IGF CultureWatch

A commentary by author and ACT-UP founder Larry Kramer, slated for the July 6th issue of The Advocate (on sale June 22), is making the rounds of the 'net. It's headlined "Adolf Reagan," and the Hitler/Reagan comparisons aren't limited to the title. Kramer begins his polemic:

Our murderer is dead. The man who murdered more gay people than anyone in the entire history of the world, is dead. More people than Hitler even.

Andrew Sullivan has a well-reasoned response on his andrewsullivan.com blog to this kind of anti-Reagan hyperbole. Sullivan writes that once the epidemic became evident:

Many people most at risk were aware -- mostly too late, alas -- that unprotected sex had become fatal in the late 1970s and still was. You can read Randy Shilts' bracing And The Band Played On to see how some of the resistance to those warnings came from within the gay movement itself. In the polarized atmosphere of the beleaguered gay ghettoes of the 1980s, one also wonders what an instruction from Ronald Reagan to wear condoms would have accomplished.

As for research, we didn't even know what HIV was until 1983. Nevertheless, the Reagan presidency spent some $5.7 billion on HIV in its two terms -- not peanuts. The resources increased by 450 percent in 1983, 134 percent in 1984, 99 percent the next year and 148 percent the year after.

And than there's the oft-repeated charge, or variants thereof, that Reagan never mentioned AIDS until a 1987 speech. For instance, writes Matt Foreman, head of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force:

AIDS was first reported in 1981, but President Reagan could not bring himself to address the plague until March 31, 1987, at which time there were 60,000 reported cases of full-blown AIDS and 30,000 deaths.

But the New York Times, in an article dated September 18, 1985 and titled "Reagan Defends Financing for AIDS," reported:

President Reagan, who has been accused of public indifference to the AIDS crisis by groups representing victims of the deadly disease, said last night that his Administration was already making a "vital contribution" to research on the disease....

Mr. Reagan said that he had been supporting research into AIDS, acquired immune deficiency syndrome, for the last four years and that the effort was a "top priority" for the Administration.

No, Reagan didn't poison the drinking water or otherwise engage in "murder." Could and should he have done more to let people know his government cared about their plight? Yes. Did his efforts to embrace the religious right as part of the GOP coalition give power and prestige to some very bad people? Yes. But that's far from what some are accusing him of. It seems the extremes of both the left and the right are united in their need to express a daily dose of hate and vitriol.

From a survey of evangelical Christians reported on the website Christianity Today:

52% of evangelical Christians would rather prohibit gay marriage through state laws than through a constitutional amendment.

48% of evangelicals say a candidate's support for gay marriage would disqualify him from getting their votes.

That is, a majority of evangelicals are opposed to the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment, and less than a majority would make gay marriage a litmus test issue. The prospects for the FMA look weaker all the time.

Mail Call

There are some new letters in our mailbag, including comments on anti-Americanism and a defense of Mississippi. Check 'em out.

From the Log Cabin Republicans:

President Reagan's inspirational vision for America relied on optimism, hope and an enduring faith in individual freedom.... He succeeded by bringing America together -- not trying to divide it for political gain.

From the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force:

The Reagan administration's policies on AIDS and anything gay-related resulted -- and continue to result -- in despair and death.

More Recent Postings

5/30/04 - 6/06/04

Many will never forgive his apparent lack of concern as so many perished from AIDS (though Deroy Murdock makes the case that much was actually being done), or that his administration helped legitimize the religious right as a political force. Still, his refusal to play the appeasement game brought down the Soviet Union and freed millions from totalitarianism, and his policies slowed the expansion of welfare-state paternalism and reversed economic stagnation here at home. A mixed legacy, as is so often the case.

Worth noting: the first openly gay couple spent a night together in the White House during Reagan's term. From a Washington Post story on March 18, 1984:

The Reagans are also tolerant about homosexual men. Their interior decorator, Ted Graber, who oversaw the redecoration of the White House, spent a night in the Reagans' private White House quarters with his male lover, Archie Case, when they came to Washington for Nancy Reagan's 60th birthday party -- a fact confirmed for the press by Mrs. Reagan's press secretary. Indeed, all the available evidence suggests that Ronald Reagan is a closet tolerant.

Deroy Murdock's column helps puts to rest the charge that Reagan harbored anti-gay animosity. He notes a Time magazine story in which Patti Reagan recalls "the clear, smooth, non-judgmental way" her father discussed homosexuality. Speaking of Rock Hudson, she says:

My father gently explained that Mr. Hudson didn't really have a lot of experience kissing women; in fact, he would much prefer to be kissing a man. This was said in the same tone that would be used if he had been telling me about people with different colored eyes, and I accepted without question that this whole kissing thing wasn't reserved just for men and women.

Deroy also reminds us that Reagan publicly opposed Proposition 6, a 1978 ballot measure that called for the dismissal of California teachers who "advocated" homosexuality, even outside of schools. His opposition was considered instrumental to the measure's defeat.

And Deroy quotes Kenneth T. Walsh, former White House correspondent and author of the biography Ronald Reagan, who wrote: "Despite the urging of some of his conservative supporters, he never made fighting homosexuality a cause. In the final analysis, Reagan felt that what people do in private is their own business, not the government's."

So the Pope criticized Bush for the Abu Ghraib abuses. A wag tells me he'd like to have seen a quick-witted Bush(!) respond, "You get the priests in line, I'll see what I can do about the prison guards."

A conservative group has filed suit in federal court on behalf of a California high school student suspended for wearing an anti-gay T-shirt and allegedly told to leave his faith "in the car."

The lawsuit against the Poway Unified School District claims that Tyler Chase Harper, 16, was suspended for refusing to change out of a homemade T-shirt that on the front read, "Be Ashamed" and "Our School Embraced What God Has Condemned," and on the back read, "Homosexuality is Shameful" and "Romans 1:27."

According to his lawyer, reports the Christian Examiner, the school's action violated Harper's constitutionally protected freedom of religion because Harper has a "religious viewpoint that...homosexuality is not acceptable." Harper wore the T-shirt in protest of the "Day of Silence," an event sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. His lawyer says he "believes the event was school-sponsored in conjunction with a student Gay-Straight Alliance."

I'm all for freedom of expression, but public schools restrict speech and behavior in all sorts of ways in order to maintain civility. Children are minors and public schools are government outposts; the rights of adults in civil society don't pertain here. I don't think there would be an issue about the suspension if Harper was expressing his Christian beliefs by wearing a T-shirt that said "Jews will burn in hell" during an event focusing on religious diversity.

Still, as NBC online reports, even some gay groups grudgingly agree with Harper:

"Those were hurtful comments and they are painful to see, but it's also necessary to recognize the importance of the constitutional protection," said Richard Valdez, a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered Association Center spokesman.

The actual nature of the "Day of Silence" event and its sponsorship may be relevant here. Public schools (that is, the government) can't force students to embrace ideas that violate their religious beliefs (unless their religion is far out of the mainstream and advocates criminal behavior). On the other hand, schools rightly should teach the need for those who differ to respect each other's rights and disagree civilly, and justly limit hurtful expressions that denigrate other students (again, "Jews will burn in hell" would not be allowed at most public schools).

In this L.A. Times op-ed. "Marriage Can Be Expanded," the mathematician father of a lesbian daughter writes:

Each time the right to vote was extended, those who already had that right were indeed threatened. They could still vote, but their vote had less impact. But permitting two people of the same sex to form a union graced by the word "marriage" does not jeopardize those already married. It does not dilute the strength of an existing marriage...

If we were able to accept the ever-broadening meaning of the vote, which at each stage did threaten the existing order, we can surely absorb the extension of marriage, which will only strengthen the bonds that hold our society together.

An interesting analogy, which reflects how in free societies the nature of rights is to expand.

The anti-gay group Focus on the Family is up in arms over the fact that, in Montana, an evangelical church's tax-exempt status is being challenged after the church showed congregants a video simulcast called the "Battle for Marriage" and then circulated a petition at the event calling for a state constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriages. Similarly, an e-mail release from the anti-gay Family Research Council declared:

pro-homosexual advocates want to silence all churches and pro-family groups like FRC who are critical of the homosexual lifestyle. It has already happened in other countries where same-sex "marriage" has been legalized, and tomorrow it may happen to the Church in this country if it does not stand firm today. The intolerance of these left-wing extremists will roll right over our First Amendment rights unless we
respond vigorously. We will respond!

An even more hysterical account, from an evangelical news service, ran under the headline "LIBERAL HOMOSEXUAL RADICAL AGENDA, MAKING ITSELF KNOWN TO BE ANTI-GOD IN MONTANA."

Of course, to be fair, liberals never object to "peace" or civil rights political activism in churches, or when Jesse Jackson and others African-American politicians pass the hat for their political campaigns at Sunday services in black churches. Whether on the left or the right, if religious organizations want to behave like political action committees, they should not retain their tax-exempt status.

Bush's Beliefs: A Response

Commenting on President Bush's remarks cited in yesterday's item, "What Bush Believes," IGF contributing author Rick Rosendall reminded me of what he wrote in a Salon.com article last March:

After calling for a constitutional amendment against same-sex marriage without once mentioning the dreaded words "gay" or "lesbian," President George W. Bush ended on a conciliatory note: "We should also conduct this difficult debate in a manner worthy of our country, without bitterness or anger. In all that lies ahead, let us match strong convictions with kindness and goodwill and decency." This reminds me of Dame Edna Everage, who, after saying something horribly cruel about her bridesmaid Madge Allsop, habitually adds, "I mean that in a nurturing and caring way."

This piece from Christianity Today about President Bush's recent get-together with religious editors and writers shows that he truly is committed to the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA), and not just as a political ploy. His conservative religious convictions are deep and guiding. He also seems to realize that the FMA, for now, lacks sufficient grassroots support:

I will tell you the prairie fire necessary to get an amendment passed is simmering at best. I think it's an accurate way of describing it. ... I'm not sure people quite understand the issue yet.

Then he adds:

It's essential that those who articulate the position that defends traditional marriage as the only definition of marriage do so in a compassionate way. I like to quote [from the Bible's book of] Matthew, that you know, I'm not going to try to take a speck out of your eye when I've got a log in my own. You know what I'm saying. And therefore, this dialogue needs to be a dialogue worthy of a nation and worthy of a debate over a constitutional amendment. And it's a very important discussion. And it's one that should not be politicized.

But of course, if you're pushing for a constitutional amendment, it can't help but be "politicized," can it? Bush's position is at best muddled -- not the hate and animus of the hard-core religious right, but still a severely misguided sense of the federal government as defender of traditional morality. (Thanks to IGF's Mike Airhart for the heads up)