Archive for December 18, 2008

One Step Back

Per an earlier post, Obama’s decision to involve gay-bashing pastor Rick Warren in the inauguration festivities annoyed me. But commenter LMLM counsels temperance:

As Obama himself said, he invited Rick Warren for several reasons. Rick Warren invited Obama to speak a while back, even though he knew that Obama’s opinions in many areas differed from his own. Obama believes that we all should be able to agree to disagree and that Rick Warren is NOT the only person with whom he has contrasting views in key areas who was invited to speak at the inauguration. Obama has appointed at least one gay individual to his cabinet and is trying to be inclusive in his cabinet and other decisions. Hopefully there will be individuals with a wide variety of viewpoints represented at the inauguration – an event for all Americans – not simply those with whom Obama agrees.

Great points. Most persuasive for me: Obama’s pick for the Department of Labor, Mary Beth Maxwell, will be the first openly gay cabinet member. Symbolic speeches are cheap, but cabinet picks are the real deal, and Obama’s decision to spend (at least) four years working closely with Maxwell sends a powerful message that his decision to “pal around with” Warren for a day cannot mute. *Alas – Mrs. Maxwell was passed over.* And – critically – Obama has circulated talking points among his staff, reminding them that he disagrees with Warren on the fundamental issues affecting gay Americans:

• The President-elect disagrees with Pastor Warren on issues that affect the LGBT community. They disagree on other issues as well. But what’s important is that they agree on many issues vital to the pursuit of social justice, including poverty relief and moving toward a sustainable planet; and they share a commitment to renewing America’s promise by expanding opportunity at home and restoring our moral leadership abroad. [. . . .]
• The Inauguration will also involve Reverend Joseph Lowery, who will be delivering the official benediction at the Inauguration. Reverend Lowery is a giant of the civil rights movement who boasts a proudly progressive record on LGBT issues. He has been a leader in the struggle for civil rights for all Americans, gay or straight.

My righteous rage is cooled. Has yours? The enduring lesson might be this: given the complex image pattern Obama’s already sketching for himself, it’s going to be a lot harder to support a “transcendental” candidate than it would be to support an empty partisan hacks. Lucky for America, but tough on us, in the short term.

Freedom Is Messy: Prop. 8, Exercising Rights, Personal Price

El Coyote is a Los Angeles landmark. The food, in my opinion, is a horrendous excuse for Tex-Mex, but the margaritas are good, and the vibe was always festive and fun and kooky.

Until now.

Long time manager, Margie Christoffersen, whose mother owns the restaurant and who is a Mormon, made a personal donation of $100 to the Yes on 8 coalition that backed the amendment to California’s constitution banning gay marriage.

No on 8 activists have targeted businesses that made donations in support of Prop. 8 for economic boycott, and in the case of El Coyote, the boycott is working. As reported in the Los Angeles Times, restaurant receipts are down 30 percent since the boycott began; layoffs threaten workers, and Christoffersen doesn’t understand how her donation could have brought about such a reaction.

She doesn’t understand? It seems pretty simple to me: Christoffersen voted her conscience, and she used her personal money in support of same. She has every right to do so.

The thousands of gay patrons who disagree with her have every right to choose not to patronize the business where Christoffersen is not only a simple employee, but as the owner’s daughter, is a special representative of ownership. While she made the $100 donation from her personal income, she has a vested interest in the business beyond a simple salary. It’s the price of being the offspring of ownership. Too bad.

Margie tried to smooth things over last month by inviting gay clients to a free lunch to talk it over, but she left in tears when asked if she would write a check to the group challenging Prop. 8.

She blubbered all over again as she thought back on the last month. She has been a nightly fixture at El Coyote for two decades, walking to work from her home just a few doors away. It’s been her life, she said. And she can’t stand that it’s been taken away.

On the other side, thousands of gay people can’t stand that their recent marriages could be taken away, and thousands more feel as though their civil rights have been violated.

I am sorry life is messy for Christoffersen and that she can’t have everything exactly the way she wants it. If people lose their jobs, it is not because of the boycott; the boycott is a sympton of Christoffersen’s larger problem: that she cannot see her action has wider impact. This is not an issue of a private citizen making a personal donation. Period.

While the market is amoral, people — with few exceptions — are not. While it appears Christoffersen has already decided gay marriage is immoral, she still needs to determine if it is similarly immoral to profit from gay disposable income while denying them equal protection. (In case it is unclear: I do not believe domestic partnership or civil union amounts to equal protection as long as “marriage” is still out there as an option for heterosexuals.)

Let’s not forget, too, hateful, discriminatory, Christian groups have made business boycotts a raison d’etre. Apparently, PepsiCo is pro-gay and oodles of other business are murdering Christmas.

Over the next couple of weeks, I will be hanging out with old friends, many of whom are gay. We will not be going to El Coyote. Besides, Ita Cho (across the street) is much better.

The Warren Court(ship)

Although I have steadfastly defended Obama’s transition decisions, even and especially when they suggested a slight veer rightward, I must disclaim Obama’s choice of Rick Warren to offer a prayer at his inauguration.

Not, though, because he’s a Christian who will offer a Christian prayer. Popular among some of my ideological peers seems to be the theory that, because Obama is a Democrat, he’s somehow also an atheist/secular humanist, committed to abolishing any semblance of religion from the public sphere. These expectations are unfounded and unreasonable. News: unless you’re either Andy Schlafly or a particularly ignorant type of PUMA, Obama is a Christian, and that Obama would want to hear a Christian prayer at his own inauguration is unsurprising. Baby steps, people: it should be enough, for now, that Obama’s religion does not appear to commit him to willful ignorance, or function to replace his common sense with a literal reading of Deutoronomy. We can’t expect Obama to be Richard Dawkins.

However, while Obama was bound to choose a Christian pastor, he did not have to pick this Christian. Conventional wisdom seems to be that Rick Warren is a kinder, gentler type of fundamentalist (even I bought into that), but he’s still a fundamentalist. The notion that he’s less of a bigot than most politically active fundamentalists is roundly refuted by his actions. Warren’s only difference from the fundamentalist (ahem) mainstream is that his obsession with gay marriage is not as all-consumingly myopic as, say, Pat Dobson: as Warren himself recently explained, it’s an issue of tone, not substance. Or lack thereof.

Sidebar. Let’s take an example of Warren’s beliefs, to see what I mean:

WARREN (on gay marriage): the reason I supported Prop 8 really, was a free speech issue [. . . .] there were all kinds of threats that if you… that did not pass, then any pastor could be considered doing hate speech if he shared his views that he didn’t think homosexuality was the most natural way for relationships. And that would be hate speech. To me, we should have freedom of speech. And you should be able to have freedom of speech to make your position, and I should be able to have freedom of speech to make my position. And can we do this in a civil way?

Warren’s argument – that the legality of gay marriage would somehow operate to prevent him from speaking against it – betrays the standard fundamentalist mixture of ignorance and cowardice, in equal parts. American law has never (since, well, 1920 or so) made it “hate speech” to speak against a group of people. So it’s not operation of law that would make Warren bite his tongue. Rather, that the legality of gay marriage affects Warren’s willingness to speak against it demonstrates only that Warren is uncomfortable speaking out against a legally protected right, for fear of looking (more) like a bigot. He needs gay marriage to be illegal, to hide behind a shield of political activism. Epic fail. Warren needs either remedial conlaw, or a backbone, or both.

Of course, Warren’s “free speech” argument against gay marriage is one of the same tired old arguments from ignorance popular among the far-right phalanx, from Coulter to Hannity. What’s troubling is that Obama’s choice of Warren to officiate at the inauguration amounts to a symbolic endorsement of such ignorance. I hope the President-Elect will keep Warren’s role small, and clarify to America how he and Warren differ on this issue.

No doubt Warren’s selection was a political move, done to show that Obama is at home with a (sadly) more mainstream version of Christianity than that which his detractors attribute to him. But all that Obama has done is to trade an allegedly-crazy, actually-inoffensive black preacher for an allegedly-inoffensive, actually-crazy white preacher. I dissent.