GOProud may have found its purpose

Timothy Kincaid

August 29th, 2012

I’m not a big fan of GOProud, an organization of one or two gay Republicans and their friends.

They only exist because they broke off from Log Cabin over LCR’s goal of trying to make the party more inclusive for gay people. They thought the goals should be limited to getting any Republican elected, no matter how anti-gay, and ranting about “the Gay Left”. (And by “Gay Left” they mean pretty much anyone who isn’t a GOProud member.)

In other words, they exist solely as an organization that opposes those gay people – in all parties – who are working for my rights.

But it seems that they did throw a decent party last night and had something like 500 GOP delegates show up. And while that isn’t astonishing and marvelous, I guess it’s something.

And this might do some incremental good. After all, for many people, the first time they ever consider gay people as real and deserving of consideration is in a social setting. Hey, it’s possible.

So maybe that’s what GOProud should do: throw parties.

Maybe they could just shut-up and serve cocktails. Because all buddying up with those who deride us (like Ann Coulter) and the sniping at gay activists fighting for my rights is really getting old.

Lucrece

August 29th, 2012

LCR endorsed the anti-gay McCain, who was a stalwart opponent to DADT repeal, and gave a glowing review of Palin.

Both at the expsense of the infinitely more gay friendly Obama.

LCR and GOProud are one and the same. And when their chapters start endorsing Romney and Ryan despite the former’s speech at Liberty University and the latter’s voting record, this tired cannard of the LCR being moderate good guys while GOProud are the partisan villains will die.

Priya Lynn

August 29th, 2012

I don’t agree Lucrece. LCR was instrumental in getting DADT repealled whereas I’ve never heard of GoProud doing anything other than encouraging the mistreatment of gays and lesbians.

Lucrece

August 29th, 2012

LCR won via the same judicial fiat they decry when it comes to the issue of federally mandated marriage equality. In fact, their case was in direct opposition to the Republican consensus that wished for the status quo. GOProud was on record for DADT repeal just as LCR claimed to be.

Sure, they’re a splinter group even more extreme, but let’s not kid ourselves that the LCR is anything but a partisan organization of individuals who wish to vote for a particular party and still remain in good faith with their dating pool.

Priya Lynn

August 29th, 2012

“In fact, their case was in direct opposition to the Republican consensus that wished for the status quo.”.

Right, so to suggest they put voting republican over gay rights every time isn’t true. GoProud may have paid lip service to being against DADT but they didn’t do anything to help get rid of it, in fact the only thing I’ve ever seen them do is justify the oppression of gays.

Timothy Kincaid

August 29th, 2012

Lucrece,

Please link to some source for LCR decrying judicial fiat.

Please link to some source indicating that Republican consensus (the voters) supported the status quo.

Timothy Kincaid

August 29th, 2012

Priya Lynn,

We seem to be in agreement on occasion these days. Clearly the world has shifted on it’s axis and Armageddon is around the corner… (except I think we both are not believers in Armageddon – sigh, more agreement).

Priya Lynn

August 29th, 2012

; )

David Waite

August 29th, 2012

Priya Lynn is correct, Lucrece, and your characterization of 2008 Obama as “infinitely more gay friendly” is suspect. Had I been a gay Republican in 2008, forced to choose between a man who apparently lied in 1996 about supporting my rights and someone who was wrong but a believer in his wrongness, I might well have endorsed McCain myself. For me, John McCain had a lot of other character issues and policy issues which would have made me oppose him even if he actually supported my equality, but I can understand that the LCRs’ mileage may vary.

One thing is certain, in my case. However long I live, I will never ever forget, or fail to remind my fellow Democrats of the fact that it took the Log Cabin Republicans to force DADT repeal on a Democratic congress and president. For both the deed itself and the cleansing effect it had on my political party, those particular Republicans are right up there with Lincoln and (Teddy) Roosevelt in my pantheon of political heroes.

Jim Burroway

August 29th, 2012

Maybe they could just shut-up and serve cocktails.

I have a feeling there are a lot of people in Tampa right now who would agree that this is the only proper role for gay Republicans.

Lindoro Almaviva

August 29th, 2012

Oh dear. You just said in nicer words what Dan Savage said not that long ago. The GOP’s house gays should just be content with being “the help”

Lucrece

August 30th, 2012

Gasp, Timothy, you mean to say representative democracy is a sham? Because your objection seems to be little else than hairsplitting.

The voters don’t decide policy; the legislators do, and apparently their supporters have no qualms in voting them back into power.

Of course, feel free to believe in your silent majority, even if it has little impact on the outcome.

While we’re asking for links, I’ll require a citation for your claim that Babeu’s reelection resulted in bitterness from the Phoenix New TImes or that GOProud is a small organization of ” one or two gay Republicans and their friends”. And by citation I don’t mean creative interpretation that you seem to be fond of whenever the Catholics, GOProud, or partisan media criticizing gay Republicans are involved.

Donny D.

August 30th, 2012

I think that is GOProud’s purpose: to convince the average, small-minded Fox News-addicted straight conservative that gay people could be permitted within the Republican “big tent”.

Richard Rush

August 30th, 2012

Gay people in the Republican “big tent” are similar to roaches in a big apartment building: You can try your best to get rid of them ALL, but you finally realize it’s not worth the immense time and effort, so you just learn to live with the fact that a small number of them will always be among you.

Blake

August 30th, 2012

Sounded like quite the party. I fear that whatever incremental good was done might have been cancelled out by the negative stereotypes they perpetuated. Did they really need to have go-go dancers with shirts on that said “Freedom is Fabulous”?

Robert

August 30th, 2012

For a Party that Barron claimed was supposed to bring in 1000+ people, according to his many tweets prior to the event, 500 actually sounds pretty paltry. Not quite the support they thought.

TampaZeke

August 30th, 2012

Word has it that many of the attendees were Paul and Obama supporters. In fact when the GOProud speaker started talking about what GOProud and the Republican Party stand for he was heckled.

TonyJazz

September 1st, 2012

Was DADT really repealed because of the power of Log Cabin Republicans? That may be true, but I didn’t see anything reported that way.

In fact, haven’t the Log Cabin Republicans lost influence in recent years due to the hard-right turn of the Repub party?

And Tim, THANK YOU, for pointing out what a small group of people this GOProud group is. They are white men with money, but there’s only a handful of them. Because they are ‘nuts’, they get a lot more press than they deserve…. (For example, can anyone name any local organizations of GOProud anywhere? There just aren’t any….)

Timothy Kincaid

September 1st, 2012

TonyJazz

DADT was repealed to a large extent because Log Cabin had won a federal lawsuit declaring it unconstitutional. This provided impetus for Congress and the administration to act before the courts determined the terms of the change.

And though the biggest support was from Democrats, they also were instrumental in getting a significant number of Republican Senators to support repeal. (republican Sue Collins and Independent Joe Biden Lieberman saved the repeal at the last moment).

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