"Blacks" hammered for Prop 8's passage on DU (whose user base is 86% White, 2.2% African-American)

[Poll_Blind]

  Hey, anyone else who is more than a little uncomfortable about why African-Americans, as a group, are being singled out for derision regarding the passage of Proposition 8 you should probably check out some interesting demographic data from 2007 about DU.

  Here's your real headline: Predominately WHITE, WELL-OFF, MIDDLE-AGED political website user base has few problems blaming "Blacks" as an entire group for inability to vote down Proposition 8 when African-Americans only made up around 6% of California's voting population.

PB

[last1standing]

1. So you're going to use a broad brush to attack those using a broad brush?

:eyes:

[kestrel91316]

2. A website can't blame. People can blame. Care to name names,

instead of tarring us all with the same brush?

I haven't seen ANYONE blame blacks for this. And if somebody did, I can pretty much guarantee you they are a troll.

[stillcool]

6. Here you go...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4401391

[amdezurik]

24. circular argument

you make an accusation then to try to prove it you refer to someone else saying the same thing.

try again. I have seen this accusation over and over and no evidence presented

[stillcool]

33. Are you referring to my post?

if you are I don't understand.

[Raineyb]

116. Here. Now will you open your eyes?

This one was particularly egregious
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=4405273

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=7785900#7785950

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=7785900#7786404

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4403929

This one doesn't even have the numbers right.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x7789242#7794787

[EFerrari]

83. Holy cow. There have been many, many posts

that buy into that whole 70% number -- before they even know if that's accurate and without even know that's a very small percentage of CA voters and not knowing at all that we did ten points better this time out than last time. :crazy:

[pnwmom]

3. How do we know the DU demographics? No one's ever asked me mine. n/t

[Mojorabbit]

52. I want to know that too

That is a lot of information and I'd like to know how it was come by.

[hfojvt]

111. that group did a survey that Skinner promoted

hence a few thousand DUers at the time went to that site and filled out a survey on those areas (age, income, race, etc.) Of course, two years and 30,000 members later, those numbers have probably changed.

[Idealism]

4. Well said

I do not understand the need for such vehemence towards our fellow man. It is of course a travesty, but further dividing ourselves will do no good. Why do we have to always find a scapegoat? Please heed to message of unity from this past campaign and in this spirit come together. We can get this challeneged in court, but currently this in-fighting must cease to be. Cooler heads must prevail if we are to move forward and put our efforts into this!

[silex]

14. Exactly

so this issue isn't going to be resolved if this continues to divide people even further.

[kevinbgoode]

27. Right....and where will the rest of you be when these amendments come up in some other states?

Nowhere - preoccupied with other matters around here. . .and we will be left to fight the battle ourselves. And then we'll be told that we are "dividing" the party by saying ANYTHING about the results. And then we'll be told once again to sacrifice our SPOUSES, our LIVES for the Party, so we can be treated like sh*t again.

What are we going to put our efforts into? Undoing the amendment in a few years? With what? And in the meantime, who is going to stand by and say nothing as 18,000 legally wed couples are notified that their marriages have been NULLIFIED?

[Tigress DEM]

56. To your left -voting against hatred and bigotry - where else?

AND I heard some challenge has been made to prop 8 as being simply illegal because what it is trying to do isn't within the scope of it's legal form. So hopefully this will be slammed in the trash can where it belongs anyway.

http://cbs5.com/politics/proposition.8.results.2.856642.html
<snip>

Legal analyst Melissa Griffin told CBS 5 that there was a substantial argument being made by the measure's opponents that the matter of same-sex marriage was too weighty to be decided by a ballot proposition.

In legal terms, it's called a "revision," said Griffin, a columnist for the San Francisco Examiner. "This is a substantive change to the constitution and a change of that nature - a revision - has to be made with a constitutional convention" — which would require a vote of two-thirds of each house of the state Legislature before being submitted to voters, she summarized.

That argument had been made by opponents before Prop. 8 even went on the ballot, but a state Supreme Court justice rejected it at the time, ruling it a moot point because the people hadn't yet voted on the measure. There was no controversy, so nothing to decide, the court effectively said.

By changing the state constitution to limit marriage to a man and a woman, Prop. 8 overturns the high court's decision that legalized same-sex marriage in the state in mid-June. Since then, an estimated 18,000 gay and lesbian couples, many of them from other states, were married.

AND I also heard that even if it is considered to have passed it can't undo any legal marriages that have already taken place.

http://cbs5.com/politics/proposition.8.results.2.856642.html
<snip>

California Attorney General Jerry Brown has said he thinks the ban would not apply to couples who tied the knot between mid-June and election day.

BUT to blame blacks for prop 8 is to simply be drinking the koolaid and letting Rush Limbaugh and that ilk hand us our talking points.

It's like feminists voting for McCain/Palin because they can't have Hilary. It's the way they WANT us to think so we'll fight with each other.


Blacks in California are 6.7% of the population. They just don't have the numbers to have done this TO the GLBT community.

http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/06000.html

[roguevalley]

57. where good people have always been, with you.

[ContraBass Black]

108. When the VA DoMA was on the ballot, I stood in vocal opposition

With the Montgomery County Democratic Party and the Young Democrats at Virginia Tech.

And then, I voted nay.

[stillcool]

5. Yeah...and I'm sure that all that..

blaming it on black people is going to go a long, long way to fix it.

[amdezurik]

28. you still refuse to say who does

[stillcool]

30. Who does what?

[xchrom]

7. seems to me DU has a lovely grand time blaming Gay folk

for all kind of probs around here.

this is another example.

[kevinbgoode]

19. Thank you.

They have no problem asking us to ignore the public statements of our presidential candidate when he said he did not believe gays should marry - and then they try to ignore how that statement was USED in a CERTAIN ethnic community to help secure votes to TAKE THOSE RIGHTS AWAY.

Then they want to pretend that it isn't a fact that 70% of African-Americans in California voted for the heinous amendment. Instead, they want to claim it's "race baiting" or "bigotry" to point the fact out.

You can bet the people posting this crap didn't do one thing to help the gay community during the battle over these outrageous amendments.

[amdezurik]

31. who, for what and why have you not reported them?

[xchrom]

38. so miss 768 posts -- why would you assume me and others haven't? nt

[Captiosus]

65. So post count now directly correlates to activism level?

And pointing out a sub-1000+ post count is now an underhanded insult?
Give me a break.

I didn't know I was on a Final Fantasy fanboy forum. :eyes:

[LostinVA]

106. No, it means they haven't been around long enougfh to make a statement like that

Gays -- the whipping boys and girls of DU, since 2001.

[thrift_store_angel]

32. Exactly.

I don't remember seeing post after post after post popping up to defend gay and lesbian people during the last election when we were blamed for everything DU could possibly throw at us.

I haven't read every single post on the topic in the last few days, but I don't think that anyone was explicitly stating the our loss on prop 8 was entirely the fault of the African-American population of California. If they are then they are wrong. I think the point is that the numbers coming out of California have shown yet again (as many other polls have -- and no I am not going to go look them up for you, they are out there, Google) that there is a problem with homophobia in the African-American community. Seeing as we keep getting beaten every time something comes up on the ballot, and I don't expect that the ballot measures are going to stop anytime soon, we need to address EVERY issue that may help us win.

Homophobia in the African-American community is one of these issues. Homophobia within the Hispanic community is another. Why is this different than homophobia in the general populace? Well the numbers run higher, so something has to be different...but if we can't discuss that without being called racists then we aren't ever going to find out why that is, or what we can do about it.

[thrift_store_angel]

40. Ok here...

After a quick Google: African-Americans are more likely than whites — by a 65 percent-to-53 percent margin — to oppose marriage equality for gays and lesbians because I know I will get slammed for not providing any support for my assertions. I am sure I could find others, but I am going to bed now.

[xchrom]

43. spot on -- thanks. nt

[Tigress DEM]

62. I FOR ONE am tired of everybody who blames anybody.

It's a waste of time and energy.

WE ALL should be getting together and working to put the damm illegal proposition in the trash can instead of fighting with each other or blaming anyone.

It's a bad law and ANYONE who voted for it whatever skin they are in did wrong.

BUT I think the CNN poll results may not be trust worthy. The ones that show 75% of black women voted for prop 8 also show 4% of black men voted but didn't vote YES and didn't vote NO on prop 8. So EVERY SINGLE black man just left that spot alone? EVERY SINGLE black man in California who was polled even gay black men didn't touch that part of the ballot?

[rawtribe]

8. I blame these people among others of there strip

http://www.christiannewswire.com/news/273468592.html

[curse of greyface]

9. Why not change the headline to Whites vote no on Prop 8 But yet it mysteriously passes.

Puzzled DU'ers wonder why?

And yet all these WHITE, WELL-OFF, MIDDLE-AGED people raised hundreds of thousands of dollars (probably millions) and got the first African American elected to the White House... Yeah we must be racists.

[stillcool]

29. If all the whites would have voted no...

would it have failed?

[curse of greyface]

36. Whites as a group voted 49% yes 51% no

I understand your point. But it is a bit of twisted logic. As a group Whites voted for civil rights and as a group African Americans opposed civil rights. This is the bottom line.

The fact that the bigots this time around were people of color should not dissuade us from calling them out on their bigotry.

[stillcool]

51. Okay. How about you keep

your calling out of black people as bigots to the state of California? Or better yet, I'm just going to stay out of this discussion.

[Bluenorthwest]

84. How fucked up you are!

He said calling bigots bigots. Look how you characterize that. Cheap, fake, and simply disgusting. All bigots will be called out, every where. All of them. Always. Get used to it.

[endthewar]

67. McCain won the white vote 55-43. I assume that whites will be tossed under the bus for this.

I eagerly await you starting a thread to vilify whites for this. After all, whites gave us Bush in 2000, Bush in 2004, and voted 55-43 to give us McCain this year.

[EFerrari]

81. Groups don't vote, voters vote. 'Way to let the white 82% pro yes voters off the hook!

God help me, it's basic math.

[amdezurik]

41. since you insist on basing it on race

and that breakdown you are being dishonest to ignore the other groups, still. If (race based as you insist) ONLY whites had voted on that one issue it would not have passed. You and a couple others fake outrage over something I have not seen happen here does not insulate you from the numbers. Facts are facts, those black voters who voted yes have just as much "blame" as any other race that voted yes. In this case white men suck (yes we do, at least 51%), but black women did not come off well either. Being black does not excuse nor does it bring special shame. Well it does, but only in your eyes. Says more about you then anyone else.

[stillcool]

50. Of course they do...

all people, regardless of their color are responsible for how they vote.

[Tigress DEM]

59. Absolutely. It would have failed

Statewide Votes
NO - 4,907,867
YES - 5,417,748
________________
Total 10,325,615


63% is 6,505,137 million votes
6% is 619,537 thousand votes

[EFerrari]

80. That has to be the saddest post I've ever seen on DU.

Where is your number for the whites who voted yes?

Jesus Christ on a trailerhitch.

[Tigress DEM]

60. BUT something else is REALLY weird about this CNN table

HOW is it even possible to have an entire group of 4% that happens to be Black Men and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM did NOT vote Yes and did NOT vote NO?

[dsc]

68. that isn't what that means

what the na means is that the sample size of black men wasn't enough to trust the results for that sub group.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

10. I agree we can't blame black people - this was promoted by Mormons and Knights of Columbus

There is tho the fact that church-going black people who voted for Obama are not *automatically* in favor of gay marriage, and part of the reason for that is the culture of the Black Church, which was a very important institution of protection and refuge but which emphasized (and still does) anti-gay ideas.

That's why I'm against most churches in general. They're not good things.

[kevinbgoode]

11. Oh...was that 70% in favor statistic..some kind of fantasy?

And don't worry - the other groups are getting grief as well. But those who are members of a minority without a lot of support - including from the Presidential candidate they just voted for. . .INSTEAD OF PROTECTING MY OWN RIGHTS - have to look at the statistics and take our turn.

Don't you worry - there is plenty of anger at the criminal-laden Catholic Church and the counterfeit self-claiming "evangelical" Christians who voted for this step toward forced theocracy.

[stillcool]

16. Are these all black people..

or just all the black people in the state of California? What about the black men? They weren't listed here. Is it just black women? Maybe we should never have given all those black women the right to vote, eh?

[readmoreoften]

23. How do you get "wanting to stop black women from voting" out of criticizing bigotry?

The mind baffles.

[stillcool]

46. okay..here's how I get it...

as far as I have seen posted there is one poll from which this 70% number is being floated. The 70% statistic is black woman.


I am no statistician, but I do not see the black vote in California as the cause for the passing of this bullshit. So this is not about the passage or failure, this is about the percentage of the black vote. I haven't read anything about how this initiative was worded. I know the 3 ballot initiatives I voted on in this past election were not worded very clearly. I happen to live in Massachusetts, and believe it or not we have black people here too. I'm having a hard time dealing with this level of hatred against an entire race on the basis of the data from this one poll.

[ContinentalOp]

17. Yeah, let's ignore actual professional exit polls and focus on an informal DU poll!

:eyes:

[TexasObserver]

12. Well said, and accurate. It's scapegoating, and it's wrong.

[kevinbgoode]

15. Are facts scapegoating?

Please explain how the statistical breakdown of the demographics of voting - and the campaign aimed at securing their votes - becomes scapegoating? The fact cannot be changed that the African-American community voted 70% to strip the constitutional rights of the gay community in California. That's what they did. It isn't scapegoating - it's a FACT.

[TexasObserver]

45. It's scapegoating to use facts to rationalize making group attacks.

Blacks didn't pass the resolution. That's a fact.

Do religious blacks vote against gay rights? Yes, because of their religious prejudices. The problem is not with blacks, or with Hispanics. It's with people who make religion a key part of their lives.

[kevinbgoode]

13. And, as a professional journalist. . .I haven't seen anyone blame an ENTIRE

group for the 70% statistic. But 70% is far and away that HIGHEST percentage of voters who cast a ballot for that heinous amendment. Don't ask us to ignore facts.

I don't have problems dealing with facts. The Mormon Church made the largest funding campaign. The African-American community had the highest percentage BY FAR of voters in favor of that amendment.

My rights as an American citizen were at stake. You can damn well bet I'm going to look at the statistics in voter breakdown. And don't make me remind you that I voted for this President-elect DESPITE his PUBLIC opposition to my right to MARRY, a statement which was used in a direct campaign to the Black community in an effort by proponents to get their votes. And it obviously worked.

[stillcool]

22. How many votes is that 70%?

and if all of those 70% had voted no, would it have failed? How many votes did the 50% of whites who voted for it amount to? You don't think you might need a little more data than one poll to let you know why these people voted the way they did? You think calling out an entire race is going to do something for you? What is it you want? What do you want to say about and to the African American Population in this country?

[Duncan Grant]

39. The votes are still relevant whether "Yes on 8" passed or not.

I'm all for more data -- the more the better. On this we are aligned.

What do I want? I want to deal with things as they are and not as I wish them to be.

[xchrom]

18. this is a bigoted homophobic OP. nt

[readmoreoften]

20. Nice way to insinuate that the gay people here are "white, well-off"

Try again. Plenty of people of color have chimed in as for NO on 8 and have been critical of the religious fundamentalists in their community--as have white people who criticize "rednecks" and fundies (who are imagined as white) and "the south" (which is of course a criticism of southern whites.)

[JVS]

21. 2.9% of us are republicans!

[readmoreoften]

25. Such a high percentage!

[JVS]

35. Considering the nature of the website, I find it odd.

[ContraBass Black]

105. Maybe they're here for the insightful discussion and extensive news aggregation.

[rpannier]

26. Where'd you get the racial make-up???

I don't remember ever listing mine.

[Poll_Blind]

37. Each of the links in my OP go directly to the statistic they refer to. There's a link to the full..

...results (it's the first link in there) which allows you to browse the other questions asked, and see how users responded. Underneath the graphic is a combo box which allows you to jump directly to any one of the questions asked.

PB

[rpannier]

55. Thanks for sharing that info

I was just curious.

Thanks

[Poll_Blind]

70. No problem, lots of interesting information about DU's actual userbase there.

Too many questions about whiskey, but otherwise good info.

PB

[LSdemocrat]

34. Perhaps the No on Prop 8 campaign should be doing some soul searching into its failed outreach

The whole blame the minorities card won't help repeal the hate amendment next time. If the anti-hate amendment campaign seriously wants to try again in an upcoming election, they sure as heck better lose their complacency and build some serious bridges to the African American and Latino communities rather than blaming the minority groups for the anti-Prop 8 campaign's own failures.

[jonnyblitz]

44. you want to blame the victims and give the minority bigots a pass

you can go FUCK yourself.

[LSdemocrat]

49. It's a political campaign that was poorly run with devastating consequences

The no on 8 campaign for way too long thought victory was inevitable and failed to properly organize for the onslaught they were up against. All I'm saying is that when they try to get it repealed, they better do a damn better job of organizing.

Just because you're on the correct side of the argument doesn't mean you can sit back and expect people who may not understand your plight to come around to the right side.

[mondo joe]

79. Fuck you very much for blaming the people whose rights were just removed

for not doing a better job of not eliminating bigotry.

[plaintiff]

90. Building bridges to bigots is neither feasible nor desirable.

...

[Poll_Blind]

109. Yep, but don't tell some Prop 8 opponants that- they don't want to hear that.

  The last some people here seem able to do is....take responsibility. Instead of realizing it was up to them to get the message out, they'd rather tear down relations with any group who didn't play ball the way they liked.

  That's probably not going to work out so well for them....

PB

[Joe Fields]

42. those figures are misleading.

they could lead one to believe that all 86 percent of the white people registered on this forum are dumping all over the African American DUers.

Can you give us a figure of how many identified white registered duers are actually dumping on blacks in this forum? It would give us a clearer picture as to the correlation you made.

[xchrom]

48. it would give the only relevant picture.

this is the OP's way of posting homophic shit. nt

[Duncan Grant]

47. All that rhetoric won't change the data regarding "Yes on 8" votes.

Pass or fail: the votes were the votes.

[slampoet]

53. Most of DUers also DON'T LIVE IN CALIFORNIA!!

This is also a basic point that seems to have evaded posters as well.


I realize that this one went across state lines but the fact is the people most likely to help on Prop 8 ARE NOT HERE ON DU.

[smiley_glad_hands]

54. This post is just more fuel for the fire, good job, lets burn the whole house down. eom

[struggle4progress]

58. It's disgraceful. That's all. It's simply disgraceful.

[ConsAreLiars]

61. I hope you realize your "statistics" are pure garbage.

The site you cite has a bit over 120 people per site on average replying to its survey. If you believe those numbers mean anything at all, well, you are, to put it kindly, an utter fool.

[Chulanowa]

63. In before the lock!

Yes, blaming blacks is stupid, and yes, I have seen several posters doing so, or at least alluding to it in the "How can they vote for the first black president, and then vote against gay marriage" sort of way.

But the real headline is this: "Dumb bigots vote against gay people" and there's all you need. White, black, latino, man, woman, dumbasses come in all varieties, and they voted yes on Proposition 8.

So is the circular firing squad going to continue or is something useful going to get accomplished? I've never seen a bunch of people more eager to blame their fellows for any wrong they can find. I think we can be reasonably certain that we're not going to find any DU posters who voted in favor of these anti-gay laws, so what the hell good is there trying to find a way to blame them?

Take it to the assholes responsible.

[freethought gal]

64. You CANNOT Ignore 70%

70% of a 6% group? That is criminal. I expected MUCH better from the African-American community. You'd think they would understand a little better than white people do. Instead, they decided to spit in the faces of gays and lesbians. And for what? The brainwashing they received in church?

[Leopolds Ghost]

89. Thank you for that bigoted rhetoric. You cannot ignore 2.2% -- enabling you to talk in 3rd person.

The type of percentage that makes DUers feel comfortable they can talk
about blacks in the third person,

just like they do in EVERY GODDAMN BLUE 60s GENERATION ENCLAVE IN THE US,
regardless of how liberal they might be.

[entanglement]

66. Before you blame the 'user base', let me say I'm sorry to see Black people attacked here on DU

While the passage of 'Prop-8' was a travesty, it does no good for (white) gays to lash out blindly against Black people. That is racist and wrong. I understand their frustration and anger, but the scapegoating isn't going to make matters better. It is also racist to hold Black people who voted for the proposition and white people (or anyone else) who voted for it to different standards.

IMHO this is the kind of thing you can expect when identity politics takes precedence over a principled stand on issues, but that is a subject for a different day.

[RogueTrooper]

69. Yes - I am deeply uncomfortable

by this. It is stone cold racism and we should be ashamed.

The failure to defeat Prop 8 is a failure we all share. We dropped the ball on this one and by the time we noticed it was too late.

We were a dollar short and day late. Shame on us.

[greyseal5]

71. Dividing Blacks vs. Gays...sounds like classic Rove.

Don't fall for it, people.

[Poll_Blind]

72. It's disturbing.

PB

[ContraBass Black]

101. And it looks to me like a smashing, runaway success.

[Occam Bandage]

73. 70% of CA blacks are bigots. I can't imagine why anyone would find that worthy of note. nt

[Karenina]

74. So what do you think should be done about that?

[Occam Bandage]

77. I have a number of ideas for outreach and education, but this isn't the place. nt

[EFerrari]

86. So, have you fact checked that number?

What does it mean in terms of vote totals?

How does it stack up historically?

Since you've made such a very serious allegation, I'm sure you have answers to these questions. You wouldn't be so irresponsible as to say something like that without solid evidence.

[plaintiff]

92. It's noteworthy only because it's illogical. But not really, it's just more "I got mine, fuck you"

...
No ethnic group has a monopoly on that.

[Leopolds Ghost]

93. What % of whites are bigots, Occam? What % of DUers voted to end welfare and public housing?

Please be specific and include a % of DUers in your answer.

[mondo joe]

75. African Americans cannot statistically be responsible for Prop 8. But the preponderance

of anti-gay sentiment among that voting segment in California is disturbing, regardless of the outcome on Prop 8.

[Liberal_in_LA]

76. I'm sick of this 'blame blacks" thing

[Occam Bandage]

78. And I'm sick of this "excuse bigots" thing.

[EFerrari]

82. Your sickness is highly selective.

[readmoreoften]

88. I'm sick of people who insist that repeating statistics and pointing out homophobia is racist.

I'm sick of people who deny a disproportionate level of anti-gay activity in the black community because of some knee-jerk misguided desire to be an ally to the black community. Who suffers most from black homophobia? BLACK LGBT PEOPLE.

Nothing will move forward unless reality is faced. Putting a white face on all bigotry will not help anyone. Bigotry comes in all colors. Refusal to accept this is racist in itself.

[EFerrari]

99. That, however, doesn't explain all this disproportionate focus on 7% of the vote. n/t

[readmoreoften]

117. Oh, I can explain that.

Most people assume that all cultural groups equally dislike LGBT people and that the dislike would fall along the lines of social privilege and historical violence: i.e. white men hating gays the most and black women hating gays the least. The fact that 75% of black women voting to take away gay rights compared to 51% of white men simply shocked the shit out of most people. They were stunned.

[LostinVA]

107. Seriously

[Leopolds Ghost]

85. Helps explain why majority in poll after DU poll oppose public housing and support gentrification.

DUers are really showing their ass, as my grandmother used to put it,
trying to demonize black people for passage of Prop 8, one of the
only remaining liberal issues DU actually cares about, (screw FISA,
screw the Great Society, screw public housing in New Orleans and
elsewhere) and for not leaving their "crappy" neighborhoods fast enough
to allow rich white scum to fix it up without running into aforementioned
"ignorant, homophobic" black people on the street and their supposedly
obnoxious double-parking-on-Sundays at all those "socially harmful"
Black churches.

[readmoreoften]

95. Wait a fucking minute. Gay people are RICH WHITE SCUM? Thank you very much.

Your post does nothing but demonize LGBT people as RICH WHITE SCUM perpetuating the bullshit idea that gay people are predominantly WHITE, WEALTHY, and MALE. This is a total caricature and really disgusting. Yes, there is a lack of concern for victims of capitalism but that is because DU is a LIBERAL site and hardly left of center, not because it supports gays too much.

The majority of DUers who don't give a shit about FISA and public housing aren't your imaginary "rich gays" it's the WHITE STRAIGHT PEOPLE on DU, fuck you very much.

Did you ever stop to think that it's the WHITE and the MALE and the RICH aspect of white, male, rich gay men who gentrify not the GAY aspect? Did you ever think that maybe WHITE GAY RICH MEN STAY in black communities because they--misguided as it might be--assume that they are not "the man"? Did you ever think that maybe their WHITE GAY RICH STRAIGHT counterparts who own and flip houses and rip off renters in the same neighborhood wouldn't be caught DEAD LIVING WITH BLACK FOLKS????

Did you ever stop to think that GAY MARRIAGE IS A POVERTY ISSUE? IS AN IMMIGRATION ISSUE? Or does the fact that my partner has to pay for my medical insurance on her $7 an hour paycheck as "added income" some sort of "middleclass bougie bullshit"? Is the fact that BLACK GAY COUPLES were separated during Katrina because of those "socially beneficient" church-influenced charities also more bourgeois elitist gay usurping of the proletarian cause?

A higher percentage of African-Americans voted to financially fuck over gay people IN THE BLACK COMMUNITY AND OUTSIDE IT than any other constituency. That is a reality. To blame African-Americans for Prop 8 is media-hyped nonsense. To state that there is a statistically provable prejudice that needs to be addressed is a FACT.

To insinuate that gay people are all rich white men is as batshit crazy and homophobic as insinuating that all straight people are rich white men.

[ContraBass Black]

104. I believe that is a misread. LG appears to be declaring that

Black people are being demonized for resisting gentrification, not that gay people are right white gentrifiers.

[readmoreoften]

115. Well in that case I apologize, since Black folks should most certainly not be demonized for

resisting gentrification. However, I do find it a little suspect on a thread where others label black anti-gay sentiment to "gay male gentrifiers" without equally questioning black anti-straight sentiment towards straight white gentrifiers and landlords.

[plaintiff]

87. Only the 70% "as a group" who voted for it...and you have no fucking idea what DUs demographics

are.
None of us do.

[Leopolds Ghost]

91. Why do you care? What about the % of Republicans that voted for it?

Oh, I forgot, blacks are easy to demonize because the people doing it ARE NOT BLACK.

[plaintiff]

94. What part of "the 70%" is too abstract here?

I don't care if they're fucking purple...any collective of which 70% vote to take away human rights is responsible at the VERY LEAST to condemn that 70%.

[EFerrari]

97. You're condemning people to whom no case has been made.

I hope you don't work in voter outreach.

[EFerrari]

96. 7% of the CA vote but, you knew that, right? And yes, there was a survey.

The OP left out "suburban" and "women".

[ContraBass Black]

98. This is why I no longer feel as welcome here, and am not nearly as pleased and proud

As I was a few days ago.

[EFerrari]

100. A lot of us are not okay with the way this conversation is going.

[Catherine Vincent]

102. Can't we all just get along?

[fascisthunter]

103. I Couldn't Believe So Many Jumped on Board with that Post

it was very racist and extremely devisive.

"Predominately WHITE, WELL-OFF, MIDDLE-AGED political website user base"


hmmmm

[pinerow]

110. My Post on the subject

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/rpinero/index.php

[Poll_Blind]

113. Thanks for the link, Pinerow! I read the entry and I agree. Moreso, it is...

...not surprising. I gotta say, though, changing the ideas that mainstream religions have about homosexuals is a hopeless cause as it pits the word of man directly against the (purported) word of (a) God.

  If this were the UK, for instance, I could see making some headway. But things are different here and even to bring things to a higher level (of discourse) here (in the US) in regards to religious parishioners doing what's "right" and what's "just" versus what their holy book tells them I...I just can't imagine that much ground could be gained.

PB

[ProfessorGAC]

112. So?

I don't live in CA. I couldn't have voted against Prop 8 no matter what. I certainly didn't support it. And you won't, CAN'T, find one post in which i accused anybody of color of anything.

And i'm one of those people in your demographic.

So, what exactly was your point?
The Professor

[johnfunk]

114. Religionists, not Blacks, got Proposition Hate passed

Tax the Mormon Church