The GOP Hates Gays — They Even Put It In Writing
I knew that Republicans aren’t pro-gay as a rule, but until recently, I didn’t realize exactly how anti-gay they are. Like, that the GOP actively, explicitly hates queer folks and wants us either not to exist or to pretend we don’t. Or they want us to suffer. They want to break up our families, and they want the federal government to explicitly state that the way we love is unnatural and invalid.
Some may think it sounds like I’m exaggerating, that I’m overreacting, getting too worked over some fear-mongering story pumped out by the “lamestream media.” Being gay is, like, totally accepted these days — even Pew Research Center says so! According to its 2017 study on the topic, 70% of Americans said they believe society should accept homosexuality. Hell, even Republicans as a group have come a long way, with nearly half being in favor of same-sex marriage.
So why am I making these radical claims about the GOP being a collective of homophobic shits? Why would I say its members want to destroy the lives of queer folks? Well, for starters: it’s on their fucking website. I didn’t realize this until recently when a friend pointed it out to me.
Their Republican Platform document, created in 2016 and reaffirmed in 2020 via resolution, is a 58-page statement of the Republican vision for the United States. It’s sponsored by the Republican National Committee and has its own page on the official GOP website. Its preamble states that the platform is “a manual for the kind of sustained growth that will bring opportunity to all those on the sidelines of our society.”
To those on the sidelines of our society.
Is any group in the United States more sidelined than the LGBTQ+ community? Of homeless youth, 40% are gay, often due to familial rejection. 30% of adults who are homeless identify as LGBTQ+. LGBTQ+ youth are five times as likely as heterosexual youth to attempt suicide. 40% of transgender adults report having attempted suicide. These tragic statistics are a direct result of the discrimination this community faces. It’s hard to fathom being more “sidelined” than this.
The GOP platform states that it wants to provide opportunity to “those on the sidelines of our society.” And yet, on page 11 under the section “Defending Marriage Against an Activist Judiciary,” the GOP platform states:
Traditional marriage and family, based on marriage between one man and one woman, is the foundation for a free society and has for millennia been entrusted with rearing children and instilling cultural values. We condemn the Supreme Court’s ruling in United States v. Windsor, which wrongly removed the ability of Congress to define marriage policy in federal law. We also condemn the Supreme Court’s lawless ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, which in the words of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, was a “judicial Putsch” — full of “silly extravagances” — that reduced “the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Storey to the mystical aphorisms of a fortune cookie.” In Obergefell, five unelected lawyers robbed 320 million Americans of their legitimate constitutional authority to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The Court twisted the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment beyond recognition. To echo Scalia, we dissent. We, therefore, support the appointment of justices and judges who respect the constitutional limits on their power and respect the authority of the states to decide such fundamental social questions.
Besides the fact that this is the most bigoted bunch of flaming donkey shit I’ve ever read, let’s also address the bald hypocrisy in this paragraph via comparison of two sentences:
“We condemn the Supreme Court’s ruling in United States v. Windsor, which wrongly removed the ability of Congress to define marriage policy in federal law.”
“We, therefore, support the appointment of justices and judges who respect the constitutional limits on their power and respect the authority of the states to decide such fundamental social questions.”
Hey GOP, you bunch of paradoxical half-wits, learn how to present an idea without immediately contradicting yourselves. Do you want congress to be able to define marriage, or not? Shall religion dictate law, or not? At least be consistent with your bigotry, for fuck’s sake.
Every time I read this passage from the GOP platform, I indulge in a gleeful fantasy in which I slap every single Republican across the face. Yes, even friends and family members. Because seriously, people, are you even paying attention? Half of you believe queer folks should have the same rights as non-queer folks. And, according to Pew Research Center, over half (54%) of you also believe that religion should not dictate government policy. Even of evangelical protestants, arguably some of the most dogmatically religious people in the U.S., 43% still think religion should not influence government policy.
And yet here it is, in plain English in your fucking political party’s playbook, that the GOP — and by extension, you — wants to overturn the Supreme Court ruling that protects queer folks’ constitutional right to marry just as you do. What in the tap-dancing fuck are you people on about? There are over half a million same-sex marriages in the United States, caring for and supporting 300,000 children. For the party who claims to be pro-family, y’all sure are trying your damnedest to break up hundreds of thousands of families via the federal government whom you claim ought not to “decide such fundamental social questions.”
I have no doubt that many Republicans who are in favor of queer rights have no idea that this is what they’re supporting. But I don’t forgive this ignorance because for fuck’s sake, people, do better. Just do better. Stop blindly following. Think critically. Read your own damn party’s literature and come to terms with the hate you’re supporting. If you agree with other parts of the GOP platform but not this part, speak the hell up and change it.
My civil rights are not up for you to debate. You will not make flowery statements about bringing “opportunity to all those on the sidelines of our society” and then sideline me by telling me that the way I love is invalid and that I shouldn’t have the same legal right to marry and enjoy all the benefits and protections that come along with that right that you do.
In my view, the worst thing a person can be is a hypocrite. And any one of you who claims to be in favor of equal rights for the LGBTQ+ community but simultaneously supports this political party is a fucking hypocrite. Do better.
