I’m flabbergasted that you don’t see the difference between a party that contains anti-gay groups and a party that adopts an anti-gay position as part of its national platform. If the Democratic Party succumbs to pressure by black southern baptists or urban minorities and makes an anti-gay position the official position of the Democratic Party, if it includes the reprehensible and illogical “special protection” language in its national platform, then I will start voting for the Libertarians or the Greens or somebody else.
I certainly do not think that fundamentalist hate-mongering is solely a Republican issue. I do think that, at this point in our history, the Republicans have acted as appeasers to that hate-mongering, while the Democrats, thus far, have not.
Just for the record, Scylla, I was raised in a family of moderate Republicans and was a registered Republican for over 20 years.
I joined the Democratic party when I began examining where some of my party’s stances were taking them – in effect, I haven’t moved – the party just went by me, heading for the far Right.
And I’d welcome having a choice of intelligent candidates to choose between – particularly in this state, where the Democrats range from fairly far to the left to Old South conservative, and the Republicans fall into two categories: (1) yuppies who don’t care about politics as long as the economy supports their lifestyle, and (2) reactionaries who think Barry Goldwater was a flaming liberal.
BTW, I’m intrigued about Arizona having an out gay Governor; last I heard, their gay elected officials consisted of two Representatives, both Republican, who were out, one of whom was facing a recall vote (largely on homophobic grounds) which he won.
Oh, and thanks to minty green for providing the cites I requested. (Sometimes people ask for them just because they do want an assertion documented; this was one of those times.)
You’re quite welcome, Poly. They weren’t the first-hand reports I would have preferred, but they at least back up my recollection of the early 2000 campaign.
Please don’t put words in my mouth. I didn’t say there wasn’t a difference. I didn’t even imply it.
What I’d implied was the the new puritanism was the common enemy and that it little to do with what party you belonged to. Further I’d implied that if this puritanism continues to rise among core constituencies, I have no doubt that the Democratic party will cater to it as well.
It’s polarized between parties right now, because there is other baggage that goes with these stances, and gay marriage is just one of the issues.
I think my party is wrong on the stance of gay marriage but correct on much of the rest of its family oriented stance, and I still prefer package A with one or two items that I don’t agree with to package B with 74 items I don’t agree with and 2 that I do.
I don’t characterize either party by this issue. Fundamentalism and intolerance isn’t Republican or Democratic at all. It will float where opportunity takes it. It has in the past, and it will again.
From a summary of “Social Cleavages and Political Change” (Oxford University Press, 1999), by Jeff Manza:
In other words, to the shock of nobody but Scylla, fundamentalists are Republicans, and non-fundamentalists tend not to be. I can certainly understand why open-minded people vote Republican despite the huge amount of influence the fundamentalists have with the party’s agenda, but don’t fool yourself into thinking that agenda has–or is likely to have in the foreseeable future–any discernible influence on the Democratic platform.
If Mary Cheney and her group are able to bring about positive changes in the Republican Party, more power to her. Shoot, kick out the fundamentalist agenda and I will happily vote Republican myself. But I ain’t holding my breath.
Excuse me? We have, as you acknowledge, a “common enemy.” You, however, think that it is excusable to pander to that common enemy, because they lend support on other issues we hold dear. I call that appeasement. You can call it whatever you will to aid your conscience.
And right now, not during the age of Lincoln or Theodore Roosevelt, is when you and I cast our votes. I don’t give a rat’s ass right now as to the stance of the Democratic Party 10 years from now. If they change their stance, I will change my vote.
Well, there, as I said before, is where we differ. I give certain issues weight (I’m sure you do also, but just different issues).
This is, IMO, your major fallacy. What creates the opportunity that causes fundamentalism and intolerance to float between parties? The attitude of that party creates the opportunity - “we need fundamentalist votes, so we will assert in our platform that protection against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is providing ‘special rights’ to gays.” Guilt by association is improper. Guilt by voluntary association is highly proper.
Actually, Scylla, that quote says quite plainly that fundamentalists are Republicans:
And here’s the part where it says non-fundamentalists tend not to be Republicans:
Sheesh, man, criticize me for the blatant appeal to authority (didn’t have time to dig up exit polls and the like), but don’t claim it doesn’t say what it says.
Have you lost your mind? Your first rebuttal makes no sense at all. You accuse me of not being aware of any difference and then use my quote where I point out the difference to prove that I wasn’t aware?
You’ve negated your own point.
How can you be so high on that horse with your head buried so deeply in the sand?
Pandering to special interests is politics and in this category, the Democrats wrote the book.
You need to be careful there.
I am of the opinion that my party doesn’t have the proper stance towards certain gay rights.
But, you’re taking a difficult question and cutting it with a simplistic knife and saying everybody on one side is anti-gay and everyone on the other is not.
The conveying of “special rights,” and the reverse discrimination that goes along with it is a seperate issue from equal rights.
If Fred sends Jeff to the hospital for dating his former girlfriend, and Jack sends David to the hospital because he saw him kissing another guy, I think Fred and Jack have committed the same crime.
I don’t think that one is a “hate crime,” and somehow worse than the other or more punishable than the other.
That doesn’t make me anti-gay.
Quite the opposite, I think. Last I heard, if you afford privileges or protection to a select group based on race, religion, disabilitiy, sexxual preference or what-have-you, you are engaging in discrimination.
I think my party is absolutely correct on the “special rights” issue.
"Last I heard, if you afford privileges or protection to a select group based on race, religion, disabilitiy, sexxual preference or what-have-you, you are engaging in discrimination.
I think my party is absolutely correct on the “special rights” issue."
—So I assume, then, you are in favor of granting gays the same right to marry that straight people have?
Eve, the response you will get is that gays already have the same right to marry that straight people have… the right to marry someone of the opposite sex.
What I’m hearing, though, is the “Christians are…” problem that I’m always combatting. Because I stand for what my Lord said and not for what various people read into other portions of the Bible, I disagree with many if not most Christians on gay rights. However, the general assumption is that Christianity is monolithically and bigotedly opposed to gay people.
Likewise, because many leading Republicans are coddling the religious Right and taking stances calculated to obtain their votes, this does not necessarily therefore mean that all Republicans take such stances, or even endorse such stances, but may have some sense of political allegiance that causes them to remain Republican even though they deplore what many Republicans have to say. Likewise, I remain committed to Christ and therefore to His Church even though I deplore what many Christians have to say.
Not the world’s most perfect analogy, but does it work?
I’ve read your cite and your quote the first time through. First off, you start your quote a line or two after it’s explained that the period being examined is from 1960 or so onward. In that context “always” has a different meaning. Secondly, the analysis suffers from the same problem inherent in all works of this type, and if you look at the whole book instead of a blurb I’ll wager the large portion of the book is spent trying to work through this problem.
Simply put, the problem is this:
Let’s say you have a Southern, Black, Female, high income earning, evangelical protestant, Democrat.
If you categorize her as a Southern black, or a southern black female, she fits the thesis. Classify her as a high income earning evangelical protestant and she does not.
So what is the order of classifaction as far as demographics go? What’s the weighting?
Doubtless the book will go into some detail as to it’s methods, but the blurb itself is useless.
It doesn’t say “Fundamentalists are Republican” as you would seem to like to think it does in a simpleminded black and white sort of way.
What it actually says is something like this “According to this set of studies and methods detailed within, which we feel are the best choices to make for statistical analysis for reasons also detailed within, we have come to the conclusion that as we categorize and define these groups for purposes of the study, evangelical Christian voting blocs tend toward the Republican in a significant fashion in the last 40 years.”
That aside, let’s pretend that your simplistic assertion that fundamentalists are all Republican is true.
Big Deal! So What?
Just because a sqare is a rectangle doesn’t mean that a rectangle is a square.
I’m sure most draft-dodgers were Democratic, but that doesn’t mean one can say that draft-dodging is a tenant of the Democratic party.
That’s just rich. You’re the one asserting that homophobes are merely a “lunatic fringe” of the GOP, when homophobia is written into the Republican Party platform. Do you get it yet? On this issue, the “lunatic fringe” has taken over the party.
No, I’m not. I’m saying that the GOP has appeased their anti-gay constituency. The question I posit is whether appeasing evil is appropriate. You can decide the answer according to your own ethics.
You are conflating two unrelated issues. The “special rights” for homosexuals is not the same as the hate crimes issue, as you, an informed voter for the GOP, should know. Hates crimes legislation would inpose additional penalties if the crime was motivated by sex, race, creed, religion, ethnicity, etc. of the victim. In some states, sexual orientation is added to the list, but not by any means in all.
It’s neither a gay issue or a special rights issue.
It doesn’t make you anti-gay. It makes you ignorant of your party’s position.
Question for you: is prohibition on discrimination on the basis of race in employment or housing a matter of equal rights for all or “special rights” for blacks?
You see, “special rights” is the code word used by your party to distinguish between discrimination based on race, gender, sex, religion, etc., which your party condemns as a violation of “equal rights,” and discrimination based on sexual orientation, which your party does not condemn, because granting such protection to gays would be granting them “special rights”.
According to your party’s platform, if Mr. Employer is not allowed to fire Joe Schmoe because Mr. Schmoe is a limp-wristed queer, Mr. Schmoe has been granted “special rights”.
Cause, don’t you know, homosexuality is a “lifestyle choice,” and if Mr. Schmoe doesn’t want to get fired, all he has to do is stop being a fag. :rolleyes: Once again, for the record, :rolleyes:
If you want exit polls, I found this one from ABC. Among the nuggets: 14% of voters identified themselves as Christian conservatives, and 80% of those voted for Bush. Not quite the same thing as “fundamentalists,” but reasonably close. I did get a kick out of the 1% of the “religious right” who voted for Nader, however.
Here’s a fun one: Would Joe Lieberman’s religion make him more likely to do a good job as vice president, less likely, or no difference? Of the 8% who thought being a Jew would make Lieberman less likely to do a good job, 72% voted for Bush. Woo hoo, let’s hear it for Republican tolerance!
That’s strange, I don’t remember arguing that fundamentalists had “always” been Republicans. As Sua has already pointed out, ancient Republican history has little to do with the here and now question of what the hell is wrong with the Republican Party.
It’s really not that complicated, Scylla. Classification as a fundamentalist does not suddenly exclude all other classes and categories. Your hypothetical person is a fundamentalist, even though she is in the relatively small minority of fundamentalists who are also Democrats.
Of course it doesn’t. I think I’ve already acknowledged that some fundamentalists are Democrats, or Libertarians, or whatever. But the great majority of fundamentalists are Republicans. Do you dispute this assertion for some reason?
