Category Archives: Gay Rights

One reason the legal recognition of gay marriage or civil unions is so important is very prosaic: health insurance. Currently, if you are gay and don’t work for an enlightened employer, you cannot put your partner (or your partner’s children unless you have somehow established a legal relationship with them—itself not easy) on your health insurance.

 Of course, that assumes your employer even offers health insurance. And the number of employers who do is declining.

 The bottom line is that America’s refusal to deal with our dysfunctional health system in a rational way affects gays and lesbians and poor people disproportionately. It is one more example why bad public policy—and not just bad policy on obviously gay-related issues—is especially important to the gay community. (The same thing is true of the battle over “net neutrality”—if the giant telecoms get their way, the web sites that will be hurt will disproportionately be those with fewer resources, those espousing less “mainstream” opinions. There are many issues with grave consequences to the community that are not “gay” issues.)

 So what would a rational, economically and fiscally sound, humanitarian and fair health system look like? What if the country were to go to a “single payer” health insurance system funded through tax revenues and administered through selected insurance companies, as is done in western Europe?

•  Increased economic development/job creation and competitiveness with foreign companies. Businesses currently expend an amount in excess of total net profits on health insurance for employees. The cost of health insurance is the single largest “drag” on new job creation. For companies that can afford to offer health insurance, negotiating and administering those benefits, and complying with government regulations attendant to them, consumes untold hours of HR time as well. (It should be noted that doctors’ overhead would similarly decline: currently, medical offices spend considerable sums on personnel whose sole job is confirming insurance coverage, complying with insurer regulations, submitting claims and collecting amounts due.) Smaller companies—the engines of economic growth—are often unable to offer benefits, putting them at a competitive disadvantage for good employees. If health coverage was de-coupled from employment, these enterprises would be able to add workers. Employers could also increase wages by some percentage of the amount currently being paid for insurance.
• The additional tax revenues needed to accomplish this would be minimal, for the following reasons: governments at all levels already expend huge amounts for health, through Medicaid and other federally required programs (Mothers and Children, AIDS, etc.), through benefits for public employees (Universities, police, public school teachers, etc.), and through support for public hospitals. A national system could effect considerable savings, by standardizing paperwork and administrative procedures (it is estimated that 30% of U.S. healthcare costs are administrative); negotiating with insurers to administer the program on condition that the premium structure eliminate marketing costs that are now included; providing more effective public health and prevention services; and by negotiating with drug manufacturers and other medical vendors for lower prices. Cost controls would also be enhanced by eliminating the practice of cost-shifting by hospitals (where those with insurance pay prices that have been inflated in order to cover the costs that cannot be recovered from those without), and by efficiencies of scale. Costs also decline when people are able to access routine medical care soon after the onset of symptoms, rather than visiting far more expensive emergency rooms when they can no longer ignore the problem.
•  Individuals would save money. Auto and homeowners insurance premiums would decline, because the underwriting would no longer need to take the costs of medical care into account. The considerable percentage of citizens who are currently uninsured would not incur significant out-of-pocket costs attributable to illness or accident.
• If all citizens had basic health coverage, we would also experience a decline in the social costs associated with the current dysfunctional system. Over 50% of personal bankruptcies are attributable to medical bills; those bankruptcies cost businesses millions of dollars, and are a drag on the economy. Employees with pre-existing conditions would no longer be chained to jobs they dislike. Absenteeism could be expected to decline. Immunizations would increase, and infant mortality decline. Studies also suggest that violent crime rates decline as social safety nets increase. While not quantifiable, these consequences are significant.

 And gay families would no longer face barriers to adequate medical care that straight citizens don’t face.    

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A blog that I read fairly regularly calls it the “War on Fucking.” 

 

I think the blogger is on to something. As she points out, it is a mistake to look at the right-wing attacks on gays, abortion, “pornography,” “non-traditional” families and the like as separate issues; at base, what these people are against is sex, sexuality, and anything that smacks of acceptance of the role sex plays in human existence.

 

Her explanation for this war is that those waging it are people who have terrible difficulty controlling their own urges, and who assume that everyone else is having an equally difficult time controlling theirs. If there are not strict—indeed, inviolable—social controls to keep these passions in check, they are sure the result would be social chaos. (This theory may or may not be true, but it sure would help to explain all those child molesting cases involving pastors and choir directors…….). As a result, they live in a state of fear, and they cling tightly to the “eternal verities” provided by highly restrictive religious doctrines and punitive laws, which they see as the only alternative to social disintegration.

 

A glance at history will demonstrate the effect this fear has had on women and our place in society. Women were seen as uniquely and mysteriously powerful—as magical beings whose appeal could make strong men weak. Thus, the notion that “good” women might actually enjoy sex has been an especially terrifying idea. This is the real root of support for “abstinence education” rather than accurate and effective sex education, of the campaign against Plan B, the “morning after” contraceptive, and more recently (and incredibly) the opposition to inoculation against cervical cancer. In case you haven’t read about this latter controversy, medical scientists have developed a highly effective immunization against cervical cancer. But it must be given to girls before puberty. As the Washington Post recently reported:

 

“A new vaccine that protects against cervical cancer has set up a clash between health advocates who want to use the shots aggressively to prevent thousands of malignancies and social conservatives who say immunizing teenagers could encourage sexual activity.

 

Although the vaccine will not become available until next year at the earliest, activists on both sides have begun maneuvering to influence how widely the immunizations will be employed…

 

Groups working to reduce the toll of the cancer are eagerly awaiting the vaccine and want it to become part of the standard roster of shots that children, especially girls, receive just before puberty. But because the vaccine protects against a sexually transmitted virus, many conservatives oppose making it mandatory, citing fears that it could send a subtle message condoning sexual activity before marriage. Several leading groups that promote abstinence are meeting this week to formulate official policies on the vaccine.”

 

This war on sexuality and sexual desire is the larger context within which we must understand the ferocious resistance to "legitimizing" gay relationships by allowing same-sex adoptions, marriage or civil unions, even laws protecting gays against discrimination. Because of their single-minded preoccupation with sex, social conservatives do not see the other elements of human relationships; thus they equate any legal recognition of gays with an endorsement of sex—and, in their worldview, “deviant” sex to boot.

 

It must be hard to live in a world where some sex fiend is hiding behind every bush, waiting to pounce—waiting to defile “pure” women and molest small children. And when you are terrified all the time, it is really hard to be logical, let alone fair or loving.

 

I’d pity them, if the rest of us weren’t civilians in the line of fire in their War on Fucking.

 

 

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We are nearing the time of year when many communities host their annual Gay Pride events.

I remember the first time I attended such a celebration, nearly twenty years ago, as a PFlag mom. Attendance back then was dominated by the most “out” members of the community—there were “leather” guys, dykes on bikes and drag queens in abundance (not, as Seinfeld might have said, that there was anything wrong with that), but few others. More recently, a casual “drop-in” at Indianapolis’ event, at least, might not have known what the celebration was all about. These days, booths are as likely to offer real estate services or symphony tickets as AIDS information or bar locations, and the crowd is a broad and far more representative cross-section of the entire community: moms with strollers, political candidates and representatives of the Gay Chamber of Commerce now mingle with the leather boys, the PFlag moms and dads and all the others.

 

Part of the reason the crowds and booths have changed is that society has changed, and mostly for the better. Earlier Pride celebrations flew in the face of social conventions that made gay or lesbian identity a source of shame, not pride. Gay people who were closeted rarely took the chance of attending and being seen, and straight people who attended often had their stereotypes confirmed rather than dispelled. As society has become more open, and many more people have come out, these events have become larger and much more representative of the gay population as a whole. If the early events tended to be defiant—even “in your face”—occasions of the “we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” variety, today’s are more likely to be get-togethers of a community of folks who have a lot in common. Some of what they have in common is the prejudice they experience from the wider culture, of course, but the way that bigotry is usually expressed has changed. Overt hostility and physical danger, while still a problem, have been largely replaced by efforts at political disenfranchisement and social marginalization.

 

Disenfranchisement and marginalization may seem strange causes for celebration, but they actually represent progress.

 

As a result, the upcoming Pride festivals will be paradoxical occasions for looking at how far the community has come—and how far it still has to go.  Progress has been made, but the backlash against that progress is in full swing. The community is getting “whipsawed;” every time a court decision favorable to gay civil rights is handed down, it enrages and energizes the fundamentalist Right.

 

A number of states have passed constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage, and several more will be attempting to do so this year. There is a concerted effort to prevent gays and lesbians from adopting children. (Apparently, God would rather children languish in foster care than be raised in loving same-sex households.) Most states’ civil rights laws still do not include protection against discrimination based on sexual orientation. Republicans are facing potentially enormous losses in the 2006 elections, and will undoubtedly use anti-gay and anti-immigrant rhetoric to rally their base and get them to the polls.

 

Time is on the side of equal rights. Poll after poll confirms what I see anecdotally in my classes—young people are far less threatened by genuine equality, far more likely to have (and know they have) gay friends and relatives, and far more likely to support equal application of the laws of the land. The challenge at this point comes down to buying time—keeping the states and the federal government from passing laws that will slow the process of achieving necessary reforms, and make positive change much more difficult.

 

What the GLBT community needs most right now is divided government.

 

So—as you all head off to your local Pride fairs and parades, here’s my advice, for what it’s worth: take time to savor the progress that has been made. Have a drink, listen to the music, kibbitz with the friends you see. Buy a music CD, hire a realtor, join a health club—whatever.

 

 But don’t forget to stop at the booth where you register to vote, the one where you volunteer for a political campaign, and the one where you donate to an organization working for equal rights. You’ll be proud that you did.

 

 

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As I write this, the news is filled with conflicting stories of interest—and concern—to the gay community.

 

On the plus side, I offer two “tidbits” suggesting increased support:

• In Asheville, North Carolina, a pastor has announced that he will continue to perform religious weddings, but will no longer “officiate” for purposes of conferring that legal status. That is, he will conduct religious ceremonies for couples desiring to be married in the church—including gay couples—but those who are straight and thus entitled to the legal incidents of marriage will need to make an extra trip to City Hall if they want legal recognition. He says that it is his way of refusing to participate in an unequal system.
• In Ohio, in response to a Republican-sponsored bill that would bar gays from adopting children, a legislator has sponsored a bill that would prevent Republicans from doing so. The anti-gay bill had a preamble with the usual “because children are more emotionally healthy growing up in ‘traditional’ families” justification; the anti-Republican adoption bill began by citing “credible studies” showing that children raised by Republicans tended to become more rigid, less tolerant adults.” It was pretty funny. The sponsor acknowledged his bill was a spoof, but said it pointed up the unfair and ridiculous nature of the anti-gay rhetoric.

 

On the minus side:

·        In response to the ever-vigilant Family Research Council, the federal Department of Health and Human Services has removed critical GLBT health information from its government website. FRC charged that the government “uses material from pro-homosexual activist groups…such as Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.” The content—which addressed substance abuse among GLBT populations—had been up for six years.

·        All indications are that the Republicans—who face formidable problems in the upcoming midterm elections—are gearing up to once again use “gay marriage” and “the homosexual agenda” as their wedge issue of choice. The gay community should brace itself for a real onslaught of hateful faux piety this fall.

 

Welcome to the culture war, 2006 edition.

 

In such an environment, it would seem prudent to reward and support those who—sometimes at considerable personal risk—have stuck their necks out to stand up for equality and human dignity. In Indianapolis, one of those people has been Congresswoman Julia Carson—and I find it inexplicable that this newspaper has endorsed her primary opponent.

 

Not only has Carson consistently and visibly supported legislation important to the gay community, she has used her considerable political capital when she didn’t have to get involved. When timid Democrats on the Indianapolis City-County Council voted with the GOP to defeat an amendment to the City’s Human Rights Ordinance—an amendment that would have extended protection against discrimination to gays, lesbians and transgendered citizens—Carson called them in and told them to do the right thing or answer to her. The amendment passed. Without her support, it wouldn’t have.

 

I can only assume that the Word decided to support her primary opponent because he is a gay man.  But it is a profound mistake to assume that people who share an identity will also share political and social goals. I am Jewish, and I can assure my readers that I share very few positions with Senator Joseph Lieberman.

 

I remember many years ago, when some of us “women’s libbers” created an organization called the Women’s Political Caucus. Its mission was to support women’s rights and especially women candidates. In the legislature at the time was a female state senator who consistently voted for conservative Christian “values” that had the effect of perpetuating discrimination against women. Redistricting had thrown her into a primary battle with a pro-choice, progressive male legislator. The Women’s Political Caucus (properly) endorsed the man.

 

When we engage in “identity politics”—supporting people because they are members of our “tribes”—we are perpetuating the attitudes that support inequality. If gays don’t support their friends, they deserve their enemies.

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