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Obama and the church
Mar. 20th, 2008 08:04 am(I wrote this as a response in a different journal but since that discussion has inspired others to characterize me as someone who was not careful or honest in my evaluations, or as "I'm-a-gay-white-man-with-a-decent-job-and-health-insurance-but-I-don't-live-in-Massachusetts-so-I-can't-get-married-and-neither-Hillary-nor-Obama-will-make-that-their-#1-priority-so-I'm-going-to-pitch-a-fit-and-pout-goddamit!"
I'm not going to link to it so as to reduce the level of fuck-tardery in my immediate vicinity.)
Do I believe that Obama would be a radically better president than the last few we've had? Yes. Would I vote for him and encourage others to vote for him?
Definitely.
Am I disturbed that a man with his background, experiences, and intelligence believes - not just strategically but apparently fundamentally - that same-sex relationships are so inferior to opposite-sex relationships that it is appropriate to enact "separate but equal" laws governing them?
How can I not be?
A man whose parents' "interracial" marriage would have been illegal and invalid earlier in the century, who knows that many of the objections to that marriage were put forth with religious reasoning and who should know that "separate but equal" is only ever the former STILL is so swayed by the preaching of his church that he says that it's appropriate for non-straight people. I find that profoundly disturbing.
I'm not talking about strategy here. If you want to talk about strategy then you'd have to believe that Obama is not being truthful about his real views in order to be elected. I don't think that's the case. I think that what he says is what he believes - that same-sex marriage is wrong because the bible says so, and the difference between same-sex and opposite-sex relationships should be enshrined into law. So for all his talk about equal rights this is what it comes down to - more for him, fewer for me.
That's why it's hard for me to get excited by his speeches, to feel the same hope and promise, to feel welcome. And to be honest it churns my stomach to hear him refer to the "Sermon on the Mount" to say that it supports legalization of same-sex relationships while contradicting himself by saying that he has a religious objection to them being called "marriage". I live in NJ, I have a "civil union", and I know from experience (as was predicted) that what it's called makes all the difference. He's too smart to not know this as well.
I guess what bothers me so much is that I *want* to be excited, I *want* to feel hope, but yet again, because of the fucking church, I can't be - because the church has told him that what I do, and who I am, goes against his god. [EDIT: Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
qnetter and a followup post, I now know that opposition to same-sex marriage as "marriage" is not the position of his church, in fact just the opposite. So it's not the position of his church yet he claims that he opposes it on religious grounds.]
I'm not going to link to it so as to reduce the level of fuck-tardery in my immediate vicinity.)
Do I believe that Obama would be a radically better president than the last few we've had? Yes. Would I vote for him and encourage others to vote for him?
Definitely.
Am I disturbed that a man with his background, experiences, and intelligence believes - not just strategically but apparently fundamentally - that same-sex relationships are so inferior to opposite-sex relationships that it is appropriate to enact "separate but equal" laws governing them?
How can I not be?
A man whose parents' "interracial" marriage would have been illegal and invalid earlier in the century, who knows that many of the objections to that marriage were put forth with religious reasoning and who should know that "separate but equal" is only ever the former STILL is so swayed by the preaching of his church that he says that it's appropriate for non-straight people. I find that profoundly disturbing.
I'm not talking about strategy here. If you want to talk about strategy then you'd have to believe that Obama is not being truthful about his real views in order to be elected. I don't think that's the case. I think that what he says is what he believes - that same-sex marriage is wrong because the bible says so, and the difference between same-sex and opposite-sex relationships should be enshrined into law. So for all his talk about equal rights this is what it comes down to - more for him, fewer for me.
That's why it's hard for me to get excited by his speeches, to feel the same hope and promise, to feel welcome. And to be honest it churns my stomach to hear him refer to the "Sermon on the Mount" to say that it supports legalization of same-sex relationships while contradicting himself by saying that he has a religious objection to them being called "marriage". I live in NJ, I have a "civil union", and I know from experience (as was predicted) that what it's called makes all the difference. He's too smart to not know this as well.
I guess what bothers me so much is that I *want* to be excited, I *want* to feel hope, but yet again, because of the fucking church, I can't be - because the church has told him that what I do, and who I am, goes against his god. [EDIT: Thanks to
qnetter and a followup post, I now know that opposition to same-sex marriage as "marriage" is not the position of his church, in fact just the opposite. So it's not the position of his church yet he claims that he opposes it on religious grounds.]
