‘We’re not trying to … sneak the left’s agenda into the conservative movement.”
Those are the words of GOProud’s Christopher Barron in explaining why the very, very conservative Andrew Breitbart, as well as Grover Norquist, Ann Coulter and others have given genuine support to a group of openly gay Republicans. Chris Geidner’s first rate and exquisitely fair reporting for Metro Weekly gives both the left and the right — and the really far right — room to make their points. GOProud obviously isn’t everyone’s cup of Darjeeling, but they are not the enemy of the gay movement. The only ones who need to worry about them are those Republicans who want to purge the party of any open homosexuals.
The heart of GOProud’s position is this:
“The problem is that the gay left has decided what qualifies as pro-gay and what qualifies as anti-gay, and a whole bunch of the stuff that they think qualifies as pro-gay, I don’t think has anything to do with being pro-gay,” says Barron. ”And, a whole bunch of stuff that they think is anti-gay, I don’t think is anti-gay at all.”
This is clearly anathema to the gay left, which has too frequently tarred anyone who questions any proposal they put forth as acting in bad faith. But it also teases out the problem Log Cabin has had among Republicans. In order to get along with the leadership of the gay left — which is pretty much the leadership of the gay rights movement thus far — LCR has supported laws that purport to help lesbians and gay men, from ENDA to hate crimes laws to anti-bullying bills. These proposals run counter to the genuinely conservative impulses of a strong (and I think the best) conservative philosophy espoused by Republicans. Government power necessarily relies on politics, and in a culture war, those politics can get corrosive when they’re not outright dangerous. In a vibrant democracy political power is dynamic; as its contours shift, the changes can intensify cultural divisions rather than resolving them.
Democrats tend to believe government has an extraordinary ability to solve, or at least ease, problems, and we Dems can minimize the consequences those power shifts cause, usually by pretending they will not occur. LCR was no liberal bastion, but they developed decent working relationships with the Democratic problem solvers.
That coalition had some success in enacting hate crimes laws, AIDS programs and other accomplishments. DADT would not have been repealed without LCR’s help, particularly in the form of their lawsuit against the federal government. But DADT, like DOMA, is different in kind from ENDA and its legislative brethren. ENDA asks the government to help ease discrimination; DADT and DOMA are, themselves, discrimination by the government that purports to be neutral with respect to all citizens.
GOProud can be disingenuous, and that’s clear when it comes to marriage. Barron says his group opposes DOMA, but on grounds of federalism, not equality. The implication is that the constitution’s guarantee of equality does not apply to homosexuality. That’s something I certainly don’t agree with, but it would be a good question to put to GOProud.
In any event, the tawdry accusations that GOProud is anti-gay or even self-hating are hard to make stick to Barron and Jimmy LaSalvia, his partner in crime. No one can accuse them of being closeted or lacking in political interest. They have a vision of what is and is not a proper role for government that is respectable and (at least what we’ve been able to see of it) fairly consistent. It is not the Democrats’ vision of government, but why should it be? Their opposition to hate crimes laws and ENDA and other social tinkering by the federal government is not an attempt to disguise some other political motives, nor are they giving cover to people whose revulsion derives from a fundamental opposition to homosexuals.
GOProud proves that there is no necessary connection between conservatism and homophobia, an assumption that has been the foundation of the religious right’s incursion into the Republican party. GOProud is short-circuiting it, and the sparks are flying.
How could that not be a good thing?
26 Comments for “Real Political Action at CPAC”
posted by Houndentenor on
What is GOProud’s agenda? I am confused by Barron’s statements and just wonder what, if any, gay rights they are willing to stand up for?
and while I understand the libertarian objection to employment nondiscrimination laws, I have yet to hear the call from a major GOP leader for the repeal of those laws with respect to women and ethnic minorities, so opposing adding gays to ENDA is a little disingenuous, isn’t it?
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Why should GOProud or the Republican Party care what bigots and hatemongers like yourself think, Houndentenor?
posted by Houndentenor on
Where’s the hate in that? That’s an accurate assessment of gay conservatives. I have no idea what they are FOR, only what they are against and that’s anything remotely “liberal”.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Of course you don’t, Houndentenor, because as a bigot, you seriously believe that all gay and lesbian people should think and act the same way as you do, and if they don’t, you think they’re irrational.
posted by Houndentenor on
LOL.
Still no answer to the question…what is GOProud FOR?
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
And really, isn’t it hilarious to watch proven antireligious bigots whine about how they wish they could discriminate against religious people?
You’d think gays and lesbians would have read the Constitution, but clearly they haven’t, given their whining that it contains a gay-sex marriage clause but doesn’t have any prohibitions against discrimination on the basis of religious belief.
posted by Houndentenor on
How does that make me a bigot? I’m speaking from experience. I watched gay men marry unsuspecting women and make a mess of both their lives. Where in that post did I claim that I wanted to discriminate against religious people?
You put in a lot of energy to try to make me sound like I said things I didn’t say and have never said.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Oh, that’s easy — for example:
As anyone who ever attended a “Christian” school already knows, the only guys agreeing not to have sex with their girlfriend before marriage are the guys who actually don’t want to have sex with her because they’re gay.
You make gross generalizations about something based solely on religious belief. Normally you would shriek that anyone who did that about gays was a bigot, but of course, you won’t apply the same standards to your own behavior that you do to others.
And then you do it again.
Half the other guys wind up in shotgun weddings when their girlfriends get pregnant (because that abstinence only education is SO effective).
Looks like the mask fell and the bigotry came out.
posted by Houndentenor on
What I said was based on actual experience. I was raised fundamentalist and went to school at a Baptist University. I know what I’m talking about. I witnessed the hypocrisy first hand. Every time we turn around a religious leader is getting caught in a sex scandal, and those are just the ones that can’t be swept under the rug. (Many victims are paid off.) Do you deny that this happens?
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Thus, since gays and lesbians are always getting caught raping and molesting children, and these are just the ones that can’t be swept under the rug and paid off, it’s pretty clear that all gays and lesbians are child molesters.
And while we’re going down that pathway, I’ve lived in San Francisco, I’ve seen how gays and lesbians like yourself dress up children and take them to sex fairs and how you masturbate and have sex in public showers and steam rooms. I’ve witnessed how gays and lesbians like you behave first-hand and based on actual experience.
Do you deny that happens? Then it’s a fair statement to say that all gays are child molesters and perverts who have public sex, just like you say all guys who agree not to have sex with their girlfriends before marriage are gay and how all the others wind up in shotgun weddings because abstinence-only education doesn’t work.
posted by Tom on
GOProud proves that there is no necessary connection between conservatism and homophobia, an assumption that has been the foundation of the religious right’s incursion into the Republican party. GOProud is short-circuiting it, and the sparks are flying. How could that not be a good thing?
Its a good thing, of course. The question is whether that, in and of itself, will do anything to move the Republican Party off its past and current “culture wars” course. GOProud seems to me to be avoiding the fight as much as anything else.
For example, GOProud is sliding around the question of marriage equality, treating the issue as a state issue (which it is) but stopping there, taking no position at all that I can discern, about the issue in the states. The action is in the states, as we all know, not at the federal level. So while it is a fine thing to stand strong against the Federal Marriage Amendment, there isn’t a chance in hell that the FMA could make it through Congress at this point, so that is tilting at a windmill.
Similarly, GOProud stands for privatizing social security, and says, correctly, that private retirement accounts are freely inheritable, helping gays and lesbians. Well, maybe and maybe not, depending on how the estate tax laws go in the future and how long DOMA hangs around. And GOProud’s “solution” doesn’t address the question of whether married gays and lesbians should or shouldn’t be treated equally with respect to social security survivor’s benefits.
In fact, the GOProud legislative agenda doesn’t say a word about Section 3 of DOMA, even though that is clearly a federal issue, and completely inconsistent with the principle that marriage law should be a state, not a federal, issue.
I think that GOProud is trying to do what gay and lesbian Democrats did in the mid-1970’s, trying to get a seat at the Republican table, and doing so by ruffling as few feathers as possible. I think the time for that is long past. The American people have changed, and it is not longer an act of political courage to stand for equality.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
The problem is, Tom, by talking about tax laws, GOProud demonstrates that there is another way other than gay-sex marriage to get what you and your fellow liberal gays are whining about.
They make you look like a fool and reveal that your whines are more about pushing gay-sex marriage than they are anything else.
Besides, Tom, gay and lesbian liberals like yourself regularly shriek and demand that taxes be RAISED and that tax breaks are rewarding the “rich”. You think people don’t notice the fact that you are demanding that THEY pay more taxes while you try to dodge your own?
posted by esurience on
“GOProud proves that there is no necessary connection between conservatism and homophobia”
I think they’ve proved that there is a connection between conservatives and homophobia. As you point out, this is a conservative organization, not a gay-activist or gay-rights organization.
Anyway, I’ll believe that conservatives are consistent and principled when they start making the case to the public that we need to get rid of anti-discrimination protections on the basis of race and sex, and yes, here’s the kicker: RELIGION (which is certainly the least justifiable anti-discrimination protection).
I’ll still think that they’re the wrong principles and that they’re philosophically unjustified, but at least they’ll be consistent up to a point.
They’re a group of conservatives who just happen to be gay. And that’s too much for a lot of conservatives.
It looks like they might get kicked out of CPAC afterall. And for what? For defending themselves against the hate groups that think they should be kicked out of CPAC. That’s the new rationale for removing them from CPAC.
posted by Tom on
It looks like they might get kicked out of CPAC afterall. And for what? For defending themselves against the hate groups that think they should be kicked out of CPAC. That’s the new rationale for removing them from CPAC.
The ostensible problem arose out of a February 9 interview that Chris Barron gave to the Metropolitan Weekly. Among other things, he said:
Barron later apologized for his characterization of Cleta Mitchell, but not Tony Perkins: ““For the past six months, we have watched as unfair and untrue attacks have been leveled against our organization, our allies, our friends and sometimes even their families. Everyone has their breaking point and clearly in my interview with Metro Weekly I had reached mine. I shouldn’t have used the language that I did to describe Cleta Mitchell and for that I apologize.”
Whether the apology will calm the water or not, I don’t know, and I can’t say I’ve ever heard of Cleta Mitchell. But Barron’s apology makes one thing clear enough — it is not only those of us in the center and on the left who have had the experience of being lied about by anti-gay social conservatives . If Maggie and Tony have a truthful bone left in their bodies, it isn’t anywhere near the surface. These folks have gone over the edge.
posted by Throbert McGee on
She’s a conservative DC lawyer who led the fight to block same-sex marriage in DC by having it put on the ballot as a referendum issue. DC already had a domestic-partnership law at the time, so if believing that DP laws should only be “upgraded” to SSM by popular referendum makes someone a nasty bigot, then clearly Ms. Mitchell qualifies. (Though I think that’s setting the Nasty Bigot threshold ridiculously low.)
posted by John on
For some reason I really doubt that’s the whole story: http://hotlineoncall.nationaljournal.com/archives/2010/12/social-conserva-1.php
What the whole story is? No clue. But as far as I recall GOProud never took a strong stance either way about the DC fiasco, so I have strong doubts that Barron, whatever other faults he may or may not have, would attack her on that basis alone.
posted by Throbert McGee on
Let’s remember that when he attacked Mitchell, he was speaking to a reporter from a DC-based gay magazine, as opposed to someone from a Chicago-based gay magazine, or from a DC-based mag that wasn’t specifically targeted to a gay readership.
To readers of Metro Weekly, Cleta Mitchell is a “local enemy” — so Barron may have been inclined to attack her just to ingratiate himself with the audience.
posted by BobN on
Someone who wants to dissolve other people’s marriages IS a bigot.
posted by BobN on
But it also teases out the problem Log Cabin has had among Republicans. In order to get along with the leadership of the gay left — which is pretty much the leadership of the gay rights movement thus far — LCR has supported laws that purport to help lesbians and gay men, from ENDA to hate crimes laws to anti-bullying bills.
What utter silliness. LCR’s positions are their own. They didn’t adopt them because they want the popular kids to like them.
These proposals run counter to the genuinely conservative impulses of a strong (and I think the best) conservative philosophy espoused by Republicans.
Really? The “best” conservative philosophy has to offer is the repeal of anti-discrimination law? Hey, it that’s the case, I surely and sincerely hope they shout it from the rooftops and work hard to revive the racism, sexism, and anti-religious bigotry of the past. Should work wonders for their minority outreach programs.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
So BobN, since you call for the repeal of nondiscrimination laws pertaining to religion, that would make you an antireligious bigot.
Meanwhile, BobN, we should also remember that you and your fellow liberals actually support discrimination on the basis of skin color and gender and believe that “nondiscrimination” laws apply unequally based on skin color and gender.
In short, it is rather hilarious to scream “racism” when you in fact support unequal enforcement of the laws based on skin color and “sexism” when you in fact state that women are inferior to men and thus need “affirmative action” to succeed in society.
posted by BobN on
you call for the repeal of nondiscrimination laws pertaining to religion
Me? Certainly not. GOProud, the TPers, and the GOP are the ones who think anti-discrimination law is an imposition on individual freedom of association, etc. I seem to recall even you taking up that stance when the discriminated against were gay.
Have you changed your mind?
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Me? Certainly not.
You? Certainly yes.
Meanwhile, GOProud and others have read the Constitution and realize that freedom of association is in the Bill of Rights, as is freedom of religion.
posted by BobN on
I believe I’ve got you flustered. That post didn’t even try to make sense.
posted by PIL on
What’s the purpose of GOProud? I don’t know, maybe to oppose things like this:
New Budget, New Tax Hikes: Obama does it again.
http://libertarians4freedom.blogspot.com/2011/02/new-budget-new-tax-hikes-obama-does-it.html
posted by Pauliji on
Right on their own website GOProud states: “We believe that every individual should be equal under the law.”
Apparently that doesn’t include being protected from unfair firings, evictions, or marriage rights.
I think this is the real problem most LGBT non-republicans have with GOP, and even Log Cabin. It’s so ridiculously clear that the GOP despises gay people. It’s not even a subject which is debated. They have shown this time and time again. What sort of credible case could anybody make to defend the position of the GOP on any subject relating to equality or non-discrimination for gays and lesbians? Their positions are all based on lies and distortions. Yes, I mean ALL of them. And yet there are these groups trying to gain acceptance from the GOP. It seems irrational.
Yeah, wouldn’t it be great if the repugs would finally open their hearts and minds, and drop the dogmatic, religion based bigotry which they have chosen to define themselves. They drew this line in the sand, we didn’t. But they will not change. They drew the line, they’re willing to go to their graves defending their positions. It’s not based on reason, so you can’t reason them away from their homophobia. Truly, the old guard will have to die off before it can change. They consciously avoid associating with gay people, just in order to avoid having to look them straight in the eye while they stab them in the back.
Why would anyone want to join a club that doesn’t want to have them? This is what I don’t understand. Why does any self respecting gay person want to join the Republican party? It just smacks of self hatred, or some kind of strange masochistic position. I don’t know. If one espouses so-called “conservative values”, then start a third party, or be an independent.
Please don’t drink the Kool-Aid, thank you.
I guess the only positive thing that can come of this sort of irrational behavior is the pleasure of watching the GOP fracture into pieces over it. I don’t agree with those people who have boycotted CPAC because of the inclusion of GOProud, but at least I understand why they did it.
posted by Wilberforce on
Why would anyone want to join a club that doesn’t want to have them? There are a few reasons.
It’s most probably just a ploy to make the GOP seem ok to gay people. And it’ll probably work with the more selfish and ignorant queers.
Also, there’s a long history of self hatred among gay people. The Stockholm Syndrome is an extreme example.
Also, and this is just as probable, Baron and the rest are so incredibly selfish, they simply don’t care about other gay people. They just want tax cuts. As the complex evasions and abstractions on this sight show, they have an endless supply of rationalizations to conceal their true motives.