homophobia

19 May

So what about a "tea party" for those of us who live in reality?

Posted by media girl in abortion, Democrats, homophobia, politics, reproductive rights, Republicans, Barry Goldwater, Barry Goldwater, Conservatism in the United States, Democratic Party, Fox News, George W. Bush, Libertarianism, Political parties in the United States, Politics, Politics of the United States, Republican Party, Social Issues, Social Issues, Tea
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mlk
There's no doubting the energy in the tea bagger movement. The spittle practically flies at you right out of the TV screen.

There have been some interesting articles on the tea baggers lately. One of the most interesting is Mark Lilla's in The New York Review of Books: "The Tea Party Jacobins":

A new strain of populism is metastasizing before our eyes, nourished by the same libertarian impulses that have unsettled American society for half a century now. Anarchistic like the Sixties, selfish like the Eighties, contradicting neither, it is estranged, aimless, and as juvenile as our new century. It appeals to petulant individuals convinced that they can do everything themselves if they are only left alone, and that others are conspiring to keep them from doing just that. This is the one threat that will bring Americans into the streets.

Welcome to the politics of the libertarian mob.

I can't so easily dismiss everything that these "Jacobins" have to say, though. Among my concerns are indeed:

  • The increasing power of the government.
  • The increasing budget of the government.
  • The increasing deficit of the government.
  • The apparent erosion of civil rights.

No doubt your average tea bagger would define these concerns a bit differently than I do. But there's a bit of common ground there. And I'd say most progressives share these concerns. It's been a regular refrain in the progressive blogosphere for years.

But the tea baggers come with baggage — offensive, hateful baggage that I simply can't endorse, or even stomach:

  • The anti-immigrant cant that smacks of racism and xenophobia and fear.
  • The anti-gay rage that burns with homophobia and fear.
  • The anti-women's health attitudes that crackle with misogyny and chauvinism and fear.
  • The hysterical, amped up propagandizing, with liberal use of "fascist" and "socialist," often in the same sentence that drips with fear.
  • And the utter stupidity that wails about fantasy nightmares like "the government taking over Medicare" (which, for you who were left behind, is a government program).

So where's the party for those of us who are fiscally on the conservative side and socially on the live-and-let-live side? Obviously the Republicans have been on a government-regulating-private-lives bent for decades now, so they're out. And the Democrats … well … when they aren't selling out to right-wing interests, they're coming up with big projects like this was 1965.

I feel like I've had no party my entire voting life. The Republicans have been hyenas barking at everyone to get in line, and the Democrats have been gazelles, running away, always striving for style points.

In the olden days, there was a real debate between Democrats and Republicans. It seems like it was more principled, more about ideas than about strutting around, claiming to be "the real Americans." And there certainly was less brazen selling out to lobbyists.

There was a time when Republicans were led by people like Barry Goldwater, who had what today would be considered "radical" ideas about small government: that "the government should stay out of people's private lives," and that included homosexuality and abortion. He even supported gays in the military.

It's a wonder the tea baggers aren't burning him in effigy.

Imagine a Goldwater kind of Republican Party opposing the Democrats. I wouldn't agree with them on a lot of things, but at least it's philosophically consistent, and would be a good counterbalance to the Democrats. As it is, I find myself rooting for the Dems not so much because I support what they're doing up and down the line — far from it — but rather because I find the Republican opposition so unprincipled, so spiteful, so unpatriotic and so incredibly stupid that it doesn't just turn me off, it frightens me.

It's almost like George W. Bush was a restraining influence, and now the wingnuts are really cutting loose.

No, if you're a fiscal moderate with leave-people-alone views on private life, like I am, you know that, when it comes down to it, we have no party to represent us. We just support the party that works against us the least. Resigned. Disgusted. Seeing the appeal of embracing cynical distance from it all, because actually doing something sensible seems so out of reach of our government these days.

And meanwhile the tea baggers mock us with their lurid, tragi-comic mockery of what this country really needs.

So now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to wrap up this little rant, pour myself a drink, and watch some TV like a good citizen.

29 Apr

Will Hillary Clinton denounce the "pansy" statement?

Posted by media girl in Barack Obama, conservatives, Democrats, election 2008, Hillary Clinton, homophobia, politics, Americablog, Business, Business, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Mike Easley, North Carolina, Person Career, Politics of the United States, Prosecutors, Social Issues, Social Issues, Women in politics
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Hillary Clinton was grinning from ear to ear while North Carolina Governor Mike Easley endorsed her by saying she's no "pansy."

It's the kind of veiled homophobic slur wingnuts use. We remind you that both Easley and Clinton are Democrats.

Never mind the innuendo directed at Barack Obama. What about voters who happen to be homosexual, or happen to think homosexuality is in fact not a mortal sin?

Ryan J. Davis on HuffPo:

Now, I know from spending many recesses in middle school being called a pansy that it's just a subtle way of saying "faggot." Clinton stood by while Easley made that comment, smiling away. Speaking to a prominent gay journalist friend of mine this morning, he expressed his frustration with her campaign. "Hillary doesn't care about the gays. It's that simple. We're a political tool, like everything else in that family's orbit."

Clinton owes the gay community, which she has shamefully used as an ATM during her campaign, an apology for gay-baiting. We're waiting, Hillary.

Joe Aravosis on Americablog:

Oh, so Hillary has launched a "culture war" against Obama. And what are the three elements of the culture wars? God, guns, and gays. Hillary already pulled the God and gun card on Obama in Pennsylvania, where she couldn't even say when she last went to church, and then claimed she was a hunter after a lifetime as one of America's top gun control advocates. And now she's gay-bashing.

So will she denounce Governor Easley? Will the media press her on it, after hounding Obama about Reverend Wright?

Oh, but let's not pick on Hillary. She's had such a hard life.

Joe Sudbay on Americablog:

Think about your daily existence and compare it to Hillary's "tough" life.

When was the last time Hillary Clinton:

Went to the grocery store?

Pumped gas?

Had to argue with her health insurance company about a bill?

Had to wait for the cable guy?

Had a spontaneous, unscripted moment?

The woman has lived in a protective bubble for over 16 years. She and her husband have hauled in over $100 million over the past seven years. Everyone around her is either paid to be around her -- or pays to be around her. And, she has paid Mark Penn a lot of money to tell her about the lives of real people, gleaned from focus groups and polls. That's her reality and she's not exactly roughing it.

20 Oct

Giuliani supports Homophobia Amendment to U.S. Constitution

Posted by media girl in bigotry, election, election 2008, homophobia, politics, religious fundamentalism, Republicans, Rudy Giuliani, sexuality, Giuliani, New York, Person Career, Quotation, Rudy Giuliani, Rudy Giuliani
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Via AMERICAblog: A great nation deserves the truth:

So many people so insecure about their sexual orientation that they demand a Constitutional Amendment! So Rudy Giuliani has flip-flopped his position and now finds room for Constitutional homophobia in his vision of a police-state America:

Still liking Giuliani, all you moderates out there? Giuliani was against bashing gays in the US Constitution before he was for it. What a freaking hypocrite, the man is pretending on every single issue to be a "real" conservative when he's simply lying. Giuliani just might give Romney a run for his money as the biggest phony and flip-flopper among the GOP candidates....
Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, told The Hill Saturday that former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) would support a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

I suppose that's one way for social conservatives to prevent themselves from "choosing to be gay."

05 Sep

Is "guilty for being gay" really a political victory?

Posted by media girl in crime, homophobia, Larry Craig, politics, progressive values, Repubicans, Senate, sexuality, CDATA, Larry Craig, Mass media, Person Career, Politics, Queer as Folk, XML
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While the Larry Craig scandal post-mortems move over all sorts of Via arcane, almost pointless speculations, I'm left wondering whether this is at all a political win for progressives.

Yes, the GOP is imploding over its holier-than-thou right to hate ______________ (fill in the blank), but is giving the "crime" of Craig's sexual orientation such political validity through all the chest-thumping really a "win"?

Yes, Craig seems to be a cheat. But cheats led the impeachment proceedings against President Clinton. What's so different now? Because Craig is gay?

This is part of the sad spectacle of American politics that goes back in my memory at least to the confirmation hearings of Clarence Thomas, when a clearly unqualified not-quite-a-judge was challenged not over his lack of qualifications but rather over sexual misconduct. Anita Hill may have suffered, and I'm inclined to believe her, but was her suffering really to the point? Clarence Thomas sits on the bench, writing inane opinion and dissent, one after the other, like some grumbling old curmudgeon clinging to the dogmas of his angry view of the world, all because the Democrats would not challenge him on the issue at hand: competence.

And now we see the crowing over the fall of Senator Craig, who is all too typical of the fragile conservative male who needs to pass law after law to prevent him from being himself. And we crow over his fall.

But isn't it a bit tragic? War, bloodshed, corruption in the billions of dollars, domestic and abroad, and the only casualties we see are over sexual "deviance" as defined by a bunch of fearful men afraid of their own shadows.

Some victory. Like standing on the top of the hill that's falling into a deeper and deeper hole.

30 Aug

Should MSNBC punish Tucker Carlson's gay panic?

Posted by media girl in blogging, crime, Dan Abrams, homophobia, internet, Joe Scarborough, Larry Craig, media, MSNBC, television, Tucker Carlson, violence, Carl Carlson, CDATA, Commentators, Heritage Foundation, Media bias in the United States, MSNBC, MSNBC, News, Politics of the United States, Television in the United States, Tucker, Tucker Carlson
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After all, shouldn't a decent red-blooded conservative be allowed to use violence to prove just how not-gay he is?

Carlson said, "Having sex in a public men's room is outrageous. It's also really common. I've been bothered in men's rooms." Carlson continued, "I've been bothered in Georgetown Park," in Washington, D.C., "when I was in high school." When Abrams asked how Carlson responded to being "bothered," as Abrams and Scarborough laughed, Carlson asserted, "I went back with someone I knew and grabbed the guy by the -- you know, and grabbed him, and ... hit him against the stall with his head, actually." The laughter continued.

Carlson's comments, coupled with laughter from Abrams and Scarborough, suggested to viewers that physical violence is an appropriate response to an unwelcome overture. This is dangerous and wrong.

MSNBC has yet to acknowledge Carlson's comments or address why Abrams and Scarborough laughed while Carlson recounted his actions. Instead, MSNBC has treated Carlson's comments as a laughing matter, re-airing the portion in which Carlson claimed to have been "bothered," but omitting the portion in which he seemed to boast of physical assault.

Typical liberal media bias -- er, liberal blog bias, trying to oppress decent homophobes! Don't the violently-not-gay people in this world have the right to express themselves, too?

After all, it must be so hard for all these conservatives who had to choose not to be gay in the first place.

One more thing: Being approached by men is something women face every day. In fact, we have to deal with notions of "gray areas" when it comes to rape itself. But if a man is even approached, watch out!

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