David Brock, the head of the left-progressive and George Soros funded Media Matters group, which basically attacks Fox News 24/7—often disingenuously (e.g., for reporting that there actually are two sides to the global warming debate)—has announced the formation of a tangent effort called Equality Matters. The new group will be led by Richard Socarides, who served as Bill Clinton’s special assistant on gay issues. From Brock’s announcement:
Despite huge progress in gay rights in recent years, exemplified by the historic vote this weekend finally striking down the ban on gay men and women from serving in the military, we are now living through a period of ferocious fundamentalism in the Republican Party and the conservative movement. Traditional conservatives and the Tea Party movement are united only in their contempt for equal rights for all Americans and a desire to return America to a 19th century idyll. Equality Matters will not allow these latter-day ‘clerics’ to gain serious recognition by the media nor influence the policies that affect the lives of every American. . . .
The purpose here is to demonize fiscally conservative Tea Party supporters as the equivalent of the Klan. The aim is to keep gay votes firmly tied to the party of gargantuan government spending and politically controlled redistribution (the Soros/Media Matters agenda). The result will be to dissuade limited government conservatives and Republicans who are rightly revulsed by Brock from positively viewing the fight for gay equality.
It’s a shame that someone as intelligent albeit partisan as Richard Socarides will be leading such a counter-productive effort.
More. “Another Steve” responds to comments defending Brock with the following:
the Tea Party agenda is to reduce government spending and support limited government. No Tea Party groups are promoting social issues–it’s not what they are about. Yes, individual Tea Party people might be socially conservative (not all; there are many, many liberterians, like me, who attend Tea Party events), but it is not what the movement is about.
So if you attack “the Tea Party movement,” as Brock does, you are attacking limited goverment conservatives, like me. You are saying that I am a bigot and racist because I oppose what’s happened to the size and cost of government. It’s the worst sort of smear.
Yes, it is. And it’s by an organization that purports to fight misinformation and stereotypes.
31 Comments for “An Effort We Don’t Need”
posted by Rodney Hoffman on
Hmmm. The Equality Matters folks said *nothing* about fiscal conservatives, Tea Party or otherwise.
You seem to be saying that Equality Matters is assuming that all Tea Partiers are anti-gay bigots. But you are similarly assuming that none of them are. You denial that *some* (I would even say most) Tea Partiers are anti-gay bigots is just as bad!
posted by AndrewW on
Equality Matters wrongly believes they simply have to catch homophobes and bigots and then publicly humiliate them. They believe they need to attack a small segment of the population INSTEAD of embracing the majority of Americans that would support our full equality.
They haven’t released much financial information yet, but it will be telling. This organization seems more intent in continuing the “argument” about LGBT people than solving the problem. Their strategy has nothing to do with EQUALITY and everything to do with prolonging the FIGHT.
The fight is over. the majority of our fellow citizens support our full equality UNLESS you insert religion or politics into the conversation – Equality Matters is doing BOTH.
posted by Tom on
Stephen: The purpose here is to demonize fiscally conservative Tea Party supporters as the equivalent of the Klan.
Do you have any evidence at all to back up this contention?
It certainly isn’t evident from Socarides’ statement of purpose or the website’s coverage to date.
posted by Jimmy on
“Counter-productive” is a relative term.
Anything that offers a counter the Scaife, Koch Bros., Washington Times fascist propaganda power base, which Brock was an inside member of at one point, is fine with me.
posted by another steve on
Rodney comments: The Equality Matters folks said *nothing* about fiscal conservatives, Tea Party or otherwise
David Brock’s statement says: “Traditional conservatives and the Tea Party movement are united only in their contempt for equal rights for all Americans .”
Rodney, the Tea Party agenda is to reduce government spending and support limited government. No Tea Party groups are promoting social issues–it’s not what they are about. Yes, individual Tea Party people might be socially conservative (not all; there are many, many liberterians, like me, who attend Tea Party events), but it is not what the movement is about .
So if you attack “the Tea Party movement,” as Brock does, you are attacking limited goverment conservatives, like me. You are saying that I am a bigot and racist because I oppose what’s happened to the size and cost of government. It’s the worst sort of smear.
posted by BobN on
David Brock’s statement says: “Traditional conservatives and the Tea Party movement are united only in their contempt for equal rights for all Americans .”
And that statement is correct, isn’t it? The only overlap between these two groups is a cluster of social issues. Traditional Republicans have already betrayed the fiscally conservative with their deal on tax cuts. There’s no common ground there. There’s none on foreign policy either. There’s limiting Obama to one term, but there’s little controversy on the right on that score.
Abortion and gay rights are pretty much the only two major issues where there is strong overlap between traditional Republicans and Tea Party Republicans.
A hint to gay GOP supporters like Miller: if you spent even a little bit of the time you dedicate to hysteria about Dems and focused just a little bit on the anti-gay fear-mongering from some on the right, there wouldn’t be a need for this effort…
posted by BobN on
It’s the worst sort of smear.
I would think being lumped with pedophiles would be worse…
posted by Tom on
another steve: So if you attack “the Tea Party movement,” as Brock does, you are attacking limited goverment conservatives, like me. You are saying that I am a bigot and racist because I oppose what’s happened to the size and cost of government. It’s the worst sort of smear.
Brock’s sloppy (and therefore stupid) choice of words aside, there his no evidence on the site that Equality Matters is concerned with anything other than accuracy in media on gay and lesbian issues. There is no indication at all that I can see that Equality Matters is going after Tea Party or limited government advocates on other issues.
Stephen, I would note, quoted only the first paragraph of the Brock statement. In the second paragraph, Brock makes clear that Equality Matters “will expose right-wing bigotry and homophobia [emphasis mine] wherever we find it”.
If Tea Party or limited government advocates start gay-bashing, Equality Matters will, presumably, go after them on the gay-bashing. If they don’t, presumably Equality Matters won’t mention them at all. In my view, that’s well and good.
We have seen, I think it is fair to say, a marked increase in lies about gays and lesbians in the rhetoric of recent months. Most of it goes unchallenged. It cannot hurt, in my view, to challenge it.
I suppose we can argue back and forth about what Equality Matters might or might not do, but it might make sense to keep our drawers out of a knot for a few months and see what they actually do.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Don’t you just love how desperate Tom is to spin?
Here’s some facts for you, Tom. Here’s your boy Brock speaking.
Traditional conservatives and the Tea Party movement are united only in their contempt for equal rights for all Americans and a desire to return America to a 19th century idyll. Equality Matters will not allow these latter-day ‘clerics’ to gain serious recognition by the media nor influence the policies that affect the lives of every American.
And it gets better.
Despite our best efforts over the years to stiffen the spines of progressives in the face of unrelenting smears from the Republican attack machine, fearful progressives continue to cede the political field to right-wingers who are waging war against core American values.
Did you hear that, Tom? Your boy Brock says Tea Party participants are “waging war against core American values”. Your boy Brock says all your neighbors who agree with the Tea Party are “clerics” who want to take the United States back to the 19th century.
And what else?
We need to do more. Our new communications war room for gay equality, Equality Matters, will expose right-wing bigotry and homophobia wherever we find it, show that the real political vulnerability on these issues belongs to the GOP, provide a desperately needed ballast in the media, and trigger progressive passion – so that our political leaders act on their convictions and fight for them.
Notice that? Brock only cares about “right wing” and “GOP”. No balance. Pure partisanship and hate. Pure anti-Tea Party bigotry.
No surprise that you support him, Tom. No surprise at all.
And you know what? The people of Wisconsin know what you think of them. They know that you endorse and support Brock. They know that you think they are all 19th-century clerics who hate American values.
And that’s why they kicked you and your bigot buddy Brock’s Obama Party out of office.
posted by Carl on
Is there any real reason to believe that the Tea Party will cause the GOP to focus more on limiting the role of government? I haven’t seen any genuine movement from major Congressional Republicans to get rid of pork. Most of the Tea Party candidates who were elected also seem to be socially conservative.
“The result will be to dissuade limited government conservatives and Republicans who are rightly revulsed by Brock from positively viewing the fight for gay equality.”
If anyone bases their view of gay equality on one organization then in my opinion they weren’t all that supportive to begin with. There will always be some group out there who says or does something which will revulse someone. Generally the only people who are going to pay attention to David Brock are people who already have a strong opinion on the matter, one way or the other.
posted by Tom on
I suspect that “repulsion” about David Brock’s (or George Soros’ or …) involvement in Equality Matters as the reason why a person “cannot” support legal equality for gays and lesbians will be nothing more than a convenient excuse in most cases, I suspect.
The question is whether Equality Matters will confine its activities to its stated franchise — countering the lies and slanders of the right-wing noise machine about gays and lesbians. If it does so, it will serve a useful purpose in my view. If it goes outside its franchise, it will not serve a useful purpose.
For all my chiding Stephen on this and that over the years, I agree with the core principle he espouses — gays and lesbians should refuse to let ourselves be locked into any other political agenda, liberal, moderate or conservative.
Instead, we should, in my view, be absolutely single-minded and relentless in our pursuit of equality for gays and lesbians, with the same singleness of purpose that the NRA, of which I am a life member, operates in the political spectrum.
Singleness of purpose entails, necessarily, that we do not concern ourselves with other political agendas.
To my mind, that entails four closely-related principles of action:
(1) we encourage support from all sides of the political spectrum, however much we may disagree with this side or that on other issues,
(2) we do not concern ourselves with collateral damage (e.g. the effect of support from liberals on conservatives, or the effect of support from conservatives on liberals),
(3) we be relentless in our political actions, supporting politicians who support us and opposing politicians who oppose us, regardless of political party, and
(4) we be forthright about our single-mindedness.
So, to my mind, it is not our legitimate concern if, as Stephen fears, “The result will be to dissuade limited government conservatives and Republicans who are rightly revulsed by Brock from positively viewing the fight for gay equality.” We cannot walk on eggshells in this fight.
posted by Jorge on
Barf. I think very little of MediaMatters. They are an embarassment to evidence-based thinking. You can refute a lot of things it reports by looking elsewhere within its own site. MediaMatters has a very intellectually annoying habit of interpreting objective neutrality as partisanship and interpreting giving fair treatment to both sides as partisanship toward the conservative side while ignoring the fair treatment given to the progressive side. It’s given rise in my opinion to a lot of stupid thinking among the internet and possibly the country at large–too many people are not interested in any exploration or discussion of a topic that is not an overwhelming validation of their side.
But I have my issues with GOProud, too. I don’t think it’s a bad thing to have the loony left among gays speak in one voice and force GOProud and LCR to counter and defeat them if necessary.
posted by Jorge on
One point of clarification.
The reason the thinking MediaMatters engages in is stupid thinking is because any honest discussion of an issue is going to expose the weaknesses of one’s position. MediaMatters thinking consistently interprets identifying a position’s weakness as a partisan attack against a cause or identity group. This weakens that cause or group’s credibility and ability to grow
posted by John on
Am I the only one that remembers a few weeks ago when GoProud sent that letter to incoming Tea Party republicans saying “please don’t hate, yo” and many Tea Party groups responded saying “let’s hate more, yo”?
posted by Jorge on
Looks like it.
posted by Carl on
If we’re talking about policies which might actually affect people (which I don’t believe David Brock’s stuff will do), it looks like a Virginia legislator is trying to pass a state version of DADT.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/virginiapolitics/2010/12/following_this_weekends_vote_b.html
While Gov. McDonnell is so far saying he will go along with the DADT repeal which passed Congress, I think we might see this pop up in other states, and some politicians are hard right enough to where this might get passed in some places.
posted by Carl on
Looks like someone in the Senate tried to push through an amendment at the last minute that would have made it tougher to repeal DADT.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/21/last-ditch-move-to-block-repeal-of-dont-ask-dont-tell/?partner=rss&emc=rss
posted by Tom on
You’ve seen the reaction from the religious right — absolute fury. We’ll see more of this from Republicans as DADT implementation unfolds during the course of 2011.
posted by Jorge on
You’ve seen the reaction from the religious right — absolute fury. We’ll see more of this from Republicans as DADT implementation unfolds during the course of 2011.
Have we really?
That at least some people would respond with hostility and attempts to backlash or sabotage the policy was inevitable. But you are generalizing, claiming that angry, bigoted reactions are widespread when in fact there is no such evidence. And certainly no evidence presented on this site that it comes directly from the religious right. You’ll have to do a lot better than that.
posted by Tom on
Jorge, haven’t you been following World Net Daily or the statements from the FRC, AFA, CWA and other religious right organizations at all? The reaction has been fierce and unrelenting.
Whether or not across-the-board outrage from the major organizations of the religious right is enough to be considered “widespread”, I leave up to you to decide. But the fact is that the religious right, and many social conservatives, are calling for defunding and other delay/destroy tactics.
The Freedom Foundation’s Matt Staver, for example, had this to say: “We believe they’ve slapped the military in the face and have betrayed the men and women in the service by using the military to push the homosexual agenda. We will ask the House to refuse to fund the repeal, which will take millions of dollars to fund. We will mobilize our constituents to make those who betrayed our military and the national interest pay for what they’ve done on the eve of Christmas.”
The FRC echoed: “There’s no obligation for Congress to fund any of this. Congress has a voice here. They are the ones who set the rules and regulations for the military. Their primary obligation is to protect the armed forces … If they fail to, the consequences in terms of retention and recruiting could be devastating to the country.”
Maybe I’m overly concerned that Republicans in Congress won’t blow them off. But if they do blow them off, there will be political retribution.
Bryan Fischer over at the AFA, for example, is calling for purge of the Republicans who voted for repeal, saying:
posted by avee on
It is unclear from the NY Times blog item which “Republicans” proposed the amendment. All of them? One of them? Who knows, but that doesn’t stop the paper from stating that “Republicans tried one last legislative maneuver to block the change,” or HRC from stating “It’s a total end run by the Republicans.”
Not all Senate “Republicans” proposed this amendment. But instead of buidling on the vote by 8 GOP senators for repeal (with 3 additional GOP abstentions), the NY Times and HRC are happy to attack all Republicans. Terrible strategy for building future support; great for HRC’s fundraising.
posted by Tom on
For what it is worth, Politico says that McConnell and McCain were behind the amendment, and Lieberman blocked it.
posted by BobN on
When 80% of a caucus votes against something, it is entirely appropriate practice not to qualify every reference to the actions of that strong majority with a list of exactly who did what.
Now, if you can manage to change the way America talks — and I do hope you apply your complaint to more than just the NYT — I’d back you 100%. I prefer the old days when newspapers always put a D, R, or I behind a politicians name and routinely reported votes with party breakdown.
Good luck with that.
posted by Jorge on
Jorge, haven’t you been following World Net Daily or the statements from the FRC, AFA, CWA and other religious right organizations at all?
Nope.
I only follow this site, the AP via Yahoo, Fox News, and occasionally my local paper and certain columnists on the internet. I only go to other organizations when I have a specific question.
But you’ll do in a pinch. Thank you so much for encouraging me to stay in the bubble of this site.
posted by Tom on
Well, for what its worth, Jorge, Tony Perkins confirms that the FRC will be working hand-in-hand with McCain to (in Perkins’ words) “turn back” the repeal or “slow down or stop” DADT implementation:
I watch the religious right like a hawk — as far as gays and lesbians are concerned, they are up to no good — and I try to track them from their own websites and press releases.
posted by Carl on
I saw that too, Tom. TPM says a McCain source told them “the law has been changed.” Maybe that means he’s going to focus on other issues.
I do hope those who helped get this repeal through will be ready for sustained efforts to reverse it because there are a lot of organizations out there, and probably some politicians who work with them, who will try to make a big case out of this. The idea of a law that says gays are the same as anyone else is something that goes against everything they believe in and everything they raise money off of.
FRC is trying to get “sexual assault statistics.” They probably believe that stories of gay soldiers going around raping men will get the public on their side.
posted by Tom on
I think we can count on the FRC and the religious right in general to do whatever they can to derail successful DADT implementation.
The FRC is particularly dangerous because Tony Perkins is silky-smooth, well connected within the Republican Party (the Values Voters Summit and so on) and, like Ralph Reed, has that boyish, All-American charm he uses for cover.
Perkins is a very effective spokesman, unlike the blunter instruments — Peter Sprigg and Bryan Fischer, for example — who come across as hot, angry and irrational.
I don’t know how this will play out in the next Congress. The new Congress will be significantly more socially conservative than the current Congress. The new Congress has a higher number of Republicans, and the Republicans elected this election cycle have a higher percentage of hard-core social conservatives than in past years. So Perkins and the FRC will have fertile ground to plow.
In the end, I don’t think that it will be possible to overturn DADT repeal. The veto is a big stick, however quietly President Obama may walk around carrying it. But the religious right, with its extensive media and close ties to the radical element of the Republican Party has the ability to queer the facts, so to speak, and make a hell of a lot of trouble along the way.
We can count on a fierce effort from the FRC and similar groups on the religious right. The religious right understands, as we do, that open service is the keystone of our struggle for legal equality. The American people hold military service in high regard and will not long deny full citizenship to men and women who put their lives on the line. The religious right has to derail repeal to block our movement toward equality.
The critical nature of the issue is highlighted by the Republican platform, quoted by Bryan Fischer: “Esprit and cohesion are necessary for military effectiveness and success on the battlefield. To protect our servicemen and women and ensure that America’s Armed Forces remain the best in the world, we affirm the timelessness of those values, the benefits of traditional military culture, and the incompatibility of homosexuality with military service.”
Notice that the platform speaks of “incompatibility of homosexuality with military service”, period. It doesn’t speak of open service or hidden service. It speaks of service.
From a political perspective, the platform isn’t just backwards, unthinking prejudice on the part of social conservatives, any more than the calls for re-criminalization of sodomy in three state Republican platforms.
As Justice Scalia noted in his Lawrence dissent, if sodomy laws are unconstitutional, then the constitutional path to legal equality — in marriage and other matters — is straight foward. Similarly, if the American public perceives that gays and lesbians serve on an equal footing with straights, the cultural and political path to equality is relatively straightforward, too.
In the long run, DADT repeal is an enormous step forward for gays and lesbians, just as military service in World War II was for Catholics and later military service was for African-Americans.
DADT was the rug under which the service of gays and lesbians could be hidden from public view. Open service removes the rug. That, to the religious right and other social conservatives, is the crux of the matter. We serve — or, more accurately, are perceived to serve on an equal footing — and they lose. It is that simple.
The Republican Party has an interesting political problem on DADT repeal going forward. On the one hand, the American people backed repeal in large numbers, and going forward, this is an issue that most people want to put to rest. On the other, the Republican base has a very high percentage of religious and social conservatives, single-minded in opposition to legal equaity and determined not to allow equal service to stand, unwilling to let it be put to rest.
How the Republican Party will try thread the needle between demands of the base for massive resistance and the desires of the American people at large will be fascinating.
posted by Carl on
The GOP will have a lot of cover if they do try to make life difficult for gays in the military, because the media insists this is a “controversial” issue and parrot the social conservative line that a lot of the public doesn’t support repeal. And a lot of people will probably think the matter is closed and not focus on any efforts by social conservatives and their allies in legislatures to push through anti-gay laws. I guess we’ll see whether they will focus more on other matters or if those in Congress like Vicki Hartzler who won based on things like opposing repeal will make big waves in anti-gay laws.
posted by BobN on
FRC is trying to get “sexual assault statistics.” They probably believe that stories of gay soldiers going around raping men will get the public on their side.
A real reporting of sexual assault in the military would certainly open a lot of eyes around this country. But the FRC won’t report reality. They’ll report assaults against gay men as “homosexual assaults”. After all, the men shoving the broomstick up the ass of the barracks queer are men, right?
They already do this with all their “predatory homosexuals” disinformation about prison rape.
posted by AndrewW on
So, there is support for attacking the minority – the religious nutcases, instead of enrolling the majority that would support our full equality.
Anger doesn’t accomplish anything and this latest effort is based in politics, not an authentic effort to create our full equality. Socarides is just engaged in more Democratic politics. This isn’t about us, it is about prolonging the argument. They make money from the argument – including Socarides, who has a salary of +$400,000 in this new scheme.
posted by Tom on
AndrewW: So, there is support for attacking the minority – the religious nutcases, instead of enrolling the majority that would support our full equality.
Two thoughts, Andrew.
First, there is a difference between exposing and correcting lies, falsehood and slander, on the one hand, and “attacking the minority”, on the other. It is possible to expose and answer without attacking.
Second, there is no conflict, that I can see, between exposing and correcting lies, falsehood and slander, on the one hand, and “enrolling the majority”, on the other.
We may be dealing with “religious nutcases” — Bryan Fischer, who I quoted above, counts as one, in my view — but we are dealing with powerful “religious nutcases”.
For example, the AFA, of which Bryan Fischer (quoted by me above) is the most prominent spokesman, publishes the AFA Journal (1800,000 subscribers, plus online readers), American Family Radio (200 stations), and OneNewsNow.com, a web media outlet with an unknown readership.
Fischer has a skewed (and, I might add, viciously hostile) view of gays and lesbians, but he is not Peter LaBarbera, a fringer out of Illinois who the media rightfully ignores, for the most part. Fischer has a strong media presence, and spreads his dreck on mainstream media. He has the mantle of “respectability”, although his views are often indistinguishable from LaBarbera’s.
Add Tony Perkins and the FRC (sponsor of the Values Voters Summit) to the mix, and you’ve got a significant voice of the current Republican primary base.
I think that gays and lesbians need to challenge the false, misleading and often slanderous statements of the AFA, the FRC and other similar groups, for the same reason that Catholics need to challenge anti-Catholic dreck and Jews need to challenge anti-Semitic dreck. Lies, unchallenged, become “truth” in the minds of people who don’t have the time or the inclination, perhaps, to sort things out for themselves.
The controversy in this case seems to come because anti-gay media statements are being challenged by the left and not the right. That, it seems to me, is easy to rectify — start challenging from the right.
The conservative voice in our country is important, for many reasons. But it is near silent when it comes to challenging the anti-gay excesses of social conservatives. I don’t know why, and I would like to see that situation change as quickly as possible.
But I don’t see anything wrong with the left challenging from their perspective, whether the right chooses to or not. I’ve taken a look at Equality Matters (particularly the EMTV area of the website) and it seems to me that the statements EMTV is challenging need to be challenged.