Weekly Column
When I first started fighting for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality in 1989, the mission seemed quite clear. We were working to educate and change the minds of traditionalists who had virtually no experience with LGBT people or issues. These individuals had grown up with stereotypes and misconceptions that could be proven false by the coming out of friends, co-workers, neighbors, or family members.
Today, defining our opponents is not so easy, and sometimes vexing, because their values are so vacant and vacuous. Back in the day, a true conservative was defined by how one lived – not necessarily how one voted. But today’s soulless, corporate conservatism has nothing to do with the way one lives and everything to do with lazy political labels and one-size-fits-all prefab positions.
Conservatism has now become a country club that offers membership to those who support a handful of policy issues. To join, one has to repudiate (or refudiate) abortion, marriage equality for same-sex couples, and the idea that global warming is man made. One also has to irrationally hate Barack Obama and favor tax cuts for millionaires.
If you deviate from the “conservatively correct” prefab platform – you are out. However, if you pass the standard “issue test” you are in – no matter how libertine your actual lifestyle is. This creed of “it’s about what you say, not how you live” is becoming rather evident as the GOP presidential nomination process heats up.
For example, Franklin Graham – the son of famed evangelist Billy Graham – offered his glowing approval on Sunday of Donald Trump’s campaign.
“When I first saw that he was getting in, I thought, ‘Well, this has got to be a joke,’” Graham told ABC’s Christiane Amanpour. “But the more you listen to him, the more you say to yourself, ‘You know? Maybe the guy’s right.’”
As Truth Wins Out’s Evan Hurst pointed out, Trump is known for his “revolving door of trophy wives.” Whether it is conspicuous consumption or sexual morals, no one can reasonably claim that Trump is genuinely “conservative.”
Yet, under the contemporary definition, Trump can join the club because he is suddenly questioning whether Barack Obama was born in the United States and posing as a great defender of “traditional” marriage.
“I’m not in favor of gay marriage,” Trump cynically said, just in time for his GOP presidential bid. “They should not be able to marry…I just don’t feel good about it. I don’t feel right about it. I’m against it… I’m opposed to gay marriage.”
Equally mystifying is the traction serial adulterer Newt Gingrich is getting from social conservatives. In a recent presidential straw poll taken by attendees at the religious right’s Awakening 2011 conference, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich placed third with 21% of the votes. Maybe I’m missing something, but how is Gingrich dumping his first wife while she was recovering in the hospital from cancer “conservative”? How do these “traditionalists” rationalize Gingrich leaving his second wife for a young staffer while leading the charge to impeach Bill Clinton?
Help me figure this out. My parents have been happily married for 41 years, yet are considered liberals because they are pro-choice, pro-gay Democrats. Barack Obama and Bill Clinton are still with their first wives, but are portrayed as anathema to the “family values” crowd. Yet, these moral scolds champion sleazy candidates like Gingrich and Trump who played musical wives.
In my view, you are not socially conservative unless you truly live that way. Where you stand on social or sexual issues during the day is less important than where you actually lie down at night. Candidates not practicing what they preach are phonies, while conservative pastors who endorse sordid candidates are puritanical poseurs who only care about political power.
It is also time for the media to stop calling crazy people conservatives. When Maryland-based anti-gay activist Bishop Harry Jackson recently said that attempts to win LGBT marriage equality were “a satanic plot to destroy our seed,” it’s just paranoia, not a political philosophy.
When televangelist Pat Robertson claimed this week that liberals support reproductive health rights in order to make lesbians feel better about not being able to have children (they actually can and often do), he’s unbalanced, not simply right of center.
And how about Democratic Jacksonville City Council candidate Kimberly Daniels? Here is what she said about Halloween:
The danger of Halloween is not in the scary things we see but in the secret, wicked, cruel activities that go on behind the scenes. These activities include:
* Sex with demons
* Orgies between animals and humans
* Animal and human sacrifices
Daniels belongs in a butterfly net, not on a butterfly ballot. Unfortunately, she represents a strain of acceptable modern conservatism that has overtaken the GOP and has even found its way into a few conservative Democratic circles.
I’ve never been a conservative, but at least I understood it before it transformed from “fuddy-duddy” to “nutty buddy.”
It’s cute that Daniels still want’s to believe theres a satanic coven living next door to her. It would almost warm my heart, thinking the fundies might leave LGBT’s alone and start rooting out the satanic cults again, but then I remember how many lives were ruined and innocent people were sent to prison, during the Satanic Panic of the late 80′s and early 90′s
I think liberal and conservative would be aptly described in this day and age as the grounded and ungrounded parties.
This is prefect!
After being faithful to the same partner for many years, sex with a demon might be a novel diversion. Where can I make an appointment for next Halloween?
That’s true Emma, the Salem like satanic panic of the 80s actually caused the FBI to waste time and money investigating these absurd claims and of course their findings were that it was just a bunch of hype about something that was virtually non-existent.
You forgot the ultimate litmus test for an American conservative. You must believe Genesis is literal, that is be a creationist. You can support ID; but you’re only doing that in order to displace the hated evolution from schools. Afterall, all IDers are closet creationists.
I could not agree more with this article. Wayne sums up the situation with crystal clarity! Thank You.
Though I would likle to clarify some of the comments. Being a creationist does not necessarily make one conservative – I know because I used to be conservative and ultra religious but now after a long period of transition I am, what I like to call, slightly left of center politically and very progressive socially. I am also transsexual so I guess I need to do something especially freaky for Halloween too (Not!). I however remain strong in my Christ centered beliefs, especially that there is an intilligent Creator of the universe and much of modern science bears this out. What I don’t have it the ignorant, dogmatic, fanatical and almost militant form of that belief system any more.
You would be surprised at just how many of us there are on this side of the issues – take a look at the United Church of Christ’s stand on current issues and you’ll see what I mean. We, the “religious left” (for lack of a better term), stand with you so keep up on standing for what is right, but please don’t bash us all so severely in the process of decrying mindless conservativism and the religious (so-called) right.
We want the same things as you – Marriage equality, Gender equality, sane government, freedom to live our lives peacefully, workplace and marketplace protections for All people, laws against bullies and thugs in schools and at large, reasonable health care and etc.
This particular Daniels is a real piece of work – it is hard to believe that so many people actually support her brand of madness. Political conservatism has truly become a farce. I wonder what Shakespeare would make of all this.
At TWO we love the Religious Left and work with them as allies.
To be clear, there is a difference between a person of religious faith who acknowledges the scientific fact of evolution, and whose faith leads them to believe that a creator guided it, and a person who rejects the scientific fact of evolution and instead declares that “goddidit six thousand years ago.”
Thank you, Evan. I am a Christo-Pagan, yet accept and support evolution unreservedly. I could go into a long spiel but basically, no creation myth goes into real detail about how the creator created everything–except for a lot of simplistic nonsense that was the best idea people could come up with at the time–so why couldn’t evolution and the other scientific explanations be the right ones? cientific research and the resulting evidence shows quite clearly that they are.
Do I want my belief taught in schools? NO. Science must remain objective and look for FACTS. Let people put whatever spin they want on it. These people are insane and intolerant…a very dangerous combination.
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[...] couple of weeks ago I wrote about the rancid “values” of those leading today’s so-called pro-family movement: [...]
[...] couple of weeks ago I wrote about the rancid “values” of those leading today’s so-called pro-family [...]