November 18th, 2008 By JOE WINDISH, Technology Editor
So much is being written about Prop. 8 and black homophobia (see for example here, here, and here) that I cannot keep up. Yesterday we learned that Prince Is Anti-Gay (but Ta-Nehisi Coates thinks Andrew Sullivan is “drawing a bizarre line between Prince’s homophobia and Prop 8 and black people” via Joe.My.God).
First is a chart showing the relative sizes and shifts of 83 demographic groups. Those above the diagonal [link] shifted toward Obama from Kerry’s 2004 performance, those below it shifted away from Obama. Tellingly, only three groups moved away–”small town,” “decided last 3 days,” and–perhaps surprisingly “gay”.
Perhaps surprisingly??? If I’m reading this chart right, the gay swing was the largest of the three. Does anyone want to attribute that swing to race?
…the best way to explain the voting preferences of Southern whites is race, but the best way to predict their behavior is to understand that racist voting has become simple partisan voting. If they were once voting for Republicans because they were racist, they’re now voting for Republicans because they are Republicans.
In the case of African Americans voting for Prop 8 in California, I tend to agree with those who say it is religion more than race. And I think along those same lines for whites who voted against Obama in the South.
The South has openly dealt with race for much longer than the North ever did. At this point religion is more to blame than race. (Even as I must acknowledge that some of Franklin’s other charts suggest I could be wrong.)
RELATED: Richard Thompson Ford makes his argument that racism is the wrong frame for understanding the passage of California’s same-sex marriage ban. I’ve addressed his argument here before.
November 16th, 2008 By JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
The comparison is getting much attention in light of the passage of California’s Prop 8, which banned gay marriage. Is the comparison a valid one? A roundup HERE.
A few days ago I received an e-mail from one of our TMV editors asking me if I would respond to a request from “Survivor Corps” to share news about their organization and about a specific program of that organization, “Operation Survivor.”
As one who has done his best to publicize the plight of our veterans, and especially the sorry treatment they have received from an administration that sent them into harm’s way and that touted “support the troops,” but didn’t, I am glad to do it, and only sorry that it has taken me three days to do so.
If you go to the “Survivor Corps” web site, you’ll learn the following facts:
First, about “Survivor Corps”:
Survivor Corps helps people around the world who have suffered war and violence to rebuild their lives and rejoin their communities. By connecting those affected by conflict through networks of survivors, they help people overcome trauma and injury and regain their place in society. Survivor Corps (formerly Landmine Survivors Network) was born out of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, co-recipient of the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize, and recently spearheaded the development of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Over the past ten years, they have established successful peer support programs in eight war affected countries in Latin America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
Now, to the more recent work by this organization, “Operation Survivor”:
First, some background:
Within the United States there are over one and a half million service members that have served in military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Over thirty thousand have been physically wounded, but many more have experienced less visible, psychological wounds. Traumatic Brain Injury and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder have emerged as signature injuries of these conflicts, with recent reports suggesting an increase in rates of suicide, alcohol and drug abuse, homelessness, and domestic violence among returning service members and veterans.
Ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are creating a generation of veterans in the United States from all branches of the armed services and all 50 states who are struggling to overcome physical and psychosocial injuries. Most combat veterans convalescing in military hospitals across the country will survive physically, but getting on with their lives after returning home to their families and communities is proving a significant challenge for hundreds of thousands. Among the 1.6 million who have served since 2001, suicide is on the rise, as is unemployment and incidents of substance abuse and domestic violence
Survivor Corps feels that the successful reintegration of returning service members is “an issue that will have a long-lasting impact on American society, and may become the single defining struggle facing this new generation of veterans.”
Thus, Survivor Corps and its partners are determined to avoid the mistakes made when veterans returned from Vietnam, which resulted in tens of thousands of post-war suicides and over 200,000 men and women living on the streets.
To avoid such mistakes, Survivor Corps will build peer support programs at the community level that will bring service members and veterans together for mutual support and encourage both individual responsibility and collective action to help others in need.
It is offering an alternative “treatment” that can be made readily available in all communities, regardless of proximity to traditional military or government centers of support. Their approach is nimble enough to address the needs of individual survivors, while still broad enough to build a coalition of survivors and service providers working to effect long-term positive change.
To learn more about “Survivor Corps” and about their new program to help the recovery and reintegration of hundreds of thousands of returning U.S. service members at a critical time for them and their country, please go to SurvivorCorps.org. You may even talk yourself into donating to this worthy program
As promised earlier, presented below is the ‘Manifesto for True Equality’ which is now making the rounds in France and was triggered by the election of President-elect Obama. The Manifesto has the active backing of French First Lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, who penned this article, ‘We Must Help Our Elites Embrace Change’, which WORLDMEETS.US posted earlier in the day.
“The election of Barack Obama exposes, through cruel contrast, the shortcomings of the French Republic and the gap that separates us from a country whose citizens were able to overcome the race issue and elect as president a man who happens to be Black. America has confirmed the validity of a democratic model based on equality and diversity.”
As much as anyone, I appreciate the praise that is being heaped on our nation because of our recent electoral behavior. But at times it’s enough to make one blush - and wonder if it’s the same campaign I recall witnessing.
“There were no personal files abused, no insinuations from the secret service, no private mutual resentments, no mutual hatreds. If there were any, they were deeply and skillfully hidden. The campaign was essentially free of below-the-belt tricks and didn’t undercut the level of political debate. … In American politics - and from the Polish perspective this might seem quaint - what counts is competence, education, skill and the experience of people who work for the President, rather than their personal ambition and ability to deliver blows below the belt.”
Thirteen English colonies on the East Coast of North America, most settled by groups seeking religious freedom, came together to form the United States. In his new alternative history, The 14th Colony, author Michael Silverstein describes a fictional additional colony, New Israelia, founded by Jews in northern Florida in the 1650s—300 years before the actual founding of the State of Israel in 1948.
“Before beginning serious research for this project,” said Silverstein, “I viewed a book about such a colony as a tongue-in-cheek way to explore one of history’s most vibrant and quirky eras, the mid-17th century. The more I researched, however, the more obvious it became to me that this wasn’t just an alternative history with a far-fetched premise, but something that could easily have happened.
“In a number of ways,” Silverstein continued, “this period also bore some chilling resemblances to our own times. There were international conflicts over markets and resources. There were heinous deeds committed by religious fanatics. Millions of people in different parts of the world were being brutally exploited and enslaved. False messiahs were garnering huge followings. There were even examples of irrational exuberance—the entire economy of Holland was almost taken down by a tulip buying bubble.”
The story of The 14th Colony plays out in both the New and Old Worlds—in an England governed as a republic under Oliver Cromwell; in the Spanish-controlled Americas; in the ghettos of Southern Italy and the surprisingly tolerant Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth in Eastern Europe; and in the Holland of Rembrandt, and its Jewish-friendly colony in northeastern Brazil.
A fuller description of The 14th Colony, and the era in which the book is set, along with notes about its author and book ordering information, can be found on the book’s Web site.
The past 72 hours have brought an extraordinary range of emotions - great joy at the election of Barack Obama and defeat of John McCain, and sadness and anger at the passage of anti-gay initiatives in Florida, Arizona, Arkansas, and California. That sadness has turned to outrage at the speed with which some white gay activists began blaming African Americans - sometimes in appallingly racist ways - for the defeat of Proposition 8. This is inexcusable.
As a mother who has raised two children in a 30-year relationship with another woman, I fully understand the depth of hurt and anger at voters’ rejection of our families’ equality. But responding to that hurt by lashing out at African Americans is deeply wrong and offensive - not to mention destructive to the goal of advancing equality.
Before we give Religious Right leaders more reasons to rejoice by deepening the divisions they have worked so hard to create between African Americans and the broader progressive community, let’s be clear about who is responsible for gay couples in California losing the right to get married, and let’s think strategically about a way forward that broadens and strengthens support for equality.
Is there anyone left out there wondering of the the rest of this planet sees America in a new light after President-elect Obama’s victory?
This article by the great Christian Merville of Lebanon’s L’Orient Le Jouris particularly eloquent - and ends much more cold-eyed than this paragraph in the beginning might lead one to believe. And demonstrating the incredible change in perceptions, it has the same refrain as the famed Le Monde front page of September 12, 2001:
“A leader was born, an unknown even four years ago, who through the magic of his word has enabled all of us, beyond the borders of his country, to imagine that we are all Americans, in solidarity at last after having been divided for so long … But the words, as exhilarating as they may be, will not suffice. Nor will promises of a better tomorrow if they take too long to come. The disappointment could be as cruel as the great hopes that were raised when everything seemed possible.”
The tidal wave of global reaction to the election of President-elect Barack Obama is enough to make a foreign desk editor cry over what to do next. Coming later today will be articles from Russia and Iraq. Here are just a few of the many stories posted on WORLDMEETS.US in the past 24 hours:
“The arrival today of the first man of color to the apex of power in the only global superpower testifies to the logic of this country and its evolution. Once again, America was ready. … Freedom is that which has allowed both slavery and its eradication; the assertion of civil rights and the existence of the Ku Klux Klan; the many ’success stories’ of ’self-made men,’ and the absence of the social state. Whoever is in power in America, this will remain at the heart of the country’s psyche.”
“Economically, culturally and militarily, the notion that the strongest must stand alone has been shown to be absurd. Cooperation rather than confrontation and negotiation rather than dictation are the new and astounding ideas embodied by Obama. … Obama in no magician - and McCain would have been less so - but he has one great advantage: He can, since he isn’t committed to a rigid doctrine and doesn’t believe himself to be on a divine mission (like Bush has), act according to rational and pragmatic reasoning. He can finally reestablish a government based on reality - no matter how bleak that may be once initiated.”
“”Let us not be stingy with our pleasure; good news is pretty rare these days. And when we use the word “us,” we mean the near-totality of the rest of the world, who were worried that we would not be seconded in our passion for Barack Obama by the American voters on Election Day.”
“Obama is the President of the United States that the planet requires. Yet paradoxically, this doesn’t necessarily imply that an Obama presidency is the best thing for United States society. … one must wonder whether the society of that country, and above all, the United States Congress, will agree. Why? Because what Obama wants to do is make the United States somewhat similar to a European welfare state, and it’s likely, sooner or later, that United Statesiens [people of the United States] will turn their back on such a project. In fact, even though the country is one of the most advanced, it has the greatest inequality in terms of wealth distribution and has never had a viable and durable social-democratic party.”
Is Barack Obama the antidote to eight years of George W. Bush? Anyone reading this editorial from Iran’s state-controlled Tehran Times would certainly get that impression. Unquestionably, Tehran is even more pleased than most Obama fans about the President-elect’s success. The editorial asks and answers: ‘And why was Obama the world’s candidate? Quite simply, because they feel they can talk to him.’ The winds of dialogue are surely blowing. Now to see what comes of it …
