LGBT rights is certainly lower down on the list of things one needs. It's not as fundamental as the right to vote, to own property, to get paid equally with others, to not be a slave just for the color of your skin.

Rare, occasional violence against LGBT activists can't compare with what black people have gone through.

LGBT activists sometimes approppriate the language of the civil rights movement. I can see how that would turn a lot of black people off.

Also, if Huckabee wants to distinguish between employment rights and marriage rights, how about supporting ENDA then? The fact is that the right wing finds some reason to oppose EVERY right sought by gays and lesbians, not just gay marriage.

captcrisis: Are you a moron? I'm sorry, but it's very difficult to be nice in the face of such ignorance and willful stupidity.

Let's start with the fact that in most states it's still ok to fire or refuse to hire a person just because that person is gay, forget about getting equal pay.

Beyond that, you've missed the entire point of the article. Get a clue.

Dilan: Exactly! The entire "protecting the institution of marriage" thing is such a transparent facade. The simple fact is that conservative religious folks DESPISE gay people.

They believe we are going straight to Hell, and they want to make sure they punish us as much as they can here on Earth before we get there.

This is spot on. We really need to push the argument that it is not a competition for who has suffered the most. For the most part I don't think gay people overreach on this - we talk about civil rights, which is what this is about. But then we do get a lot of reaction from African Americans (and those like Huckabee who would exploit them) who then raise the comparison - how dare you compare your struggle to mine. The challenge for gay people is not to take the bait. Call it message discipline, I guess.

It is refreshing to have someone who is neither African-American or Gay decide this (Sarcasm). Before you start to claim that this is NOT a Civil Rights Issue, even Coretta Scott King so named it. Quote:

POMONA, N.J. (AP) — The widow of Martin Luther King Jr. called gay marriage a civil rights issue, denouncing a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban it.
Constitutional amendments should be used to expand freedom, not restrict it, Coretta Scott King said Tuesday.

"Gay and lesbian people have families, and their families should have legal protection, whether by marriage or civil union," she said. "A constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages is a form of gay bashing and it would do nothing at all to protect traditional marriages."

and

"I still hear people say that I should not be talking about the rights of lesbian and gay people and I should stick to the issue of racial justice," she said in March 1998. "But I hasten to remind them that Martin Luther King Jr. said, 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.' I appeal to everyone who believes in Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream to make room at the table of brother and sisterhood for lesbian and gay people."

and

"We have a lot of work to do in our common struggle against bigotry and discrimination. I say 'common struggle,' because I believe very strongly that all forms of bigotry & discrimination are equally wrong and should be opposed by right-thinking Americans everywhere. Freedom from discrimination based on sexual orientation is surely a fundamental human right in any great democracy, as much as freedom from racial, religious, gender, or ethnic discrimination."

I didn't say it wasn't a civil rights issue. I said that most of the time, comparisons to the black rights movement are inappropriate.

I also love the people feel as though they can deduce my race or sexuality from the tone of my writing.

"It is refreshing to have someone who is neither African-American or Gay decide this (Sarcasm)."

I was referring to Huckabee, not you Adam.

Lol my bad.

"inappropriate overreach" ??

CIVIL RIGHTS: "The rights belonging to an individual by virtue of citizenship, especially the fundamental freedoms and privileges guaranteed by the 13th and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution and by subsequent acts of Congress, including civil liberties, due process, equal protection of the laws, and freedom from discrimination."

Seeing current discrimination as completely separate from previous civil rights battles is precisely what enables us to ignore whatever pressure we might feel to be on "the right side of history." The comparison isn't inappropriate, in fact it's necessary to provide a context with which to understand discrimination that we grew up with and see as normal. There's a huge gap between promoting a narrative of a living, dynamic, civil rights movement that is not confined to one time or one oppressed group on one hand, and keeping an oppression "score card" on the other.

I'd really rather not hear the word "inappropriate" in a conversation about equal rights. Explain to me exactly whose interests are served when we refuse to link de jure discrimination of the past to de jure discrimination of today?

Nowhere in any doccument today is there a law or proclamation that being black, brown, red, white, tan etc. is morally wrong. Just because the law condemns and yet refuses to prosecute gay sexual activities...that makes it wrong? What we really need to do is get rid of the stupid bible and it's followers reasonings that being gay is "abnormal"--"sinful"--"reprensible"--sickening, etc. Just because THEY say gay is morally wrong doesn't mean it is. Just because THEY say it is morally wrong for a married man or woman to cheat on each other---that makes it wrong??? I don't think so. The bible has no right to dictate what is right or wrong for me. It is an outdated book with no relevance whatsoever for the modern man and society.

Setting aside the "what's appropriate" discussion of black vs. gay oppression politics (as someone who's both it's not related/analagous... except, of course, that it is), I find Huckabee's "violence" standard amazingly ludicrous... apparently, gays haven't been beaten... enough. And blacks have. What a refreshing opinion for both.

In the end this is why gay marriage has become such a rallying cry - I don't think, en masse lots of (bitter, jaded) single gays (especially men) want to be married; but even we can spot thinly rearranged assessments of our moral character, and our value as people. And really the "beat me harder, daddy" approach to civil rights ought to be dismissed with more humor than contempt. Otherwise, one might think we take this seriously.

While the murder of San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk by former Supervisor Dan White was no doubt tinged with a considerable amount of homophobia, I'm sure, it's also useful to remember that Mayor George Moscone was also killed during that rampage and Mayor Moscone, to the best of my knowledge, was not gay.

Dan White, "Twinkie Defense" or not, was a seriously and obviously dangerously unbalanced individual and his motives were complex.

My reaction to the killings at the time was that the motivation was more political than social. White and Milk, in fact, were allies for some time during their tenure on the Board and relations only soured after a conflict over a zoning issue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_White#The_assassinations

Look, I get that this is a sensitive subject but this kind of african american "ownership" of the term civil rights is really as absurd as any other group deciding it has "ownership" of a whole series of rights due to a specific history. I have this argument all the time with Jews who think they can hold onto a word, like "holocaust" because...what?

Civil rights are rights that we grant to citizens in civil society. AFrican american history has nothing to do with it except they are the most recent beneficiaries, after a long struggle, of the expansion of the concept of *citizen* and of *full human* to include a group that was disenfranchised and disrespected for most of its history in this particular polity.

Gays and LGBT people don't have to prove to anyone that they have, or haven't suffered to be entitled to full rights in any insititution in this country. But, if they had to, you know what? They have suffered. Gays, lesbians, and people of indterminate or intersex have been killed, tortured, operated on against their will, etc...throughout most of modern western history. As have mentally retarded people, poor people, and women.

Civil Rights are human rights. The last group to be offered them doesn't get to pull up the ladder behind them and pretend that they are so special that these rights belong only to them.

aimai

that was awesome aimai. I think I am going to steal the part about pulling up the ladder.

Aimai,

I think you're misunderstanding. It's not an "ownership" over the term civil rights. The right to marry is unquestionably a civil right.

I'm simply arguing that the historical comparison to the black rights movement of the last century, commonly referred to as the civil rights movement, is not really appropriate because the nature and context of oppression is different. I'm not saying that gay rights activists should refrain from using terms like "civil rights." I'm saying the historical comparisons are likely to get them in more trouble than they're worth depending on the context, and so they should be avoided unless explicitly relevant, as in the case of anti-miscegenation laws.

"I'm saying the historical comparisons are likely to get them in more trouble than they're worth depending on the context, and so they should be avoided unless explicitly relevant, as in the case of anti-miscegenation laws."

Yeah, but -- that is precisely the comparison that was made repeatedly in opposition to Prop 8 and explicitly rejected by a substantial number of voters. So then what? What are the options when perfectly valid comparisons are summarily rejected?

It seems to me that you either believe that every American is entitled to the same civil rights -- and their concomitant responsibilities -- or you don't. That's irreducible. Everything else is sophistry.

thanks again for a good post adam. basically the only reason i read tapped anymore.

It is not against the law to be a color. Race is not in question here. Race based discrimination is and should not be tolerated in a society where all people are deemed "equal".
The Homosexual community must prove (or atleast squeak the wheel long and loud eneough)that being homosexual is a "born this way" issue---not a chosen lifestyle. The Christian and Jewish Bible are at fault here for condeming homosexual behavior and relationships. We must be rid of this book and it's followers opinions. If someone is "born" homosexual just as someone is born Asian--then we have a new catagory for absolute rights. We should do everything possible to support the aetheists of the world and abolish the laws we have on our books based on the bible. Maybe then we can have peace.