The New York Times spilled some ink today to discuss the recently passed Employment Non-Discrimination Act. Not surprisingly, the left-leaning paper urges the Senate and President Bush to move forward with the law and protect America’s gay people. The paper also takes some time to celebrate Barney Frank and Tammy Baldwin, the homo-politicos who helped push ENDA’s painful passage. Here’s what the gray lady says about the controversial trans-exclusion:
Transgender people should be protected from discrimination, and we hope they soon will be. It would have been regrettable, however, had the sponsors refused to compromise, and as a result, lost the chance to extend basic civil rights to the millions of Americans who would be covered by the current bill.
Throughout American history, civil rights have been achieved in incremental steps. The landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, for example, barred race discrimination in public accommodations, an enormous step forward at the time. It wasn’t until the next year that Congress protected voting rights in a separate bill.
We bet the NY Times five dollars trans-rights aren’t passed next year. Or the year after. Regardless, they’ve got a point, even if they’re taking a bit of an overly optimistic view.
Bill Perdue
Is this the same New York Times that supported the invasions of Iraq and Vietnam the escalations of those colonial wars of aggression? Yes, it is.
Is this the same New York Times that’s against socialized medicine and for the union busting schemes like NAFTA? Yes, it is.
Is this the same New York Times whose long history of gay bashing was only recently covered up in bogus display of the liberal version of political correctness? Yes, it is.
It may be hushed up but it’s still deeply entrenched in the New York Times’ culture. Just this summer Michelle McNally a New York Times editor called a staffer a “faggot†at an office party.
It so upset the Democratic Party’s lap dogs over at the HRC that they blasted the Times. In a no holds barred, Barney Frank style ringing denunciation of homobigotry on the job they said “Offensive words like that epithet should not be used in any workplace setting. Most gay people can tell you if the word was used in a malicious way or if it was banter among friends. But on the whole, in a workplace setting, the word should not be used,†said Daryl Hirschcraft, director of HRC’s Workplace Project.
Is this the same New York Times who supports the Democrats snake oil version of ENDA? Yes, it is.
Rt. Rev. Dr. RES
Everything that I have previously said about this subject. DITTO DITTO DITTO
Every praise worthy statement about brother Bill Perdue…..DITTO DITTO DITTO
hells kitchen guy
Bill Purdue: Whew! It’s a mainstream paper, the most important in the US (& probably world). Give it some credit for being so gay friendly and even gay positive these days.
Don’t get the “until recently” comment. The paper has moved forthrightly toward great coverage of gay issues ever since Abe Rosenthal retired from manaing editor decades ago.
W/out rehasing Michelle McNally contretemps, I think she meant it in a “girlfriendy” way, it came out wrong, she apologized. I hardly think one incident indicts the whole corporate culture.
And not everyone is so black-and-white as you are about issues like NAFTA. Sometimes I wish I had the bullheaded certainty about everything people like you and Rev. RES have.
But most of the time, I’m glad i don’t.
Bill Perdue
hells kitchen guy
So you approve of colonial wars of aggression like Iraq/Iran. Like Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani. And support union busting. Like Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani. And think the best of gay bashers, but only if they express regret. Like Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani.
Congratulations! You’re a Democrat and/or Republican.
Leland Frances
There he goes, Comrade Perdue doing the Time Warp again and again with his own self-reverential, bloviating Friar Fuck playing bagpipes.
Doesn’t the Friar’s partner get jealous of how much time he spends publicly going down on another man? Or is there a partner at all? Are there two different people at all, or one screeching in two only slightly different voices saying the same things over and over? Ladies and Germs! Tonight on our stage, he walks, he talks, he crawls on his belly. Billy Perdue the World’s First Communist Ventriloquist.
Wait for it, he comes back with another vicious, polysyllabic bag of pus in 10…9…8…7…6…
hells kitchen guy
Purdue: Um, all I said was that the Times does a good job of covering gay issues and is on our side of the street on almost all issues.
Why does that suddenly transform me into a pawn of the Great Fascist War Machine?
Geez,get a life!
Bill Perdue
tHE sAN fRANCISCO cHRONICLE
Bill Perdue
The San Franciso Chronicle takes a better approach:
“On Protecting Gay Americans from Workplace Discrimination Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) vote tests our values
An incrementalist law is a blunder
…the recent history of the LGBT movement suggests that incremental approaches sometimes prove effective, still American history is rife with counter-examples where the increments won were far too modest and actually slowed progress and where the sacrifices made were unconscionable by most any measure.
With ENDA, Frank is again leading the charge to pass a fatally compromised bill. While most incrementalist approaches to civil rights have sought to protect an entire group or “class” of people, and gradually expand protections, Frank’s ENDA compromise divides the LGBT community by protecting some members while betraying others. The scaled-back version of the bill would protect many lesbians and gays, true, but it leaves all transgender people unprotected from employment discrimination. According to several studies, unemployment among transgender people is believed to exceed 70 percent.
As a result, no national LGBT organization supports the Frank compromise, and hundreds of organizations around the country have risen up to oppose Frank’s efforts. Even worse, President Bush already has pledged to veto ENDA under any circumstances. So if the Congress is to vote on principle, one can’t help but ask: What principle?” November 7th, 2007
Leland Frances
Once again, Comrade Perdue simply lies to try to keep his colostomy bag of putrid nonsense from bursting at the seams.
The “New York Times” piece that is the subject of this thread is an official Times editorial. “The San Francisco Chronicle [does NOT take] a better approach.” Perdue’s quotes are not “from” the “San Francisco Chronicle” at all, let alone their editorial voice or even the opinion of one of its staff. It is from a guest opinion that appeared IN the Chronicle, written by a nobody involved in a group that did not exist three months ago.
Mr. Nobody is as entitled to his opinion, of course, as any of us, but judge its credibility by the fact that he states “no national LGBT organization supports the Frank compromise.” Give me an H! Give me an R! Give me a C! That spells the largest most financially successful LGBT organization in history. I may hate them, and I do, but that fact, anymore than the author disagreeing with them, doesn’t mean they don’t exist.
Further he is not just a careless writer, but a dumb one. One’s heart, for instance, can be “fatally comprised” and ya die. The only way a bill in Congress can be “fatally comprised” is if it fails to pass, which this one did.
Then there’s his variation on the various claims about transgender umemployment rates that he tries to use as an appeal to the reader’s sympathies. I don’t doubt they are disproportionately high. They could even be 70%. But he, nor any others using this tactic, present any evidence that it is soley BECAUSE of transphobia. Nor is even the most perfect ENDA a job-guarantee bill, but merely one that would ban discrimination. Many “trust fund babies” don’t work either but no one’s claiming it’s because they’re discriminated against for being rich.
kel777
The only reason we can vote either is that we can’t be visibly identified.
I still haven’t seen an analysis of this ‘religious exemption’ crap … what does that mean for gay high school students or teachers (say in a catholic school)?
I’m not as incensed as some others about the trans exemption (though I am incensed). I’m somewhat torn on the issue myself.
I’m inclined to think this bill (if it becomes law, which it will not) would allow a LOT of people to come out. Face it, most gays are not out at work unless they’re in the service industry, fashion industry, media industry, the arts, or something else gay friendly. Being ‘out’ in your typical american office environment or small business is hell and is quite scary. The more people that come out, the more used to these things USians will become. When/if this law passes it will be explosive.
hells kitchen guy
Leland: Don’t waste your breath trying to talk sense to this guy. His main rebuttal seems to be “The San Franciso Chronicle takes a better approach.” So, for him, it’s a long walk off a short pier to: “you approve of colonial wars of aggression like Iraq/Iran” and blahblahblah.
He’s just a parlor pinko. Hey, look at the bright side; If he’s “fighting” his (virtual) “revolution” from the safety of his computer, at least he’s not out in the real world where he can cause some real damage — by boring people to death!
kel777
Bill Perdue:
You are correct, the NY Times is a neo-liberal, at times neo-conservative gang of bourgeois assholes that has always supported the US imperial project, in all its forms. I couldn’t give a fuck what is in the NY Times.
On the issue of incrementalism, however …
Coming out is our only truly effective bit of activism. Our entire problem stems from the basic fact that we don’t have to (though it may make us miserable). I can’t help but think more people coming out will increase the typical americans comfort with this issue, and make it more likely that a future trans-inclusive bill will pass. Maybe not. I do think trans people belong under our umbrella and it is quite possible they’ll be forgotten. I’ve met enough assimilationist faggots and dykes that it gives me pause.
Leland Frances
Thanks, hells, blahblahblah about sums it up. I do keep trying to shoot down his hot air balloons because so many well-meaning people have been duped by the distortions purposely circulating. E.g., kell777 above regarding the “religious exemption crap” when “exemption in ENDA for religious institutions, such as church-run schools or associations, is identical to the religious exemption in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.” – Washington Blade.
It’s easy for us 43 years later to forget how much racism even among those who called themselves religious existed and yet exceptions were made for them. The irony of the fight against gay ministers in the Episcopal Church today is that it parallels the objection years ago to Black ministers/bishops, and sadder still is being led by some homophobic Black Episcopal ministers and bishops/archbishops.
At the same time, if we don’t want churches empowered to tell us what we can do then we can hardly say we have the right to tell them what they can do. I’m be happy when all churches dry up and blow away but until then separation of Church and State must go both ways.
Rt. Rev. Dr. RES
“He’s just a parlour pinko” is the only retort that Leland and his fellow traveller seem to have in responding to Bill Perdue…along with a moniker that has nothing to do with the 21st century. Having travelled in this century to both Moscow and Beijing…I am loathe to find a tovarich ….but fascists abound in both capitals.
If you are DLC and DINO centrists willing to support one wing of the bird which is the same bird as the one supporting the other bird….have the bullocks to have some
“BLESSED ASSURANCE” …YES, START SINGING THE HYMN TO ABSOLUTISM….that you are right and that your certainty that we are wrong is divinely inspired. My views are mine, and you do not have to describe them . I can very nicely, thank you.
Hell’s Kitchen…..Jerry Nadler’s district….
Rt. Rev. Dr. RES
Let me understand this convoluted logic in the guise of wisdom from the Washington Blade, Log Cabin and other such rags…
Leland’s final sentence of his rant is also his Final Solution for all those who profess a faith system in opposition to his. Where is his Wanasee Conference to be held?
The fact that many gay, lesbian, bisexual and yes transgendered folk are observant Christians, Jews, Muslims must have escaped your omniscience.
There is a duel for the soul of the Church and men like +Desmond Tutu and +Joseph Akinola both exist within one Church and one denomination.
Yes, Leland, I would surmise that you too are a victim of spiritual violence – and your nihilism is the solution that is shared by a Russian Orthodox Christian activist named Vladimir Illych Ulyanov “Lenin” and a Roman Catholic Christian named Josef Dagushvili “Stalin” as they embraced atheism because their Churches embraced fascism.
Nothing new in the fight, Leland, and grow up….first you swear like a sailor and then like a child you have to use “Queenly language” to describe us…GROW UP
lyssa
The NY Times…Oh yeah, they’re the ones who published the anti trans pieces on Bailey and Dreger.
Leland, are you a Fundie sockpuppet?
hells kitchen guy
Rev. RES: You are obviously educated and you have a large expanse of references and vocabulary. Unfortunately, you use them to obfuscate any real, profound thoughts.
Leland and I aren’t the ones who are professing Stalinist “certainty.” It’s you guys. I’m with Socrates: I only know that I know nothing. But that puts me way ahead of you & Purdue, with your sanctimonious certainty.
hells kitchen guy
Oh yea, and I like Jerry Nadler. I guess I’m just a hopeless patsy of the Bush war machine.
hells kitchen guy
And if you want to get out of 20th Century monikers, maybe you shouldn’t use phrases like “fellow traveler.”
Just sayin’.
Nigel S-S
Leland and Kitchen Guy….
The Hell you say. Individuals simply have to read your pinko remarks and your comrade remarks to know who throws stones, and then acts like a victim when the true victim of your words reply in their defense.
You understand what he wrote. However, you chose to reply to a bait and switch of your own creation. It is a cute debating trick, but it is disingenuous. My husband speaks about Christian communes and you speak about atheists who corrupted an effort to create justice for peasants oppressed in autocracies. You speak about the destruction of Christianity and expect a Christian bishop to say nothing. Yea, we get it men !!! Loud and clear.
Bill Perdue
Nigel S-S – keep in mind that Frances frequently uses aliases on this and other blogs. This may be one of those cases.
He shares a revealing stalkers hatred of much younger men who he knows from bitter experience wouldn’t give him the time of day. One of them is Reichen Lehmkuhl, who appears to be happily hopping from boyfriend to boyfriend and bed to bed. It’s what guys do, but it enrages the stalker instinct in Frances who compulsively posts creepy denunciations of Lehmkuhl. By the oddest of coincidences ‘hells kitchen guy’ began his posting career at Queerty by ‘joining’ Frances in red baiting AND in stalking Reichen Lehmkuhl on his first day. A few minutes after Frances lashed out at Lehmkuhl of his unfaithful ways, ‘hells kitchen guy’ chimed in this hissy fit; “Lehkmul’s 15 minutes are UP. Quit workin’ it, bitch’. ‘hells kitchen guy’ even apes Frances’ trademark use of the bigot term ‘bitch’. See “Reichen Breaks Out Lawyers…†posted by Queerty on the same day.
Frances, like his mentor, J. Edgar (Mary) Hoover uses red baiting and xenophobia to cover the fact that they don’t have real answeres to politcal questions. Frances is a pom pom monkey for the Democrats and he can’t see beyond that. When all else fails Frances wraps himself in an American flag like Ronald Reagan and George Bush.
Frances laces his comments with venomous gaybashing and misogynist terms like ‘mad tranny disease’, ‘cunt’, ‘bitch’ and ‘fag’. Those are terms used by bigots or those suffering from Tourettes Syndrome or both.
His has a distinct bias against African Americans, portraying them as antigay. He, Chris Crane, the Dixiecrats, the KKK and the Dixiecrat-Republicans all claim the Jena Six are ‘thugs’. They use the classic reactionary trick of claiming that the victims are the criminals. He says that Oprah Winfrey is a ‘bitch’ for endorsing Barak Obama and that ‘Black churches have influenced him, the majority of which rabidly oppose gay rights.†No mention of the Euroamerican southern baptists, the roman church or the mormons.
Frances is angry at Oprah’s endorsement of Obama because she has clout, influence and an audience. His preferred audience is his aliases, who pop up as needed when he wants to cover the fact that he’s not an isolated bitter old reactionary on his way out of the GLBT movement.
Hurry up and move into that Log Cabin, Frances. You’re boring us with your shilly-shallying.
Rt. Rev. Dr. RES
At the end of a long Sunday – yes, I told Nigel that Leland has many aliases conveniently supportive of his empty rhetoric. It is also the aliases who attack when he needs approbation for his ad hominems. LOL
Thank you Bill Perdue, for your contributions.
hells kitchen guy
Wow, you guys really need to get out of your virtual world and into the real one more. Whew! I don’t know who Leland Francis is, nor do I particular care. Umm, this is getting a little to “Matrrixy” for me. C ya!