Recently I had a heated conversation with a loved one about politics. We all likely have. We were discussing potential presidential candidates for the upcoming 2024 election, who would be the funniest, who is likely to win, who should and shouldn’t run. As such a talk is bound to do, we landed on Ron DeSantis, Governor of Florida and Sam the Eagle lookalike. I’ll be open and clear with my biases. I’m a social democrat. I despise DeSantis. My loved one… The conversation landed on me being told that DeSantis is not being homophobic. He is simply protecting children. We’ll have to agree to disagree on what homophobia is. I yelled. If you know me, you know I’m not much one for confrontation. I tend not to get angry, and my anger rarely manifests. I yelled. Left the conversation. It ruined my night. It was hard not to drink.
A couple of days before, I read a twitter thread by Ryan Short in which he described his reaction to a conversation in which his father mentioned continuing to vote for the GOP despite their support for anti-lgbt policies. He said yes. So Ryan sent an email to his family:
“Hear me clearly – you cannot vote for the GOP and continue to have a relationship with me. Attacks in the USA by conservatives … against LGBTQ+ communities are growing in legislative bodies, online, and in public spaces. You may be thinking, “But, Ryan, why are you disrupting the family over political disagreements?” The safety of me, my husband, and my community is baseline, non-negotiable, and unrelated to politics. (I)t becomes clear that defending queer and trans rights is necessary to defend our very family itself. Will you commit to not voting for the GOP ever again? Our love is massive, but it’s not without conditions. Your unwavering support of LGBTQ+ peace is required.”
At time of writing, his account is suspended. I am unaware why. But his letter had a positive end: his father left his local Republican club and agreed with his son.
There were plenty of responses to that tweet. Support, of course, discussion of collective queer trauma, chosen family, love, and the joy of acceptance from those who love and/or raised us. Some were pure vitriol. Some disagreed based off their own trauma and longing for family. I want to highlight a specific breed of negative response. The denial.
“You’re a horrible person and I feel sorry for your dad. You’re hurting him with your identity politics. He never did anything to hurt you, his vote doesn’t hurt you and everything you believe about republicans is a lie.”
““Seeking to murder me” makes this seem like a parody account lmao. Nobody’s trying to kill you, the mainstream GOP position is simply that literal children shouldn’t be subjected to gender therapy/conversion and overt public sex acts.”
“Or maybe, just maybe, you’ve been lied to about what Republicans really think, what the laws are actually about, and the thoughts in other peoples’ heads. But hey, why try to understand them when you can be a victim, right?”
There are multiple versions of this.
The GOP is not homophobic. Voting conservative is not an act connected to or passively accepting homophobia. That’s what my loved one said. I’ve heard that a lot over the years. Someone told me once that opposing gay marriage isn’t homophobic. That same person, a few years before, shared an article calling for the Biblical stoning of gay people. She said the gays started it. It wasn’t homophobic. The Catholics on my old college campus and on Twtitter now say it isn’t homophobic to say all gay people should be celibate or marry people of the opposite sex anyway.
So. Let’s go in. This video will, by necessity and my own limitations, not be comprehensive. It will be long.
First: let’s get to a commonground definition first. Often times when people are accused of homo/queer/transphobia, they’ll turn into little cave imps, dancing about and playing their idea of a semantics game. “I’m not scared of them! Phobias are irrational fears. I’m not scared.” Cool. They are, actually, but they’re unlikely to do the digging to understand that connection. The next step is sometimes to point out that it can mean hatred towards queer people, and they’ll turn around with, “I don’t hate anyone. I love everyone.” Hate the sin, love the sinner nonsense. Right. I think ContraPoints in her video “The Witch Trials of JK Rowling” framed it in a great way. Do you think there is anything that would qualify as homophobia? If not, then you’re disguising you bigotry, which is so all-encompassing, under an idea of objective reality so you don’t have to do any interrogation of your world view. So let’s go with a third, all-encompassing definition. “Homophobia: fear, disgust, or hatred of those with non-heterosexual attractions, whether conscious or unconscious, often expressing itself in opposition to the political advancement of non-heterosexual persons.” Replace the appropriate noun-descriptors to get the definitions or transphobia, queerphobia, and so on. Now, if you use a definition of that sort to point out someone’s homophobia, there’s a chance they will still reject it. They do not want the label, but they might readily say the oppose gay rights, for instance. Why is that? I’ll get to that later.
For the moment, when I say homophobia or transphobia, I mean it in the sense of opposition to LGBT rights, though that opposition is always fueled by the fear/disgust/hatred. Put a pin in that.
I want to discuss, in-depth, the big name Republicans in the ring for the GOP nomination going into 2024. Before I can do that, though, we need to Not Say Gay.
Don’t Say Gay Bill
Normally, when we talk about the Florida Don’t Say Gay Bill, people on my side get accused of not reading the bill. So. Let’s do the most entertaining thing possible and, together, read the entire text of HB 1557. (https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2022/1557/BillText/er/PDF)
Exhilarating, isn’t it?
The most pertinent paragraph for us is paragraph 3. “Classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”
Now. What does that mean? That seems like a leading question where I’m going to immediately answer it for you with my interpretation, but it’s an actual question. WHAT does it mean? “Classroom instruction … on sexual orientation or gender identity.” What, in this case, does instruction mean? Is it teaching about what different orientations and genders are? Is it teaching on any events about gay rights? Is it some fantasy about teaching children TO be a certain orientation or identity? In the preamble to the law, it says the act will be “prohibiting classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in certain grade levels or in a specified manner”. So then, does instruction mean discussion?
According to an NBC article on the statute, Law Professor Charlton Copeland of the University of Miami says, “(W)hen I taught them statutory interpretation, and one of the things that courts certainly do, is to look at the preamble to assess, ‘Well, what’s the scope of that term called ‘instruction?’”
In other words, the preamble defines for us what the authors meant. Instruction, here, means discussion. So let’s insert that in place of the word instruction and re-read the bill to get a clearer meaning. “Classroom discussion by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”
That is a clearer and yet more broad bill. Discussion may not occur. Discussion on sexual orientation may not occur. So, despite what the bill’s supporters may think, in legalize, that translates, roughly, to the slogan Do Not Say Gay. If a students has two mommies, and another student is curious about that, don’t answer their question. Don’t mention that boys can have crushes on boys when one does. If a student is bullied for expressing a queer crush, you can make a vague anti-bullying statement, but you can’t affirm that it’s okay for that child to have their silly little stupid crush. Now, supporters of the bill may roll their eyes at those potentials, but the bill itself makes no exception in that way. It says no instruction, and by way of the preamble, we know that means no discussion. It does not say, “No discussion with the exception of…” No discussion.
Now, that’s not our only vaguity in this bill. What is “sexual orientation?” We can charitably assume that the authors focus on the sex part of that phrase. But I just mentioned crushes. And parents. Colloquially, sexual orientation is a phrase that encompasses both sexual and romantic inclination. The text of the bill makes no distinction between those two things. As such, we can only come to two conclusions: EITHER the authors mean that queer romantic orientation is open for discussion and only sexual orientation is off limits OR the authors are using the broader and more widely used definition which encompasses both. The text does not specify. I, and I assume most others, will assume the latter of those two options. I think it’s the more likely intent, as well. So then, there’s no discussion or romantic inclination, and I think we can all readily assume that children or the specified age range are not experiencing sexual attraction. The world they occupy is of romantic, silly, stupid little crushes. Mommy has a crush on Daddy. We can’t discuss crushes. No more Valentine’s Day parties. When a teacher gets married, better not change your last name, because then you’d have to explain. If a pregnant teacher is asked what pregnant means, the canned, stereotypical answer, “When a mommy and a daddy love each other very much…” Uh oh. That’s a discussion on sexual orientation. Misses can no longer be used in the classroom. It implies marital status. Marital status implies romantic inclination. Romantic inclination is sexual orientation.
Let’s keep going. What is “gender identity?” The bill does not specify what they believe this to mean. Now, obviously, they meant trans and gender non-conforming people. But that’s not what the bill says. The bill says there is to be no instruction, thereby discussion, of gender identity. If a student has a mommy and a daddy and then later in the year they actually have a mommy and a mommy, even though they’re the same people, a child who asks about that will be left without an answer. If a child has an intersex loved one, they can’t ask about that. If they have a trans loved one, they can’t ask about that. Or, rather, they can, but they will not be answered. If a male student is bullied for behaving in stereotypically feminine ways, a teacher can give a vague anti-bullying statement. But can that teacher affirm that it’s okay to act outside of gender norms or is that suddenly discussion gender identity? When acting out a story, and a girl wants to play a prince, can the teacher allow that or is allowing that, in a way, discussion of gender identity? “Girls can be princes too.” Can a teacher deny that or would that be discussion of gender identity? If this means teachers must strictly follow a student’s sex, how is a teacher allowed to refer to and address and intersex student, regardless or how they present or identify? Being super uncharitible, gender identity removes all pronouns. Misses was already denied, but not so are Mister and Miss. Teacher is what remains.
Surely I’m done taking the piss out of that law. I’m not.
Third parties. We can assume that means anyone who is not an instructor or a student. Discussion by anyone besides a student. Okay. Parents who come in to talk about their jobs. No one who works weddings can discuss those except in the vaguest terms possible, no mention or brides or grooms. Two parents of the same gender cannot show up together and mention their marriage. Who else is a third party? Administrators. Counselors. Suddenly all those who can respond to bullying issues are not allowed to help a child not internalize the bullying they recieved. Saying it’s okay to have a crush on another boy or it’s okay to have two mommies is discussion and affirmation or sexual orientation. Books. If an author’s book includes an LGBT character and is in a school, are they liable as a third party providing discussion? Is their publisher? The illustrator? How about the librarian?
But we haven’t even touched yet on the second half of that sentence. A refresher: “may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”
Well isn’t that interesting. I was told by my loved one that it was protecting children grade 3 and under. That they didn’t need to know. But the bill uses OR. It does not restrict itself so. That second half does not modify or restrict itself based on age. As of recording, those standards are not fully written, shipped, or implemented. What are they? Who determines? If the state determines that sexual orientation and gender identity are inherently adult, taboo subjects, then the discussion ban rises throughout all primary education. Are we looking at our own Section 28? Are they going to mean being queer, and how will they get around that being sex discrimination? Can a high school teacher discuss Pulse Nightclub? The AIDs epidemic? So many classics are ripe with sex and gender play. Are they banned? When you teach Shakespeare, are you forbidden from mentioning that often boys played the female roles? In Oedipus, a man claws his eyes out because he’s been sleeping with his mom. Is that age-appropriate for a minor, or is violent straight incest more innocent than queer people existing?
The law is intentionally vague. The lawsuit page where school districts will pay for any investigation is paired with the vagueness in order to scare school and teachers into compliance beyond any reasonable, good-faith interpretation of the law in order to save themselves the financial and harassmental burden of lawsuits. The entire premise is that queer people are inherently inappropriate by nature of our existence.
That is dehumanizing and homophobic. My having a husband is no more inappropriate than a woman having a husband. To believe elsewise requires the belief that my eventual marriage is lesser, of a different quality. It is to believe that I am not allowed around children. That is homophobic. The law, by its nature, is homophobic.
Do you want to know the true reason? Bill sponsor Dennis Baxley, according to CNN, made the bill because children are coming out more now. He thinks it might because schools are encouraging that. He said, “There really is a dynamic concern of how much of this are genuine types of experiences and how many of them are kids trying on different kinds of things they hear about.” So rather than allow people to figure out who they are, Baxley made this bill so the schools can shut up and hopefully less people are queer. Because he views being queer as a social contagion. Because he is both a bigot and an idiot.
So now, let’s get to the 2024 GOP candidates. Before we do, I want to say, out of the generosity of my spirit and out of the hope that people can change and grow over the years, I will do my best to only use statements from within the 21st century, and the more recent, the better. Now, in cases of continued rhetoric, I may pull from older examples as well to show the depth of the underlying beliefs.
GOP Presidential Candidates
Ron DeSantis
It only makes sense to go from the Don’t Say Gay bill to the governor who oversaw its implementation in Florida, Ron DeSantis. So it’s time to throw in an update.
The Florida State Board of Education, staffed by DeSantis appointees, have proposed the following update to the “Principles of Professional Conduct for the Education Profession in Florida” (6A-10.081) . Rule 6, the one placed by the Don’t Say Gay Bill, is proposed to be edited to change it from kindergarten to 3rd grade to pre-kindergarten. It also adds a new rule, 7, which says that educators “Shall not intentionally provide classroom instruction to students in grades 4 through 12 on sexual orientation or gender identity unless such instruction is either expressly required by state academic standards … or is part of a reproductive health course or health lesson for which a student’s parent has the option to have his or her student not attend.”
Now I’m more willing to assume a specific idea of what constitutes “instruction” when coming from a government agency whose entire purpose is to oversee education. However, given that the law this is in effect expanding was purposefully vague and seems to define instruction as mere mention or discussion, I have to assume that this update is meant to be applied in the same way. LGBT people and existence are to be confined to very specific lessons or to optional sex ed classes, which automatically sexualizes our entire existence AND allows parents to effectively censor our existences out of their child’s entire life. Though, I’ll be honest, I believe allowing sex ed courses to be optional in any capacity is a mistake of the educational system that should be corrected. Sex ed should be mandatory and comprehensive.
When critiqued over the original Don’t Say Gay law by Disney, DeSantis and the Florida GOP passed retaliatory legislation aimed to punish Disney. After taking control of the special administrative zone that includes Disney World Theme Park. DeSantis said, of the board, according to NPR, “When you lose your way, you gotta have people that are going to tell you the truth. All these board members very much would like to see the type of entertainment that all families can appreciate.” In light of the events leading up to this shake up, it’s clear: DeSantis plans to use the board to harass Disney if it continues its slow march towards inclusion of LGBT people in its properties. I can only imagine it would want them to end their Gay Days too. And while they can’t control creative decisions of the company, they can do their best to make life hell for the park unless it follows their conservative will.
Who did DeSantis appoint to the Board? Besides 3 lawyers that I didn’t find much about, there are two interesting placements. These sections will be brief, because we’re overall talking about DeSantis here.
Bridget Ziegler
Ziegler, according to NPR, co-founded the group Moms for Liberty, a so-called parental rights organization that, on its resources for parents section of its website, links to notorious anti-gay hate group The Heritage Foundation.
Ron Peri
Ron Peri leads the Christian Nationalist group The Gathering which argues that the United States is a Christian Nation that should be ruled by Christianity, or his interpretation of it, at least. In a slideshow called “Ethics and the Chrstian,” the Gathering discusses, vaguely and sometimes not well, schools of philosophy. In its section on hedonism, it says, “Transgender resasignment may seem good at the moment but likewise devastating in the future,” weirdly implying that trans affirmation of any sort is hedonistic.
Peri, according to Business Insider, also blames the statistical rise of homosexuality on estrogen in tap water and a society no longer “constraining” evil.
Desantis Return
Back to DeSantis himself. Before he was governor, DeSantis was a member of Congress as a Representative. So we have a voting records. When he served in the 114th Congress, the Human Rights Campaign gave him a score of 0 when it came to LGBT support. This includes his voting against two amendments put forward that session that would ban federal contractors from discriminating against LGBT people in the Departments of Transportation, HUD, VA, and in military construction.
DeSantis’ State Board of Education declared their support of the idea that Title IX sex discrimination bans do not apply to trans people. According to Jacksonville Today, Esther Byrd, a DeSantis appointee to the Board, said, “I believe reading sexual orientation and gender identity into Title IX is not only legally incorrect, but it undermines the intent of Title IX.”
On a Fox News appearance, DeSantis spoke out against the Respect for Marriage Act, claiming there was no need for it and its opponents have valid religious concerns. The law forces states to acknowledge gay and and interracial marriages performed in other states, though it wouldn’t make them issue marriage licenses if the relevant SCOTUS cases end up getting struck down.
Let’s keep going. DeSantis filed a complaint against a R House, a Miami Bar, supposedly out of outrage that children were allowed to be around drag queens. According to NBC News, the complaint cited a 1947 SCOF ruling that calls drag queen performances that are suggestive are a public nuisance that corrupt morals and are therefore things the state has an interest in shutting down. Fun fact about that case, much like DeSantis’ own pet law, is a little vague. Suggestive is a subjective thing. In certain religious communities, a woman showing leg is sexually explicit. Just a fun fact.
It’s all about protecting children though. After all, before the Don’t Say Gay bill was passed, DeSantis’ then press secretary Christina Pushaw had some words about protecting children. According to The Hill, she said the bill is more accurately the “Anti-Grooming Bill” and “[i]f you’re against the Anti-Grooming of 4-8 year old children.” If you disagree with a vaguely written law that was put forward in an attempt to keep children in the closet, you’re a pedophile. But Pushaw doesn’t come out and call specific people “pedophile.” Because that might be actionable. So she says groomer. A little vaguer. Because to acknowledge the existence of queer people is the same as trying to fuck a minor. “Sometimes boys have crushes on boys and that’s okay,” a teacher might say, and that’s obviously the same thing as a teacher pulling down their underwear and masturbating.
In 2021, according to CNN, DeSantis objected to spending state funds on housing programs for homeless queer youths. So much for protecting the children. That same year, his DoE removed federal anti-bullying links about queer youth. Supposedly the links were made into political advocacy platforms. According to that same CNN article, the biggest change was going from “LGBTQ Youth” to “LGBTQI+.” So apparently being against the bullying of intersex children is a step too far in liberal ideology for Florida.
It’s not about protecting children. DeSantis does not care about children. Children are just useful tools for him to get useful dupes to hate the people he hates. If he says it’s “to protect the children,” then supposedly well-meaning people might not recognize the homophobia and transphobia. Or, more accurately, it makes it easier for them to pretend that it’s not there and continue to harm their loved ones by supporting it.
Next.
Nikki Haley
Nikki Haley, former Governor of South Carolina and former Ambassador to the UN, announced her campaign on February 14th, 2023. Valentine’s Day. That, as we’re about to find out, is a bit ironic for Haley given her beliefs.
Haley has her own critique of the Don’t Say Gay bill. Her take? It doesn’t go far enough. According to an article in the Guardian, she said, “I’m sorry. I don’t think that goes far enough. When I was in school you didn’t have sex ed until seventh grade. And even then, your parents had to sign whether you could take the class. That’s a decision for parents to make.” Haley immediately going towards a sex ed class is revealing. The law does not specify sexual education. Nikki is taking the LGBT community and sexualizing our existence. While she singles out gender, it’s not that big of a stretch to think she would include orientation in the same question. So therefore, students should only learn about queer people and queer existence in the confines of a sex ed class that parents are allowed to opt their children out of. Given the interpretation of third parties to include school librarians, now no art containing LGBT characters should be allowed in public schools except in the context of optional sex ed classes.
The article further goes on to quote Haley as having said, “We should not be talking to kids in elementary school about gender, period. And if you are going to talk to kids about it, you need to get the parents’ permission to do that.” Did you catch that? It’s the same switch the law does. Instruction has become discussion. “That is not something that schools need to be teaching,” she says. “They don’t need to be teaching whether they think you’re a boy or a girl.” The switch happens again. Discussion is now called instruction. With the last sentence, it becomes clear that Haley is pretending as if discussing trans people, gender expression, or the very concept of gender is the same as “transing” the kids. It’s a nod to the idea of Section 28 in England. We must ban exposure, because exposure leads to social contagion. Social contagion, by the way, is utter nonsense. It is pure homophobic and transphobic garbage. And no one of any intellectual ability actually believes in it. That’s why I said Haley is pretending. Because she knows she is incorrect, and is dabbling in these waters anyway because she believes it will help her politically.
Now, this is speculation on my part, but I also want to zero in on Haley’s specificity there. She complains that the law does not go far enough in terms of “gender.” She does not mention sexual orientation. At the same time, she does not criticize the law for going after sexual orientation. She doesn’t say that she thinks it too should be shut out of schools, but she doesn’t say it shouldn’t be either. I think that’s deliberate. In my opinion, it was a calculated challenge to DeSantis. Nikki bills herself as solidly conservative while being more calm and moderate than some of the more popular members of her party. By making this comment, her air of “moderacy” makes it seems as if the expanded version of the law is the minimum position. If Desantis did not expand, she can call him weak. That he has, she can take credit for that maneuver, saying he didn’t do it until after she called him out on it. Now, her halfway commentary, by only mention gender, gives her a second move here. If the action is taken positively by the base on all levels, she can champion it in its entirety and take, on some level, credit for the expansion. If the base does not enjoy the law and the culture war, she can say now that the law goes too far. After all, she only called for it to include discussion on gender, not on sexual orientation. It’s a calculated and cowardly statement, in my opinion, because Nikki Haley does not have any actual beliefs. She is feckless.
Back in 2014, as South Carolina Governor, Nikki Haley opposed gay marriage, saying that she “personally believes marriage should only be between a man and a woman,” even if she no longer makes a fuss over that belief.
That was nearly a decade ago. What other things has Nikki been saying? Well, at CPAC, according to the Human Rights Campaign, Haley said, “We need our military to be stronger than ever. But what does Joe Biden have our troops doing? Taking gender pronoun classes…(T)that disgusts me. Our troops already know the difference between men and women. … (T)his woke self-loathing has swept our country. It’s in the classroom, the boardroom and the bathrooms of government.” Acknowledging and being accepting of trans people apparently makes people weak. Self-loathing. Haley wants to bring strength back to the bathrooms of government. Because she’s a strong piece of shit.
On that same idea, conflating trans with weak, Haley apparently said on Fox in 2022, “I look at what’s happening with this woke culture, in our schools, wanting our kids to decide their gender… What I will tell you is we need to snap out of it. This is absolute craziness. We’ve got enemies trying to come after us, and America has been naive. It’s been weakened.” Which seems to me to imply that if we were to suffer an attack on American soil or to lose a military battle, Nikki might place the blame… on trans people. How does that make sense? Ideologically, it feels like a successor to those people who blame natural disasters on the acceptance of gay people.
Nikki may not be the worst of the field, but she’s no ally.
Next.
Donald Trump
The criminal of the group.
Former President Trump implemented a trans military ban.
The two judges who struck down the conversion therapy bans in Florida were appointed by Trump.
Trump opposed the Equality Act which would prevent discrimination on basis of gender identity or sexual orientation.
AG Sessions of the Trump Administration declared that the DoJ would cease arguing trans people have federal protection from discrimination in employment.
Trump’s DoJ also filed a brief to SCOTUS in Bostock v Clayton County that sexual orientation is not covered by Title VII prohibition on sex discrimination.
On a similar note coming from the same base argument, Trump’s Health and Human Services Department attempted to roll back rules that would prevent discrimination based on gender identity and expression, essentially covering both under the idea of sex discrimination.
The administration denied embassies the ability to fly pride flags during pride month.
His State Department announced a Commission on Unalienable Rights to help shape policy on human rights. The Commission alluded to focusing on principles of natural laws, a dog whistle we’ll get into when we discuss the GOP platform.
In declaring his reelection bid, Trump railed against trans participation in sports and seemed to show extreme support for DeSantis’ Don’t Say Gay by threatening schools who engage in “gender insanity” with loss of federal funding.
Trump’s vice-president was Mike Pence, famous homophobe and notorious bigot.
But really, when I want to critique Trump on LGBT issues, I want to look at the GOP Party Platform for 2016 and 2020. As the nominee, Trump and his lackeys had a lot of leverage in shaping and accepting the platform. So. Let’s get started.
The Republican Party’s National Platform
So. Party National Platforms are not shaped by any one person. However, the stronger your showing in the primary, the more power, generally speaking, you technically have to move the platform in your favor. Therefore, in regards to the GOP Platform in 2016, I do not but any argument that the overall tone policy prescriptions are not pieces accepted by Trump and his allies. This is not to say they were the ones to put such provisions in the platform. As such, I also place the platform on the backs of the party as a whole. It goes beyond any singular individual. So. Let’s talk the GOP Platforms for 2016 and 2020.
2020 is easy, honestly, because they simply adopted the 2016 platform. Now, I don’t actually fault them for this. The convention would otherwise have been in the midst of the beginning throws of the COVID pandemic, and would therefore affect participation in the creation and lobbying for revisions to the platform. It does, however, mean the 2016 platform is still the applicable document.
Page 9, heading “A Rebirth of Constitutional Government,” subsection “We the People” paragraph 2.
“We denounce bigotry, racism, anti-Semitism, ethnic prejudice, and religious intolerance. There, we oppose discrimination based on race, sex, religion, creed, disability, or national origin and support statutes to end such discrimination.”
You may notice something is missing from that list. There is no mention of sexual orientation or gender identity. Now, if we had no other data, we could reasonably assume that such protection falls under opposition to sex discrimination and that homophobia and transphobia fall under denounced bigotry. However, given that the Trump Administration argued in court that prohibition on sex discrimination does not prohibit LGBT+ discrimination, we can more reasonably infer then that the GOP does not, in this platform, oppose discrimination against people on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. Perhaps the anti-anti-discrimination takes by the GOP have been guided by that lack inclusion in the platform.
Page 10, same section, subsection “The Judiciary,” paragraph 1.
“Only a Republican president will appoint judges who respect the rule of law expressed within the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, including the inalienable right to life and the laws of nature and nature’s God, as did the late Justice Antonin Scalia. … Only such appointments will enable courts to begin to reverse the long line of activist decisions - including Roe, Obergefell, and the Obamacare cases - that have usurped Congress’s and states’ lawmaking authority, undermined constitutional protections, expanded the power of the judiciary at the expense of the people and their elected representatives, and stripped the people of their power to govern themselves.”
You may note several odd things there. We’ll get to “laws of nature and nature’s God” and Scalia later. Put in those for a second. Obergefell v. Hodges is the SCOTUS case that struck down gay marriage bans across the country in the summer of 2015. I was a junior in high school. You will hear people say that no one is coming after marriage equality. But the platform says otherwise. There are only two specifically named cases here. They finally got their wish with Roe v Wade. As of right now, there is no platform to suggest the party is not still aiming for the end of Obergefell.
In the Dobbs case that overturned Roe, Justice Clarence Thomas in a concurring opinion says that, “we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell. Because any substantive due process decision is ‘deomnstrably erroneous,’ … we have a duty to ‘correct the error’ established in those precedents.” He then goes on to say that doesn’t say the courts won’t find those rights still in the Constitution, but that they should overturn those laws.
That’s a SCOTUS justice saying that the Dobbs decision should spur conservatives to bring cases before the court to challenge Obergefell–marriage equality–and Lawrence v Texas, the 2003 decision that found sodomy laws unconsitutional, in other words striking down bans against gay sex and, technically, straight sex that isn’t procreative.
Page 11, same section, subsection “Defending Marriage Against an Activist Judiciary”
That itself should tell you where this goes. Let’s read it anyway.
“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. Hodge, 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.”
The very first sentence is chocked full of homophobia. The implication of traditional marriage being the foundation for a free society is that same-sex marriage is the upending and destruction of a free society. The second half of that sentence implies that queer couples will not be up to task to raise children and teach them right for wrong. The implication there is that being gay showcases an inherent lack of ability to access reason and morality. The first sentence holds an implication that same-sex marriage will destroy society because gay people are immoral.
Windsor struck down the Defense of Marriage Act signed by President Clinton that prohibited the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages. Later in the paragraph though, the platform says that this should be left up to the states. That alone shows they don’t care about the carrier they use to ship their bigotry. If this was purely a states-rights issue, they would want the federal government to have no ability to restrict or define marriage at all, instead extending full federal benefits to any marriage recognized by the state in which it was performed. That’s not their argument. Their argument is that congress should be able to bar it. Correct the course of those immoral states.
In that paragraph, the GOP again states their opposition to Obergefell and their desire to see it overturned. They dissent. They would like to do away with marriage equality. This is not a statement about individual Republicans. This is the national party platform. It speaks for the party. The paragraph ends with a promise that the GOP wants judges who will act as they will and overturn Obergefell. In other words, lower courts who will serve up dissent in the circuit courts so SCOTUS and Thomas can take up the case and overturn marriage rights.
Page 11, same section, subsection “The First Amendment: Religious Liberty,” paragraph 2.
“We endorse the First Amendment Defense Act, Republican legislation in the House and Senate which will bar government discrimination against individuals and businesses for acting on the belief that marriage is the union of one man and one woman. This Act would protect the non-profit tax status of faith-based adoption agencies, the accreditation of religious educational institutions, the grants and contracts or faith-based charities and small businesses, and the licensing of religious professions…”
Now, if you take Senator Mike Lee’s word for it, who introduced FADA, which thankfully didn’t pass, it would not allow for discrimination in commerce, employments, health benefits, housing, or federal benefits.
I don’t necessarily understand that. If it prohibits the government from taking action against individuals and businesses who act in accordance with their religious belief in so-called traditional marriage, but it doesn’t let people discriminate, then it doesn’t do anything.
Contrary to Lee’s assortment, NBC News, in an analysis of the law, says it would allow discrimination.
The US Conference of Catholic Bishops, in a document arguing for it, in their interpretation, seem to believe it would allow the Boy Scouts, for instance, to bar gay men from being Scout Leaders without being subject to discrimination laws. Or, at least, it would bar the federal government from taking action on that front, as it couldn’t define state law.
So it seems to come together that the law would allow individuals and businesses to discriminate in anyway they wish when it comes to sexual orientation and sexual behavior so long as that discrimination comes from a religious belief. Would it support Kim Davis in her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples? That seems to be the implication to me. The platform, in endorsing the law, and in the wording surrounding it and their urge for states to pass their own versions of this law, seems to endorsing discrimination against LGBT persons. We see this in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case, in state contract battles with adoption agencies where contracts were not renewed or granted due to discrimination against queer people, and those agencies called foul.
Page 12, same section, same subsection, paragraph 4:
“We support the right of the people to conduct their businesses in accordance with their religious beliefs and condemn public officials who have proposed boycotts against businesses that support traditional marriage. We pledge to protect those business owners who have been subjected to hate campaigns, threats of violence, and other attempts to deny their civil rights.”
Obviously, I’m against threats and acts of violence and agree that those acts should be condemned. However, this paragraph condemns calls for boycotts. That condemnation in connection to the second paragraph seems to imply that boycotts are either hate campaigns or denials of civil rights that the GOP vows to protect them against. Does this mean censuring of speech for public officials and restricting their First Amendment rights? If boycotts and public campaigns against businesses for their beliefs and practices is wrong… Is there any advocacy against anti-queer bigotry that is okay?
Page 31, section “Great American Families, Education, Healthcare, and Criminal Justice,” subsection “Marriage, Family, and Society,” paragraph 1.
“Foremost among those institutions is the American family. It is the foundation of civil society, and the cornerstone of the family is natural marriage, the union of one man and one woman. Its daily lessons – cooperation, patience, mutual respect, responsibility, self-reliance – are fundamental to the order and progress of our Republic. Strong families, depending upon God and one another, advance the cause of liberty by lessening the need for government in their daily lives. Conversely, as we have learned over the last five decades, the loss of faith and family leads to greater dependence upon government.”
Here we again have a statement that straight marriage is the cornerstone of society. As no one is suggesting doing away with marriages between people of the opposite sex, we can only assume the implication is instead that same-sex marriages are against civil society. As straight marriage is called “natural” marriage, it’s clear that same-sex marriage is unnatural, a statement whose only natural conclusion is that being gay is against nature. With the statement about faith and God juxtaposed with comments on marriage, not only is the GOP disparaging people of different faiths, they seem to be making a claim that affirming Christians and queer Christians have lost their faith. There also seems to be a baseless assumption that same-sex marriages result in families that depend more on the government.
Pages 31 and 32, same section and subsection, paragraph 3.
“The data and the facts lead to an inescapable conclusion: Every child deserves a married mom and dad. The reality remains that millions of American families do not have the advantages that come with that structure. … Our laws and our government’s regulations should recognize marriage as the union of one man and one woman and actively promote married family life as the basis of a stable and prosperous society. For that reason, as explained elsewhere in this platform, we do not accept the Supreme Court’s redifinition of marriage and we urge its reversal, whether through judicial reconsideration or a constitutional amendment returning control over marriage to the states. We oppose government discrimination against businesses or entities which decline to sell items or services to individuals for activities that go against their religious views about such activities.”
We open with the idea that children raised by straight couples have better outcomes than children raised by same-sex parents. The paragraph states clearly that the data leads them to that conclusion. They are lying. The data does not say that. The American Psychological Association says there is no evidence that parenting effectiveness and childhood outcomes are not at all related to the orientation of their parents.
A meta-analysis of studies on the issue published in the BMJ Global Health Journal found little to no deviation in family outcomes between same-sex and opposite-sex families.
If the first statement is wrong, since the data does not agree, why make the statement? It is to imply that gay people are bad at raising children and therefore should not have the right to marriage. But since the data does not agree with this statement, it becomes clear that it is a statement of bias that does not care for facts or civil rights. In other words, it is plain and clear bigotry.
We then get another statement that they want the government not to recognize marriage equality, though here it goes a step further by saying that our regulations should also not recognize gay marriages. Which would seem to me to mean that even if it goes back to the states and a state recognizes marriage equality, the federal government would be meant to pass regulations acting as if that marriage is invalid.
The platform states that they will try to undo marriage equality either through the court system or through a constitutional amendment supposedly sending it to the states. But given that they have time and time again made it clear that where a state might pass marriage equality, they would want the federal government to not recognize said marriage, one must imagine their proposed amendment would instead outlaw marriage equality directly in the Constitution. That clear cut homophobia.
Then we get another statement that they are against the government punishing people for enacting discrimination. A right not to sell items or services. Now someone might say it’s about religious conscience when it comes specifically to the ceremony, a la Masterpiece. But that is not what they said. Let’s say, for arguments sake, that a group holds a religious belief that gay marriage is wrong and that sex is only for marriage. Maybe they would have an issue with having to provide health insurance that covers PrEP, a preventative drug used in the fight against HIV, claiming the covering it is the same as encouraging people to act upon their same-sex desires and love. Perhaps a judge would find that would violate their rights to religious freedom. Maybe that court case would be called Braidwood Management v. Becerra.
Because the platform does matter. Because it is used by the party as a roadmap. Because it is used to deteriorate queer rights, as they promised they would.
This is an argument that allows for discrimination. If a married couple book a hotel room, can the hotel then decline them a room when they learn that they’re two men because allowing them to share a room together as a married couple would be somehow blessing their union? Family photographers can deny family portraits on the basis of orientation of the parents. Kim Davis can refuse to issue marriage licenses. Adoption agencies can discriminate.
And that’s why that first assertion is there. Not because the data agrees with them. It does not. It’s because pretending that it does lets them more easily go into their next bit.
Page 32, same section and subsection, paragraph 4:
“Families formed or enlarged by adoption strengthen our communities and ennoble our nation. Private entities which facilitate adoptions enrich our communities. We support measures such as the First Amendment Defense Act to ensure these entities do not face discrimination because of their views on marriage and family.”
Adoption agencies should be allowed to discriminate against gay couples and couples wherein one or more partner is trans without government intervention. That’s one statement. On its own, it’s nothing new. When you get to the previous incorrect statement on child rearing, though, it seems as if in the GOP’s mind, the government has a vested interest in not only allowing discrimination in adoption but actively encouraging it if not outright outlawing gay adoption.
According to an NBC News article, 8 states passed laws permitting state-licensed and partially funded agencies to refuse to place children with gay couples if they claim that discrimination is based in religion.
The same article says that the Trump administration, another mark against the man, allowed agencies in South Carolina to discriminate against queer couple despite receiving federal funding.
Page 35, same section, subsection “Title IX,” paragraph 1:
“That language opened up for girls and women a world of opportunities that had too often been denied to them. That same provision of law is now being used by bureaucrats – and by the current President of the United States – to impose a social and cultural revolution upon the American people by wrongly redefining sex discrimination to include sexual orientation or other categories. … They are determined to reshape our schools – and our entire society – to fit the mold of an ideology alien to America’s history and traditions. Their edict to states concerning restrooms, locker rooms, and other facilities is at once illegal, dangerous, and ignore privacy issues.”
This was before Bostock v. Clayton County which upheld that discrimination based on orientation and gender identity is of course sex discrimination. It can only make sense now that this is yet another case that furthered the rights of LGBT Americans that the GOP would like to reverse. Their argument in this paragraph is that discrimination against LGBT people is permitted in the United States. They do not say that Title IX does not apply, and therefore Congress should pass a law to such. Remember earlier, in their list of discrimination they are opposed to, they did not mention discrimination against queer and gender non-conforming people. They argue time and time again that people and businesses should be allowed to discriminate on religious grounds. They want the government to discriminate when it comes to marriage and adoption. The argument here then twists the very ideas of what sex is so as to avoid extending protections to LGBT people. If someone discriminates against a man for being married to a man but would not have if he were married to a woman, that is by definition discrimination based upon sex. If someone is gender nonconforming or trans, discrimination against them is discrimination based upon assumptions made about their sex and how it should be expressed. That is clearly sex discrimination.
Not only do they argue for discrimination, in this paragraph they say that extending nondiscrimination laws to LGBT people is a concept alien to the United States. Which perhaps protecting our citizens and upholding equality is often a concept alien to our government. Clearly, throughout history… Their final statement is blatant transphobia that doesn’t need an explanation.
Page 37, same section, subsection “Protecting Individual Conscience in Healthcare.” There’s only one paragraph. It is heinous.
“America’s healthcare professionals should not be forced to choose between following their faith and practicing their profession. We respect the rights of conscience of healthcare professionals, doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and organizations, especially the faith-based groups which provide a major portion of care for the nation and the needy. We support the ability of all organizations to provide, purchase, or enroll in healthcare coverage consistent with religious, moral, or ethical conviction without discrimination or penalty. We support the right of parents to determine the proper medical treatment and therapy for their minor children.”
A religious hospital in a rural area wherein a patient is admitted via emergency transportation and is then held in a room for recovery. Let’s say his life is no longer in danger. His husband comes to visit him. By all rights under federal law and recognition, he is allowed to see his spouse. The religious hospital or the receptionist on duty or the doctors and nurses in charge of the patient’s care do not believe in same-sex marriage. In following the law and allowing that visit, they are recognizing that couple has the rights of a married couple. Should the hospital be allowed to refuse that man the right to see his husband? According to the GOP, yes.
A doctor sees a patient and asks about their sexual health. Perhaps she has come in for a screening. She reveals that she is a lesbian. That doctor refuses to test her because to do so would be to encourage her to continue having same-sex relations.
Obviously, ethically, any idea of allowing a healthcare provider to discriminate on the basis of their faith is disgusting. It violates the Hippocratic Oath. It violates basic decency, and the right to life that the GOP pretends to uphold.
Now, I don’t believe that they are advocating a reading of law here that would allow for insurance companies or employers to not extend spousal healthcare benefits to legally married couples. They might wish for the government to not be able to act upon such discrimination, but I haven’t seen a legal theory put forth to allow for that beyond a potential usage of their FADA dream.
Which, yes, I find what I’ve said so far about this paragraph to be disturbing in its own right, but it is not what draws my ire. To quote again, “We support the right of parents to determine the proper medical treatment and therapy for their minor children.”
With all of the language surrounding ideas of religious convictions and the push throughout the platform against LGBT people, with the lack of specific therapies and treatments they believe are under threat here, it seems as if the specific therapy they believe parents have a right to choose for their children is so-called conversion therapy. Practices which aim to change someone’s sexual orientation. Fun fact: they don’t work. Fun fact: there is no evidence that they do work. Fun fact: so called “ex-gays” are not, in fact, former homosexuals. They are grifters or traumatized or realized some form of bisexuality. Now, why would I assume this?
According to NBC15 out of Madison, Wisconsin, state Republicans blocked a conversion therapy ban and crafted a bill that would prohibit any future bans on conversion therapy by the state board overseeing therapists, counselors, and social workers.
Oh hey, remember those judges who decided bans on conversion therapy, at least in the talk therapy form, are unconstitutional? Judges Grant and Lagoa were appointed by Trump. In their ruling, they stated that talk therapy is speech instead of medical practice which can be regulated by the state and relevant government bodies. That is a ridiculous twisting that would, I think, make all forms of talk therapy not medical care and instead simply conversation. Want to read someone smarter than I explain the ridiculousness of the argument? Here’s a piece published in the Harvard Law Review.
The full 11th Circuit denied a rehearing of the case. Of the 12 non-senior Judges on the court, six were appointed by Trump and one by Bush. Though I didn’t spot the exact vote breakdown, Judges Grant, Branch, and Lagoa, Trump appointees, filed a concurring opinion defending the original idea that talk therapy is not speech that can be regulated. I read through it. I also read Judge Jordan’s dissent and the first of Judge Rosenbaum’s dissent. The dissents also highlight the ridiculous attitude that talk therapy is not medical when it is carried out by licensed medical professionals.
The following states do not have conversion therapy bans for minors: Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Arizona, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and West Virginia. Those are any bans, from what I can tell, not just on “talk therapy.” There are no bans on electroshock, aversion, any of it. Because supposedly parents have the right to torture their children. Now, if that is not what they mean by this section of their platform, then GOP politicians must put forward, sponsor, co-sponsor and lobby for legislation and regulation banning the practice with license suspensions, monetary fines, and jail time if necessary. If they believe there’s a First Amendment issue with talk therapy bans, then they must put forward bans on all other forms of conversion therapy for minors at the very least, though any practice of conversion therapy for anyone of any age is inherently harmful and goes against medical best practice and the Hippocratic Oath. If you do not think the government should respond to this abuse and torture of your fellow citizens, in which case, what is the point of government, then you best go out and protest and lobby against all practitioners of this torture until they do not feel welcome to torture us.
But let me go a step further. Conversion therapy for any person of any age is wrong. It is torture.
During an interview on the YouTube channel Fundie Fridays, a video titled, “Conversion therapy, Liberty University, Milo & more with Lucas,” Lucas Wilson, a survivor of conversion therapy makes the case that no one should be able to choose to be tortured and have that as acceptable practice. The right not to be abused does end when someone turns 18. You do not get a mythical right to abuse someone because they can freely choose to be tortured at your hands. To do so is still wrong, unethical, dangerous, and medical malpractice. Bans should be total bans, and anyone who is unwilling to go that far is not an ally for queer people.
Now, let’s go to the false assertion of support for parental rights in deciding medical care for their children. According to NPR, the leading medical organizations in the United States support gender affirming care for trans youth. Several states, including Ron DeSantis’s Florida, have decided to ban that care.
Now, that makes it seem as the platform is lying. What the GOP means to say, is they support the rights of parents to make the medical decisions that the GOP agrees with. They do not care what the evidence says. They do not care what the vast majority of medical professionals say. They do not care what parents would choose for the children. That makes it incredibly clear to me that this section has nothing to do with medical choice and everything to do with a defense for the torture of LGBT youth under the guise of a practice we call “conversion therapy.”
My state of Georgia recently passed a ban on gender affirming care for youth. I attended a march protesting against that held in Savannah. I read the bill before I went. Now defenders of the bill, who may not have read it, might say that it simply makes sense to ban surgeries before a minor turns 18. But with the bill in Georgia, that argument is defeated by that very bill itself which includes a carve out for surgeries to be performed no minors and infants who are intersex so that doctors may “correct” “vague” genitalia and assign a sex to that child, a practice according to PBS, condemned by the UN and human rights organizations.
If we do not want irreversible surgeries on minors when they are below the age of an ability to legally consent on their own, why then is there not a ban on non-religious, non-medically necessary circumcision on infants and children? I read about the so-called medical benefits to the practice in a human sexuality class in college. Those who go on about the supposed benefits do this fun thing where they quote statistics of “this much higher percent risk” of whatever, while failing to note the actual percentages of such cases that occur either way. In the vast majority of cases, circumcision is a purely cosmetic, irreversible genital surgery on a child who, by the GOP’s own logic, is not old enough to make such a decision themselves.
And that’s the platform. Accepted by Donald Trump twice. The document that has driven anti-LGBT legislation and actions by the GOP ever since 2016. To stand against the rights of gay and trans people is to actively engage in homophobia and transphobia. That is the Republican Party.
And now it’s time to go back to that dog whistle. “Natural Law.”
“Natural Law”
The GOP Platform, as a refresher, says this:
“Only a Republican president will appoint judges who respect the rule of law expressed within the Constituion and Declaration of Independance, including the inalienable right to life and the laws of nature and nature’s God…”
Now, you may cry foul there with that 1) being a phrase lifted from the Declaration and 2) being a different thing than what I called it, “Natural Law.” So let’s briefly go over what laws of nature are and why they don’t apply here and we can therefore assume what is meant is so-called “natural law.”
According to the Internet Encyloppedia of Philosophy, Laws of Nature are physical or metaphysical laws the describe or prescribe factual truths about the universe, depending upon which school of thought your laws of nature theorist ascribes to. As far as I can tell, they are not moral claims. So, as that article says, Laws of Nature have to satisfy at least 5 conditions: they’re factual instead of logical truths, are true across space-time, have no proper names, must be universal or statistical in nature, and are conditional claims. So “if an atom has 8 protons, then it is an atom of oxygen” is a law of nature.
You can view those laws as descriptive or prescriptive depending on your view of blah blah, the important thing is that laws of nature are factual truths that must be true and cannot be broken. Legal laws and moral laws can be broken and therefore cannot be called “laws of nature” in the philosophical understanding of the term.
That was a long winded way to say, I believe that, at least so far as the platform of the Republican Party stands, the “laws of nature and nature’s God” refers to an understanding of Natural Law.
Natural law adherents tend to love one special man: St. Thomas Aquinas, namesake for a Catholic ministry at my alma mater I have particular distaste for. Natural law adherents believe in a thing “objective morality,” that, like laws of nature, there are actual moral facts that can be known. Natural law also attempts to assert itself as self-evident through an appeal to general human instincts to morality. Say, humans, in general, have a conscience across the planet and time, that have oriented us to find that, in general, murder of our fellow humans is a moral wrong that should therefore be legislated against. That generalized “instinct towards good,” as a natural law adherent might refer to it, is evidence in their minds of objective moral truth for which religion and philosophy exists to attempt to discover. This also means that natural law, the instinct towards, is reliant on our ability as human beings to apply reason. That is why we are held to morality that is not applicable to animals. A wolf which kills and eats a fox has done no moral wrong. A spider which kills and eats its young has done no moral wrong. A human who has killed and eaten its young has, we determine through our use of reason, committed a grave act. So natural law does not simply mean “occurring in nature.”
In a 1998 article for The Creighton Law Review, “Natural Law, Homosexual Conduct, and the Public Policy Exception,” Raymond B. Marcin says,
“Other conceptions of natural law theory have arisen in recent generation, but it was the fully developed theory of Saint Thomas Aquinas, explicated by his sixteenth and seventeenth century followers, that held sway in the era in which the early common law was being formulated. It is that theory that is rightly regarded as classic natural law jurisprudence and it was that theory that informed the early common law decisions declaring homosexual conduct to be contrary to the law of nature.”
He goes on to explain that to Aquinas, heterosexual marriage is a rational moral good because it leads to harmony, love, all of that, and for the well-being and raising of off-spring, a supposed instinct of all animals, including humans. Which, wrong, but let’s go with it. So affairs are wrong because potential children will be hurt by whatever hidden machinations or broken relationships result. Non-procreative sex is wrong because it presents some sort of harm to a potential child, which is also a wild claim because there is no potential child, but I guess “not being” is a harm. So then homosexual acts and marriage are wrong because they cannot create children. No, there’s no concept that certain groups of trans people in gay relationships might bear and raise children in the way he dreams of.
So I’m not going to argue the morals against natural law moralists. They’re homophobic. On the face of it. Many natural law adherents view objective morality as their brand of religion so it’s likely that adherents, in a model state, would create a theocracy, an inherently fascist goal. Regardless, if “laws of nature and nature’s God” refers to natural law as put forward by thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas, that is a very brief overview of what that means.
In his paper arguing against natural law theorists and their homophobic legal theories, Dr. Brent L. Pickett writes in “Natural Law and the Regulation of Sexuality: A Critique” for the Richmond Journal of Law and the Public Interest,
“Today, natural law theory offers the most common intellectual defense for the differential treatment of gays and lesbians. Leading natural law theorists, such as John Finnis, Robert George, and Richard Duncan, have eagerly inserted themselves into debates about law and sexuality. If their arguments are sound, it is permissible to treat gay and lesbians differentially as a matter of law. Natural law theorists defend a range of policies in this regard, from anti-sodomy laws, to allowing persons to discriminate against gays and lesbians in employment and housing, to a fierce opposition to same-sex unions or, in their watered-down version, civil unions. In general, natural law theorists believe that it is rational for the state to ‘discourage’ homosexuality through such policies.”
Now, surely, if that interpretation of natural law theorists is correct, and the GOP is advocating for a homophobic natural law in jurists, we would see that in other areas of the platform. For instance, they might want to overturn Obergefell and Windsor. They might view state discouragement of homosexuality as, perhaps, allowing and implicitly endorsing conversion therapy. They might oppose interpretations of law and new legislation that would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Which they did.
In a piece for The Federalist Society, Kody Cooper seems to argue, as far as I can tell, that an originalist reading of the Constitution would require and understanding of the Founder’s reliance on natural law, especially in regards to the Establishment Clause. He uses this argument to put forward his belief that the court should side with a Catholic adoption agency in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia in ruling unconstitutional a provision made by the city that contracts for adoption could not go to those who discriminate against protected classes including LGBT people. The Court ultimately did rule in favor of the petitioners, but in a more narrow way than Cooper seems to have wanted, and mostly based on a weird exemption policy the city was doing to their nondiscrimination bit in the first place. In other words, here’s a conservative using past prescribers of natural law to argue that religious organizations should have exemptions to nondiscrimination laws.
That argument that the natural law understanding that the Founders had is integral to originalism, it seems to me, is how natural law legal theory persists in the courts today, regardless of whether the justices themselves call their general legal theory to be a natural law legal theory. Substantial due process and implied fundamental rights come into issue with this. A lot of conservative jurors hate substantial due process in the first place, but they’ve come to this fun compromise position, some of them, that it’s okay in the cases of rights held in the nation’s tradition and history. Well then, if the right to marriage is a fundamental right, in the broad, it makes sense to say, well, according to that being a fundamental right, not allowing certain US adult citizens to participate in it because of their sex is a clear denial of their fundemental rights and dignity. But, if you interpret it strictly through the lens of historical natural law, being gay is icky, so no need to give them rights. States have a legitimate government interest in discriminating against gay people: marriage is a good because of children. Which we all know is a nonsense argument. Infertile couples are well within their rights to get married. No married couple is required to have children.
Let’s get back to that sentence though. After the mention of the laws of nature and nature’s god, it says “as the late Justice Antonin Scalia did.”
Well. What did Antonin Scalia do?
Antonin Scalia
So, given that this entire section is a fit thrown over Obergefell and praising Scalia as the mode to uphold, what did Scalia do?
In 1996, two years before I was born, Scalia dissented in Romer v. Evans, a case that overturned a Colorado effort that said explicitly queer people could never be covered by anti-discrimination laws. In his dissent, Scalia asserts that is very reasonable for people to hold a moral animus against homosexuality and that anti-discrimination laws that explicitly protect queer people is giving us “special rights” rather than saying that discrimination based on sexual orientation, like many other traits generally not chosen, is wrong.
Scalia dissented in 2003 in Lawrence v. Texas, the ruling that overturned sodomy laws. The case that made it so consenting gay adults can have intercourse legally across the country. I was 5 years old. He said he doesn’t really care about gay people, but it’s not bigotry to openly despise queer people and view being queer as a harmful, disgusting practice. He would have kept the law. Further, he pulled a fun little argument that has always been used to argue against advancements in queer rights: it cannot be discrimination, because straight people, who would not want to, are not allowed to engage in that activity. So obviously a ban on same-sex intimacy cannot discriminatory against gay people, because heterosexuals also aren’t allowed to have gay sex. So no group is being targeted. Which is nonsense. It is saying, hey, if you don’t want to be criminalized, why don’t just go and have straight sex? Why don’t you marry someone of the opposite sex? Hey, remember that whole spiel about the current platform and conversion therapy. I imagine Scalia was a fan. And isn’t the an anti-miscegenation defense on interracial marriage and relations? Hm. I read the dissent.
United States v. Windsor, 2013, the case that struck down the part of the Defense of Marriage Act that had the federal government unable to recognize same-sex marriages regardless of the marital acceptance or status in the state performed. If a marriage occurs, say, in New York, as it did, and the state acknowledges and accepts it, but the federal government treats it as if doesn’t exist, well. Scalia, of course, dissented. I was 15.
Obergefell v. Hodges, 2015, gay marriage legalized. I was 17. Social media flooded with people I knew in my small Kentucky town decrying the Biblical end times. Scalia, of course, dissented. He insulted the majority opinion as basically gobbledygook. He goes onto a high-minded rant about how marriage discrimination is historic, and therefore, obviously, a just and moral take. He said the decision questioned the legitimacy and power of the Court.
Well, how about in 2012, before Windsor and well after Lawrence? Well, according to Slate, he said, “If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder?” Which translates to: “If it’s wrong for me to be bigoted, then it’s wrong for us to not allow murder.” He acknowledges that it’s an absurd argument, but he doesn’t seem to get that it does not reflect well on him. He also seems to indicate that in 2012, when I was 14, he would still have ruled in favor of banning gay sex.
Justice Antonin Scalia was a homophobe. In a platform that advocates for discrimination against queer people, for revocation of our right to marriage, for the rights of other people to torture the queer out of us, it only makes sense to invoke Justice Scalia to indicate all their hearty woes and wishes to harm LGBT people across the country.
But, you might say, he’s dead. He did other things. And sure, the platform itself, expounded and approved by the party and its nominee, might be explicitly and implicity extremely queerphobic. And sure, maybe the three most recognizable names of the primary are rallying against us in homophobic and transphobic rhetoric and policy, but surely, as those original tweets said, we misunderstand conservatives. So I guess perhaps you aren’t represented properly by your presidential candidates, by your party platform, or by the judicial hero of the party. So who are the major names of the GOP, and where do they stand?
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