Observe how the Homosexual attempts to obscure his Agenda:
What is important is what the Homosexual doesn’t tell us.
Get up - in an House (or Apartment) of Gayness!!
Go to Work - where, by wearing pants that accentuate his buttocks, he will surreptitiously recruit co-workers into Gaydom!
Come home - note the use of the word “come”. Enough said.
Watch a little TV - what the Homosexual doesn’t tell you is that he is watching Will & Grace!!
Go to Bed - either (a) with another Homosexual (perhaps one of his poor recruited co-workers) or (b) alone, but to dream of other plans of recruitment and World Gay Domination.[sup]TM[/sup]
[Glinda voice]
Follow the lavender contrail
Follow the lavender contrail
Follow
Follow
Follow
Follow
Follow the lavender contrail
[/Glinda voice]
JDM, who thinks this might be an overly complicated joke, since the juxtaposition of “lavender” and “contrail” in a sense negates the whole concept, and it doesn’t quite scan with the extra syllable (contrail), but what the fuck…
Well… the way I understand it, none of these groups have any “special” legal rights under anti-discrimination laws. The laws basically say: you cannot treat someone in a certain way simply because of age, religion, etc.; if you do, that person has legal recourse to redress the offense.
Likewise, gay people are not asking for “special” legal rights; as with other protected classes, we are simply asking for the right to enjoy the same privileges under the law, and to be treated, as anyone else.
The issue gets a bit thornier, though, when it comes to things like gay marriage, gay adoption as so on. To some people (not myself) this does create a “special” right because it seeks to alter the conservative notion of what constitutes a marriage, a family, etc.
In other words, the conservative definition of marriage (as you quoted in your post) is a convenient shelter.
[slight digression]
On a side note, a law student once explained to me one of the legal difficulties in developing anti-discrimination laws which protect gays. An anti-discrimination law creates a protected class – that is, a group of people who are meant to be protected by that law and have recourse to the law in order to redress any discrimination they have experienced. To create this protected class, though, you have to be able to define it in law. You have to develop criteria for determining who is and is not part of that group, who has access to the protection and who does not.
Gender, race, disability, veteran’s status, national origin, religion… all of these can be defined fairly clearly, for the most part. The definition of sexual orientation is somewhat more difficult to pin down.
Which is not to say that no one should try, but again, it becomes a convenient excuse to avoid the issue.
This crap always fills me with disbelief. The self-righteousness of so many Democrats and liberals who point to a small minority of the Republican party as if it represents the whole is nothing short of deliberate ignorance.
Join the 20th century? The civil rights movement was started by Republicans. Barry Goldwater, the father of Modern Conservatism fought for the equal rights of black servicemen as far back as the 1950s, before it ever became a cause celebre. In the 70s and 80s he fought for the same equal rights for gay servicemen. Not “don’t ask, don’t tell,” but equal rights.
Perhaps the strongest Republican, conservative bastion of them all is Arizona. Guess who’s states Conservative, Republican Governor is openly gay?
Don’t tell us we’re joining the 20th century. We made it happen. The big difference is that instead of putting on drama and playing these things for publicity, Republicans and Conservatives have been quietly and effectively promoting change and equality for 50 years.
The liberals might have been helping out, but they were too busy sympathizing with Communist interests (yeah, as it turns out the Rosenburgs really were spies, so says the opened Soviet archives,) and using the same old tired trick of attacking Republicans to pull attention from their own failures and lack of clear direction.
Do we have assholes in our party? Do we have a lunatic fringe and a far right? Sure do.
Best look to thine own fringe before you going painting whole parties in extremist colors.
Do I seem harsh? Sorry.
You get tired of hearing stupid shit from people so naive they beleive their own press releases.
But, I guess Conservative/Republican bashing is a good thing. It gives a past-time for those with strong deep-seated moral convictions utterly unsupported by brains or the ability to perform routine due diligence.
Scylla, I assume that, before you posted your rant, that you read the links to the 2000 Republican Party Platform kindly provided by MEBuckner right? So, pray tell, how did the “lunatic fringe” of the Republican Party manage to sneak in and change the language about “special rights” for sexual preference?
Is Bush part of the “lunatic fringe”? If not, was his promise to veto any attempt to repeal Texas’ anti-sodomy law a reflection of mainstream Republican thinking?
Oh, and for the record, I have never sympathized with “Communist interests” or defended the Rosenbergs. And, of course, you read Goldwater’s more recent attacks on the Republican party as a whole over this very issue?
Yes Sua, I read it, and I think my party is wrong to handle the issue the way it is. I think it’s catering too much to its moral majority, fundamentalist coalition, while at the same time trying not to piss off the more progressive types.
I think trying to play both sides of the fence like this is a mistake.
And, I don’t see what the fact that december started this thread has to do with anything. He’s wrong, and the rest of you chiming in about how backwards and primitive the Republican party is also have your heads up your execretory orifices.
The fact is that it’s not that we haven’t joined the 20th century, but because of our catering to fundamentalism we risk reverting out of it.
That’s the source of Goldwater’s disagreements, though I’m not aware of any recent disagreements (unless he’s doing them from beyond the grave.) He’s been dead a while and that kind precludes the possibility of a recent history.
Or, do you consider decompisition to be a rhetorical device?
To clear up any confusion regarding the OP – I am critical of the Republicans’ stance on homosexuality. OTOH I’m glad to see them moving forward on this issue. IMHO, they’re still in the 20th century – i.e., behind where they should be. I hope they catch up ASAP.
The libertarian side of the Republican party should be the natural home for gays. Two prominent ones are Andrew Sullivan and Camille Paglia.
Well, Scylla, the Republican Party certainly has a noble history on civil rights issues–in 1860, I’d definitely have been voting Republican. However, it’s not just some wild coincidence that the G.O.P. absorbed the most reactionary elements of the white Southern Democratic Party during and after the civil rights era. Parties do change. I hope the Republican Party continues to change in the future. Right now, it is (IMO) dead wrong on a whole host of social and Constitutional issues.
(I’m not saying the Republican Party of today is a racist party, or that I’m in lockstep with the Democrats on racial issues, but it’s silly to act as if the Republicans are just the Party of Lincoln, and that there’s no historical reason why they came to be so mistrusted on racial issues.)
I’m all for decent people in the G.O.P. acting for change from within. I don’t want a one-party state. Even if I never wind up voting Republican with any regularity, whoever I do vote for will need an opposition party to keep them honest. However, blustering and trying to act like there is no problem won’t do anything to effect meaningful change.
Nonsense. A good bluster helps clear out the nasal passages.
More importantly, when you’re knocking on thick walls, you’re best off using a sledgehammer.
Yeah, there’s a bunch of chuckleheads in my party and they’re being catered to, just as the Democrats have their own crosses to carry with their own special interest groups and entitlement holders.
But, I wouldn’t go around saying that the Democrats are a bunch of tree-huggers primarily intersted in creating a welfare state and undermining the economy, because that brush is so broad it’s flat out wrong.
Similarly, suggesting that because of current stances that the Republican party is just now becoming cognizant of civil rights issues is equally asinine.
Did anybody in this thread claim “that the Republican party is just now becoming cognizant of civil rights issues,” aside from the civil rights of homosexuals? The only time I’ve seen anyone mention the Republican stand on race, gender, etc. was when MEBuckner cited approvingly from the Republican platform on those issues.
The problem with your complaint, Scylla, is that it doesn’t apply to any statements made in this thread, apart from the issue of gay rights, on which issue you have conceded the party’s official stand is wrong. In short, you overreacted to a criticism that had not even been made.
On this issue, the leader of your party is one of the “chuckleheads”. On this issue, the GOP has adopted the position of the “lunatic fringe” as its own. Is a reprehensible policy to be excused because it was adopted to throw a bone to some of its rabid followers? Do you believe that the Democrats sorry pandering to the NEA over school vouchers is excusable for that reason?
What matters here is the words of the Republican National Platform. It is the expressed policy of the GOP - who cares why it is there. And the policy is reprehensible.
I fully acknowledge that, in our two party system, most of us have to swallow positions we disagree with when we vote. I think where we differ is about what positions stick in our craw. I hold my noise and usually vote Democrat because, while I strongly dislike a lot of Democrat positions, particularly on economic issues, I am repelled by the Republican Party’s position on many social issues, particularly this one. YMMV.
Do you know what the title of this thread is?
or what about when Captain Amazing said:
or when Sua said:
My party currently is making what I consider to be a bad error in catering to the hate clique under the thin guise of state rights.
But, that is just one aspect of my party. I think that the larger, driving force recognizes that equality is simply equality and that there’s no hedges around it. Ultimately, it’s that conservatism that’s the driving element of the Republican party throughout the nation. Right now, the fundamentalists have a firmer and more front and center grip on the controls than they should. But, this too shall pass.
It’s not as is this is a problem unique to the Republican party. There are anti-gay elements within the Democratic party, but their voice isn’t very loud on this issue right now.
So Sua, what party are you going to vote when black southern baptists find their funamentalism aligning with their Republican brethren on this issue?
Urban minorities aren’t exactly pro-gay, either.
Both of these are core democratic constituencies.
I think you make a big mistake to characterize fundamentalist hate-mongering as a Republican issue, or to think Republicans are therefore not civil rights minded as a group.
Ok, that was kind of mean of me, but it was intended to be tounge in cheek, hence the smiley. Having been given the opening in the thread title, I took it.
However, if you read the rest of my post, you’ll see I say that this isn’t even the first gay Republican group…that there have been Republicans concerned about the issue before this group.
I actually agree with a lot of Republican positions…heck, I was a McCainiac in the 2000 election.
Every one of those comments goes directly to the issue of gay rights, Scylla. I simply do not understand how you could reasonably generalize from those issue-specific comments to some sort of generalized “Conservative/Republican bashing .”
Christ, there are all sorts of issues on which I disagree with the Democrats. Am I “Liberal/Democrat bashing” if state that the party’s platform on farm subsidies is a bunch of socialist horse crap?