IGF CultureWatch

The Gay Left Exposes Itself. An article in Monday's LA Times, "Gay Pride Confronts an Identity Crisis," notes that "Longtime backers of [the] San Francisco event question the role of conservatives." Well, so much for the left's commitment to "diversity," as if we didn't know that their real aim has been to exclude anyone who doesn't toe their increasingly rigid party line. As reported by Scott Gold:

"a growing number of old-school, left-leaning gay activists are convinced that their movement is being sold to the highest corporate bidder, and that it has become so inclusive that it may rip its once-radical roots out."

I guess some types of inclusion are just TOO inclusive.

The report continues:

"As San Francisco prepares for the annual Gay Pride Parade and Celebration on Saturday and Sunday - an event that is expected to draw a million people to downtown - many liberal gay activists have begun belittling some of their fellow entrants: gay power company executives who rake consumers over the coals, gay landlords who evict hard-working tenants, gay cops who still harass cross-dressers."

And these folks claim to be opposed to stereotypes! Clearly, rather than a gay pride parade, the gay left would much rather be part of a "socialist pride" march, dedicated to nationalized industry, government-owned communal housing, and disbanding the police so everyone can be free to live in peaceful equality. The degree of infantilism here is truly sobering.

America's Future. On a happier, more hopeful note, check out this moving story about a Connecticut high school athlete's very public coming out to his peers, from the Waterbury Republican-American, via the site of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network.

A Question You Never Thought You"d Hear. "Is John Ashcroft becoming a liberal?" asked the Washington Post's "Political Notebook" column on June 21. The religious right, it seems, is furious at the attorney general for allowing his deputy, Larry Thompson, to address a gathering of gay Justice Department employees at an event sponsored by the group DOJ Pride. "After all the work we did to stand up to the liberal mudslinging during Ashcroft's confirmation fight, this is what we get?" asked Robert Knight of the anti-gay Culture and Family Institute. As I"ve said before, that's politics, baby. And it's becoming increasingly evident that the future belongs to "big tent" inclusiveness, and not to the exclusionary religious right.

So, just how loony can the anti-gay right get? A press release issued by the group Concerned Women for America (CWA) asks, "Why is Mr. Ashcroft, a committed Christian, using his official capacity to celebrate sin?" CWA's Sandy Rios fumes, "It won't matter if we dismantle terrorism if we implode from within. The presence of a top aide to the attorney general at an event celebrating "gay pride" is a clear endorsement of homosexuality."

This is about as over the top as anything I can recall -- they actually think speaking to a group of gay civil servants is as bad as terrorism!

In contrast, in the Post article the Log Cabin Republicans praised Ashcroft and Thompson for sending gay Justice Department employees the message that "the government is proud of their service" in the war on terrorism.

Remember all the predictions about the anti-gay crusade the Republicans would unleash if Bush won, and then if his attorney general pick was confirmed? As an e-mail I received commented, Ashcroft "catches flack from the right for sanctioning a Pride event, and meanwhile, no matter what he does, most of the gay groups demonize him." That about sums it up.

Patriotism Is Not a Gay Value? Now, for fairness, let's turn to that other contingent of deep thinkers, the gay left. Michael Bronski, in a piece for the Boston Phoenix titled "Rally 'round the fag: The sorry fate of queer politics since September 11" laments that a surge of patriotism was expressed during this year's gay pride celebrations. Writes Bronski:

"few could have predicted that the terrorist attacks' effects on the gay-and-lesbian-rights movement would be so, well, perverse". That was clear this month when Gay Pride celebrations across the country could have just as easily been called American Pride. Take Boston, historically a site of radical gay politics, where the theme of Pride this year was "Proud of Our Heroes." -- It is, indeed, a brave new world. And desperately patriotic flag-waving at Gay Pride events are -- telling us how far we still have to go."

Actually, it's telling us just how far the gay left has fallen into irrelevancy.

A Harbinger? When the Supreme Court voted last week 6-3 to bar executions of the mentally retarded, it reversed its own 1989 decision which found such executions constitutional. Justice Sandra Day O"Connor, who had written the 1989 decision, this time voted the other way, citing a change in national sentiment against executing murderers who are retarded. The Supreme Court is generally loath to directly reverse a prior decision, so the fact that they did so now bodes well for their willingness to reverse their 1986 decision upholding so-called sodomy laws, which still make same-sex partners criminals in many states. Clearly, national sentiment on this issue has also changed, and dramatically so, over the past decade. Let's hope the High Court revisits one of its worst decisions ever before another decade goes by.

The Left Strikes Back, in Typical Fashion. I"m all for full and rigorous debate among gays and lesbians from all points on the political spectrum, but the debate should be honest. Unfortunately, Village Voice columnist Richard Goldstein presents a vastly deranged portrait of those he terms "homocons," or gay conservatives, in his new book "The Attack Queers: Liberal Society and the Gay Right," and in a related article he penned for the current issue of The Nation, titled "Fighting the Gay Right." Goldstein feels a particular animus toward Andrew Sullivan, the highly successful gay pundit (and IGF contributor) who blogs away at andrewsullivan.com. But while a full airing of their differing opinions on the gay movement might have been interesting, Goldstein instead grossly distorts Sullivan's views in a way obvious to anyone who has actually read Sullivan's writings. Here's what I mean. Goldstein, in his Nation article, portrays Sullivan as some sort of anti-promiscuity crusader, stating:

"Marriage, Sullivan has written, is the only alternative to "a life of meaningless promiscuity followed by eternal damnation." "

But here's Sullivan's actual quote from his book "Love Undetectable," in which (as Sullivan points out in a response to Goldstein on his website), the context is the destructive effects of homophobia -- particularly in the guise of religion. Writes Sullivan:

"If you teach people that something as deep inside them as their very personality is either a source of unimaginable shame or unmentionable sin, and if you tell them that their only ethical direction is either the suppression of that self in a life of suffering or a life of meaningless promiscuity followed by eternal damnation, then it is perhaps not surprising that their moral and sexual behavior becomes wildly dichotic; that it veers from compulsive activity to shame and withdrawal; or that it becomes anesthetized by drugs or alcohol or fatally distorted by the false, crude ideology of easy prophets."

See what I mean -- Sullivan was clearly paraphrasing what homophobes say, and showing how such teachings have a harmful effect on gays. Goldstein's distortion makes it appear that the arguments Sullivan is explicitly criticizing are, in fact, Sullivan's views.

Here's another example. Goldstein writes (again, in his Nation article) of "homocons," saying that "they push a single, morally correct way to be gay," and adds, "The gay right is ready to lead a charge on behalf of what it calls "gender patriotism"."

In fact, the only actual use of this phrase is in a bit of drollery titled "Gender Patriots" by IGF's own Dale Carpenter, which is a sarcastic look at queer "gender rebels" who think gays must take up arms against gender differentiation. Carpenter writes:

"Poor souls, our rebels must try to enlist us in a war against gender that few of us believe in, and indeed, one in which most of us appear to be fierce partisans for the other side. It seems that someone, whether from the far right or the far left, is always trying to tell us how to live. But the gender rebels are entitled to their idiosyncratic strategy for achieving equality. I will leave them to the care of Karl Ulrichs, the "third sex" theory, the mythical urnings, and the other anti-gay stereotypes they hold so dear. We gender patriots have work to do."

Looking askew at militant gender rebels is hardly a call to enforce rigid gender roles. And, in fact, it is Goldstein and the gay left who more accurately could be charged with holding out only one correct way to be gay -- the left's way. They, in truth, are the real "attack queers."

Symbolic Affirmation: Big Deal. One of the bigger stories of Lesbian and Gay Pride Month has been the issuance, or non-issuance, of government proclamations marking June's pride celebrations as "official" (i.e., government recognized). This controversy plays out in localities, states, and at the federal level as officials who court the gay voting bloc sign Pride proclamations, while those who fear alienating social conservatives forgo the exercise. However, when proclamations are issued by cities and states -- or even when Bill Clinton became the first U.S. president to formally recognize Pride Month -- the move gets barely any media play. The world at large just doesn't consider this a big deal. However, among lesbigay activists and organizers, it's a very big deal indeed, and much effort is directed into securing proclamations -- and denouncing those officials who choose not to make them.

Which brings us to President Bush, who again declined to issue an official Gay Pride Month proclamation. Said White House Spokeswoman Anne Womack, "The president believes every person should be treated with dignity and respect, but he does not believe in politicizing people's sexual orientation."

"Bush won't recognize Gay Pride month," declared a story on the planetout.com website:

"[Bush"s] refusal to issue a proclamation is a big deal to us," said Rob Sadler, a board member of Federal GLOBE, a group for GLBT federal employees. "Issuing a proclamation is totally a symbolic act, it doesn't give us any additional tangible rights, but it helps people who work for the federal government feel valued as an employee and it makes us feel like we're doing a good job," said Sadler.

See, I told you it was a "big deal." After all, how can you "feel valued" without an official government proclamation attesting to your inherent worth?

A different view, as you might expect, was voiced by the pro-Bush Log Cabin Republicans. LCR spokesman Kevin Ivers responded in the same article that:

the absence of the proclamation shouldn't be such a big deal. In fact, while the attorney general, John Ashcroft, is a well-known Republican conservative, his second in command, Deputy Attorney General Larry D. Thompson, will speak at the gay pride celebration on June 19 in the Justice Department's Great Hall. "This shows that the country is changing for the better," said Ivers." We shouldn't get so hypersensitive about symbolism. Symbolic acts are important, yes, but we have more important things to work on."

But for the activist-minded, symbolism -- and its alleged power -- IS what matters. That's why many activists will admit that even if hate crimes bills and anti-discrimination laws won't actually have much impact in terms of actual litigation, they are important because of the symbolism of "inclusion."

Bush's Balancing Act. Aside from the gay pride celebration at the Justice Department, the Washington Post reports that at the Commerce Department, management is allowing gay employees to proceed with events but has withheld official sponsorship. Official pride proclamations, however, have been issued by Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta (ok, he's a liberal, anti-profiling-at-airports Democrat) and by Environmental Protection Agency head Christine Todd Whitman. And the State Department co-sponsored with the group Gays and Lesbians in Foreign Affairs Agencies (that's GLIFAA) a talk by Rep. Jim Kolbe, the openly gay Republican congressman from Arizona, on the global challenge of HIV and AIDS.

For symbolism counters, you"d think this was a fairly good haul. But the negative always trumps the positive, and a group of gay employees at the Commerce Department has now filed a complaint charging the agency with discrimination based on sexual orientation. According to another Washington Post story, "Part of the complaint"can be traced to a Commerce decision last year to end official sponsorship of gay pride activities," and the fact that this year the Patent and Trademark Office, a Commerce agency, pulled back its sponsorship of gay pride activities. "Gay pride events will go forward", the Post reports, "but will be sponsored by a gay employee group."

Well, I"m all for symbolic inclusion, but elevating the issuing of pride proclamations into a top movement goal strikes me as identity politics at its silliest. This is the deal: Politicians who are elected with a big gay bloc are more likely to issue proclamations. Bush's constituency, on the other hand, includes a much larger bloc of social conservatives. He"d like not to alienate them will symbolic kow-towing to gay activists, but he"d also like to court a larger share of GOP-leaning gay voters, too. So this administration, which has made several high-level openly gay appointments -- from the head of national AIDS policy to the ambassador to Romania -- is allowing more pride recognition events, with and without "official" sponsorship at the Cabinet level, than any previous GOP administration, but is withholding the big proclamation by the president himself.

Know what? If more gays vote for Bush in 2004, you can bet that he"ll go even further. That's politics, folks.

Hate Crimes Rashomon. Gay politics can be like the classic Japanese film in which the same incident is seen in vastly different ways by various characters. The question is, which interpretation of events seems closer to objective reality, and which is more likely to be informed by ulterior agendas?

On June 11, the Log Cabin Republicans issues a press release titled "LCR Disappointed with Senate Democrats on Hate Crimes Maneuvers, But Optimistic That Breakthrough is Near." Meanwhile, the Human Rights Campaign, which is closely tied to the Democratic Party (despite a few token Republican endorsements), issued a release titled "Republican Senate Leadership Stalls Hate Crimes Bill." Like I said, it's Rashomon.

At issue is what happened with a federal hate crimes bill that both LCR and HRC support. According to HRC, "Senate Republican leaders strong-armed Republican supporters" to oppose a motion that would have ended debate and brought the bill up for a vote. Said HRC head Elizabeth Birch, "While the Republican leadership talks about wanting to move the business of the nation forward, when it comes to hate crimes legislation, they went out of their way to grind the nation's business to a halt."

But wait, here's LCR's interpretation of the exact same events. "Despite".a pledge on the Senate floor by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) -- the lead Republican on the Judiciary Committee -- to work with the bill's lead sponsors in order to "make the House accept it" and strengthen its chances of enactment into law with improving amendments, the Democratic leadership forced a procedural vote to cut off all debate -- a strategy which drove two original co-sponsors of the bill to vote against them." As LCR explains it, the Republican majority in the House is not going to vote for the bill as it now stands. A major issue is a provision that makes crimes based on gender the subject of federal prosecution, which conservatives fear would, in effect, federalize the prosecution of rape cases at the expense of local law enforcement.

But is the inclusion of "sexual orientation" also at issue? No, says LCR: "In his floor remarks, Sen. Hatch reviewed a series of brutal hate crimes, most of which were committed against gays and, in one case, a transgendered American, and said "no one is more committed than I am" in fighting such crimes with an enhanced federal role, including crimes against gay Americans."

Hatch wants to see the bill pass, says LCR, but wants to offer amendments to gain House support. Hatch's amendments "would leave the definition of a hate crime intact, including sexual orientation," but make modifications involving the relationship between the Justice Department and local authorities. Significantly, Hatch also wants compromise language that would both "ensure the inclusion of gender in the bill"as a protected category" but also address concerns about the federal impact on state prosecution of rape cases.

As LCR sees it, the Democrat leadership entered a motion to cut off debate "only minutes after the bill was brought up, not allowing Hatch's amendments to even be considered." Key Republican sponsors, including Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) and Sen John Ensign (R-NV), then voted against the motion to bring the bill to a vote sans amendments. In this version: "The Democrats used a high-risk strategy"and it not only failed but insulted supporters and prevented a breakthrough deal," said LCR head Rich Tafel.

Maybe both sides are playing politics. But, from my point of view, the Democrats know they have more to gain going into the November election by blaming Republicans for blocking the bill, then by making reasonable compromises over legitimate jurisdictional issues and letting the thing pass. As with the proposed federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), which the Dems may also bring up knowing it won't pass the GOP House, the game is to mobilize gay voters by ensuring legislative defeat (or near defeat, as long as the GOP can be made the focus of blame). And in this game, HRC knows very well the role it's been assigned to play.

The Dyke March, in Their Own Words. Rebecca Fox and Nicole Levine, organizers of the June 8th D.C. Dyke March, penned an op-ed for the Washington Blade titled "D.C. Dykes Will March for Revolutionary Movement," in which they state:

For us, a revolutionary queer movement would address injustice in all forms. It would demand reproductive rights on demand and without apology and health care for all. It would challenge the prison industrial complex and our wars at home and abroad. It would demand equality, but not just the watered-down on-the-books-only equality that many gay and lesbian organizations are forced to settle for.

Clearly, the true barriers to gay liberation are too few taxpayer-funded abortions, prison sentences for criminals, and the war against terrorist murders. They continue:

The Dyke March is in part a response to the male-dominated, corporate-sponsored Capital Pride events, but even if the pride festival were more inclusive, we would still need a dyke march. Sexism, racism and transphobia are alive and destructive in the gay movement. We want our gay brothers to know that you can't simply get more women or more people of color to be involved and assume that the event is more inclusive. You have to look at how your meetings are run and how conflicts are negotiated.

Yes, getting more women and people of color is only superficial inclusion; "real" inclusion means altering how everything is done so that no female or person of color can in any conceivable way feel that they are being denied the preferential treatment they are entitled to. And finally:

We organize as a feminist collective, without hierarchy, without corporate sponsorship. We do this to show that our community does not need to rely on corporate money or mainstream acceptance to be empowered or to make our voices heard.

Yes, capitalism is clearly the enemy of gay rights because, well it is. And so is organizational "hierarchy"; much better to have an unstated power structure that only insiders can fathom. Otherwise, you never know what sort of non-progressive, non-socialist, non-revolutionary sorts might try to make a place for themselves in our movement.

Bigots, Bigots, Everywhere. A full-page ad appearing in many gay newspapers, paid for by the coalition supporting the continued boycott of Coors beer, claims that "Coors money founded the Heritage Foundation, America's premier far-right think tank." Heritage, of course, is a conservative policy institute that could be described as center right; it opposes gay rights efforts, but it's hardly the klan. Calling it "far right" simply shows an ignorance of mainstream conservative politics. But worse, the ad goes on to declare that "Massive Coors family funding of right-wing homophobia continues today, including"the Center for the Study of Popular Culture"." On the contrary, David Horowitz, the head of the Center, is a gay-inclusive conservative who has frequently scolded other conservatives for homophobia; he also features articles by gay authors (including, in the past, myself) in his publications and on his website. But, to the gay left, anyone to the right of Jesse Jackson must be part of the vast "far right" homophobic conspiracy.

I"m Not Making This Up. From the AP earlier this week, about a priest's slightly unusual online offering:

A Web site founded by a priest that featured images of young wrestlers in bikini briefs was voluntarily shut down after questions were raised about its content and purpose. --

So he's just a wrestling fan, I guess.

A Movement of Their Own.Yet another annual "Dyke March" will decend on Washington, D.C. this weekend. According to the official Dyke March website, organizers are "Calling all "lesbians -- dykes -- bi-women -- lesbian moms -- lesbianas -- transwomen -- androgs -- queers -- gay girls -- womanists -- asian dykes -- dykes on bikes -- senior lesbians -- lesbians of color -- rural dykes -- femmes -- butches -- goddesses -- poly girls -- amazons -- hippy chicks -- lipstick lesbians -- lesbian avengers -- differently abled dykes -- wise old lesbians -- boychicks -- grrrls -- leather dykes -- babydykes and all those in between!" Well, that about covers it.

The event will once again be an "in-the-streets in-your-face celebration/demonstration of dyke love, power and rage," as if you couldn't guess.

By the way, can you imagine the righteous outrage if gay men dared to entertain the thought of staging a male-only march to celebrate male solidarity and male-bonding (and reached out to straight men in order to form a broader men's movement?) And what if this "for men only" march were led by male-only groups ranging from a "Gay Male Avengers" (with a "bomb with lit fuse" logo) to a "National Center for Gay Male Rights." I"m not advocating it, mind you, it's just that the sexist double standard ("We want our own groups and events; oh, and we want control of the biggest lesbigay groups and events, too. You disagree? Sexist pig!) is so all-encompassing that we typically don't even bother to recognize it anymore.

Actually, maybe my crankiness is, in fact, just jealousy. There was a time in the early days of the movement when it was acceptable for both gay men and lesbians to have their own cultural, social, and political space (aside from the purely sexual spaces, that is). Working to create a culture of gay men was not automatically denounced as part of an anti-woman conspiracy. But today, lesbians may claim their own sphere, but outside the bars and sex clubs, gay males can't associate in private gay-male associations without being denounced as part of an anti-lesbian conspiracy -- unless the purpose of the group is to confess and work towards overcoming their supposed misogyny.

So There. The New Republic has published my letter taking to task their recent anti-Log Cabin "one party's enough for us" screed.

Wink, Wink, Nudge, Nudge. An interesting Cathy Young op-ed in the Boston Globe, "The Bias Against Male Victims," argues that too little is being made about the psychological harm inflicted on adolescent boys who are seduced by older women. I can't really buy that all, or even most, of these "Tea & Sympathy" / "Summer of "42" type cases necessarily constitute "abuse" (much depends on the age of the "boy" and his eagerness), but Young does score a few points on the equal treatment front when she notes:

In 1993 in Virginia, a male teacher who had sex with three teenage female students was sentenced to 26 years in prison -- while the next day, a female swimming coach who had an "affair" with an 11-year-old boy and sexual encounters with two others got 30 days.

To many men's rights advocates, this double standard reflects an egregious form of political correctness: the refusal to take seriously the victimization of a male by a female perpetrator. (Sexual abuse of boys by adult men is seen very differently.)

Your FBI at Work. A Washington Post report on how the FBI devoted major resources to keeping a New Orleans (hetero) brothel under surveillance is well worth pondering. Using wire taps, "month after month, 10 agents recorded the men's demands, the brothel keepers' deals and the prostitutes' complaints." No mob ties were found, but federal prosecution is being applied because the prostitutes flew in and out of New Orleans and were part of a "national prostitution ring," according to the local U.S. attorney. Oh, and by the way, the FBI was listening on Sept. 11, in the days before and in the days after. Good to know that federal law enforcement has its priorities straight.

He Could Use a Hug. The AP reports on an unusual encounter between troubled former heavyweight champ Mike Tyson and a gay rights demonstrator, who apparently was protesting anti-gay language on Tyson's part:

Mike Tyson hugged a demonstrator Sunday who shouted 'stop homophobia' at him. Tyson, in town to fight heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis next Saturday night, got out of a sport utility vehicle outside a fitness center and walked over to nearby gay rights activists. "I was shouting stop homophobia and holding up my sign, and then he just came up and hugged me and said he wasn't homophobic," said Jim Maynard, vice-chair of Equality Tennessee and one of three demonstrators. "I was totally shocked," Maynard told The Commercial Appeal. "I didn't really know what to do. So I just posed with him and smiled for the cameras."

Odd, but kinda touching.

Subverting from Within. The Log Cabin Republicans sent out a link to an intriguing column by Steve Sebelius at the Las Vegas Review-Journal, about Nevada's Chuck Muth, newly appointed head of the Washington-based American Conservative Union. Muth, a conservative/libertarian, is being attacked by the hard right. Sebelius writes that the anti-gay crowd is upset because, for instance, "as the Clark County [Nevada] Republican Party put the anti-gay marriage Question 2 at the top of its agenda, Muth wondered in vain if any candidate would swear off taxes instead."

One local anti-gay blowhard declared that "The big worry about Muth taking that position is that (the ACU) is going to start abandoning their pro-family positions"He is entrenched within the gay agenda ... he sympathizes with that agenda." But Muth, columnist Sebelius notes, has not come out in favor of gay marriage, "he simply has said there are plenty more important issues that should top the conservative agenda. And, contrary to the good Rev. Jerry Falwell, Muth has scoffed at the notion that the nation was left vulnerable to terrorism because two gay gentlemen tied the knot in Vermont." Concludes Sebelius, with tongue in cheek, "Clearly, Muth is a subversive. But the addled folks at the ACU don't seem to see it; Muth still has his job. (Maybe the entire ACU has been infiltrated by gay-friendly fifth columnists?)"

All told, Muth's ascendancy at the ACU is one more small but undeniably positive development.

Kiddie Porn? Below is a message, in full, from Mrs. Andrea Lafferty, Executive Director of the Traditional Values Coalition:

Dear Friend,
Nickelodeon will be airing a show this summer that will promote homosexual sodomy as a normal lifestyle to our nation's children! I have just signed a petition urging Nickelodeon to cancel production of this pro-homosexual show. I am urging you to sign this petition to protest this effort to normalize homosexuality. Nickelodeon leaders must get the message that they should not be promoting sodomy to children! Please join with more than 43,000 concerned citizens who have already signed this petition! To sign this petition, go to: Stop Nickelodeon.

Just imagine, the premier children's cable network, in between re-runs of "The Andy Griffith Show" and "The Beverly Hillbillies," will be instructing the tikes on the intricacies of anal penetration. My, this world is truly a den of sin. Lottie, get the checkbook!

The show, by the way, is one of a series of "Nick News" reports, produced by veteran journalist Linda Ellerbee, examining topics in the news -- this time on gay rights.

Fortuyn's legacy. IGF stalwart Jonathan Rauch forwarded these off-the-cuff comments, recommending a piece in the usually gay-unfriendly National Review about Pim Fortuyn, the recently assassinated Dutch conservative/libertarian political leader who might well have become his nation's first openly gay prime minister. Writes Jon:

Here's a piece that might be worth recommending to blog readers, a very astute article by John O'Sullivan arguing that Fortuyn may have been the start of something big. He picks up on the fact that gays -- appalled by the virulent homophobia of many Muslim fundamentalists and disappointed by the establishment's indulgence of said attitudes -- are fast moving into the orbit of Europe's growing conservative/libertarian coalition. Joining them are many feminists, Jews, and blue collars. Could be, he notes, the beginning of a European political realignment that both broadens the right's base and softens its edges.

Yes indeed. Told that it's "extremist" or "fascistic" to question immigration or criticize Muslim intolerance, that Israel is a brute and Al-Fatah is on the side of the angels, and that nationalism and patriotism are outdated in the age of the EU, gays and Jews and blue collars and others are naturally going to say: Stuff it. And the European establishment seems eager to drive away all these voters -- epitomized by Fortuyn himself -- by pooh-poohing them as neanderthals. In fact, the left had more problems with Fortuyn's politics than the right did with his homosexuality.

One other interesting aspect: O'Sullivan is utterly matter-of-fact about the prospect of gays joining a European conservative coalition. He even seems to welcome it. You'd never have seen that in National Review a few years ago, when failure to write snidely about homosexuals cost conservatives their union card.

Is this truly a shift in the political tides? We shall see.

Polling Priorities that Perplex Purists. Gays and lesbians overwhelmingly say the right to marry should now be the number-one priority of the gay rights movement, dwarfing those who identify equal employment opportunities and hate crimes legislation, according to a new poll by Zogby International (the highly regarded national polling outfit) and GLCensus Parnters (a "GLBT Consumer Research" firm associated with the S.I. Newhouse School at Syracuse University). Here are the percentages of lesbian and gay (and bisexual and transgendered) respondents identifying the "top priority":

Marriage rights: 47%
Equal employment opportunities: 16%
Hate crimes legislation: 9%
Increased gay representation in government: 7%

While nearly half of gays and lesbians call marriage the top priority, the percentage was even more pronounced among younger respondents (51% of those aged 18 to 24). So why is ENDA (the proposed federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act) the number-one priority of Washington-based lesbigay lobbies? And why was the leadership of the Log Cabin Republicans pilloried by ENDA supporters for daring to raise the issue of re-accessing movement priorities?

Another nifty finding: 48% of those polled would like the media to refer to our community as "gay" or "gay and lesbian" or "lesbian and gay"; 39% favor GLBT (that's gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender) or LGBT (lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender). So, naturally, a growing number of activist groups have gone with GLBT or LGBT. Even the press release accompanying the poll results stated at top that "most prefer media to use "GLBT" vs. "LGBT" -- -- as if that was the most important finding from the naming question. It figures.