President Talks About Gay Rights During Inaugural Speech

[NGNM85]

I figured it was only a matter of time until someone started a thread on this, so here goes;

"We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths -- that all of us are created equal -- is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall...

...Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law -- for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well."

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americ...719319317.html

[TheGodlessUtopian]

The bigots are bound to freak out but other than throwing a minority a bone I do not see how this is unexpected; Obama tends to mention social-movements that he pledged to "support" as a sort of token appreciation for progressive ideals.

[graffic]

I really hate the way "gay rights" rhetoric is used by neo-liberals like Obama. He talks about being "equal" under the law when he's bombing the shit out of foreign lands and presides over one of the most un-equal developed countries.

The majority of religious people aren't homophobic nutters. Gays shouldn't be equal under the law because it condones a more selfish lifestyle that people with a conscience would rather not condone, not because they are homophobic, far from it, but because humans are happier when they are not selfish so people would prefer to condone and encourage what makes people happier and what is best for people and society.

Neo-liberals like Obama morally condone exploitation and talks vaguely about "freedom". And the homosexuality thing kind meets up and makes up for the condoning of exploitation according to some peoples progressive beliefs which is abhorrent.

[soso17]

I really hate the way "gay rights" rhetoric is used by neo-liberals like Obama. He talks about being "equal" under the law when he's bombing the shit out of foreign lands and presides over one of the most un-equal developed countries.

The majority of religious people aren't homophobic nutters. Gays shouldn't be equal under the law because it condones a more selfish lifestyle that people with a conscience would rather not condone, not because they are homophobic, far from it, but because humans are happier when they are not selfish so people would prefer to condone and encourage what makes people happier and what is best for people and society.

Neo-liberals like Obama morally condone exploitation and talks vaguely about "freedom". And the homosexuality thing kind meets up and makes up for the condoning of exploitation according to some peoples progressive beliefs which is abhorrent.

Do you even realise what a reactionary religious freak you sound like? What is so "selfish" and, according to you, unconscionable about gay people having the same rights as anyone else? Why do you keep pretending you're not a homophobe? You Christian routine has outstayed its welcome.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

Rhetorical support for lgbt rights won't cost Obama much in terms of political capital and can reinforce the(eroding but still existent) hegemony of the Democratic Party in the mainstream official lgbt movement.

[sixdollarchampagne]

Rhetorical support for lgbt rights won't cost Obama much in terms of political capital and can reinforce the(eroding but still existent) hegemony of the Democratic Party in the mainstream official lgbt movement.

Obama will never face the voters again; he can say and do whatever he pleases, in hopes of strengthening the pro-war, imperialist Democratic Party.

Furthermore, and Lenina got this part of it right also, the Democrats have a stranglehold on the gay movement (which, from my observation, is largely petit-bourgeois in its composition), and the Democrats control, not just that movement, but, in fact, all the social movements that I have seen in the US. When there used to be an anti-war movement here in the US, back when the Prez was a Republican, that movement kept things quiet during election years, disappearing into the night, as it were, so as not to anger its masters in the Democratic Party.

[NGNM85]

Rhetorical support for lgbt rights won't cost Obama much in terms of political capital...

That's true.

and can reinforce the(eroding but still existent) hegemony of the Democratic Party in the mainstream official lgbt movement.

I can't speak with any authority as to the nature of said hegemony, or whether such hegemony exists. However; it is worth keeping in mind that the Democratic party is the only electable party which has shown any degree of support for gay rights.

What I'd be curious to know is; What is it that you think the administration should be doing, in terms of advancing LGBT rights?

On a completely unrelated note; at least Justice Roberts actually said it right, this time. Last time they actually had to do it over because he fucked up so bad.

[RadioRaheem84]

I can't speak with any authority as to the nature of said hegemony, or whether such hegemony exists. However; it is worth keeping in mind that the Democratic party is the only electable party which has shown any degree of support for gay rights.

You act like all gays are in the same lot. There are a lot of gay Republicans too, i.e. the Log Cabin Republicans. There is also a socio-economic divide among gays who are pushing back a lot of the left over vestiges of when the fight for gay rights was a lot more nuanced than it is today (which is simply looking for entry into the mainstream). They're not looking for fundamental change but just inclusion into the system which can throw them overboard at any time in the future.

With all that you read did you not read about that? Or are you too busy with idealist sense of what these rights mean?

You clearly need to get a class analysis of things instead of sounding like such a naive idealist noob.

[NGNM85]

You act like all gays are in the same lot.

I only assume all gays are gay. Hence my use of the word; 'gay.'

There are a lot of gay Republicans too, i.e. the Log Cabin Republicans.

This group represents but a paltry fraction of the Republican party, which has been fairly unequivocal in it's opposition to gay rights. For example; the 2012 party platform called for a Constitutional amendment to permanently ban gay marriage. (Which will never happen, incidentally.)

There is also a socio-economic divide among gays who are pushing back a lot of the left over vestiges of when the fight for gay rights was a lot more nuanced than it is today (which is simply looking for entry into the mainstream). They're not looking for fundamental change but just inclusion into the system which can throw them overboard at any time in the future.

I have absolutely no idea what you're rambling about.

With all that you read did you not read about that? Or are you too busy with idealist sense of what these rights mean?

The concept behind; 'gay rights' is that homosexuals are human beings, just like heterosexuals, and, as such; are entitled to the same legal rights as heterosexuals, particularly the right to marry. There's nothing idealistic about that.

You clearly need to get a class analysis of things instead of sounding like such a naive idealist noob.

This is so depressingly typical. You just throw together a word salad of preferred pejoratives, which you absolutely refuse to qualify.

[graffic]

Do you even realise what a reactionary religious freak you sound like? What is so "selfish" and, according to you, unconscionable about gay people having the same rights as anyone else? Why do you keep pretending you're not a homophobe? You Christian routine has outstayed its welcome.

Some social conservative morality is rational. The gay lifestyle is more selfish because they don't take part in patriarchy, they don't have children, they can't be fathers so they don't need to get married. The only reason for gay marriage appears to be to condone a selfish, consumerist lifestyle.

Religious and traditional people don't want to condone homosexuality because they want the best in people and for people to be happy. Men are happier with their own family. There is no problem with homosexuality or homosexuals but promoting it as a lifestyle by legalising same sex marriage is wrong. It's the same as condoning drinking heavily or adultery, sodomy is objectification, it doesn't lead to happiness or fulfillment and it shouldn't be condoned.

I've got a gay friend who doesn't go to gay pride marches, is against gay marriage and stopped being involved in the gay "scene" because he has some self-respect and he wants to develop himself.

[RadioRaheem84]

http://monthlyreview.org/2001/05/01/...ationist-split

[FONT=Times New Roman]Apparently, you’re not familiar with the socio-economic divides within the gay community. Instead you’re cheering some token remarks by the President as evidence of progress. [/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman][/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman]There are gays within the community that have vested interests in seeing the community build itself around a niche market and care less for social justice involving gays unless it involves enhancing this niche market. Many of them dislike the more vocal activist elements and even shun the activism of the past. [/FONT]

In an essay entitled “Endorsement of D’Amato=Betrayal,” Carmen Vasquez argued that those who question whether the progressive social justice agenda serves queers should ask the thousands of gays and lesbians on general assistance for whom budget cuts mean the difference between low-income housing and the street. Vasquez suggested the queer/gay assimilationist split “is a rift between those who want to be normal at any cost and those of us who believe gay liberation (and therefore reproductive rights) is a central and inviolable tenet of our struggle for freedom.”11 The idea of normal sexuality implies a culture of privilege that guarantees social injustice. A movement positioned to attain civil rights in some distant future, but to act today as power brokers for those who accept the prevailing social and economic system, has no room for sex radicals or gender deviant people of any kind, and much less for activists who seek to challenge the current social system. Leslie Cagan explains that,
…the divisions that we see in the gay movement now can certainly be traced back to the earliest days. In fact, it has only been magnified as we’ve gotten bigger and more institutions and organizations have been built. But there really is a profound difference between those people whose real agenda is about integrating out gay people into the various structures of this culture: the economic, the social, the cultural, the political.… And that’s one sort of thread, one perspective in this community. The other one which I certainly align myself with, as [do] the other members of the Ad Hoc Committee for an Open Process, is that we are critical of the whole ball of wax. And its not about integrating ourselves into this, its about adding. What the struggle for gay liberation does is to add another level of understanding about the nature of the oppression that we’re up against.
Debate over the D’Amato endorsement and the Millennium March dominated the November National Gay and Lesbian Task Force meetings held in November 1998 in Pittsburgh. The Ad Hoc Committee for an Open Process held a number of open meetings during the conference. “You’ve betrayed women, people of color and poor people by endorsing D’Amato,” Robert Haaland of the San Francisco Tenants’ Union told Human Rights Campaign representatives during one session. Suzanne Pharr argued that a progressive movement has to address multiple concerns. She said, “To have single-issue politics means that we think that we’re only queer, and we’re not. We want to live fully in this society. Liberation is not about liberation of just a piece of oneself.…Do you want to create a better world or do you want to create a better world for queers?”12

Read on, NGN. This is a very problem a lot of minorities have faced when dealing with civil rights in the United States.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

Some social conservative morality is rational. The gay lifestyle is more selfish because they don't take part in patriarchy, they don't have children, they can't be fathers so they don't need to get married. The only reason for gay marriage appears to be to condone a selfish, consumerist lifestyle.

Plenty of LGBT people have children of their own. Plenty more adopt. Plenty of heterosexual people have no children and want no children. So, what's your point?

It's the same as condoning drinking heavily or adultery, sodomy is objectification, it doesn't lead to happiness or fulfillment and it shouldn't be condoned.

So who appointed you and other social conservatives the arbiters of what does and doesn't make other people happy or fulfilled?

I've got a gay friend who doesn't go to gay pride marches, is against gay marriage and stopped being involved in the gay "scene" because he has some self-respect and he wants to develop himself.

Why does every bigot have a "I have a ____ friend" anecdote?

[graffic]

Some LGBT people do adopt but it's not the same. They are not productive. And hardly any heterosexual couples "don't want children". A lot of couples who don't have children don't have them because of contraception problems or other problems. A much smaller number choose not to have any and yes, they are pretty selfish and I would go out on a limb and speculate that most of them probably would be happier if they had a child or two and perhaps even regret not having children.

Men are happier with their own family. Presumably you're aware of this so I have no idea why you bothered posting a reply.

[Tenka]

Some LGBT people do adopt but it's not the same. They are not productive. And hardly any heterosexual couples "don't want children". A lot of couples who don't have children don't have them because of contraception problems or other problems. A much smaller number choose not to have any and yes, they are pretty selfish and I would go out on a limb and speculate that most of them probably would be happier if they had a child or two and perhaps even regret not having children.

Men are happier with their own family. Presumably you're aware of this so I have no idea why you bothered posting a reply.

Leaving aside the rest of the post for now.... Heterosexual couples who do not want children are more common than you think. And what, pray tell, are "contraception problems"?

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

Some LGBT people do adopt but it's not the same. They are not productive. And hardly any heterosexual couples "don't want children". A lot of couples who don't have children don't have them because of contraception problems or other problems. A much smaller number choose not to have any and yes, they are pretty selfish and I would go out on a limb and speculate that most of them probably would be happier if they had a child or two and perhaps even regret not having children.

Selfish = "seeking or concentrating on one's own advantage, pleasure, or well-being without regard for others." I fail to see how not having children qualifies as "being without regard for others." You seem to want to reduce human relationships to the level of livestock breeding productively, which is a totally fucked up worldview.

[NGNM85]

http://monthlyreview.org/2001/05/01/the-queergay-assimilationist-split

Apparently, you’re not familiar with the socio-economic divides within the gay community. Instead you’re cheering some token remarks by the President as evidence of progress.

I actually didn't make any value judgments, whatsoever, regarding the President's statement, this is something that you are projecting. However; this statement is absolutely one of any number of indications of the progress that has been made towards LGBT equality. I also find it very difficult to be upset that the President expressed support for gay marriage.

There are gays within the community that have vested interests in seeing the community build itself around a niche market and care less for social justice involving gays unless it involves enhancing this niche market. Many of them dislike the more vocal activist elements and even shun the activism of the past.

Read on, NGN. This is a very problem a lot of minorities have faced when dealing with civil rights in the United States.

Oh, Christ. I'm not completely sure what point you are trying to make by linking to this ponderous, and convoluted essay. It appears as if you are perhaps trying to point out that equal legal status for homosexuals is only but a small step, that does little, at least, in any immediate sense, to protect gays, and lesbians (or anyone else) from the predations of capitalism. If this is, in fact, the message that you are attempting to convey, my response is; no shit.

[Ostrinski]

I figured it was only a matter of time until someone started a thread on this, so here goes;

Hmm. Okay, I actually don't think this is the case at all. No one in their right mind still cares how much lip service the president pays to progressive causes anymore as he has reneged on them enough times so as to make any further lip service for such things almost a parody of the causes in question i.e. LGBT rights.

[NGNM85]

Hmm. Okay, I actually don't think this is the case at all.

We'll simply have to agree to disagree.

No one in their right mind still cares how much lip service the president pays to progressive causes anymore as he has reneged on them enough times so as to make any further lip service for such things almost a parody of the causes in question i.e. LGBT rights.

In that case, I would ask you the same question I asked Lenina Rosenweg; What is it that you think the administration should be doing, in terms of advancing LGBT rights?

[Lenina Rosenweg]

The Democrats did not expend much political capital, nationally or locally, in fighting for lgbt rights. On a state basis the Dems only supported same sex marriage when it was not politically risky. In Washington State it seems evident that the state Dems supported marriage equality as a distraction from the massive cutbacks in the state budget they were forcing though.

Obama did not support same sex marriage but "evolved" on the issue until opinion polls showed the majority of Americans support it and even then his support was very tepid.

What should Obama have done? The same thing he should have done with "single payer" national healthcare, the same thing he should have done in bringing the criminal bankers to account, the same thing he should have done with nationalizing the insurance, auto, and banking industries and placing them under democratic public ownership, the same thing he should have done with closing Gitmo, ending the Forever War, demilitarizing the US economy, ending the racist war on drugs and what's been termed the New Jim Crow. When Obama was first elected there was mass outrage and people were seriously expecting Obama to be a "transformative leader" and bring about real change.The guy could have led a mass movement for radical change.

The fact that he didn't and the reasons why should be self evident.

Obama won't be running again and mainstream lgbt rights groups like the HRC, Lamda Legal, GLAAD, etc are solidly embedded in the Democratic Party.Mentioning Seneca Falls, Stonewall, and other civil rights battles of the past are an easy way of looking progressive while doing well, jack shit,

[NGNM85]

The Democrats did not expend much political capital, nationally or locally, in fighting for lgbt rights. On a state basis the Dems only supported same sex marriage when it was not politically risky. In Washington State it seems evident that the state Dems supported marriage equality as a distraction from the massive cutbacks in the state budget they were forcing though.

That's mostly accurate. It's also true that politicians, by nature, tend to be cautious and conservative creatures.

Obama did not support same sex marriage but "evolved" on the issue until opinion polls showed the majority of Americans support it and even then his support was very tepid.

That's pretty accurate.

What should Obama have done? The same thing he should have done with "single payer" national healthcare,
the same thing he should have done in bringing the criminal bankers to account, the same thing he should have done with nationalizing the insurance, auto, and banking industries and placing them under democratic public ownership, the same thing he should have done with closing Gitmo, ending the Forever War, demilitarizing the US economy, ending the racist war on drugs and what's been termed the New Jim Crow. When Obama was first elected there was mass outrage and people were seriously expecting Obama to be a "transformative leader" and bring about real change.The guy could have led a mass movement for radical change.

The fact that he didn't and the reasons why should be self evident.

Obama won't be running again and mainstream lgbt rights groups like the HRC, Lamda Legal, GLAAD, etc are solidly embedded in the Democratic Party.Mentioning Seneca Falls, Stonewall, and other civil rights battles of the past are an easy way of looking progressive while doing well, jack shit,

Those all sound like excellent ideas, however; it should be pointed out that the President does not have the power to unilaterally do most of those things.

You've made a number of suggestions about the welfare state, drug law reform, foreign policy, etc. However; you still did not answer my question. What would you like to see the administration do (Note; future tense.) to advance gay rights?