“First They Came for the Gays”
Peg on Jan 31 2008 at 10:15 am | Filed under: Culture, Foreign affairs, Peg's Page, Religion and theology, Society
My liberal friends think I’m a conservative. My conservative friends think I’m a liberal. Frankly - there is truth in the assessment of both groups. Depending upon the issue, you can honestly label me with both.
One issue that continues to gnaw at me is that of equal rights for gay people. Again - I am bothered by positions by both conservatives and liberals on this topic! Too many conservatives either do not appreciate the burdens that gay folks must experience today, despite improvement in recent years. Others are out and out homophobes. On the liberal side, too many seem unaware of the relationship between the battle against radical Islam and the fight for equality for gay people.
Bruce Bawer has a column which highlights these points. Whether your general philosophy is of a conservative bent or a liberal one - please read this and take it to heart. Have more consideration for your gay neighbor. If you already do - then please realize that his rights are under terrible threat in societies that you consider to be “enlightened.”
Sphere: Related ContentEurope is on its way down the road of Islamization, and it’s reached a point along that road at which gay people’s right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is being directly challenged, both by knife-wielding bullies on the street and by taxpayer-funded thugs whose organizations already enjoy quasi-governmental authority. Sharia law may still be an alien concept to some Westerners, but it’s staring gay Europeans right in the face – and pointing toward a chilling future for all free people. Pim Fortuyn saw all this coming years ago; most of today’s European leaders still refuse to see it even though it’s right before their eyes.
Great posting that unfortunately is giving me chills to my spine.
It is symbolic of the times in which we live that most of the gay community is part of a political faction that supports regimes that believe gays should be stoned to death. Along with feminists who believe George Bush is a greater enemy than fundamentalist misogynists and those who supposedly hold free speech as one of their highest values enthusiastically supporting speech codes and restrictions on political speech.
I would like to work with those on the left to expand freedom. I would. But until the left works through the contradictions in their own philosophy, I don’t see how that’s possible.
Good link, I read that a few days ago and also found it very sad and frightening.
most of today’s European leaders still refuse to see it even though it’s right before their eye
If the average person doesn’t see it, the leaders wont bother looking for it.
“My liberal friends think I’m a conservative. My conservative friends think I’m a liberal. Frankly - there is truth in the assessment of both groups. Depending upon the issue, you can honestly label me with both.”
That is certainly the case for me too. Personally I think the government needs to get out of most social issues and stick to the business of national defense, and the protection of our rights.
That’s why, while I find the idea of Bill Quicks American Conservative Party interesting, I think it wont go to far with the “conservative” label. It’s to tainted to be generally acceptable.
I think we’d get farther with an “American Liberal Party” or something such. The divide may be social conservative/social liberal in some respects but that’s not going to get a majority when the so-coms are every single bit as statist as progressives.
Names stay the same while policy changes. What is “conserved” these days is usually classical liberalism, belief in liberty and human rights. What liberalism has progressed to, is multi-culturalism which may have been conceived as promoting individual rights but actually promoted group identity and gives us this very un-liberal consequence where respecting other cultures means abandoning the base tenets of liberalism and supporting intolerance and violence against homosexuals or women. Certainly a whole lot of people who find themselves in that situation recognize that something is wrong.
Maybe “Individualist Party” would fly.
But the so-coms (!) and the so-libs (?) have to give up the statist assumptions they operate under. It’s not necessary to coerce everyone into accepting what they may view as moral or immoral. It’s simply _not the place of government_ .
“Liberal” has the same problem, to much baggage.
Individualist sounds to Ayn Frankian.
I like American Consensus Coalition/Party. But it doesn’t really mean anything. Might as well be Party X
There’s a lot of people dissatisfied with the status quo, and I think just begging to find the right place to stand.
And right now the problem with the ACP is lack of definition. I think a lot of people aren’t going to get behind an effort without it being defined.
I still like liberal capitalist. Putting capitalist next to liberal pretty much defines what baggage needs to be attached to it, and what doesn’t.
It is a catchy phrase.
As this site’s resident homosexual, I can chime in and claim that the gay adherence to certain old left ideologies is very much a generational thing. The comments to this post from August of 2005 are, I think, indicative. The gay rights movement is in the midst of a revolution, as people my age are realizing more and more that a little “D” or “R” next to someone’s name has very little to do with how well they’d fight or preserve our right to an equal stake in this country. The way in which the gay rights establishment ignores the plight of executed teenagers in Iran while decrying the “Taliban” of the GOP (as annoying as guys like Huckster are, they’re pathetic compared to the old school homophobes of even a few years ago) is sowing the seeds of their own destruction.
As far as parties go, this might also be a generational thing: no one my age, at least that I know personally (it’s a larger group than you’d expect), wants to be a part of any political party. They/we all think the system is hopelessly corrupt. Incidentally, as it may be.
I still like liberal capitalist too, although I wish it were MORE catchy
If anyone wants to start an ad hoc committee in your state or help form a national ad hoc committee, let me know.
Still, I may have been trumped by McGeHee with his Get Offa My Lawn! Party.
yours/
peter.
Josh,
Have you ever written a “Gay Manifesto,” or maybe something like a gay version of “I have a dream”? If so I’d really, really like to read it.
yours/
peter.
I like that… Get Offa My Lawn.