White House Looking Into Census Inclusion

Timothy Kincaid

June 18th, 2009

From the Wall Street Journal

The White House said Thursday it was seeking ways to include same-sex marriages, unions and partnerships in 2010 Census data, the second time in a week the administration has signaled a policy change of interest to the gay community.

The administration has directed the Census Bureau to determine changes needed in tabulation software to allow for same-sex marriage data to be released early in 2011 with other detailed demographic information from the decennial count. The bureau historically hasn’t released same-sex marriage data.

Jake

June 18th, 2009

I feel like that battered wife whose husband is shopping for flowers

Patrick

June 18th, 2009

Woo……..hoo.

That sure beats being treated with dignity, respect, equality…

Jim Burroway

June 18th, 2009

I think it’s possible to look at this positively. It’s not the repeal of DOMA or DADT. But one of the problems with the previous policy is that it made LGBT couples legally and officially invisible.

Let’s face it. DOMA will probably still be around in 2010. But now we’ll have an opportunity to show that there are same-sex couples in nearly every county in the country via official government statistics, not inferred as the Williams Institute has had to do in the past.

It doesn’t mean we stop putting on pressure, nor does it make up for the DOJ brief or lack of movement on DADT and DOMA. What it does mean though is that the pressure that we must continue to put on the Administration is having an effect.

So why stop there? Why, as a community, aren’t we also putting pressure on Pelosi, Reid, and the rest of Congress?

Lindoro Almaviva

June 18th, 2009

Yawn…

How many more attempts at appearing to be relevant will he make. Someone needs to tell him that we see through it and he needs to stop.

Once again:

Barack, we have heard how “big” is it, now we want to know if it gets hard.

Bruno

June 18th, 2009

@Jake: Well, I think he’ll need to buy us lots of flowers before we put out again.

Leonard Drake

June 18th, 2009

@Lindoro Almavara: I just spilled my soda all over the table and barely missed my computer with that last comment you wrote! LOL! Rock on!

You are so correct. Hopefully he, and/or all of those in the upper-ups of the White House will get our message VERY, VERY quickly.

Jason D

June 19th, 2009

I agree with Jim that this is a good thing.

I know we’re all focused on the big ticket items but this WAS an issue. Without a change of this kind the census has a way of making us invisible.
Sure, if DOMA were repealed and Marriage Equality were national, then the census would HAVE to count us and all would be good.
But as Jim points out, DOMA is likely to still be around when the census starts in 2010. Even if it wasn’t, changes to the census have to take place 2 years before the census starts, so it’s already too late to change the official census guidelines. If there isn’t a work around, our families in the 6(seven? I’m losing count) states where marriage is legal, and the dozen(?) or so where there’s domestic partnerships/civil unions would all be invisible for at least another 10 years.

This workaround, if it actually happens, gives us another arrow in our quiver. We will have official government documented statistics as to how many gays and lesbians are partnered in some legal sense. Think about that for a second, the government will know exactly how many people it’s screwing over by denying full equality. Numbers can only help us in this regard.
It’s easy to say no to a nebulous cloud of gay couples — but to put numbers behind it, and geographical documentation gives us a lot more to work with.

The Lauderdale

June 19th, 2009

Put me down as another person who thinks this is a big deal, in the good sense. No, it doesn’t excuse other areas of neglect, but I *like* numbers and statistics. Getting on the Census is like going bluer.

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