The United States and Iran can’t seem to agree on nuclear weapons, but they’ve managed to find common ground on a different issue: disdain for gay and lesbian rights. In a vote at the United Nations on Monday, the U.S. supported an Iranian recommendation to deny “consultative status”—the ability to distribute documents at meetings of the U.N. Economic and Social Council—to two international gay rights groups.
The story is bizarre for more reasons than one. First—as if the U.S. and Iran didn’t make for strange enough bedfellows—there’s the, ahem, eccentric roster of countries that joined the U.S. in support of the Iranian resolution: Cameroon, China, Cuba, Iran, Pakistan, the Russian Federation, Senegal, Sudan and Zimbabwe. If you thought the U.S. would think twice before associating itself with some of the worst human rights abusers in the world, you thought wrong.
Second, the state department’s putative explanation for why the vote was cast makes not a single shred of sense. According to Mark P. Logan, a deputy assistant secretary of state, the vote was not the result of the department’s “being against gay rights groups.” Rather, he insisted that it was based on “the controversial history of the International Lesbian and Gay Association [ILGA]—an affiliate of the North American Man/Boy Love Association” [NAMBLA] that “was associated with it in the past and openly condoned pedophilia.”
The problems with this argument are many: not only did ILGA, an international umbrella coalition of more than 400 gay and lesbian rights groups, sever its ties with NAMBLA more than a decade ago, but the U.N. vote didn’t even let the groups make their case for consultative status.
This afternoon I caught a documentary on how the Mississippi set up an agency to spy on and distribute information about the civil rights movement in the 1950s and60s. Today how we disdain such actions and see them for the pure hate they were.
Maybe in another 10, 20 or 50 years we will look back and wonder why we ever denied the vote to women, denied equal rights to blacks, or discriminated against homosexuals.
As distasteful as I believe homosexual acts to be, they don’t happen in my bedroom. As the Supreme Court said, what happens in their bedroom is their business.
When will Americans stop finding someone to hate?
the wannabe theocrats of the American Religious Right have more in common with the Iranian mullahs than they would like to admit.
TomPaine.com? Puh-leaze
You’re right in that we’ll look back at some of the gay bashing of today the same way we now look at the discrimination of the past. If you look at polls on gay marriage, the most controversial gay issue at the moment, opposition to it is a function of age. The oldest age segment is the most opposed, and it diminishes as you work your way down to the youngest segment which is the most supportive. Support is already over 50% for the under 30 crowd. A different poll of high school seniors had over 50% for gay marriage, more for civil unions (I forget the exact number) and I think 30% or less opposed to both. While we’ll reach a limit eventually, I think this trend isn’t done and over time as the torch keeps getting passed we’ll move out of this phase.
Someone called it the civil rights movement for my generation. I feel that way, not because racism and sexism are eradicated, they’re certainly not, but because the gay rights movement is at such a younger stage, as evidenced by the fact that it’s still okay to publicly piss all over them. The example I trot out all the time is that Trent Lott says something vaguely, indirectly racist and there’s an outcry and he loses his position as Senate Majority Leader. Even the president condemned him. Meanwhile Rick Santorum can compare homosexuality to bestiality and incest and nothing happens at all. Well, it looks like he’s going to lose his reelection bid, but nothing happened at the time. He was once considered a presidential contender. But anyway, that’s why gay rights is a big issue with me. But I strongly believe this is a phase we’re going to move past eventually.
One major (or minor depending on your hatred for Christians) difference is Iran has a death penalty for homosexuals. Please sell crazy somewhere else Dvorak.
I find it rather disturbing that the US government would ally itself with those countries, after years of opposing most of them. What are they saying anyways? Cuba is God’s gift to the US when they’re against gays, but their cigars are evil and don’t let them in the country?!
BTW I’m just having a little fun with this, you guys…don’t go jumping down throat about it! : )
Given there are so many sado masochistic homosexuals in the present administration, I don’t find this strange at all.
Donovan, don’t kid yourself. I think you’ll find plenty of support for a death penalty for homosexuals among “the wannabe theocrats of the American Religious Right” considering the level of hatred that they’ve expressed over the years.
“The State carries the power of the sword, that is, the power to prohibit [homosexual] conduct with physical penalties, such as confinement and even execution. It must use that power to prevent the subversion of children toward this lifestyle.”
— 2002 concurrence in a custody case involving a lesbian mother by
–Roy Moore
Removed Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice, Ten Commandments monument crusader and favorite on the ultra-conservative lecture circuit
Oh, and by the way Donovan, take a look at the original post, it’s not by Dvorak.
quote found at the Southern Poverty Law Center
Watch Your Mouth: The Religious Right on Homosexuality
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/slideshows/117_antigay/IR117_antigay_05.html
Thank you Gerry, that post was very well put.
yes, very well put Gerry.
Jerry Falwell, rom the same web site:
“Brute beasts … part of a vile and satanic system [that] will be utterly annihilated, and there will be a celebration in heaven.”
— On homosexuals, as quoted in The Bible Tells Me So, 1996
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/slideshows/117_antigay/IR117_antigay_01.html
Sounds like the way the President of Iran talks about Israel …
So you’d like to dictate to these Islamic countries on some things at least.
Tom – I agree re TomPaine.com. John should have linked to the original article from ILGA.
Paul
You make a good point and I don’t disagree. My point is that this is about America and the discrimination happening in America by Americans.
We have this wonderful Constitution we hold up to the world as an example of how great we are. Yet the same Constitution counts Blacks as 3/5th of a white person. It granted the vote only to white men. It took 80 years and a civil war to get Blacks equal rights. Then they were systemically denied the vote and a place in society. It took another 100 years to get Congress to uphold the the 14 and 15th Amendments. It wasn’t until 1920 that women were constitutionally given the right to vote. When will homosexuals be given equality?
Some day, we will look back and wonder why homosexuals were treated this way.
None of this excuses what they do in Iran, Sudan, or any other cheesy dictatorship. Oh ya, this homosexual discrimination is Bushes fault too.
I do believe that Bush is more moderate on the gay issue personally, but if he panders to the zealots, what difference does it make if you get the same policies either way? In fact, it speaks worse of him because he’s taking a stance cynically to gain political support instead of through conviction (but what else is new in politics?)
He and Rove pander to the zealots. It gives them power and legitimacy. The fact that we have to remind people that Dobson and his ilk don’t speak for all Evangelicals let alone all Christians shows how strong they are. The media takes them seriously. Didn’t they get concessions from Microsoft and Ford before they were forced to backtrack? Aren’t they getting anti-gay marriage bills passed in the states even if they can’t do it nationally? Some of them outlaw any kind of civil unions or domestic partnerships as well. Wasn’t there the perception, whether it turned out to be legitimate or not, that the last election was won on gay marriage and “values voters”? Big influx of political power for these people, on top of the legitimacy and encouragement.
Also, I’m not comfortable banking on it being okay for him to promise something since it’s never going to get through. There’s always the chance it could. That was the logic that soothed my mother’s mind about drilling in ANWR, and that’s pretty close to happening now. A constitutional amendment is a hell of a lot harder, but still.
But in terms of direct action by the federal government, you’re right in that there aren’t many examples I can think off the top of my head. Maybe someone else can help me out here. But the one I can think of is a doozy. The sorely needed Arabic translators that were fired by the military because they were openly gay. There’s still a lack of them, you know. Talk about priorities.
Paul
but blaming bush for it stupid. he’s done absolutely nothing against homosexuals in his tenure that i’m aware of. oh, he’s said things. but he’s not done anything. has he?
That is exactly what this blog is about. The State Department decided to side with some of the worst Human Right abusers today to deny homosexuals the CHANCE to address the United Nations. Bush is the President of the United States. The State Department reports to the President. The President is the sole authority for foreign relations. So this goes right to Bush’s desk.
When I originally said this was Bush’s fault too, it tongue in cheek. In reality though, he is responsible. The same as he is ultimately responsible for FEMA, the Iraq war, the failure to catch bin Laden, and the soaring deficit. He is responsible for Medicare recipients not getting their drugs, he is responsible for the Army Corp of Engineers and the levee inspection and upkeep, he is responsible for Indian Affairs not returning the money the courts have ruled on, and he is responsible for mine inspection.
And yes words do count. He doesn’t need to use a baseball bat to injure a “queer”. Just speaking that they are second class, undeserving of the same rights as other Americans, is wrong and injures them. Can anyone show me how their marriage has been hurt because a same sex couple wants to marry? Yet to fan the flames of homophobia, to use his influential position to deny homosexuals the right to be the same as “us” is just as harmful as using the baseball bat.