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Edited on Fri Nov-05-04 04:26 AM by UdoKier
"...to tell these people to stop kneejerking and blaming us for the election loss. "
I agree. You're not at all to blame. Kerry himself in his non-response to the flip-flop smears alone deserves more blame.
Not once have I come out and called anyone a homophobe...And you are not one to talk either, because you are one of the people who began one of these threads.
My gripe was with my mayor, Gavin Newsom, and him alone. I never blamed any of the good people he used as props for his own purposes. Some posters compared that event to Rosa Parks, but it was totally different. Rosa Parks sat in the front of the bus on her own. She didn't have some slick rich guy telling her when and where to do it while bathing in the spotlight for himself, right after taking office.
A lot of the queer DUers worked their asses for this election campaign.
And you have my sincere gratitude for that, as do our brothers and sisters of every color and creed who did likewise.
They put their own feelings aside regardless of what we were facing from the right as well as from those on the left who truly do not support us and see us as something that costs them elections.
If there was this big block of democrats who really felt that way, don't you think the party would have put the DOMA in our platform? There are differences of opinion in how to get there and whether or not to call it "gay marriages" or "civil unions", but the vast majority of democrats support equal rights for GLBT people. Can you honestly say that for the GOP, except for their tiny libertarian leaning minority?
one certain member was going around constantly spouting how us gays cost the 2000 election. I'm not sure who you mean, but I know it wasn't me. 2000 was 100% full-on Florid voter fraud. The results this year were much more disturbing. There was fraud, but probably not 4 million votes worth. We are out of touch with too many of the electorate. I don't know what issue or combination of issues it is, but we need to figure that out, and these discussions are a part of that. The mainstream media decided early on that "God Guns and Gays" was the reason for our defeat, so expecting it to not come into the conversation at all is a bit unrealistic.
Are we going to have to hear about this every other day for the next four years?
Doubtful. hopefully, as a party we will find a new approach that everybody is happy with well before 2006. Even Dumbya has endorsed the idea of civil unions, so that should be seeen as the farthest-right position acceptable within the democratic party, IMO.
Or wouldn't it be better than instead of dividing the democratic party even further apart, trying to pull us all back together, so we can work for the greater good? And that greater good is proving that election 2004 was a FRAUD!
Yes and yes. Again, anybody that blames this mess ON GAYS is a pig. But talking about trying to approach GLBT issues in a different way should not be divisive. For example, if the consensus of the party is that we should push even more forcefully for gay marriage, fine. But we should all be on the same page about it. Newsom pulled his little stunt, annd then there were plenty of gays popping up on TV to express their disagreement with it. I think we really need to work on getting a more uniform message out there.
Is it fair that after all the hard work we have done as well, that we must again be the victims, when we are the ones who face becoming federally sanctioned second class citizens next year?
No, and it's not fair to the millions of blacks who have been treated as 2nd class citizens since they were "freed". At least you have a choice of whether or not to make your status as such known when you apply for a job, etc. I'm a straight white married male. Apparently that means I'm a part of the "power elite". And yet, I work my ass off to make only 30K per year and barely get by. I really don't feel very empowered.
if the attacks on us continue, then these people spouting their bullshit towards will get what they want in the end, and that is the loss of the gay vote for the democrats in the next election and so on.
I don't think that is what they want, and no - they SHOULD NOT take the gay vvote for granted. But let's say the position of the party becomes support for civil unions and full equal rights otherwise - and let the ACLU challenge the gay marriage bans in the court - would that make you want to leave the party? It is still progress from where we were only 12 years ago, you know. Gays flocking en masse to the green party would not be enough to make IT a relevant party, so you would essentially be a constituency without representation - and the further weakening of the democratic party would undoubtedly mean an end to overtime, social security, enforcement of civil rights laws and labor laws- IE we all slide into poverty, which equals political impotence, which equals further weakening of the party and so on...
So if you think going on exactly as we've been doing will work, fine. If you think merely getting printouts on the diebold machines will be enough, fine.
But I've seen the face of these people, and they are not playing. Of the 11 anti-gay initiatives, most of them passed by 70% margins. That's a pretty resounding message. Are we as a party to simply write off those states forever because their populations are overwhelmingly religio-nuts?
Which brings me back to my header - nothing is ever simple in politics - and this surre as hell isn't. You try to boil it down to a matter of right and wrong - and sure, not compromising on this in any way would be "right", but cchrist, we have to compromise on TONS of things to get things done. Hell, 40% of Americans have NO HEALTH insurance, and a ton of them can't affford to see a doctor. I personally believe health care should be a right, but I still voted for Kerry with his sad, watered-down, corporate-contaminated health plan, in hopes that it could eventually become something better. What you are doing, is essentially demanding the equivalent of single payer, NOW.
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