 21 years older than me and I grew up hearing lots of it, too.