Tackling Dummy - "Christians are the new Negro"

Lord, I can't write what I'm thinking

For one, Christians are not a minority in this country

Two, the political power is constantly on display.

Three, can we start talking about a black pastor mafia fomenting homophobia in black communities (Harry Jackson, Uncle Ruckus here, Fipro Carr, Bernice King, Eddie Long, the McPherson guy in California...etc.) and using black communities as a shield for anti-gay bigotry groups that also have past (and maybe present) ties to white supremacists.

And I will go downhill from there, so let me stop.

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by: kevinchi @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 08:14:50 AM CST

Money talks.

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by: night owl @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 09:49:00 AM CST

[ Parent ]

I know the feeling not being able to comment as I would choose....it'd get real ugly, real fast

I will say for being the NEW NEGOES, the Christians have had EVERY one of the 44 presidents, and 90+% of every Congress person since the first Congress, and all but a hand full of every Supreme Court Justice.

How they've managed so powerless in America, is a testament to their COURAGE.

"race, taste. and History finally overcome....and you ain't there"
by Tony Kushner

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by: peteyPornpig @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 20:33:52 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Christians are the new Black?

WTF is this dude smoking?

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by: P4ttythe3p3rf3ct @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 10:21:32 AM CST

He also signed the Manhattan declaration.

Getting publicity for being black + anti-gay and saying he does it so that "god will get all the glory" is this peacock's m.o.

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

Lurleen on Twitter.

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by: Lurleen @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 13:10:29 PM CST

"Lost Humanity"

You can't lose what you never had.

"Christians are the new Negro"? Black is The New White.

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by: David Ehrenstein @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 13:11:34 PM CST

Hart & Hutch are BOTH wrong....

"the struggle of African-Americans for equality is not comparable to the struggle of GLBT citizens (including blacks) for equality"

BULLSHIT!

With respect, Mr. Hart, in that statement you are no less wrong than Hutch. The analogy is NOT broken because gays were never enslaved as a class.

What are DOMA and DADT but Jim Crow-like laws?

It was once totally legal to fire/refuse to hire blacks. It STILL is for LGBs in some 20 states, and more for Ts.

It was once totally legal to refuse to rent/sell a home to blacks. It STILL is for LGBTs, etc., etc.

If I need to go on, then...well I'll shut up, too, and turn it over, once again, to gay AND black late civil rights icon Bayard Rustin who declared over 20 years ago:

"Today, blacks are no longer the litmus paper or the barometer of social change. Blacks are in every segment of society and there are laws that help to protect them from racial discrimination. The new 'niggers' are gays. No person who hopes to get politically elected, even in the deep South...would dare stand in the school door to keep blacks out. Nobody would dare openly and publicly argue that blacks should not have the right to public accommodations. Nobody would dare to say any number of things about blacks that they are perfectly prepared to say about gay people. It is in that sense that gay people are the new barometer for social change.

Indeed, if you want to know whether today people believe in democracy if you want to know whether they are true democrats, if you want to know whether they are human rights activists, the question to ask is, 'What about gay people?' Because that is now the litmus paper by which this democracy is to be judged. The barometer for social change is measured by selecting the group that is most mistreated. To determine where society is with respect to change. one does not ask, 'What do you think about the education of children'? Nor does one ask, 'Do you believe the aged should have Social Security." The question of social change should be framed with the most vulnerable group in mind: gay people."

Change. Hmmm. Seems like I remember hearing about that some time back....

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by: Michael Bedwell @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 13:46:16 PM CST

Well...with DADT

gay people can serve in the military. They just can't be open and serve in the military. That's a qualitative difference (and difficulty) in identification.

In some ways, the GLB situation is even worse...they never kicked you out of the military for being "openly black" (with the possible exception of the Confederacy, lol) You just had to serve in a racially segregated unit with your racial kind.

Which makes me wonder what other types of inequities are present for GLB military folks.

The question I have, Michael, is who should be doing the comparing in this case. Let's outline our case for inequality severely (do out GLBTs actually make less than their all-other-things-being-equal straight counterparts? Denied propomotions? Etc...)?

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by: kevinchi @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 14:09:01 PM CST

[ Parent ]

You know je t'adore, Kev...

...and I know it's intellectually frustrating and convoluted, but we must amplify the quantifier more than you did which, out of context, could sound just like something John McShame would say. We must never stop driving home that DADT was a charade from the start. Gays in the military can't be open to ANYONE, ANYWHERE, at ANYTIME without risking discharge. Relatives and civilian friends and neighbors have even been interrogated to "get the goods" on someone suspected. At least one of the d's in DADT should stand for "draconian."

As for your question, "who should be doing the comparing?" - I say "anyone who

1. knows reasonably equal amounts of the history and current status of the groups being compared/contrasted; and

2. understands what those verbs mean"....which many of those screaming about the process, particularly that insufferable loon who both shits and goes blind as we ornery old queens used to say every time someone uses the word "apartheid," apparently don't.

Can a white gay person speak to what the "experience" of being POC [gay or not] is? Of course, not. Can a man speak to the experience of being a woman? Ditto. A non-Jew a Jew; a non-Muslim a Muslim; the non-physically challenged the challenged; non-trans trans? Ditto plus.

But the comparison/contrast put forth is very rarely about day-to-day living, experiences growing up, etc., and rather about status under the law specifically and generalized attitudes of the majority population.

As I've written before, the Obambots who attempt to dismiss the contrast between Truman's balls and Obama's lack of same vis-a-vis racial/gay military integration by simply saying Truman wasn't dealing with statutory segregation insult blacks [and everyone's intelligence] by ignoring how much greater a racist hurdle Truman had to jump than the homophobic one Obama faces.

And, yes, I, too, would like to see a credible study on the degree of economic consequences for being out on the job. It would be HUGELY complicated, however, as trends in the influence of race are fairly easy to document because, in most cases, race is apparent. E.g, the number of equally qualified people of one race hired for a specific number of openings versus another [factoring in the percentage of each that apply].

But, say, I'm out at work and just as qualified for the promotion as "Bob" who isn't. How would the one conducting the study go about documenting any difference without "Bob" admitting being gay to him/her?

That challenge is likely to inhibit anyone even attempting such a study...and is the inherent flaw in election exit polling. I'll not see in my lifetime everyone LGBT identifying him/herself to the pollsters, but I'd at least like to see the latter change their reports to the more accurate "percentage of OUT LGBTs who voted for _____."

 

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by: Michael Bedwell @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 15:05:05 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Oh, I get this

Gays in the military can't be open to ANYONE, ANYWHERE, at ANYTIME without risking discharge. Relatives and civilian friends and neighbors have even been interrogated to "get the goods" on someone suspected. At least one of the d's in DADT should stand for "draconian."

And there's the "Don't Pursue" part of DADT. Which they don't follow too closely, it seems.

And I just made one about the military vis-a-vis the comparison/contrast method. I am qualified to make other comparisons along this line of course. I say...it all depends on what we're comparing. And, as you state, controlling for other factors like race and education. Hence my "all other factors being equal" idealistic qualification.

And you are right. As Philip points out below, the biggest problem still is the closet.

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by: kevinchi @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 15:14:52 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Answer to the question...

"When will Reverend Ken Hutcherson find his lost humanity?"

The short answer is -- he won't.

The likes of Hutcherson sold their humanity the moment they decided that they had to be "better" than somebody else, because they themselves had been oppressed in their collective past.  It's the same dynamic that operates at the household level when the husband or wife comes home from a bad day at work and yells at the spouse; the spouse then yells at the oldest child; the oldest child then yells at the youngest child; and the youngest child then kicks the dog.

I remember Jesse Jackson's remarks of 2004; and far from stating that gay Americans should not compare the current struggle for gay equality to the struggle that black Americans faced for their equality, Jackson remarked that both forms of discrimination, whilst qualitatively different, are wrong, immoral, and utterly indefensible.  One of the differences between the struggle that black Americans faced and the struggle that gay Americans face is the fact that many gay Americans can hide their sexual orientation.  Whereas the likes of the late Reggie White used this fact as the basis for claiming that being gay is "a behaviour" and that gay Americans are merely people who have made an immoral "lifestyle choice", the cold truth is that the ability of so many gay Americans to hide the fact that they are gay is one of the greatest stumbling blocks that the gay community faces in its long and difficult struggle for equality.  Far from making life easier for gay Americans, this invisibility is a curse.  The fact that so many gay Americans do hide when in the midst of openly homophobic men and women is precisely what enables such homophobic bastards to continue the taunting, the abuse, the discrimination, and the naked cruelty.  It is much, much easier to insult and abuse somebody in their perceived absence than is the case when that person is sitting directly opposite the tormentor.  The bigots know this full well, which is why they so vehemently promote such ugly policies as the so-called "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) policy in the Armed Forces; this policy forces gay servicemembers into the closet, which in turn enables gay-bashers to promote their climate of polarization, hatred, and abuse (if forcing gay men and lesbians to hide their sexual orientation is the official policy of the armed forces of the nation, then (under this rationale) there must be some merit to demanding, more generally, that gay Americans remain hidden and closeted).  Similarly, the opposition that the hard right raises to legislation that protects people from sexual orientation discrimination is also based, in part, on the fact that the recognition of this class of persons by the laws of the land compels the recognition of this class of persons by ordinary men and women, who would otherwise not think of these people at all, or do so only on the bigots' terms.  The passage of legislation such as the "Matthew Shepard / James Byrd Hate Crimes Act" similarly forces Americans to recognize the hard reality that many Americans are violently attacked on the basis of their sexual orientation.

I consider it to be nothing less than the civic duty of every gay person to come out of the closet, even if the consequences of making this decision are costly.  I myself have paid the price; in 2006, I was fired from a high-paying consulting position after my manager -- a devout "Christian" who had put all three of his children through missionary school -- learned that I was (am) gay.  One direct result of this decision was the fact that I promised myself, then and there, never to enter any church or house of organized worship again as long as I live (a promise that I have kept thus far, and fully intend to keep for the remainder of my life).

Never have I seen religion abused in more ugly a fashion than is currently the case with respect to the issue of gay marriage.  The First Amendment to the US Constitution mandates that the government may not meddle in ecclesiastical matters, and that the church may not meddle in affairs of state.  Currently, no church anywhere in the nation can be compelled to marry a couple if that church disapproves of that marriage (for example, the Catholic church refuses to marry any person who is divorced).  The arrival of gay marriage in Massachusetts, six years ago, did not result in churches up and down that state being forced to marry gay couples against their wills, nor do any gay couples I know of wish to force the churches to perform gay marriages of which those churches disapprove.  This issue is a red herring.  How any particular church wishes to deal with marriage is entirely up to that church - and no church has ever been forced, in any jurisdiction in the US within which gay marriage is legal, to officiate at gay marriage rites!

In the eyes of the US Supreme Court, marriage is a "fundamental" right (Zablocki v. Redhail, 434 U.S. 374 (1978)).  Employing both an equal protection and a due process analysis, the Court struck down all state statutes that prohibited interracial marriage in the landmark case of Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967).  The Court struck down Colorado's infamous "Amendment 2" on equal protection grounds in Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620 (1996).  The Court also struck down all state sodomy statutes on due process grounds in Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003).  If the Court remains true to its own jurisprudence, the Court should strike down the DOMA and declare that gay couples are also entitled to marry, on the same terms as are applicable to heterosexual couples.

Don't expect the "Reverend" Ken Hutcherson to find his lost humanity when this eventually occurs...

PHILIP CHANDLER

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by: philipcfromnyc @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 14:02:54 PM CST

Fantastic post, Philip

Far from making life easier for gay Americans, this invisibility is a curse.  The fact that so many gay Americans do hide when in the midst of openly homophobic men and women is precisely what enables such homophobic bastards to continue the taunting, the abuse, the discrimination, and the naked cruelty.  It is much, much easier to insult and abuse somebody in their perceived absence than is the case when that person is sitting directly opposite the tormentor.

And the necessity and pressures of the closet (or the DL) brings on so much mental illness and repression.

My cousin actually attempted to argue the bullshit with me that gay people tend to be psychologically sick people. I flipped back at his ass that gay people might tend to be that way because of homophobic bigotry of society at large more than anything else.

I consider it to be nothing less than the civic duty of every gay person to come out of the closet, even if the consequences of making this decision are costly.

Had to emphasize a different word here as, yes, it is about what it means to be a full citizen in this country and, therefore, a civil right .  

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by: kevinchi @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 14:20:58 PM CST

Thank you, and more on DADT...

Thank you for your compliments.  A few words on the DADT military policy:

It is not enough that the gay servicemember not come out to anybody in his or her unit to ensure that the servicemember not be "separated" from the armed forces.  No, that is not nearly enough.  The gay servicemember may not say a word about his or her sexual orientation to ABSOLUTELY ANYBODY.

If that person tells his own mother that he is gay, he has violated the "Don't Tell" portion of the policy in the eyes of the armed forces.  If that person tells his own minister of religion or priest that he is gay, he as violated the "Don't Tell" portion of the policy in the eyes of the armed forces.

The hard drive of a suspected gay servicemember can be seized and searched for evidence of that individual's sexual orientation, if that person is suspected of having broken the "Don't Tell" portion of the policy.  The mother of a lesbian woman can be forced, under penalty of contempt, to testify before a military tribunal regarding her daughter's sexual orientation -- under oath.  The private mail of a person suspected of being gay can be opened and read by prying eyes.  That person's life can be (and this has happened many, many times before) turned UPSIDE DOWN by the armed forces in their search for "incriminating" material.

And this is what we put up with, and refer to as "progress" under a Democratic Administration?

Clinton folded like a house of cards as soon as he encountered resistance to his proposed directive, to lift the ban on openly gay persons serving in the armed forces.  I have a little more faith in Obama, but I will wait until I see concrete action before I will make any judgments with respect to his integrity...

Yes, indeed, it is the CIVIC duty of every gay person to make his or her sexual orientation known.  How much self-respect can a person possibly retain if he or she sits and listens to his or her colleagues make snickering, snide remarks about gay people -- and that person just sits and listens, not telling those colleagues that they are laughing about him or her?  Just how much self-respect does that person retain, listening to such horrible comments made by such horrible people?

I understand that it is easy to tell people about your sexual orientation if you live in a large city and work for a diverse employer, and that it is not so easy if you live in a small town with limited employment opportunities, or if you are an Arab linguist working in the armed forces.  But how much abuse does one have to endure, in the form of insulting comments and ugly remarks made about gay people as a group, before the preservation of personal dignity counts for more than the security of that particular job?  The Arab linguists who are currently being fired for being gay are in the best position to bring the full absurdity of the military policy home to those who implement it, as well as to those who fashioned it -- by merely being themselves, both on and off the job.  The military DADT policy supposedly comes with a "stop loss" provision -- what will it take to trigger that provision?  And once it has been triggered, how can the armed forces drop it if more and more gay people -- including potential recruits -- remain open about their sexual orientation?

With citizenship comes responsibility -- and that responsibility entails more than cashing a paycheck and keeping one's head down every time a bigot makes a disgusting comment about gay people.

PHILIP CHANDLER

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by: philipcfromnyc @ Sun Nov 22, 2009 at 03:11:50 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Because I'm curious

Did your cousin have a comeback for that?

"Oh, I thought you meant a specific plan. With maps and stuff." -Buffy

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by: Aspasia @ Sun Nov 22, 2009 at 18:42:28 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Ugh, it makes me sick

This sort of BS rationalizing is on-par with the "indians aren't downtrodden, they have casinos" argument.

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by: Baconcat @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 14:21:21 PM CST

It's not all about marriage, though

Yes, marriage is the front page issue, for the most part, but the Christianists are resorting more and more and more to "gay marriage" as an umbrella term for all LGBT civil rights. And to extent, marriage is the only issue that gets play in the media (though DADT gets a little play, but nowhere near as much).

David is right to note that Uncle Ruckus and those of his religious reich ilk oppose any and all measures for GLBT, not simply marriage (see that post about The SCLC in Tallahassee, Fla. or Alvin's latest ENDA post). But watch for this change in political rhetoric referring to all LGBT civil rights under the umbrella term, marriage.

And our community has a part to play in that also, since...well, it seems as if that's alll we're really talking about too, at times.

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by: kevinchi @ Sat Nov 21, 2009 at 14:35:07 PM CST

It's this totally made up garbage, on top of their denial they are the oppressors, and always have been

That makes me want to move heaven and earth to yank their MOTHERF*CKING tax exeptions.

So beware you evil little turds....the TAX MAN COMETH!

"race, taste. and History finally overcome....and you ain't there"
by Tony Kushner

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by: peteyPornpig @ Sun Nov 22, 2009 at 14:18:32 PM CST

Great post

But this:

Gays, at least those of white ancestry, are not the descendants of slaves. That is indisputable fact.

Isn't true and is quite disputable. For one, it supposes that throughout all of human history, the only folks who were enslaved were black Africans in America. Since slavery has been ubiquitous, unfortunately, throughout much of human history, EVERYONE is a descendant of peoples who were enslaved at some point. I'm hoping that's not what you mean, but I've met too many people who are disgustingly ignorant of history and genuinely believe the only time slavery happened was when some European countries enslaved and transported some black Africans to the American South.

For two, it supposes that someone who is considered to be white in America is "pure", when the last time I checked, geneticists have said that as many as 1/3rd of all white Americans have some recent (within 4-5 generations back) black African ancestry...and that probably comes from a slave. For three, though it's rare, there were some Africans who did not come to these shores as slaves back in the day. For four, that statement also ignores any recent African immigrant to America, who most likely do not have ancestors who were enslaved in America (Liberia being the exception) who is also gay.

Okay, I'm done with that.

This whole tactic of RW Christians claiming "persecution" worries me. It can be used as a launching pad for even more legislation against their "oppressors" since, as is pointed out upstream, Christians are in the majority in legislatures. And I've never seen such persecuted people be in so many positions of power and be able to be so vocal and heard in a variety of media. Gee, when my step-grandpa's people were being persecuted in 1930s Germany, they certainly weren't on the radio in Germany talking about how persecuted they were.


"Oh, I thought you meant a specific plan. With maps and stuff." -Buffy

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by: Aspasia @ Sun Nov 22, 2009 at 18:41:13 PM CST

Tackling Dummy - "Christians are the new Negro"

Thank you, David, and thank you, Pam.  I have been encouraging people to read Loving v. Virginia for insight into the gay marriage issue for some time now.  It's available on the internet and only 5 pages long.  And, you don't have to be a lawyer to understand it.

I also pointed out on another blog just the other day that the people of Virginia did not get to vote on whether to allow interracial marriage.  Why?  Because Constitutional rights are not subject to referendum.  The anti-gay-marriage crowd just don't seem to get this.

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by: Gordon @ Mon Nov 23, 2009 at 15:27:58 PM CST