For the first time ever in the history of the entire universe, three Republicans Congressmen have appeared in an “It Gets Better” video… and did so without bursting into flames. So now GOPs don’t want LGBT kids to shoot, hang, and stab themselves… how progressive. Is it a problem that three of the GOP representatives in the video also voted against the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and support the Defense of Marriage Act?
A handful of Democrats and Republicans appear in the New Jersey congressional delegation’s IGB video and of the lot, Republican representatives Leonard Lance, Jon Runyan, and Frank LoBiondo support DADT and DOMA. However Lance and LoBiondo also support the Employment Nondiscrimination Act which would offer job protections regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.
As a debate continues to rage about whether IGB videos should be used as a political cudgel to force anti-gay politicians to support LGBT-friendly politics, it seems that the IGB campaign has less and less to do with stopping LGBT kids from killing themselves and more to do with politicians and corporate policy makers gradually recognizing the needs and rights of LGBT Americans.
Maybe the IGB is less useless than we worried.
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
Michael
*Scoffs* Please these hypocritical hatemongerers making an It Gets Better video is like Pat Robertson making an It Gets Better video.These people have never given a damn about our rights or protection as human beings.They only did this video for PUBLICITY nothing else but that thats all these people ever care about is making a name for themselves ( which would be bigot asshole the list is endless)which is nothing positive to begin with. So no while I respect the message of the video I do not respect the REHEARSED men and women who are constantly against us as human beings and our rights because we are gay SAYING these words though.
It’s like a wolf in sheeps clothing this is beyond ridiculous especially for the IT GETS BETTER campaign.Having these people claim it gets better when they are constantly trying to trample on us and our rights is fucking ludicrous makes a mockery of IGB and is hypocritical period.When friends like these people… who needs enemies?
Michael
With friends like these people who needs enemies damn typos.
Interesting
Yes, these statements mean a lot. They mean that gay Republicans can claim, “See, we are as tolerant as the Democratic Party,” which they often mistake with the Left, but anyway, that’s another part. In short, it has some definite PR value to it.
If you mean does it mean anything else? No. But, we live in bullshit age so PR is all that matters.
Shannon1981
It’s a bit of a slap in the face. At first, I tried giving them the benefit of the doubt, but, you know what? Fuck that. They are hateful bigots, no better than the students and teachers and parents and whoever else is bullying these kids into early graves. They vote against our rights, they do all but criminalize our very existences, then turn around and make a video saying they don’t want us all dead, kids included? What utter bullshit. Dan Savage needs to pull this video, or at least point out the hypocrisy of individuals who hold these views making this video. Disgusting.
JohJoh
No – if anything it’s insulting; these bigots are only doing this for show.
It’s obscene how low they are willing to go.
disco lives
A year ago, when Hillary Clinton became the first straight person to make one of these videos which were supposed to be made by actual gay people, I predicted that YouTube would be soon be clogged with videos from every random politician pandering for votes. It turns out I was correct.
Michael
What’s next? A KKK member telling a black person they won’t kill them, they’ll just stick to burning crosses and what-not?
Hugh
The Canadian version happened recently too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV1i8LWb9hY
It makes me physically ill to see these homophobes pretend to give a sh*t, when they’ve spent their lives fighting against anything pro-GLBT. They’re responsible for all the bullying and suicides we see rampant. This type of propaganda-in-concert by Cons north and south of the border shows how the Canadian Cons are just a branch of the American GOP, a hydra of malicious intent infecting and controlling all of North America. They know they’re guilty, they know the blood is on their hands (I wish someone would throw not pies but buckets of blood at them). This is another example of how, like ghouls, they thrive off corpses, shamelessly using gay suicide for their own political gain. We don’t need a revolution, we need an exorcism!
Jim Hlavac
Oh, I think it shows a major “evolving” on the issue — oh, young folks, I remember when 100% of all politicians, Democrat and Republican, were against us; I remember bar raids, when all were all for it. I keep saying — take them at their word — we are a difficult subject for them — they admit it — far more heteros are gay-perplexed than “anti-gay” — we should recognize this, and embrace their problem, and lead them to the promised land. The bigot of yesteryear is often the friend of tomorrow — let these people “evolve” and help them along. Don’t keep attacking them when they begin to change, but accept that this change is real, however begrudging and befuddled it might be, and encourage them in every way imaginable; give them space; they will come to our side. Our salvation is not found in getting the Democrats to squash the Republicans, but for each and every fellow citizen, regardless of party or religion, realizes we are a benign, even good presence in the nation. Encourage, don’t denigrate. Thank, don’t disparage. Let us take every new statement of support as exactly that. Of what point is there to keep arguing with them when they are moving inexorably, however slowly, to our side? Let them come at their pace, and they will join us soon enough. That is the way it has been from the beginning, back when Frank Kameny started our plea for acceptance. Encourage them, for heaven’s sake; accept their change of mind, and worry not of what they said years ago, nor fret much about their confusion of today; they will all turn. Give them time.
Tee
Just wanted to point out that the link to this article features a photo of U.S. Senator Robert Menendez and the video at the head of this article (prior to clicking to start it) features a screenshot of U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg. Both are Democrats and both support civil rights for gay citizens, among many other sensible and fair policies supported by most of us and indeed most of the country when the poll questions aren’t skewed. For those who don’t know, I didn’t want their images to rouse negative impressions the next time anybody saw them. They’re the good guys.
To the question posed by this article, of course it’s better that Republicans who oppose civil rights for all law-abiding American citizens are willing and feel able to show they are not gleefully for the suicides of these gays they seek to disenfranchise.
But to these Republicans, and anyone who would support the anti-American, counter-Constitutional, and spiritually inauthentic norms and legislations that do, long have, and would further disenfranchise gay Americans (to borrow a phrase from another New Jersey politician), I would point out that if you want to give a gay kid hope that life will be worthwhile, create a world that is not only safer for and more supportive of him or her as a kid but that gives him or her true equality in the eyes of the Federal government as an adult.
Kids and adults must have the option to participate in all aspects of government-sanctioned society, and marriage is a civil right among those aspects. Various churches should be free to adhere to whatever hateful slivers of their respective dogmas they still choose to cling to (as opposed to the beautiful, loving, and spiritually authentic messages present in all religions and predominant in Christianity), but considering those branches and sects who have already seen fit to embrace their gay congregation and officiate at their weddings (some even open to openly gay clergy), it is an even more stark contrast to the travesty of how the U.S. Federal and state governments persist in the exclusion of gays in the second decade of the twenty-first century. It is, after all, these religions’ respective founding documents that hold a paltry couple of third-rate comments against gays, and not the founding documents of this country. And of course it is the founding documents of this country, and not those of these religions, that should and do establish the civil rights of gay Americans, even as those who claim to be defenders of those documents in the Republican party freely and unashamedly argue against this.
But what surprise should that be, when the vast majority of things the Republicans have said or done are patently wrong, and composed to appeal primarily to the interests of the wealthiest and most hateful in society, at the expense of all others. Their intransigence and single-minded destructive streak since the election of this president has been a new low following the egregiously poor administration of his predecessor. The current crop of Republican presidential candidates shows their willingness to lower their once dignified and responsible standards—and the potential of this country and its citizens—even further.
kylew
@Jim Hlavac: Jim, I couldn’t disagree more. If recent global politics (Saddam, Gadaffi, Mugabwe, Khomeni) has shown us anything, appeasing hatemongers just makes it worse in the long run. Accepting the hand that tried to stab you
in the back is naive in the extreme.
These hatemongers go here the wind blows, and they will be haters till the day they die; but they’ll just be the kind of creeps who try to introduce petitions anonymously.
We should say “Fuck you; gay kids don’t need or want your help.” This equation has three sides, pro, against, or undecided/disinterested. These people are still firmly in the against camp, and nobody should be fooled by their public displays of support or crocodile tears.
I would no more EVER trust these people than I would expect a Jew to trust a nazi.
Michael
@Jim Hlavac:
I’d much rather have a pitbull as a friend then these people… excluding the supportive dems who actually DO give a damn about us in that video.
Not to mention us excepting that they have an issue with homosexuality does NOT make it better only worse.It just gives them the idea that their hate is warranted and that we will roll over except it and keep taking it as they continue to dish it out.No that will not solve anything ultimately in the end only make things worse for this community in the long run.
I’m not gonna support people who can not even see me as a human being and realize that I should be treated with civility respect and like a human being just as they should be.If they are not capable of understanding that seperate is NOT equal then to hell with them period.
Matt Connolly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYWkOTiC_MU
Matt Connolly
This:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYWkOTiC_MU
Billy
Beware of a wolf in sheeps clothing! oops, did that biblical reference(paraphrased) offend the hypocritical replublicans? God I hope so!
Kurt
The whole “It gets better” program is a total joke, was started by the biphobic and transphobic hypocrite Dan Savage, and now this just shows how the IGB project is pointless.
The It Gets Better project turned into Z-list celebrities, many of them closeted, making meaningless, generic Youtube videos in a desperate attempt to get a little social media buzz. Now you have pro sports teams and companies pretending to care about GLBT youth just to get social media attention for 10 seconds of attention in the spotlight.
It’s also a way for Dan Savage to self promote himself and he earned a reality TV show on MTV for doing so while pretending to give a shit about GLBT youth and teens all while trashing bisexuals, women, and trans people like he has for decades.
GreatGatsby2011
Ridiculous. These men should have had to publicly pledge not to support anti-gay legislation from now on before being allowed to do an IGB video. I have no doubt that these men haven’t the slightest desire to do any such thing, so homophobia will continue to be government sanctioned. Thus exacerbating the hostile environment these teens already survive in. This video is like offering comfort to sucidal LGBTeens with the left hand while handing them the razorblade with the right. The IGB project had already diluted itself into near-mundanity, but, for me at least, this hypocritical nail is the last in IGB’s integrity coffin.
Little Kiwi
no. from them it means “It gets Better – don’t kill yourselves, one day you’ll be an adult and you can live a Closeted life because we Republicans support your employers being allowed to fire, or not hire, you based on your being LGBT. And we support their right to deny you housing. And you wont’ be allowed to marry, or have civil unions, and/or visit your loved-ones in the hospital. But we want you to not kill yourselves. because we want your tax money. Love, the GOP”
fuck off, you pricks. don’t tell kids that “it gets better” – tell your fellow Republicans to stop making things worse – you wanna see the root of the problem? It’s grown-ass adults in positions of political power keeping anti-gay bigotry alive in order to gain votes. Disgusting.
Pat Duffy
They don’t want us to “off” ourselves…it makes them and their Belief System(s) look bad.
Brett
Why would queerty post a picture of Senator Menendez right underneath its headline about anti-gay politicians? He’s on our side! Sometimes when I read queerty, I think that with friends like these, who needs enemies.