I don't want to take this too far for a couple of reasons. I don't like the idea of being an apologists for homophobes--least of all black homophobes. Also, I'm concerned that my defense not make black folks think that this isn't an issue worth our attention. But sweeping statements like "no ethnic community [is] as homophobic in America as African-Americans" should induce some serious pangs of skepticism. Are African-Americans really more homophobic than, say, Italian-Americans? Are we really more homophobic than Hasidic Jews? Than Caribbean Americans? Than Puerto-Ricans?There is, alas, no ethnic community as homophobic in America as African-Americans. Which is why the ballot initiative in California could be close.
To the direct point, Andrew's argument is wierd. First blacks only make up 6 percent of California's population. Whereas Latinos make up 35 percent of the population. Are Latinos likely to support an anti-gay marriage ammendment? Well here's what we know:
Blacks, like whites, are divided on the issue. In March 2000, when Californians voted on Proposition 22 (the statutory ban on gay marriage that the state Supreme Court struck down in May), a Los Angeles Times exit poll showed that levels of support were very similar among the major ethnic groups, with Latinos slightly more opposed to allowing gays to marry, Asians and whites slightly less opposed, and blacks right in the middle.Well not exactly in the middle but less homophobic than Latinos. The point is that Latinos were more likely to support the ban, and there actually are more Latinos. I don't want to scapegoat my brown bothers--my sense is that ethnicity is a really bad filter here--for blacks, whites and Latinos. For instance, is homophobia tied to wealth? Is it tied to education? Is it tied to region? What is the best predictor of homophobia? Is it really race? Or is it something like poverty or even church attendance?
When constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage were on 11 state ballots in November 2004, blacks in Arkansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Ohio and Oklahoma were at least one percentage point less likely than whites to vote for them, according to CNN exit polls. Only in Georgia were blacks slightly more likely to vote for the amendment. (The remaining four states had too few blacks to make a meaningful comparison.)Like I said, lets not make excuses for the thugs amongst us. The black community is being ravaged by AIDS right now, and part of the problem is homophobia. But that's more--not less--of a reason to not generalize. We need credibility, and you don't get that by toting around weak arguments. I've said this before and will say it again: Conservatives want us liberals to stop being soft-headed, politically correct and stick with the facts. Cool. But in return, we ask only the same.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
I'll take poverty and education for 1000, Alex.
I was taken aback by that comment too. Homophobia is a problem in every community. My experience has been is that people who happen to very religious that they tended to take the bible literally when it come to homosexuals but not too literally with the Noah’s Arc story. I live in Memphis and COGIC rules. The hypocrisy makes you laugh. The ones preaching hate are the ones who are in the closet. If you want to find a place where AA people can be openly gay try ATL.
To Andrew's defense, I think this is just a case of Andrew Sullivan wildly overreacting and making huge exagerating statements.
He probably wanted to mention black homophobia (and yes, there are concerns among people in the No on 8 campaign here in California that the heightened turnout for Obama among black people will provide the margin of victory for the amendment if the vote is close) and ended up making that broad overstatement as he is wont to do.
For the rest, yes on what you said.
Agree with Ann. Lord knows we got some homophobes among us, but, as she cogently points out, the issue tends to break down by religious affiliation, not race.
As a refugee from COGIC and now the proud member of a black Methodist church that is open, welcoming and supportive of ALL God's children, I take exception to the notion that the 'African-American community' (which, of course, is really many communities) is more homophobic than most.
Want to see homophobia? Come hang out with some Irish Catholics I know here in Boston. Whoo boy!
Ta-Nehisi, isn't it possible to be against gay marriage for legitimate reasons, that have nothing to do with homophobia? Gay marriage is a very radical proposition, and opposition to it is not equivalent to bigotry.
Thanks for asking for harder numbers, I for one would like to see them, see if Andrew's rhetorical flight has any basis. I get the feeling on the ground in LA, where I'm white, date interracial, and pass through south LA every day, that the black folks on the ground could not really give a hoot if I'm queer or not. There was a load of BS in Black Studies in the early days (Asante claiming that black were never gay and had merely picked picked up unwholesome habits from the white colonists), but this sort of errant nonsense never really made it to the street any more than melanin theory did. The preachers, on the other hand, get a lot of credit for keeping the culture of DL and AIDS transmission rates high in these neighborhoods. Just ask any church choir member in a South LA Protestant church, ahem.
I have yet to hear one Wizer. But please outline them for me. You have my ear.
One more thing about the Miami-Dade initiative: age might have played a big role. It was in primary day and most Hispanic primary voters in the county are old Cubans. They tend to be well educated but not much into church attendance. Homophobic they are -you can trust me on that.
"isn't it possible to be against gay marriage for legitimate reasons, that have nothing to do with homophobia?"
No, not really.
Everybody knows the Amish are the most anti-gay "ethnic" group. ;)
(I know they can't fight back online.)
Could not have been put any better-well done TNC!
Wizer:
No, it's kind of not. The only real possible opposition to gay marriage must stem from the assertion that a gay relationship is less worthy and less real than a heterosexual relationship. I don't know how its possible to make this argument without being anti-gay.
Gay marriage is a very radical proposition, and opposition to it is not equivalent to bigotry.
This brings up an interesting question: Is there a difference between personally objecting to gay marriage and wanting to change the Constitution to prevent gay marriage? Can you be a bigot who believes in equal rights?
If I looked back on history to answer this question, I'd have say NO.
Ta-Nehisi, isn't it possible to be against gay marriage for legitimate reasons, that have nothing to do with homophobia?
Haven't heard one that doesn't boil down to, we don't want to give "the gays" credibility. Look, we could create civil unions and then a ton of laws ensuring that civil unions are treated the same as marriages, and have a bunch of law suits where people claim said laws aren't fair. The only winners in this are lawyers. Or, we could just let the gays be married under the law and if you don't like gay marriage you're welcome to join a church that agrees with you. I would think that to most Christians what matters is the marriage before God, their church, family and pastor and not the piece of paper they sign and turn in to the county clerks office.
"Are African-Americans really more homophobic than, say, Italian-Americans?"
Yes. I mean can anyone who tans, excessively works out, kisses their male friends, leaves their shirt open to their navel, matches their sneakers with their track suit, and puts that much "product" in their hair really hate gays that much?
Seriously though, despite my lack of hard empirical data that seems to be required to make any point on this blog today, I would have to agree with Andrew based on my own experience. I don't know what the hispanics in Cali are like, but in NY I feel like the Ricans and Dominicans are used to gays by now. I may also be unfairly biased because every few weeks a crew of black israelites camps outside my office window and screams for hours about how god hates fags and they should all go to hell. And no, I don't consider them Jews, no matter how many verses they quote.
TNC,
Is it possible to be against a woman's right to vote for completely legitimate reasons, that having nothing to do with sexism?
"I would think that to most Christians what matters is the marriage before God, their church, family and pastor and not the piece of paper they sign and turn in to the county clerks office."
Clearly you didn't see the California couple a few weeks back that refused to sign their marraige license because it now says Spouse 1 and Spouse 2 instead of husband and wife. Their pastor highly encouraged this.
But yes, that's not most Christians. Just the ones that proclaim their religion most loudly. I believe there are some verses about the Pharisees that apply.
Given that out of the 30ish states that had "ban gay marriage" laws on the ballot that 30ish-minus-one have passed them, I, personally, don't think that the African-American vote is the first place I'd start railing against if I wanted to change things.
I think that this is more of a "HEY!!! WE SUPPORTED YOU PEOPLE!!!!!" kind of argument from him.
I think he's close enough to the argument to not be able to see that any argument that sounds like it includes the phrase "you people" isn't going to go over particularly well.
One would think that he would know better.
A legitimate reason to be against gay marriage would be if there were a God, and S/He forbid it. But it got left out of the Ten Commandments, and Jesus didn’t speak against it.
As for the opposition to gay marriage that doesn't rely on bigotry, I'd go with something like this:
"I'm 100% fine with those people getting married at the local Unitarian Church, but I don't want those people suing my church for discrimination against homosexuals when we tell them they can't get married *HERE*. Leviticus 20:13. While I am open-minded enough to say that I don't think we should stone homosexuals, I do think that we should be allowed to tell them that we don't serve their kind and they should visit that church with the rainbow flag in front of it. Given that if gay marriage is legalized, we won't be able to do that... the gays will win every law suit and the Supreme Court will take their side just like it did in Lawrence v. Texas, saying that gay marriage is banned is the only way we can keep our church pure. The United States doesn't believe in freedom of assembly or freedom of worship anymore. The ban is all we have between us and underground churches."
Okay, maybe there was a bit more bigotry in there than I thought there'd be.
If there were assurances that any given church couldn't be sued for denying marriage services to homosexuals (DISCRIMINATION!!!!), maybe there are three or four people whose minds might be changed. In theory.
(For the record, I *DO* think that the whole "our church can deny sacraments to whomever we want to!" is pretty much a protected Right.)
The "blacks are more homophobic" meme is a lazy narrative that has more basis in assumptions than in any kind of hard truth. There was actually a study that showed that blacks were less likely to vote on actual legislation that halted gay progress than whites were, and then there's the whole argument that blacks aren't in the real positions of power in congress, etc. that would allow them to make any sort of real dent in gay progress. It's laziness and victim politics that is practiced by privileged white gays (like Sully). For every black homophobe I guarantee you can find a white gay racist, and as a black gay male I can tell you that I've encountered a few.
I think Mr. Sullivan's perceptions may be biased by the part of Washington DC he lives in. When white gay people are part of the opening wave of gentrification in majority-black urban neighborhoods (which they often seem to be because schools aren't much of an issue) -- well, you work it out.
Hey TNC,
I love your blog, but you have to lay off of Andrew. Although your argument is absolutely correct, we need to understand where he is coming from. (BTW, I've fallen in love w/ Andrew b/c he has been on fire about the is Palin thing and is giving conservatives strokes. And on Obama he deserves a Bill Clinton like induction into the AA community...lol).
But seriously, we are not always so rational when it comes to racism. More intellectually, we do have a serious problem of homophobia in the AA community and its killing black women. I am a preacher's daughter and consider myself to be a socially conservative christian. I am not ready to sign on to Gay marriage but I have grown significantly in the past 10 years regarding Gay rights and Christianity (some significant growth due to reading Andrew these past couple years...he touches my heart...can't help but love the angry brit). Now I think that my opinion is that I would not advocate it b/c is violates my core religious beliefs about the definition of marriage but I also would not vote to BAN it b/c that would violate my core moral and constitutional beliefs about empathy and equal rights. I wish the Black community would walk into this new century and get healthy. This secrecy and homophobia is killing us.
"Want to see homophobia? Come hang out with some Irish Catholics I know here in Boston. Whoo boy!"
Please be careful not to confuse bigoted humor with homophobia (or racism, but that's another topic).
Working class Catholics of the type I am familiar with here in the Northeast (Irish, Italians generally) talk alot of ish about gays, usually when they are talking to eachother. For example when meeting a friend for a drink last week. He was late because he was attending a political fundraiser. While we are now both attorneys, we are both of working class Catholic background, so I asked him if he was late because he had to boff any c***cks on his way out of the fundraiser. I talk this way with my friends (mostly those I grew up with, not the uptight "fags" I went to school with) all the time, yet none of us hates gays by any means.
Totally agree with this post.
Could it be that Sullivan, like a lot of Americans, thinks this because of the rampant homophobia in the Hip Hop world?
this goes straight to the problem I have w/ Andrew, his profound ignorance and stupdity. he is ignorant because he refuses to recognize AfricanAmericans as a race. Due to slavery and rape we cannot simply point to one another as Yoruba, Zulu, Shona, Somali or Tigre. As a consequence he always starts his argument from the wrong point of view.
the gays will win every law suit and the Supreme Court will take their side just like it did in Lawrence v. Texas
Lawrence v. Texas, the Supreme Court case that overruled the appalling Bowers v. Hardwick (1986), was quite recent (2003), and it is a split ruling that's at risk from Bush-appointees Alito and Roberts.
Jaybird, isn't is already the case that there is no grounds to sue a church for denying to marry you? I've never heard of it happening--that's just a big fat lie served up by the fundies as a distraction. Of course a Hasidic Jew Rebbe can deny this Xtian-turned-atheist marriage rituals at his temple. And a bigoted ass like Dobson can deny every single homo the right to get married at his "church." Heck, I imagine we'll get some pastors who ONLY do gay marriage. The point is marriage is a civil right, not a religious right.
laborlibert (and others),
Homophobia doesn't mean you hate gays, it means you fear and/or avoid them. Hatred often stems from fear, but I think there's a lot of fear/aversion that doesn't manifest itself as hatred. This might seem like mincing words, but I actually think it's an important dimension in racial as well as sexual politics; there's relatively little overt hatred out there, but lots of muted aversion.
I'm just glad you thought about it. I shared the article via RSS with lots of friends with this caveat: "Maybe I'm a little defensive, but it seems to me that many ethnic communities in America are rather homophobic. I'm not saying that African-Americans aren't (10 minutes with my grandfather will absolve that notion), but it makes me uncomfortable that Sullivan feels the need to single them out above all others."
Last analysis I saw had 55% against, 41% for among likely voters and among all of those folks, only 4% weren't firm in their position. So, even if that entire 4% came from the against side, and the remaining 4% of undecideds all went to "for" and they ALL voted, California would still come out 51-49% against Proposition 8.
Ta-Nehisi, go down the hall and tell Andrew to chill the fuck out.
For the record, the argument presented is not an example of my own, personal, opinion but given as an example of an argument that I could theoretically see as not being completely without merit.
My opinion is that I don't care if two guys get married, more power to them, try not to get divorced, make sure you go on a long road trip after you get engaged but before you announce it to everybody you know, and if there is alcohol served at the reception, I'll get you a better gift than if there is not.
As for the question of "isn't is already the case that there is no grounds to sue a church for denying to marry you?"
I don't know. Is there? Has there ever been a lawsuit brought to court based on The First Church Of Protestantism turning away John Doe and Jane Roe?
I think M.C. gets it exactly right. Sullivan is, at this point, very much a creature of D.C. And in D.C., there's huge tension between the black and gay communities, largely due to gentrification. It's much like AA-Jewish conflict in NY and Chicago, which, as Chuck D once noted, is a mostly local phenomena that gets taken as a universal by journalists who live in NYC.
Obviously, this doesn't negate Sullivan's experience---any gay man in DC knows that it's always black guys, not white guys, who get menacing when they see you---but he's definitely confusing a local tension with a cultural fact. I think this ties in to your earlire post, TNC, about how many journalists forget about white poverty (and crime, and ignorance, and bigotry), because they live in cities where the poor are largely black, unlike in most of the country.
To get back to Andrew, he often makes wild generalizations unsupported by fact. His posts are often self-righteous and very, very irritating. His Palin mania is a great example. I'm an Obama supporter in a big way and I think Palin is unqualified, but Andrew's focus on Palin is obsessive and points to poorly understood unconscious processes on his part. I'm white and gay by the way and live with my partner, who is of African descent (born in Guyana), and our adopted African American daughter. We live in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. A very black neighborhood for those not familiar with New York City. We have been welcomed with open arms in this neighborhood and our family treated with respect. There have been homophobic moments but not many and no more than I would have expected anywhere else in NYC.
Ta-Nehisi, isn't it possible to be against gay marriage for legitimate reasons, that have nothing to do with homophobia?
Better yet, isn't it possible to be homophobic and support gay marriage? Personally, I find homosexuality kind of gross, I think same-sex sex is immoral, etc. But I'm not against gay marriage. If they want the state to bless their relationships, that's fine by me. It isn't the government's place to decide which relationships are morally worthy of being called marriages and which aren't. Still a homophobe though. So that being said, how do you, TNC, get from how black people vote on gay marriage to how homophobic they are?
This emphasis on the legitimacy of gay marriage is, IMO, leading the discussion into a nest of non-falsifiable conclusions:
1. God told me it was bad.
2. Gay sex is icky.
3. It seems wrong
What I think would be more useful is establishing the empirical thresholds for bad parenting and seeing if gay families(adoptive and otherwise) raise children less likely to thrive than two-parent hetero families.
Any other argument inevitably revolves around the non-falsifiable conclusions listed above.
any takers?
If we could remove religion from the gay marriage argument, there wouldn 't be any argument. Right-wing religion is poison! Right-wing christians agree with Islam in regards to gay rights. Right-wingers have no business voting on my intimate life!
you have to lay off of Andrew
No, you don't.
Before his revelation in 2004, Sullivan, like most white voters, cast his ballot for the more homophobic candidate and the more homophobic party.
I don't think Sullivan is in any position to claim that his "ethnic community" is less homophobic than the one who voted for the less homophobic candidate and the less homophobic party - at least not without some explanation as to why the "tolerant" white voter who cast their ballot for the anti-gay Bush is better than the "intolerant" black voter who cast their ballot for the pro-gay Gore.
It ain't as simple as who supports same-sex marriage and he shouldn't pretend that it is.
But yes, that's not most Christians. Just the ones that proclaim their religion most loudly. I believe there are some verses about the Pharisees that apply.
Sigh, don't get me started on that subject. My comment was more wishful thinking, then how it currently works. I can't take credit for this observation, but it's sad that certain Christians have defined the religion by what they hate, rather than by what they love.
It isn't the government's place to decide which relationships are morally worthy of being called marriages and which aren't.
Exactly, the government needs to stay the hell out of purely moral decisions.
Not really, the government really should stay the hell out of purely moral decisions completely.
I support gay marriage because Marriage is fundamentally a contractual relationship between two people for the raising of children.
Overtly open displays of homosexual affection make me a bit more uncomfortable than the same hetrosexual displays. Does that qualify me as a homophobe? I don't know.
I support gay marriage because I believe that we should not deny any portion our civil liberties to anyone for any reason. (Speaking of we need a civil rights act for smokers.)
However I do not nessicarily believe that opposing gay marriage makes a person a homophobe per se.
This is a hard question. It's like asking if supporting segragation during the jim-crow era south automatically made someone a racist. To continue the analogy I know a few people of my grandparent's generation who have told me that they were shocked when the civil rights act was passed in 1964 because they saw segragation as a natural part of American Life.
I think that this question bears further study. However it should be possible to say that there are those who oppose gay marriage because they are blatent homophobes and those who do so either out of ignorance or because they are resistant to change.
All of us can think of crotchety old men who refuse to buy a cell phone, have used a computer, and may or may not have cable TV. Does this make them technophobes or are they simply unwilling to change themselves to a changing world? I think the same sort of argument might be able to be made for a non-homophobic aversion to gay marriage.
I don't know if I made any sense but I think we need to draw some distinctions between those who are bigoted willfully and those who are merely ignorant.
I'm Catholic and when 2 people enter a Catholic marriage they're told to "go forth and multiply". So, from a Catholic perspective, a marriage can only be legitimate if the 2 people who enter it have to goal of having their own children. If these 2 people can't have children, it's not something they're expected to know before getting married. Then adoption becomes a second-best option.
That being said, I don't think Catholics forbid women too old to have kids from getting married and more importantly, Catholic belief should have nothing to do with CIVIL marriage.
Just wanted to put that out there as a not-exactly-bigoted reason that is used by some for not allowing gay marriage. Of course, then the Church also has this thing about not letting gay priests and arguing that being gay is a choice which just makes the statement that marriage is about children seem like a poor excuse.
"I don't know if I made any sense but I think we need to draw some distinctions between those who are bigoted willfully and those who are merely ignorant."
willfully ignorant like...reading newsweek at the breakfast table and exclaiming, "why honey they're locking up negroes like hotcakes!"
the sentence in the second to last paragraph should read
"All of us can think of crotchety old men who refuse to buy a cell phone, have never used a computer, and may or may not have cable TV."
Apologies
I don't have any easy answers all I am saying is that it is possible for people to take stands that I believe are morally reprehensible for reasons other than prejudice.
Not every person who flies the confederate flag is a racist, and not every racist wears a sheet.
I think we need to be carefull
If they want the state to bless their relationships, that's fine by me. It isn't the government's place to decide which relationships are morally worthy of being called marriages and which aren't.
If you really believe the second sentence, you should drop the word "bless" from the first sentence. I'm hetero and I don't want the state to bless or take a moral stance on my relationships. I want the state to affirm my contract with my partner and protect my rights. Period. That's all gay folks want, too. Truly, we would be better off if the state refused to call any relationship a marriage and turned all partnerships into domestic partnerships. If you want to get married you it do with a religious sanction, not a state one.
Also, the distinction everyone seems to be looking for is between homophobia and heterosexism. Homophobia: afraid of/disgusted by homosexuality. Heterosexism: heterosexuals deserve more civil rights than homosexuals. Of course it's logically possible to be homophobic and not heterosexist, but I imagine it's pretty uncommon. It would be even harder to be heterosexist without being homophobic on an intellectual level, but it seems like a lot of high ranking Dems (like Obama) make that unfortunate compromise for political reasons.
Please understand that this next sentence contains no value judgments.
I think that the path to full equality of marriage travels through "separate but equal" and the demands for immediate full equality have a great deal to do with the lack of progress.
I might be stepping into a minefield but I think blacks might seem more homophobic, in a perhaps paradoxical way, because the black population votes more solidly Democratic than Latinos or Italians. The other groups that vote similarly Democratic (unmarried women under 30, irreligious people, etc) tend to be less likely than the general population to hold socially conservative views.
For pollsters the black vote at times seems an anomaly. Black voters are generally portrayed as "liberal" but they have higher than average belief homosesxuality is a sin and that Jesus will return in their lifetime.
http://people-press.org/report/?pageid=1084
I'm scared to death this is going to sound offensive. Maybe I am being offensive and if so I hope to improve myself.
Sorn: "Overtly open displays of homosexual affection make me a bit more uncomfortable than the same hetrosexual displays. Does that qualify me as a homophobe? I don't know."
No, it likely means that you don't know many gay couples (or gay couples comfortable with expressing affection openly). Once you've been exposed to enough same-sex affection, you'll stop looking at it as "homosexual affection"--the same way you probably don't pay any attention to a straight couple holding hands walking down the street (just look at that heterosexual display!). It becomes just "affection".
"I support gay marriage..." Thanks! :-)
"All of us can think of crotchety old men who refuse to buy a cell phone, have never used a computer, and may or may not have cable TV. Does this make them technophobes or are they simply unwilling to change themselves to a changing world? I think the same sort of argument might be able to be made for a non-homophobic aversion to gay marriage."
Hey, you just described by partner's father! (I swear, he will have a Jitterbug phone by Christmas.) However, his decision not to pay for TV doesn't affect me one bit, except for having to hear his complaining about the signal quality of channel 2. He has, though, enjoyed hundreds of tax benefits and options not available to me or his son, simply because he's married. Reducing our relationships (and the social good they engender) to the same level as cable TV vs. antenna is bewildering and beside the point. My partner's father doesn't get to make decisions about my technology choices, and he shouldn't be able to make decisions about my civic ones just because he's uncomfortable with change.
I agree that change is hard, especially for older people set in their ways, but that doesn't mean they have an excuse (or a duty) to prevent it.
Hasidic Jews aren't really an "ethnic community," or at least not any more than "African-American evangelicals" or "Italian Traditionalist Catholics" are.
YAH! That's what I'm talkin' about, TNC! Tear him apart, dude. Don't let this shit stand. A far cry, thankfully, from your response to Clinton's laziness visavis the Obama endorsement.
And I second the point about Irish people in Boston.
And the Hispanics in LA and their anti-gay machismo...
And a number of other ethnic groups! Sullivan picked the wrong fight!
This is the same Sullivan who first got famous for giving TNR's inches to racists. Nothing against the guy (whose blog I ready daily), but that bit of racism in him will likely never go away, and might be his way of getting other conservatives on to the Obama bus.
Please, please, please don't ever refer to Sullivan as a conservative. He isn't. Unless you think Hillary voters who vote for McCain are liberals. No one who espoused conservative principles of government would support Barack. It's that simple. Nothing in Barack's record is remotely bi-partisan, except for bills that passed almost unanimously. Sullivan may be a 'moderate' liberal (although referring to him as moderate about anything is hard these days), but he certainly is not a conservative. As to why he smears black people as homophobes, he can answer for himself. It would be conservative (or liberal or just basic journalistic integrity) to look at the polls prior to making that claim.
ExCharmCityCub
Thanks for the reply. I was just trying to see if I could find some sort of possible reason that those who oppose marriage for those who choose alternative lifestyles might have that didn't revolve around the person's themselves.
I agree with you that reducing the idea of contractual relationships to technology choices is a bit bewildering. It's the only analogy I could come up with that made any sort of sense.
It is very hard to understand these people that deny the rights of others to enjoy the basic freedoms that they themselves take for granted.
In a nutshell the debate goes back to the fundamental doctrines of freedom and equality before the law. In the words of H.S. Maine the history of man in society traces his movement from status to contract.
I have one further question. Since we live in a pluralistic society where the majority of the people voting on an issue have the ability to make the laws should those people be allowed to act when their views infringe upon the rights of the minority?
Personally I don't think so. However there are those who do, and those are the people who are passing constitutional amendments in places like Colorado and Wyoming.
Having read a lot I personally have a lot of faith for the future of the equality of everyone before the law. 50 years ago I don't think this conversation would have even been held. Perhaps we are moving to a state of society wherein we can finally realize the ideals (not the practices of) Thomas Jefferson.
Here's to hoping
I think the fact that post-Apartheid South Africa protects gay people in their constitution and legalized gay marriage is a pretty clear refutation of the claim that you can be against gay marriage without being homophobic. South Africans know a thing or two about discrimination, and the fact that they chose to explicitly address marriage equality for gays and lesbians along with racial/ethnic equality speaks volumes.
Rab: Have you read any of Andrew's books or his thesis on Michael Oakeshott? He is definitely a conservative ... just one of the seemingly few that bases his belief on a real philosophy and not on Republican mantra.
Maybe he was, but I think he was always more of a libertarian than anything.
He basis political endorsements on who disappointed him, hurt his feelings, or makes him feel good. A "real philosophy" has little to do with anything. (Except maybe his endorsement of Ron Paul during the primary, but even then I think that's just because the neoconservative wing upset him)
Sorry to keep supporting this tangent, but if you haven't read Andrew's books you don't have much insight into his rational or philosophy ... if you have read his blog you have a lot of insight into his personality. There are a big differences between the two mediums.
"If there were assurances that any given church couldn't be sued for denying marriage services to homosexuals (DISCRIMINATION!!!!), maybe there are three or four people whose minds might be changed. In theory"
I'm pretty sure that the Supreme Court would unanimously hold that churches can administer whatever sacraments they want to whomever they want, & it's unconstitutional to require them to conduct gay marriages. I don't think that one's a close call. A lot of rabbis won't marry non-Jews; I'm not aware of any antidiscrimination lawsuits about that, and certainly no successful ones.
I've thought for a while that there might be a fair degree of genuine, understandable confusion about this among religious voters which the "civil unions" compromise actually worsens, because it obscures the difference between civil & religious marriage. But, I've also run across people who just refuse to believe it & like to play the victim of religious oppression.
To Andrew's defense, I think this is just a case of Andrew Sullivan wildly overreacting and making huge exagerating statements.
To Andrew's defense? This is kind of the general problem with Andrew Sullivan, isn't it? It was what he did when he was a Republican hack, and it's a large part of what he's doing now that he's turned against the Republicans. It's nice to have him on the side of the angels now, but sometimes he still says embarrassing things.
Seriously though, despite my lack of hard empirical data that seems to be required to make any point on this blog today, I would have to agree with Andrew based on my own experience. [...] I may also be unfairly biased because every few weeks a crew of black israelites camps outside my office window and screams for hours about how god hates fags and they should all go to hell.
Judging all African Americans by the Black Israelites makes about as much sense as judging all white Americans by Fred Phelps.
Marc:
I realize that. That's why I said that I may be "unfairly" biased by the blizraelites.
The most homophobic community of any significance in America, or anywhere else, is the Muslim community.
OK, so maybe it's Black Muslims then if you want to get into subgroupings. But in broad terms, I haven't seen African-Americans call for stoning of gay people (contrast with Iran and Saudi Arabia), or deny that they really exist in their country (contrast with Ahmadinejad).
Remind me again, was it negroes who killed matt shephard? Is it negroes who host drag the fag parties? We can't be the "most" homophobic by the sheer fact that we've never had enough power to be so homophobic.
The most homophobic community of any significance in America, or anywhere else, is the Muslim community.
Same bigotry, different "other." And this time, with even less support than Sullivan can dig up.
Wow. Nearly every attempt to refute Andrew is relying entirely upon anecdotal evidence.
In contrast, Andrew has now posted quotes from and links to a number of recent polls that show dropping support for homosexuality and same-sex marriage in the black community.
If you want to argue with his assertion, back your argument up with facts to match his, not with your anecdotal experience or stereotypical ideas about ethnic groups.
Liz, I looked at that Pew poll, and I saw dropping objection to homosexuality and same-sex marriage in the black community.
Opposition went from 62 percent to 56 percent in four years.
Why wouldn't it continue to fall?
LIZ IS SPOT ON.
Some gay guy who lives in Bed Stuy and says blacks are nice there. REALLY? You don't say. Brooklyn (and this includes Bed Stuy) is probably the most Bohemian place on the East Coast. I was in Bed Stuy last week and while it's still overwhelmingly black, it's hardly a microcosm for the black community in america.
On the other hand, the pew research is empirical. I mean, anctedotally, I could throw around stories about DC (where it's no contest who's more homophobic), but the numbers tell the truth.
There is a tendency (justly btw) in the black community to be defensive when called out and wonder why no one's calling out the other groups.
If this isn't a bigger issue in the Black community, then why isn't there a major issue with the being "Down Low" in the white and hispanic communities?
I think TNC makes a very good point about education and economics, however, the numbers also show that blacks are, on average, less educated and less affluent than their white peers (I don't have the data to compare hispanics). So wouldn't it follow that those reasons are why blacks are more homophobic?
No one is saying there's some inherent homophone gene in Africans. Rather, the sociological factors that are responsible for the current malaise in the lower income black family, namely, lack of education and job opportunities are also contributing to there perspective on gays.
The black church also plays a major role in this. I'd venture to say that the black church plays a much, much, bigger role in shaping the social attitudes of its member than in predominantly white churches. But unfortunately, I don't have anything to backt his up.
To Andrew's defense? This is kind of the general problem with Andrew Sullivan, isn't it? It was what he did when he was a Republican hack, and it's a large part of what he's doing now that he's turned against the Republicans. It's nice to have him on the side of the angels now, but sometimes he still says embarrassing things.
This. I will never, ever forget or forgive Sullivan's support and fervent defense of the 90's-era Republican Congress and of the Bush Administration in general (until the fact that they were torturing people shocked him out of his rabid fanboy-ism). Have people really forgotten the decadent left = fifth column Sullivan so quickly?
The rabid anti-Obama screeds will appear on Sullivan's blog as soon as Obama tries to implement anything remotely liberal. Like Ariana Huffington, Sullivan is an opportunist - progressives would be fools to expect further support from either of them once Obama takes office.
Liz didn't bother to read the post linked above, whose author cited a number of exit polls that showed that black voters were no more likely than white to support anti-marriage amendments.
Myself, I'm still wondering why white voters aren't held responsible for voting for anti-gay bigots like George Bush and John McCain, not to mention Marilyn Musgrave, Wayne Allard, and their ilk.
I suspect one will never be forthcoming. Apparently, it's wrong to vote against equality - unless you get a tax cut for it.
Andrew may be an opportunist, but he's one of the only pundits on either side to admit he's been wrong (Bush, Iraq, etc.) and he the only blogger I read that frequently posts the opposing point of view.
I don't see an agenda, I see an intelligent, passionate man who evaluates things as objectively as he can.
Personally, I hate reading the Huffington post and other liberal circle jerks where everyone is agreeing in how righteous they are. I enjoy someone who doesn't seem to toe the party line.
Besides, anyone who's read Andrew over the past 10 years has seen a massive transformation. He's had the wool pull from his eyes re: the republican party and it's attitudes towards gays. Sometimes, all you need is a flash of sunlight to motivate you to look for more.
If you want to limit yourself to "progressive" writers who will only "support the cause," than you are no better than those sycophants at the National Review and the Weekly Standard.
No one is saying there's some inherent homophone gene in Africans.
This, albeit inadvertently, is the funniest thing I've read on the Internet. Ever.
Andrew is being really selective in choosing data to support his position. In his response to TNC, he ignores TNC's directly relevant data showing that blacks are less likely to support anti-gay marriage initiatives while he highlights less pertinent data showing blacks are overall more homophobic and more likely to express disapproval of gay marriage and civil unions to pollsters.
Conclusions:
(1) Blacks appear to express more anti-gay sentiment than some other ethnic groups (for Andrew to exaggerate this finding by alleging that blacks are more homophobic than "all" other ethnic groups is an unproven absurdity).
(2) Blacks are less likely than some other ethnic groups to translate their anti-gay sentiment into actual support for anti-gay marriage initiatives in the voting booth.
(3) Andrew does his readers a great disservice by not describing the nuance involved in understanding black homophobia as indicated by TNCs and Jamelle Bouie's responses to his original post. Bouie reasonably concludes that "blacks appear to be more likely than whites both to see homosexuality as wrong and to favor gay-rights laws.”
Bouie also notes how Barney Frank said, blacks in Congress are "with no close second, the most supportive group for gays and lesbians.” Andrew ignores this information. His readers should not have to click on a link to Bouie's response to find this important contextual information.
(4) Andrew's initial post stood out as weird and out-of-place--particularly since it was unsupported by any evidence. This indicates to me that he has some preconceived notions about black homophobia, maybe rooted in personal experience, that may be immune to any counter-evidence.
I'm glad that TNC and Bouie confronted Andrew on his strange myopia, even if Andrew's unwilling to admit the limitations of his conclusions that they've exposed.
Here's hoping that someone can parse the conflicting datasets that Coates and Andrew quote. I can't make heads or tails of Pew or exit polls when it gets into something so close to my life. One thought I'll offer is that as a American gay man of a certain age, it can feel like a bit of a betrayal that black folks don't get it that preacher's wrong to teach hatred of gays and inject the secrecy, shame and self-destruction caused by homophobia into congregants. The black church in the U.S. was a morally transcendent force during the civil rights struggles of the 1960's. Where did that go to? Anyone with the smallest amount of sense can see that the nelly organ player or the frail, feminine boys clinging to their mothers in church did not make a moral choice to be the way they are. God, or Nature, turned them out of the mold exactly as they were meant to be.
What I take away from this thread today is that Obama's chances to get elected are going to change the way we talk to each other. No more need to mince words between races and no criticism, if well placed and backed up with some data, can be rendered moot with accusations of insensitivity. That goes for anything that you want to say to me about gays, too. No more PC police and good riddance, that sort of speech monitoring has held progressives back for too long.
Re: I will never, ever forget or forgive Sullivan's support and fervent defense of the 90's-era Republican Congress and of the Bush Administration in general (until the fact that they were torturing people shocked him out of his rabid fanboy-ism).
There are an awful lot of people who voted GOP in the 90s and even supported Bush in his first term-- and then saw the light. rather than holding useless grudges against them you should be welcoming them.
Andrew posted numbers. I would say that it is part of African American history, and the strong influence of the church in Black communities why Blacks would be more resistant to gay marriage than other ethnic groups. As a smaller, tighter knit community that relied more heavily on the church than others for their very survival, it may just be that this resistance is vestigial of it (for non-Christian blacks) or derivative of it (for Christian blacks).
In nations that claim universal protections of civil rights, why is it more acceptable to be homophobic than racist? I'm not saying either is more or less damaging - but in America at least, you'd be hard-pressed to deny that overt and public homophobia is not just accepted, but expected.
I have often heard the claim from civil rights leaders that any mention of the GLBT struggle and that of African Americans is so specious as to be laughable. Sure, less involuntary servitude has befallen us queers - unless you count interior design firms, Broadway, and the Bravo network. But the oppression of GLBT folks and black folks has tragically cost millions of beautiful and worthy human beings their lives in each case - both have been robbed of entire generations. AIDS if nothing else should have been the catalyst of a grand and mutual outcry against discrimination, against the muted silence of "tolerance" (which in the case of the AIDS crisis has always meant "looking the other way"). Neither minority is "more oppressed" or more worthy of attention, because all oppression attacks the soul of man and we do have a fundamental responsibility to eliminate it as best we can. But the quest for true equality all but demands basic equanimity in how we view each other. From whence I assume Andrew's anger arises.
I have heard little but vicious dismissals in the public forum from any African-American in a prominent national leadership position re: GLBT rights. I would love to see examples to the contrary. But I would also be remiss to (as Andrew has) ignore that I have also never seen ANY leader of an ethnic minority voice support for sexual equality - which has the effect of broadening my initial question. Is it not counterintuitive to consider the missions for racial, gender, and sexual liberty as struggles apart? Is any the "lesser" one? If not, why do we insist on treating some as such?
I have heard little but vicious dismissals in the public forum from any African-American in a prominent national leadership position re: GLBT rights.
Barack Obama opposes don't ask-don't tell and the Defense of Marriage Act, and supports banning discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and extending anti-hate crimes legislation. John Lewis supports gay marriage (and draws on the full weight of his history in the civil rights movement to reject any "separate but equal" compromises). Maxine Waters has a strong record on LGBT rights. Deval Patrick fought to protect same-sex marriage in Massachussetts.
If you've heard little from the black leadership, you haven't been listening.
"There is, alas, no ethnic community as homophobic in America as African-Americans."
Seriously? What about white southern cowboy conservatives...and I would definitely consider them an ethnic group within the U.S., with their regional accent, their regional food, their fundamentalist religion and their tendency toward war and violence (not that all ethnic groups are like that).
How did George Bush get into office? By talking about having a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage...and I'm pretty sure it wasnt the AA-population that supported that. Religious white right-wingers (ie. the ethnic community that Andrew Sullivan is a part of) are the most homophobic group within America today, to the point where it can be the sole motivating factor to get their vote. Last time I checked, rappers weren't trying to stop gay men and women from adopting children and teaching in schools. And isn't there a law that says that if you get fired from your job because of your sexual orientation, you can't sue for discrimination? Was it black people that passed that law? The white church is ridiculously homophobic...what do you see all day but a sea of white religious leaders parading across the cable news channels all day, disparaging gay people. It's pathetic.
Conservative whites are the most homophobic people in America...and they pass the laws to prove it.
From the San Jose Mercury News:
"Black and Latino voters critical to same-sex marriage ban's success
Exit polls showed that 70 percent of black voters, and a majority of Latino voters, voted yes on Prop. 8, one likely reason why the measure won a slim majority in Los Angeles County, where pre-election polls had suggested it would lose, even though it lost by a huge margin in the Bay Area."
http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_10909847
Numerically, I suspect that the greater number of Latino voters had a bigger impact, but it appears pretty incontrovertible that black voters were the strongest supporters of Prop 8.