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Here’s some Monday fun for you. This bizarre headline at RENWL reads:
I laughed out loud when Clarknt67 Tweeted me today:
@Pam_Spaulding shocked to see you are part of “Gay Inc. White Privilege” http://bit.ly/c0O3mn #LGBT #DOMA #DADT @renwl
The last time I looked in the mirror (that was this AM), I wasn’t white and I’ve never been mistaken as such in the past…
Heck, my photo is at the top of the freaking blog, lol. I certainly wasn’t white at any time in the past, and don’t have any white relatives on either side of the family for as many generations back as we can recall.
What’s the charge? I’m not only tossing around my white privilege, but get this — I’m part of Gay Inc media outlets for saying this:
Pam’s House Blend: BREAKING: Obama DOJ to appeal Massachusetts DOMA caseHow about that fierce advocacy! Predictable, given how things have gone so far; this admin’s DOJ and this President (a constitutional scholar) are going to defend discrimination. From Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (email press release)…
The rationale at RENWL:
The anti-Obama machine in Gay Inkdom is alive and strong. It’s purposefully misleading, resentful and born out of the ironic reality that the LGBT community has yet to suffer one casualty in a so-called quest for civil rights. The continued dishonesty and lack of forthrightness on behalf of LGBT leadership and their media outlets may cost the Democratic party the midterm elections. We really wish these people would stop their hysteria mongering and lack of integrity in regards to misinforming the LGBT community. It is not serving our community well. Not at all.
I’m not sure how white privilege (that I don’t have) and loose professional associations (that I don’t belong to) have anything to do with the opinion that this President:
1) hasn’t kept his promises made to the LGBT community;
2) has thrown every roadblock possible to the feeble DADT repeal that’s on the table;
3) has made embarrassing specious legal arguments that appear to claim constitutionality of discriminatory laws;
4) has said that he wants to be held accountable for his performance.
Besides, I don’t think Gay Inc. wants my Cheetos-stained, PJ-clad posterior in their club.
I certainly can understand someone disagreeing with me on a topic, but for god’s sake, at least start off with a reality-based premise before doing so. LOLOLOL.
39 Comments
Wow
That is offensive on so many levels.
LOL!Maybe some of my whiteness rubbed off on ya this summer???
Sheesh! (and I’m still looking for Offical Cheetos Stained PJs for all of us for Christmas…)
Well, I am a regular commenter at both blogsso I really don’t want to get in the middle of this.
But…of course will.
1) To be perfectly honest, in my opinion, this is an advocacy blog and that has both its’ strengths and weaknesses.
Yes, a certain POV is articulated here at the expense of something more objective.
For example, in the Massachusetts DOMA cases if the Obama DOJ doesn’t appeal than the ruling applies only to Massachusetts and maybe only to the plantiffs.
So don’t we want the Obama DOJ to appeal that ruling?
More generally, it would be nice to have some sort of…legal viewpoint that’s as objective as can be.
2) As far as the white privilege bomb, my only question is what is Gay, Inc.
3) As far as “casualities” and the LGBT movement not suffering any, depends on how you define “casuality.”
The very essence of how homophobia affects GLBT’s is not firehouses and siccing dogs on people but is in silence.
Here’s a “casuality,” for example.
Everybody LosesInternecine battles cost everyone and benefit no one.
We have been set up as scapegoats from the very beginningThe LGBT community, that is. It was quite obvious by summer of 2009 that we were going to be the reason Dems do poorly in the midterm election, along with real progressives (as opposed to the ersatz ones who are actually right-leaning corporatists that make up the Democratic Party nowadays.)
Gays are the Green voters of 2010, and you can put that sticker on your bumper.
That’s what was so offensive about renwl’s articleTHIS
Thing is, the Dems have been down this road before…in 2004 and after the Scott Brown loss earlier this years, gays were made out to be the scapegoats with very, very little empirtical evidence.
Like I said, the Green voters of 2010The 11% of self-identified Democrats who voted for Bush in 2000 had far, far more impact than the 2% of Democrats and 5% of independents who voted for Nader. But facts have never been terribly useful to the Democratic Party (nor to the Republicans, for what that’s worth.) If you are a card-carrying member, you will NEVER be blamed for anything.
Unless you are gay, however. We are responsible for everything wrong on the planet, from the immenent losses of the Democrats to world hunger to dandruff.
renwl does have a pointabout white privilege in the gay civil rights movement (even Pam would agree with him on that).
And it is something that needs to be talked about (and again, renwl and Pam are in accord on that).
He didn’t outline the specific case here in this article (although he does write about it a lot). He just threw some spaghetti on the wall, in this instance.
Again, he simply implies that opposition to the approach(es) of the Obama Administration by “Gay Inc.) is steeped in white privilege and racism.
Now, renwl’s been arguing that for some time; now he’s lobbed these “Uncle Tom” accusations at both Pam and Rod McCollum.
It’s sounds like the “y’all acting white” type of bullying to me.
it is bullying, and a poor job of itIf you’re going to “throw the spaghetti against the wall” make some sense. Yes, there is white privilege that has a problematic effect in advocating for LGBT rights. It often allows others to dismiss the discrimination because the power of the LGBT movement is unfortunately not diverse. It allows poor narrow decisions to be made without the benefit of class diversity as well.
However, lobbing the Uncle Tom charge is intellectually flaccid; it has nothing to do with race when I criticize this President. None of the opinions I lodge in those posts have anything to do with race and everything to do with political tactics by this admin and orgs working on our behalf that, quite frankly, suck. It’s as simple as that.
If RENWL disagrees, that’s fine. No one has to be unified in messaging or opinion, but stay on topic and stop tossing unnecessary inflammatory crap into the mix when in my case it isn’t there. I’m sure Rod would agree.
Facebook thread continues the midterms blame the gays memeThe ever-recurring meme that the LGBT community will be to blame for Dems losing in the midterms is alive and well on my FB page, where I posted the link to this entry. A sampling.
Well, this puts a seal onsomething we’ve all suspected: being black is a choice. Pam you are clearly a product of ex-black therapy, and you need to come clean about it. Be honest about your lifestyle choice.
boy, the Blenders here are way too tameThe discussion on my FB page is going wild.
Wow…that some pretty serious political (and perhaps personal) homophobia there.
They need to answer that question to have any credibilty.
So what are we voting for?After the 2008 elections we had a Democratic “Fierce Advocate” President, a strong majority in the House and a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.
With all this “liberal power,” did they force through ENDA? No. End DOMA? No. End DADT? Sorta kinda “technically” tried, but ultimately & honestly no.
What did we not have in this mix that we’re wanting to vote for in 2010?
Is there any candidate out there who is truly for gay rights and not just gay votes?
I’m hip to attacks from that blogI know where you are coming from, Pam. Twice, I’ve been attacked by that site and I don’t understand it. It didn’t get in contact with me or seemed to be familiar with all of my work – not just about exposing the religious right, but also my posts about balancing the lgbt and black identities.
RENWL tries to be a good site but whoever posts there makes assumptions about people and then takes nasty pot shots at them.
Yeah, that’s how he rollsalthough I do have to say (partly in his defense) that renwl is pretty equal opportunity when it comes to personal attacks.
from the article:
no shit. so where is this sort of reassurance from the POTUS? why can’t he advocate for a shift in the public opinion on DOMA, using his own personal bigotry towards gays and lesbians as an example in how personal opinions are irrelevant when it comes to equal rights in this country? he could LITERALLY change the tone and shift the way people think about this issue. but he won’t. and so, the fear and anger towards obama on issues of the gay rights struggle are not isolated–what we’ve seen is a disturbing trend, beginning with donnie mcclurkin and rick warren, continuing through with either silence or outright bigoted statements on recent gay rights and marriage advancements, and ending up most recently with these blind and outrageous defenses against horrific and illegal laws. obama can perform his presidential duties to their fullest without being completely unsympathetic to the people whose lives it is actually affecting. so why won’t he?
the sadder fact beyond obama’s disdain for the personal injuries of GLBT people in this country is this: obama doesn’t fight for ANYTHING. his inability to assure the GLBT community of his committment to our equality is a result of the bad taste it leaves in his mouth, but it’s also a symptom of a much larger problem with him, as a president. he’s a weak leader who is extremely pro-business and has allowed the 20%-approval-rating rethuglicans walk all over him and control the messaging. no wonder things are still such a mess from the days of bush. he’s still too interested in trying to get love from the people who hate him. it hasn’t worked, and we will never see any sort of real reform from this man. and that’s why this “white-privileged” gay dude is so royally pissed off, because the knowledge has sunk in that a republican president couldn’t do any more or any less for us than what we’ve gotten, or will ever get, from obama.
Wow indeed …Here’s what I said:
Wow. I’m a regular reader of Pam’s and not only haven’t I seen any “anti-Obama hysteria” I’ve seen her and lots of others talk about why they’re planning on voting this year despite disappointment about what’s been accomplished.
Sure there are some who say they’re not voting (I saw a comment from David Ehrenstein over the weekend relating his views back to the Kent State protests) … while I personally disagree with them I’m appalled that people would attack Pam for creating an environment where it’s okay to express a range of views.
And I totally agree that this kind of internecine attack is laying the ground work for “teh gays cost the Dems the election” which does nobody any good. Very unhelpful.
BOTTOM LINE:
Nothing would satisfy “RENWL” except everyone sticking his/her head as far up Obama’s ass as he has….and, then, he’d demand first whiff rights.
DARE ADMIT IT: he shows all the signs of a black racist; the fact that he likes SOME “whites” doesn’t make it any less so. The fact that he can be sometimes right about subject X or Y makes him no more someone who should be taken seriously than the broken clock that is right twice a day.
Truth be told(and I wish that renwl be be more articulate on this)…
he’s not all that happy with Obama either…
I actually think that it has little to do with him being a “black racist” and has more to do with the fact that renwl likes stirring the pot, really
I guess the 7 gay teen suicides in that last several weeksare not casualties. Chopped liver like the rest of us uppity gays, second class citizens though we may be.
I already voted btw.
Oh, how I wish this weren’t all SO VERY TRUE!
I respect your input, as you’ve read far more of him than I…
…who only bumps into his nonsense periodically on others’ Facebook threads.
There certainly is the species whose first motive is to “stir the pot.” But I still assert the spoons they choose can be revealing.
Why bother?So, I did a little googling, and I found some doctor in the Miami area named George Bishopric who is probably this guy, who’s done a comment or two on some online articles, but nothing of note. In other words, he’s nobody. So, my question Pam is, why put yourself through the stress? People like George are an inevitability in your life given what you do. You can’t prevent that. You can’t do what you do without having critics. What you can do is control how you react to them. Why do you let this nobody get under your skin? Why do you let this gadfly stress you out?
Now, if he were a serious voice with a considerable following, there might be good reason to address his comments. Even then, the comments are addressed as if said in a public forum, and are said for the benefit of the audience, not the interlocutor. If you let him play with your ego you give him a tool to manipulate you.
Seriously, if you’re going to do this kind of work, you can’t let the bastards get you down.
nor Harvey Milk, nor Matthew Shepard nor Lawrence King and …So-called, huh?
“this” indeedThe Dems run a sloppy campaign with a weak candidate, and they will still blame everybody but themselves. It’s like all the rebel generals blaming each other, for decades, about who lost Gettysburg. At least one of them had the sense to say, “Well, maybe the Yankees had somethin’ to do with it.”
Very good pointsYou’ve touched on something that’s been seriously bothering me. He’s exercising power and making decisions/actions/inactions that majorly impact our community without talking to our community. It’s clear that he doesn’t respect us enough to at least clue us in to what goes into his decisions and why he’s taking the approaches he’s taking. Even when he takes an action I disagree with, I’m willing to show the President enough respect to allow him to explain himself. Maybe he sees considerations I don’t and if I saw things from his perspective I might just agree with him for all I know. But to take actions counterintuitive to our best interests and not even bother to try to explain why only invites the intense criticism, backlash, and abandonment he’s seeing from the LGBT community. He’s bringing it on himself.
I’m not stressed, lol.
I was laughing the whole time I was responding. It’s not whether he has a following, it’s that he made points that deserved a rebuttal.
Holy S***TExcept for the hundreds of LGBT teen suicides, and tens of thousands of LGBT teen suicide attempts.
Except for August Provost and gods know how many other abused, blackmailed, and otherwise crapped-upon soliders under the knife of DADT, not to mention the almost-thousand-per-year who lose their jobs as a result of that policy each year.
Except for the thousands (no, really) of new HIV cases predicted each year by Francis and Mialon just as a result of the social stigma of same-sex marriage bans.
I could go on, I really can’t believe that anyone who believes in any sort of equality whatsoever wrote that statement. It’s pure divisiveness and hatred.
I left a less nice note on that page.I think I need to take a three week-break from the internets from that one line alone.
This is just bullying, pure and simple. The Obama administration is good at bullying.No sale.
You’re confused. Clearly a byproduct of White Privilege thinking. What does the 7 gay teens have anything to do with LGBTs engaging—now that’s a key word—engaging—in an authentic civil rights battle?
You know, like sit-ins, boycotts, civil disobedience, crazy whacky stuff like that which requires—-now hold on to your hat—–that gay people actually leave their comforts zones and put themselves at risk.
You’re so self-righteous and convoluted in your thinking that you actually equate any discrimination towards gays as gay people fighting for their civil rights.
Any persecuted minority group in America could come up with a laundry list of assaults against them and victims as result of those assaults. That still leaves the question of well how are you standing up to that?
WHAT GAYS OF AMERICA CANNOT COME UP WITH is any action on their behalf in terms of STANDING UP, LEAVING THEIR COMFORTS, IN THE NAME OF EQUALITY.
That’s what the post is talking about. But you don’t get that cause those white privilege issues finds the notion of gays actually doing something as beyond are reason and necessity. That’s so sad. And clearly delusional.
What does one need for you people, show and tell pictures of what fighting for one’s civil rights looks like?
Read above response. You too, are lost in translation.
Behold! Proud Idiocy!
Take a look at picture in the upper left corner of this blog. It’s been up there before.
Many instances — in the past year, much less the past decades — of such actions are all over teh intertubes.
Get out of your “comforts” and take a look around.
HILARIOUS!! Four people out of how many gays in the US. Oh you’re a scream. The folks from Get Equal feel EXACTLY as I do. The LGBT “COMMUNITY” needs to engage. What about the word “COMMUNITY” do you not understand?
YOU ARE A SCREAM!!! LOL.
Hold it!You have a point here but Constance McMillen left her comfort zone as did the kid (I forget his name, Derrick Martin?) from Georgia.
They are a part of the LGBT community to, renwl, and they defintely left comfort zone to do what is right.
Pam Spaulding defintely leaves her comfort zone; in fact, since she lives and actually works in North Carolina whereas you’re in Los Angeles, who actually has more of a comfort zone?
See, you think that LGBTs should be like blacks and should suffer like black folk.
(As much as some LGBT leader invoke the Civil rights movement, you would have a point here if you had raised it).
Silence, it seems to me, really is a good portion of the essence of LGBT oppression in a way that it never was for blacks because…well, some (most?) LGBT’s can blend in.
Did you miss the month of June?Did you miss the March on Washington last year?
Many people who go to Pride and Equality events are safe–their lives will not be disrupted by acknowledging an intrinsic trait. Many others are not. They can lose their jobs, they can lose housing, young LGBT members can be kicked out onto the street by Good Christian (TM) Parents, they can face bullying and violence, there are frequent counter-protests reminding us that we’re not equal.
Oh, and if we ever forget that we’re not equal, we’ve got “progressive” blogs and message boards where anti-gay sentiment flows as wide and deep as the Mississippi.
Fortunately, we have You, the Gatekeeper of Equality, to remind us that our not having equal rights is, in fact, our own fault. If only we’d “outreach” more. If only we’d “suffer” more.
Meh.
Read above response. You are lost in Privilege.
if we are so all powerfulthat we can turn elections, wouldn’t it make more sense for the politicians to just give us what we want, or at least some of what they promised us, instead of pissing us off?
Why go out of your way to avoid making any progress on your promises and even attack a whole community if you actually believe that community can cost you an entire election cycle?
It’s just complete idiocy to shoot yourself in the foot and then get your panties all in a wad when you don’t like the fact that your foot hurts.