Somebody posted a link to this letter on my recent post about the racially characterized attacks against blacks by some in the gay community for what CNN exit polls said was a 70% vote in favor of Proposition 8.
The letter is from Kathryn Kolbert, President of People For the American Way Foundation. Among other things, it called the accusatory rhetoric of gay activists towards African Americans, "deeply wrong and offensive." And she added--as I stated in my original piece--it was counter productive. And since Ms. Kolbert (a HuffPo blogger) hasn't posted this yet, I took the liberty to. In the letter, she is eloquent and impassioned. But, more importantly, she's accurate about the facts. I just hope people put down the pitchforks long enough to listen.
The public letter, in its entirety, can be found here. But here is an excerpt.
Nov. 7 -- The past 72 hours have brought an extraordinary range of emotions -- great joy at the election of Barack Obama and defeat of John McCain, and sadness and anger at the passage of anti-gay initiatives in Florida, Arizona, Arkansas, and California. That sadness has turned to outrage at the speed with which some white gay activists began blaming African Americans -- sometimes in appallingly racist ways -- for the defeat of Proposition 8. This is inexcusable.
As a mother who has raised two children in a 30-year relationship with another woman, I fully understand the depth of hurt and anger at voters' rejection of our families' equality. But responding to that hurt by lashing out at African Americans is deeply wrong and offensive -- not to mention destructive to the goal of advancing equality.Before we give Religious Right leaders more reasons to rejoice by deepening the divisions they have worked so hard to create between African Americans and the broader progressive community, let's be clear about who is responsible for gay couples in California losing the right to get married, and let's think strategically about a way forward that broadens and strengthens support for equality.
Here is the full letter.
Follow Raymond Leon Roker on Twitter: www.twitter.com/raymondroker
Calif Prop 22 (defined marriage in statute law) passed in 2000 with a very small number of blacks voting in favor, so what happened between 2000 and 2008 in the black and other minority communities? Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee thinks it's first time voters (Obamamania).
http://www.sacbee.com/walters/story/1387029.html
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/11/prop-8-myths.html
Silver states flatly that "the notion that Prop 8 passed because of the Obama turnout surge is silly." And the exit polls themselves, even if taken at face value, show the contrary. According to exit poll results, first-time voters went over 80% for Obama, but over 60% against Prop 8.
Given Silver's comments elsewhere on exit polls, I take his reliance on them here to be solely for the sake of argument; that is, even if exit polls are accepted at face value, the reasoning Walters bases on them is blatantly fallacious, and the conclusion he draws from them cannot be right. But we would be better off rejecting exit polls in the first place (and without them, there would be no reason to think that blacks were any more responsible for Prop 8 than any other segment of the population, so there would be nothing to explain). The problems with exit polls are too fundamental to be solved by widening the margin of error; their samples cannot be relied on to be random, among other things.
Let's refocus, and leave fratricide to the Republicans who are agonizing over their electoral defeat. The circular firing squad is much more fun as a spectator sport.
If the Mormons can be criticized publicly by all races as bigots, so can the Black Church.
P.S. There is no such thing as "The Black Church".
BTW : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Church
my bad.
I'm against proposition 8. But I wasn't invited to this meeting that supposed to have taken place where the upper-income white gay community met with this monolithic group of black voters, where a deal was made that since Hillary lost the nomination they would support OUR BLACK candidate if we voted no on 8.
Another thing. From now on I'm not going to call myself a "liberal" anymore. It doesn't mean anything except that you don't support the traditional gool-ole-boy power structure. As I've learned from this presidental election process, you can be racist, homophobic, intolerant to all Blacks, Arabs, and all people of the Islamic faith and still style yourself as being "liberal". That's BS.
I'm against proposition 8. But I wasn't invited to this meeting that supposed to have taken place where the upper-income white gay community met with this monolithic group of black voters, where a deal was made that since Hillary lost the nomination they would support OUR BLACK candidate if we voted no on 8.
Another thing. From now on I'm not going to call myself a "liberal" anymore. It doesn't mean anything except that you don't support the traditional gool-ole-boy power structure. As I've learned from this presidental election process, you can be racist, homophobic, intolerant to all Blacks, Arabs, and all people of the Islamic faith and still style yourself as being "liberal". That's BS.
Deuteronomy 22:22 "If a man is found sleeping with another man's wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die."
Leviticus 20:10 "If a man commits adultery with another man's wife--with the wife of his neighbor--both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death."
24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
The effect of this line, of course, is not to win over socially conservative voters of any color, but to split the progressive coalition.
As a friend in California pointed out to me, the state has made a degree of progress. The last time gay marriage was up for approval, it failed by 22%. Prop 8 only passed by 4%. Though not a good outcome, the progress is undeniable.
Are people saying African Americans need to be 'taught' not to hate other minorities? Is that not as condescending as simple blame?
For it was just as true then as it is now.
For every 100 people the voting was something like this:
For Prop 8 Against Prop 8
Caucasian 49 51
Asian 48 52
Latino/a 51 49
African American 70 30
My numbers are off the top of my head, but I know they are not that far off from what was reported. So it doesn't matter if 490,000 whites voted for it if 510,000 whites voted against it. The only thing the smaller number blacks as a part of the whole means is that if they had voted even remotely close to any of the other races this measure would have failed. That doesn't mean blame should be assigned to the black community, but it does underscore where the gay communities civil rights struggle lies.
what is wrong with drawing a parallel from other civil rights struggles to this one?
Why is Loving Vs. Virginia or inspiration from other leaders who championed civil rights 'appropriating' from one community as if we are stealing, diluting?
Do you believe that Dr. King meant, let's get some civil rights for ourselves and let the other folks worry about themselves? Is it a measure of who has suffered more? But if it is........ 46 years ago the laws changed to support civil rights for people of color.
And what's the stategy for the churches? One bigoted, rich, theocracy seeking idiot and apparently the mormon church were the heavy muscle but most of the bible based churches encouraged their folks to vote this in. No logic and thoughtfulness. They make up ridiculous arguements & all nod in agreement, because it fits their prejudice. Quote old testament to support prejudices, make up LIES about schools, children, loss of tax status, etc. which is BARING FALSE WITNESS. Shame on them.
That's what I am most frustrated by........ that a non-thinking, brain-washed group can self righteously vote away rights of another group and feel so good about themselves while they do it.
I was shocked to find people of color in that demographic for any reason. Wrong assumption.
Church trumps it all folks. do we have a strategy for that?
We have to find it. Prop 4 was defeated on Tuesday, how was that one beaten? That issue was on the ballot before and also lost so backers were trying it again. I'm sure the churches were supporters of Prop 4, how did the "No on 4" group beat them?
Most importantly, it was an inclusive campaign; White proponents didn't spend precious run up time predicting the negative impact of a huge black turnout for the presidential elections and devising ways of thwarting said turnout. Instead everyone against 4 seemingly worked cohesively to fight something they believed in - black & white-
The ensuing outrage from white gays suspiciously & ironically betrays a deeper and seemingly long held disdain/disrespect/intense dislike of blacks-
This even more evident from the rhetoric spewed when hurt feelings have been expressed with much blatant condescension towards blacks & where more restrained re: the benefactors - the mormon church/the catholic church etc.
Black friends have reported the most hateful treatment meted out since Nov. 5th.
Its funny - brings one back to the point they keep trying to make...they can't hide their skin colour, but the mormons and catholics can all move about, mingling unharrassed in relative anonimity - No tell tale signs until of course you stand outside their churches on sunday-
Black people were hit in the head with bricks for trying to vote, drink at a fountain, use a public bathroom, etc. Thousands of black people were hung from trees. Their leaders were assassinated and houses fire bombed.
The dangers gay people face today are not even close to what black people faced during the civil rights movement, so the notion offends black people. If you don't approach the black community with adequate awe and respect for the civil rights movement, you've already started off on the wrong foot.
"And what's the stategy for the churches? One bigoted, rich, theocracy seeking idiot..." Black churches helped win the civil rights struggle. Disdain for churches in general gets translated in the black community into disrespect for black culture and history.
"...a non-thinking, brain-washed group can self righteously vote away rights of another group..." Name-calling will get you nowhere.
Blacks are very loyal to their allies. They have a history of marching arm in arm with Jews during the civil rights movement. There's a history of Dr. King and Cesar Chavez working together to help the poor of both communities. Same thing with the trade unions. Where have you seen LGBT groups marching with black people over racial profiling, or affordable housing, or anything?
The honest truth is that gay activists didn't campaign in the black community. Period.
thank you for a thoughtful reply
I appreciate what you are saying
two things,
first, I do not disdain churches, I am a member of a church
it's the absolutist view in the right leaning churches that upsets me. There does not appear to be enough discernment, just absolutes.
I experience faith as calling us all to more
(and the bigoted rich theocracy seeking idiot is just a rich guy in LA who funded this, not a church.)
And because the churches in the black community were involved so heavily in social actions, I have thought these were in the discerning end of the spectrum.
second, the LGBT community was not so organized in 62 but as individuals we were marching with you
and yes, I think gay activists failed to reach out over this latest prop. This got funded late and didn't have enough organization behind it on the NO side.
I do not believe we should be blaming blacks now
it was just a wake up call for me and shocking since my assumptions were the groups who suffered so much and fought for civil rights would recognize prop 8 for the denial of civil rights that it is and vote against it.
So thank you for taking the time to explain more in response to my questions.
It helps me understand better.
Suggesting we do not get support from the AA community because the discrimination, beatings and death we face don't measure up to those they faced is grotesque. The leaders of the Civil Rights movement fought and died so that ALL minorities wouldn't HAVE to suffer the same injustices. If not, then it was only an exercise in self-preservation.
Gay suffering is different, but no less devastating than African American suffering. Yes, some of us can easier hide our minority status, but those of us who choose not to have lost our jobs, homes, families, churches, rights, and our lives. We haven't had churches firebombed because we are just getting to the point where we can even HAVE gay churches. In the meantime, we have to fight to worship in places where we resonate with the beliefs, but the clinging to literal interpretation when it is easy and convenient means that our fellow members shun or expel us (or in the case of the Mormon church, recommend we commit suicide).
Your argument is equivalent to telling a patient dying of pneumonia "don't you dare compare yourself to me, I had cancer."