Gay Political Rights Lag Behind Culture
When I read Political Shifts on Gay Rights Lag Behind Culture in the NYTimes yesterday, I didn’t notice it was by out gay reporter Adam Nagourney. That changes nothing, really. Except maybe that his experience makes him more attuned to the topic:
The conflicting signals from the White House about its commitment to gay issues reflect a broader paradox: even as cultural acceptance of homosexuality increases across the country, the politics of gay rights remains full of crosscurrents.
It is reflected in the surge of gay men and lesbians on television and in public office, and in polls measuring a steady rise in support for gay rights measures. Despite approval in California of a ballot measure banning same-sex marriage, it has been authorized in six states.
Yet if the culture is moving on, national politics is not, or at least not as rapidly. Mr. Obama has yet to fulfill a campaign promise to repeal the policy barring openly gay people from serving in the military. The prospects that Congress will ever send him a bill overturning the Defense of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as between a man and a woman, appear dim. An effort to extend hate-crime legislation to include gay victims has produced a bitter backlash in some quarters: Senator Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina, sent a letter to clerics in his state arguing that it would be destructive to “faith, families and freedom.”
Memeorandum has discussion. If you missed my post last week, ‘No Single LGBT Rights Leader’ a Feature, Not a Bug, in response to this NYTimes piece, it is right on point:
…the single most important way the lgbt rights movement differs from the black and feminist movements is that lgbt people can choose to stay invisible.
Once society wanted its lgbt citizens to stay invisible. Once the culture enforced invisibility on lgbt people. But so long as lgbt people were invisible, they could only be a hidden menace.
The choice to come out and declare one’s sexual orientation as a cultural identity was a prerequisite to progress. That lgbt people have made so much progress is a tribute to each and every individual who made that declaration to their family, friends and professional community.
Today the culture no longer wants its lesbian and gay citizens to be invisible. LGBT characters on television and in the movies, in politics and community life, along with those who are our friends, neighbors and colleagues, are clear evidence of this.
The culture, in this instance, is ahead of the courts. It is the foes of that cultural acceptance who have deftly used the courts and the law to hold old norms — norms that are no longer culturally relevant — in place.
Political rights are coming soon. LGBT people know it. The foes of that political acceptance know it too.
5 Responses to “Gay Political Rights Lag Behind Culture”
Yes, LGBT people know it, but do the polygamists. And do polygamists “come out” as well? If so, will people punish them with bigotry and prejudice?
They are consenting adults in love. Who are we to say that they don't have a place in “LGBT”. Properly, it should at least read “LGBTP”. The other fetishes will have to get in line. Polygamists have been praying for legal rights to marry much much longer than same-gender fetishes..
When bigots “come out” will people punish them with freedom of speech?
Who are we to say that they don't have every right to expose their own hatred?
Sexual Preference is by definition a choice.
Race has no choice. Gender has no choice. Ethnicity has no choice. National origin has no choice. Age has no choice.
Therefore, IMO, gay civil rights should have limits and should NOT have all the civil rights and protections afforded other civil rights litigants.
Having said that, cultural oppression is wrong. Intentionally harming people physically, mentally, or financially because of their sexual preference is wrong.. There is no reason that same sex marriage should not be allowed to exist with the full legal privileges afforded opposite sex couples. Where same sex couples, or, anybody for that matter, should choose to live, certainly should never be restricted.
Religious preference has civil rights protections also, but their are restrictions because religion is indeed a choice. People cannot force their religious culture upon others. As well, people’s sexual preference and the culture associated, should not be forced upon anybody else. This is cultural suppression and it is problematic in general, but must be allowed to a point, so that all people whom are emphatically culturally opposed can be reasonably free from the culture that offends them.
So what I think should be asked of gay rights advocates is; How far do you expect to take Gay/Lesbian/Transgender civil rights? In the end, what are the specifics that you want protected rights to give you?
Father_Time, thanks for your comments, but they don't make sense. You list race, gender, ethnicity, national origin, and age as being without choice. When did you choose to be straight? If you can describe the process you went through to choose to be straight, I might believe you. But no one I know has ever described to me that process, and indeed, I cannot either.
I don't believe homosexuality is a choice, but is formed in the womb in place of conventional development.
It's old, but still good: Consider the logic of adolescence and young adulthood for gays. Do you really think it's a choice that they would not only want to differ from the mainstream but deliberately seek such differentiation and the abuse that has long accompanied it?