When the rumor first surfaced that President-elect Barack Obama's transition team was strongly considering union activist Mary Beth Maxwell for secretary of Labor, gay ears perked up. Gay news outlets across the country and around the world covered the story with marked interest. Gay blogs covered every hint and rumor about the selection process. The Human Rights Campaign, which had already endorsed Rep. Linda Sanchez for the job, announced that it would simultaneously endorse Maxwell. Why such fascination? Maxwell, you see, is a lesbian, which is apparently a very important qualification when it comes to the study of ergonomics, implementation of the Walsh-Healey Public Contracts Act, and compliance with the Office of Labor-Management Standards.
My reaction to the news that Maxwell was under serious consideration was less enthusiastic. Whereas the gay press focused almost entirely on Maxwell's attraction to women, the mainstream media was more interested in her ardent support for a deceptively titled bill called the Employee Free Choice Act. Under current labor law, if a union wishes to organize a workplace, it must first win the consent of a simple majority of workers who vote the same way the rest of Americans do biennially on the first Tuesday of November - by secret ballot.
The Employee Free Choice Act would change this. Instead, all a union would need to secure the right of representation is collect cards signed by a bare majority of employees. Armed with a list of workers' names, union organizers would know who has - and who has not - publicly indicated their support for the union. Such a system clearly lends itself to abuse, as union bosses can pressure and intimidate workers into supporting unionization. Maxwell, a longtime union activist, has been one of the most outspoken supporters of the measure.
That Maxwell is sexually attracted to women is all well and good, but her support for the Employee Free Choice Act ought to be more significant. And while it would be nice to have an openly gay cabinet secretary, I'd rather have a straight one who doesn't support this legislation - barring that, anyone who isn't as zealous a proponent of it as Maxwell. Should this opposition to the appointment of an openly gay person - opposition based not a whit on said person's sexuality but rather my sincere beliefs about the damage she could inflict upon the nation's economy - make me a pariah among gays?
Ultimately, Obama passed over Maxwell in favor of Rep. Hilda Solis, who is no less devoted to the Employee Free Choice Act. But in the weeks since this decision was made, gays have grown more vocal in their demand that someone, anyone, gay get a high-level cabinet appointment.
Attention soon turned to Fred Hochberg, a gay man who served in the Small Business Administration under President Clinton, whom gay activists favored for Commerce secretary after the scandal-plagued Bill Richardson withdrew himself from consideration.
"We're not pushing his name just because he's gay," insisted Phil Sousa, the creator of the website EqualRep, which is pressuring the Obama administration into appointing the first openly gay cabinet secretary. "We're pushing his name because he's highly qualified and the fact that he's openly gay is kind of icing on the cake there."
In other words, they're pushing Hochberg because he's gay. Were he not, they wouldn't be pushing him.
While it's important to have openly gay public figures as advocates for equality, role models for the young, and living proof that we are not the depraved perverts our adversaries portray us as, the near-singular focus on obtaining an openly gay cabinet nominee comes at the expense of more important gay rights causes. It essentializes gay people down to their sexual preference.
Inaugurated in 1993 after the nostrums of identity politics had successfully pervaded the media, universities, and popular culture, Bill Clinton was the first president to appoint cabinet secretaries under the rubric of a racial and gender spoils system. Soon after his election, for instance, it was revealed that Clinton would consider only women for the job of attorney general. This poisoned the opening months of his presidency, as insufficient vetting resulted in the scotching of several nominees over a variety of damaging revelations.
It's understandable that gay activists would want openly gay people in high levels of government, and I stand with them. But there's something a bit pathetic in the way gay organizations and the gay media have fixated on the appointment of openly gay individuals. By focusing so heavily on the sexual orientations of the people under consideration, it seems like we're fighting for scraps off the table of the incoming Obama administration. We're looking for a singular trophy when we ought to be fighting for a turkey in every pot, and it reeks of desperation.
According to a recent Advocate.com report by Kerry Eleveld, the leaders of the nation's major gay organizations spent the "bulk of a two-hour meeting" with transition officials last month pressing for the appointment of an openly gay cabinet secretary. Wouldn't their time have been better spent talking about how to pass pro-gay legislation in the upcoming congressional term?
While a cabinet appointment would be a breakthrough, it's hardly the impressive accomplishment that gay groups are portraying it as. Openly gay elected officials like Barney Frank and Tammy Baldwin had to fight their way up the congressional food chain to earn national prominence; they didn't get their jobs thanks to a well-moneyed gay lobby pressuring for their selection.
Indeed, a cabinet appointment is not always a sign of merit; it's often as much, if not more, a result of political favors, a desire to please an important political constituency or a mixture of the two.
But at this point, thanks to the blatant way gay rights groups have gone about campaigning for it, such a selection would be perceived as cynical tokenism. And given all the public pressure directed at Obama to appoint a gay person to a high-profile job, the appointee would automatically be viewed as the recipient of preferential treatment. With so much attention devoted to that appointee's sexuality - as opposed to their actual qualifications - the first openly gay cabinet secretary would be robbed of their individuality, and their accomplishments in office would come second to their sexual orientation.
Like everyone else, gays should be judged by their abilities. This quest for homosexual affirmative action is a throwback to the mau-mauing of women's and ethnic groups during the Clinton administration. As with racial and gender preferences, when important positions are "set aside" for a certain class rather than the most qualified individuals, everyone loses out, not least of which the intended beneficiaries. The obsessive focus on openly gay cabinet appointees risks further ghettoization of gays, as we are compelled to "support" whatever gay figure is foisted upon us by gay organizations irrespective of whether or not we agree with that person's political views.
Gay people have every right to lobby the government to address their concerns. But by demanding that Obama prioritize sexual orientation in the hiring of employees, we diminish ourselves, not just collectively but as individuals.
8 Comments for “Orientation Isn’t a Qualification”
posted by TS on
As bureaucracy grows, the symbolic importance of top officials grows and the importance of their abilities to execute the job description diminishes.
I’d say the first president where the person stopped really mattering was Truman or so. Now we’re at the point where the secretaries don’t matter. The people chosen reflect the priorities of the administration. For the Bush admin, it was to reward cronies and celebrate insider status. For team Obama, it is to get one of every color of the rainbow.
As long as experts with nuanced political priorities and finely honed skills are selected for the sub offices, government should keep working just fine.
Though I do agree that it’s a silly system and we should not be clamoring for a lesbian Labor Sec just because she’s a lesbian, but I don’t think it matters as much as it seems to.
posted by Jennifer doe on
Hi! I really wanted Mary Beth Maxwell because she is a member of our community but also because she understand how the Employee Free Choice Act helps the LBGT community. Currently, in states where there are LBGT workplace protections, the ability to enforce these protections is negligent. Thanks to unions and groups like Pride at Work, we have increase our opptions in the workplace to fight back when we are discriminated against. But we need to increase these protections, and we can’t when there is no democracy in our workplace. Now when workers go to form a union employers use every tactic they can, legal and illegal, to sniff out who support the union and to intimidate the workforce. By the time the election happens, employers know who is voting what, and 1 in 3 union drives workers have been fired for supporting the organizing drive. It is like voting in a dictatorship- “you like paying your mortgage, having a job, not being picked on? Well I am the boss and you can vote my way or lose these things.” – Please! keep the right wing propaganda down thank you and be centrist.
posted by Bobby on
What do you expect, Kirchick? You want people to be judged by the content of their character? Puh-leeze, it’s all about race, gender, sexual orientation and national origin now.
I work in advertising, a profession based on talent, yet now the diversity nazis are complaining that we don’t have enough minorities. We don’t have enough white people playing basketball, but I guess diversity doesn’t work that way. So when it comes to political appointments, the immaculate Obama plays the same game. Our “historic” black president-elect is already going to cost us $160 million dollars for his “historic” inauguration. It’s funny, the second time Bush got inaugurated it only cost $44 million and the liberals complained about wasting money! But now that the messiah has been elected, it’s all good.
But don’t worry gays, I’m sure Obama will appoint some gays to low level cabinet positions, and then The Advocate will shower Obama, the most merciful, with praise. Obama bless America! All hail his holiness, B. Hussein Obama as Ann Coulter calls him.
posted by just the facts... on
Obama himself supports the Employee Free Choice Act, and thus you are quite naive to think that he might choose a Secretary of Labor that does not. Presidents get to choose cabinet members tht support the president’s positions — in this case the Free Choice Act (which allows a majority to get a union, as it should be). You lost the election. Get over it! Of course Obama would pick an EFCA supporter, either LGBT or straight. Also, though not that I think you care about facts or the rule of law, your description of current labor law is just plain wrong. You write that “Under current labor law…” there must be a secret ballot. Wrong! Under current law, majorities are allowed to sign up for a union by signing cards, just as it will be after the Free Choice Act becomes law.
posted by Bobby on
“You lost the election. Get over it!”
—Like you democrats got over Bush “stealing the election” the first time and getting re-elected the second time. People like you have treated Bush like crap, and now you expect us to give Obama a pass? Hypocrite. You’re like John Edwards telling people not to drive SUV’s while he’s living in a gigantic power hungry house and flying private planes.
And by the way, the so-called Free Choice Act is a terrible idea. It forces union voting to be public, giving labor unions the power to intimidate anyone who doesn’t vote for them. But whatever, go ahead and join your union, I hope you like paying $50 or more in union dues. Just don’t bitch when the union decides to cut people’s salaries to save the company like its happening in the airline industry.
posted by avee on
Jennifer’s argument for legislatively killing the use of secret ballots for union elections is a strange one indeed. She appears to be saying that the secret ballot must be done away with because it’s necessary to protect gay workers through unions, and if workers can vote by secret ballot, they might vote against the union, which would be bad. So, because workers won’t vote for what’s in their best interest (or the best interest, in her view, of gay workers), bye bye Democracy and secret ballots. Welcome to the age of Obama!
posted by TS on
“B. Hussein Obama as Ann Coulter calls him.”
Umm… did you seriously just suggest that adopting a practice initiated by Ann Coulter, the raging venomous anti-gay swine, is a good idea.
I was agreeing with everything you said right up to then. I voted for Obama, mostly because I am a stalwart opponent of the Republican outlook on foreign policy and conception of the War on Terror, but I think the idolatry is absurd. But now I see that he is an even bigger charlatan than I was prepared for. If I were elected president, my speech would be: “We are 10 trillion dollars in debt. Our economy is tanking. Everybody is anxious about whether the worldwide free market is simply finished. Our military personnel are sacrificing their lives and limbs in an effort to stop foreign civil wars because the prior president was a short sighted moron. Oh, and by the way, by causing and participating in those civil wars we have killed some hundred thousand citizens of those foreign countries, the rest of whom now hate our guts. The electorate in this country still have idiotic attitudes about religious and moral issues. Minorities in this country, having finally broken through the unfair systems meant to keep them away from justice, have decided to go for broke, thumb their noses at a universal offer of full equality, and demand reparations. Fear of liability and leverage are grinding all our institutions to a halt. Nobody knows what to tell the children, so people have just plain stopped having them. No fucking parties. No $150 million love fests. If you want to party, go to a fucking bar and help yourself to lots of beverages until nobody wants to party anymore.”
What do you think? Do I sound electable? Would you vote for me?
posted by Bobby on
I think you’re a moderate, TS. I like libertarians and conservatives. I disagree with your views against foreign wars. Bush was an isolationist until 9/11, a lot of people forget that, he didn’t bring us to war, the war was brought unto us.
You should read Ann Coulter before attacking her, you might find yourself agreeing with 99% of what she says. I could have the same attitude against Pat Buchanan, an enemy of Israel and no friend of gays, but sometimes he’s right and so I give him credit.