Honestly, we’ve tried to forget what the Department of Justice called America’s gays in its offensive Defense of Marriage Act court filings in Log Cabin Republicans vs. the United States of America, but we’re pretty sure it had to do with a Big Love plotline. Something about incest or pedophilia or underage marriage? But when Tom Perez, he of DoJ’s Civil Rights Division (which is “protecting” gay persons this way), met with the gays in Milwaukee last week, he played down the significance of his department’s language. It’s not like he called you a bunch of fudgepacking faggots, after all.
When top Justice Department official Tom Perez sat down with gay leaders in Milwaukee last week, a member of the audience challenged him about a legal brief the department filed last year which many in the gay community took offense at.
“Someone brought up the DOMA [Defense of Marriage Act] brief and how hateful it was to LGBT people. He said look at least in the more recent briefs the language had been changed,” said Brion Collins, a spokesman for the LGBT Center, which hosted the discussion.
Indeed, they’ve come up with new ways to insinuate you’re second-class. Brava!
[Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, Politico; photo via]
Andrew
I realize I’ll probably get hounded for this by the Queerty community, but the matter of fact is that the situation has improved ten fold since just two years ago when Dubya was in office.
Can we agree that improvements are being made and push for more, rather than attacking the people who I believe are genuinely on our side?
jason
What improvements? We’re still being treated like second-class citizens courtesy of the Democrats and Obama. Except for federal hate crimes laws, the improvements have been largely in a small number of states.
Even Dubya invited gay groups to the Easter Egg roll.
Andrew
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_LGBT_civil_rights_February_2010.svg
Care to say that again?
Hint: Not a single of those protections was won by voting for Republicans.
Cam
So regarding the subject of the Post…
If somebody tells me “I’m sorry, fags aren’t allowed in here”
Or if somebody says “I’m so sorry, but we choose to, because of our beliefs, to not do business with homosexuals.”
There is NO DIFFERENCE! This guy can go fuck himself. They altered the wording of the language…but it says the exact same thing. If you call a woman a bitch and don’t hire her because she is a woman, or you call her a girl and don’t hire her because she is a woman…guess what? She STILL doesn’t have the job.
These guys have been in politics so long that they don’t even realize that altering language doesn’t alter reality.
counterpoll
Seems like the DOJ is focusing more on being a “department” than on furthering “justice.”
Perez has yet to say anything against the principles behind DOMA, and he wants us to be swayed by the fact the “language” has changed? Not too convincing.
@Cam: Nicely said! You always seem to cut to the heart of the matter. We don’t see enough of that in the blogosphere. Or in politics, for that matter.
the crustybastard
Mr. Perez, you are a career civil rights attorney arguing that the government’s refusal to recognize the civil rights of LGBT citizens is both necessary and rational.
Do you really suppose the problem here is verbiage?