The Log Cabin Republicans, a national LGBT organization, has endorsed Donald Trump for president in next year’s election.
This, despite Trump being “the most explicitly anti-LGBT administration in modern history,” according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Trump has banned transgender people from the military; ended diplomatic visas for same-sex domestic partners; and legalized anti-gay discrimination by framing it as a religious freedom issue. He also selected a vice-president who supports gay conversion “therapy” and a constitutional ban on same-gender marriage.
Trump’s non-sexual policies that destroy the public’s trust in science aren’t good for gay people (or anyone else) either.
But enough about Trump. This is about gay people. It turns out—drumroll, please—they’re more people than gay. Just like women—more people than women. Just like people of color—more people than of color.
A gay organization’s endorsement of Trump just proves that people who are not straight white men can be as confused as, well, straight white men (and anyone else). They can be confused about sex, and even what’s good for the gay community. Gay people don’t have a monopoly on clear thinking about sexual orientation or gender identity. In fact, any given person living a non-heterosexual, non-traditional life may not think about that life clearly at all.
And so gay people can be horribly misguided about their self-interest, just like anyone else.
We absolutely cannot assume that members of any non-traditional, disempowered, or historically oppressed group will think more clearly than others—even about their own sense of exclusion and disempowerment. Some will, some won’t. Everyone gets to have their feelings of course, but group membership or identity is no free pass to be taken seriously in a policy discussion.
When it comes to serious intellectual conversation, there’s very little place for “Well, as a gay person, I think…” or “As a person of color, I think…” any more than “As an older white woman of privilege, I think…”. What matters is if you can say “As a thoughtful person, I think…” or “As a well-informed person, I think…” Those things are color-blind, gender-blind, and other group-identities blind.
If you think putting gay people in positions of authority or moral suasion would benefit all gays, look no further than Milo Yiannopoulos and Andrew Sullivan. If you think all trans people think clearly about trans issues, look at the activists who have trashed Dan Savage, Germaine Greer, and the new demon, so-called female TERFs.
Back in 2012 I said that voting for Hillary Clinton because she’s a woman was tribalism, not democracy. (Full disclosure: I voted for Hillary Clinton, but not because she was a woman.)
To kill the idea that women politicians will necessarily be more compassionate, less corrupt, and more inclusive, just look at Sarah Palin, Sarah Sanders Huckabee, Betsy DeVos, Ivanka Trump, and Michelle Bachmann. Traitors to their gender? No, they’re people with bad values promoting horrible policies—who happen to be women.
As public figures, they’re not “women,” they’re people with a ghastly ideological agenda. Don’t insult them by imagining they think with their ovaries. No, they think with their donor’s money.
People who were old enough to go to Woodstock fifty years ago remember when smoking pot was a dangerous, politically defiant activity. At the time, pot smokers (“hippies,” “heads”) assumed that anyone else who smoked pot was “one of us,” in terms of ideals and political desires (and musical tastes and sexual values).
At some point that changed. Now that anyone can get pot, and it’s openly smoked by America’s elite and underclass alike, marijuana use is no longer a sign of virtue or any particular values.
The same is true with being gay, or trans, or any other sexual identity. When it was existentially dangerous to be gay or into BDSM, most practitioners were deep in the closet. They were highly dependent on their underground, and trust was essential. The then-secret language of kinky sex was a way of navigating big cities, the Navy, and the demimonde. “Gaydar” could save your life; a single misstep could end it (as with Matthew Shepard).
Now that you can buy a whip on Amazon.com, anyone can be sexually transgressive. Teens are describing themselves as bi, trans, or non-binary just to be cool—they’re no longer markers for authenticity, integrity, wisdom, or anything else.
So today, a whip is just a whip. Being gay is just being gay. And apparently, a group of gay Republicans is hoping the entire country will bend over for Donald Trump for four more years.
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If you liked this article, you’ll enjoy my piece at www.MartyKlein.com/metoo-is-creating-a-country-of-female-victims