Are all right wingers homophobic? I used to think that bigots called themselves conservative because it sounds nicer.

The question arises in the interest of precise thinking. When somebody yearns for the 1950's I have assumed they want to go back to pre-Stonewall fag-bashing. This is frequently incorrect.

Because conservatives give political cover to bigots they don't deserve much sympathy. But it's good to know the sheep from the goats.

Is there a way to tell who is a true conservative and who is merely a bigot?

I don't believe all right-wingers are homophobic. Most are, but not all. It can be hard to tell who is conservative from who might be a bigot. But one thing has always been clear to me....bigots will ALWAYS give themselves away because they are stupid! In their conversations, attitudes, even dress....they are stupid and will ultimately give themselves away.

Please remember that even some of us gay men are conservative in some of our philosophies. Though I would never consider George W. as my REAL President, I do agree with his recent rescinding of the Worker's Repetive Syndrome Act. Some things in life get WAY out of hand and ridiculous in Democratic politics. Does this make me a right-winger? Does this make me a bigot? I don't think so.

Saying all right-wingers are homophobes would be analagous to saying all left-wingers are communists. Both examples are based on faulty generalizations. You will find bigots populate both the left and right. As for giving cover to bigots, both Conservatives and Liberals offer sanctuary to bigots because each group has its own agendas. As we all know (hopefully), a bigot by definition holds a prejudice against a racial or religious group. Bigots should never be given sympathy or allowed to seek refuge behind their political affiliation. A true bigot distinguishes themselves from a position of intellectual dishonesty. This is why you find more bigots on both the far left and the far right extremes. The word 'prejudice' is derived from the word 'prejudge'. When we prejudge others without having all the facts or information, prejudice is often harmful. When we draw incorrect conclusions about others based on faulty generalizations, the result is often not without prejudice or harm. Hence, making prejudgments about a group of people based on political affiliation is equally onerous.

[This message has been edited by ORD ComXchgGuy (edited March 21, 2001).]

Yeah! And as Gay people, we must never vote a bigot into office, just let Bush do it for us......

To demonstrate political correctness, George Bush made sure to appoint token members of different groups to his cabinet. There was one Hispanic, two Blacks, several women, two Asians, etc. But George didn't appoint any token homosexuals.

It's probably correct to say that right wingers are homophobic. There aren't many that aren't, and you have to get to know them before you find that out. The generalization works even though there are exceptions.

People who voted for Bush would probably not object if an active persecution of gays were to start up again. If it doesn't affect anybody they know, it doesn't affect them.

Given the rabid dogs on the radical right who are straining at the leash, the indifference of the moderate right is ominous.

i've come to believe just of late that many, many republicans don't give a shit about social issues. all they're concerned with is their money and their stock market. that's why they vote in the old white men. the old "i've got mine--i don't care if you've got any or not" philosophy.

i know many conservatives who are completely unruffled by homosexuality, but issues like equal rights, women's rights, gay rights have nothing to do with their voting.

Family issues are important to right-wingers and they actually work for a living feeling over burdened with taxes.. I am curious to know if dwight has any experience in the private sector. My guess is he receives a disability check and if he has ever worked, he was on a government payroll.Doors have been removed from toilet stalls in public restrooms--can you imagine why???? AIDS is still being spread by promiscuous men-is that ok in your book??? Incidentally, most of the multi-millionaires in the senate are liberal democrats.Name a right wing senate republican who is a multi-millionaire??? Dwight, refuses to believe that the hierarchy in the democratic party would never except him and he would not welcome. Why do some of you guys still believe wealthy people are conservative republican---in reality the more affluent areas in california, florida, new york, etc. are liberal democratic strongholds!

The reason that I narrowed the focus of an earlier thread is that right wingers kept changing the subject. Liberal-bashers are not good at sticking to the topic, especially an unwelcome one like homophobia within the right wing.

I didn't ask about toilet doors or government paychecks or Florida millionaires. I asked a simple question: Given that not all right wingers are homophobes, is there an easy way to tell the sheep from the goats?

I didn't get very good answers, and now I know why. Homophobia is part of a cluster of attitudes not usually found among gays. You don't expect to find this attitude among gays themselves. But when people oppose equal rights for gays can you call it anything else but homophobia?

I wonder, frankly, how gay right wingers really feel about themsleves. They don't sound like they affirm their own identities.

I would imagine Moderate Gays and Independents feel very good about themselves since they don't have to play the willing, sympathetic role of victim that Liberalism and the left demands of them.

What is becoming abundantly clear to many gays is that you don't have to play either the queer victim or subscribe to its tenants of victimology. Instead, we see the positive progress toward legal and social equality. The reason is simple: Politics has a limited, and declining, ability to shape society and social attitudes. Instead, we see social change and social attitudes shaping politics. Utltimately, politics can only adjust to the deep changes taking place in society. It might be useful to remind ourselves of a few of the fundamental changes taking place on a social, cultural, and economic level that encourage liberty or equality for gays.

We notice on a daily basis the increased visiblity of gays and lesbians as ordinary parts of our society. We see gays more visible in the mass entertainment media today. Almost every poll touching on gay issues shows young people (18 to 29 year olds) are far more accepting of gays than are older people (65 and above). Overall, social attitudes will slowly evolve as the older people die and the younger people carry their gay-friendly attitudes with them into their adulthood and maturity. Psychologists and other therapists firmly reject the idea that homosexuality is anything to reject. Now, they are focusing on helping gays to accept themselves and flourish in their lives and work. This change reflects the much needed decline of Freud and neo-Freudian doctrines. It also deals with the realization that 'conversion therapies' do not work and that gays do not exhibit evidence of pathology. With greater emphasis on self-acceptance and self-actualization, the new focus shifts the focus from compelling the individual to adjust to the majority to the personalist focus.

These are just a few of the changes taking place today that does not require gays and lesbians to be willing victims and the attendant victimology of the left politic.

Dwight as expected missed my point! Doors have been removed from toilet stalls in many public restrooms for obvious reasons. These decisions were made in certain colleges and theatres by persons who share your leftest ideology. Many union members who have children go ballistic when guys are messing around in public places. Does this make them homophobic????? You best realize right-wingers are not the only ones that don't want 'hanky pank' going on in public places.

NOLA Coonass???

NOLA = Northern Louisiana. Bordered on the north by Arkansas, on the west by Texas, on the east by Mississippi. A stronghold of the KKK.

Freudianism is not dead, because castration anxiety is alive and well and motivating behavior. As a people, Americans are not doing all so well psychologically that we can afford to dismiss the notion of passing laws guaranteeing equal protection to sexual minorities.

Gay people are legally second class citizens. That is what was held in the 1986 Supreme Court decision Bowers v. Hardwick, and remains the law of the land. Gays have not come so far that the Bowers decision is irrelevant. That is just not true.

I do not expect that the necessary changes in the law will come from the right wing. In fact, given the indifference of moderates, any changes coming from the right wing will probably take the form of renewed persecution.

Dwight ~

You're much too emotional and your persecution complex is beginning to dominate your life. As evidenced from your own rantings and delusions, a specter haunts you and the 'queer' left -- the growing ranks of ordinary homosexuals who don't feel all that radically different from heterosexuals except for the matter of being attracted to the same sex. It appears you are heartbroken that being gay isn't seen as being excitingly alien and subversive any more. How will the queer left go on feeling special and commanding everyone's attention?

The queer left is in denial that homosexuals are increasing ordinary. Instead, the queer left has tried to describe homosexuals as a sub-species of Homo Sapiens, with their own peculiar values and ideas. The queer left bitterly criticises gays who have put their own sense of being alien behind them.

Behind all the talk of the queer left's revolutionary values, the need for a sense of being alien, the supposed subversion of gender roles, lies the fear of being ordinary. It is like the childlike need to have everyone's attention. If it is ordinary to be gay, there's nothing special about you on that account. You have no secret rings or rites, no hidden passages or esoteric language, no distinct set of values, no special insight into human suffering or longing. You're only an individual who must make your own way in the world, unable to depend on the safety of belonging to an elect tribe.

It is mythology and harmful for the queer left to show gays as sexual revolutionaries, with alien natures and values, threatening and iconoclastic, angry, ennobled, and enlightened by our oppression, but just not ordinary in the sense that really matters. But, we are better, and bigger, that that. We needn't fear being ordinary.

And you needn't fear being a Sunny Dogg of a fella, NOLA.

I find Dwight's references to the Bowers v. Hardwick case amusing.

The Bowers v. Hardwick Case did not require the United States Supreme Court to make a judgment on whether laws against sodomy between consenting adults in general, or between homosexuals in particular, are wise or desirable. The case did not raise a question about the right or propriety of state legislative decisions to repeal laws that criminalized homosexual sodomy, or of state court decisions invalidating those laws on state constitutional grounds.

What was put before the United States Supreme Court to judge and decide is whether the Federal Constitution itself confers a fundamental right upon homosexuals to engage in sodomy, and hence invalidates the laws of many States that still make such conduct illegal, and have done so for a very long time.

The USSC, by a 5 to 4 majority decision, disagreed with the Court of Appeals and with the respondent (Hardwick) that the Constitution confers a right to privacy that extends to homosexual sodomy. The Court ruled no such right to privacy to conduct homosexual sodomy was reached in prior cases of the Court. The Court further stated the claim that such a right to engage in such conduct was deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition or implicit in the concept of ordered liberty was a facetious claim. The Court further reasoned that sodomy laws should not be invalidated on the asserted basis that majority belief that sodomy is immoral is an 'inadequate' rationale to support the laws.

What is amusing about Dwight's references to this case is that the Georgia Supreme Court struck down the Georgia sodomy law in 1998 (Powell v. The State). Hence, gays and lesbians in the State of Georgia have their right to privacy affirmed by the State's highest court.

Since the Georgia Supreme Court has struct down the sodomy law on the basis of violating a person's right to privacy, as implied in the State Constitution of Georgia, the effect of Bowers v. Hardwick becomes moot.

[This message has been edited by SunDogg (edited March 24, 2001).]