Bush: "Gay community? What gay community?"
I had the idea this morning to start another blog revolving around the role of religion in the media, the exploration of my personal faith, and the relationship between the two. Nevertheless, this might be a tad ambitious to implement immediately. :-) So I'll start small with this LA Times op-ed about Bush and his handling of the gay marriage debate.
I find it interesting that Bush's strategy seems to involve him thinking, "If I pretend hard enough, the gay community will disappear, and we can go back to the way life should be." Conservatives complained when Clinton engaged in roundabout language games and semantics, yet this is a pretty incredible example of the same thing--talking around an issue so much that any mention of "the Other" (the GLBT community) disappears completely. Another op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution interprets this strategy as part of a grand game of political theater, which I think has a point, but also gives Bush way too much leniency in this case. After all, he hates hearing about things that don't fit into his parameters of "good news." And the thought of gay marriage throughout the country probably doesn't constitute "good news" to him. So, in this case, GLBT citizens don't exist, making the reasoning being the (half-) debate something to the effect of, "We need to reinforce marriage for the sake of reinforcing marriage!" Sounds pretty silly to me.
I still think afterthefair is right on this issue--ten to fifteen years from now, social conservative leaders and citizens won't be able to get away with the same bullcrap on this issue that they are today, such as Bush's strategy above and the use of 1950s-era "miscegenation" language as a point of argument. It simply cannot work for much longer.
I find it interesting that Bush's strategy seems to involve him thinking, "If I pretend hard enough, the gay community will disappear, and we can go back to the way life should be." Conservatives complained when Clinton engaged in roundabout language games and semantics, yet this is a pretty incredible example of the same thing--talking around an issue so much that any mention of "the Other" (the GLBT community) disappears completely. Another op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution interprets this strategy as part of a grand game of political theater, which I think has a point, but also gives Bush way too much leniency in this case. After all, he hates hearing about things that don't fit into his parameters of "good news." And the thought of gay marriage throughout the country probably doesn't constitute "good news" to him. So, in this case, GLBT citizens don't exist, making the reasoning being the (half-) debate something to the effect of, "We need to reinforce marriage for the sake of reinforcing marriage!" Sounds pretty silly to me.
I still think afterthefair is right on this issue--ten to fifteen years from now, social conservative leaders and citizens won't be able to get away with the same bullcrap on this issue that they are today, such as Bush's strategy above and the use of 1950s-era "miscegenation" language as a point of argument. It simply cannot work for much longer.