LET ME BEGIN with a simple provocation: queer folks—every last one of us—should vote to re-elect President Barack Hussein Obama in 2012. From an electoral standpoint, there’s really no choice for GLBT people this or any other November—that is, if you define “choice” as having more than one viable option. I do not say this with any hint of glee or gratitude. The sad reality of our national politics is that there are only two governing parties for any of us to choose from, and only one of them, the Democratic Party, has shown any inclination, albeit belatedly and often grudgingly, to support policies that advance GLBT rights and equality, while the Republican agenda has typically been to restrict or pre-empt these goals.
Of course, the same thing can be said of other marginalized groups—African-Americans, recent immigrants, women, the poor, and so on. This amounts to a tragic irony at work in our so-called democracy. Taken together, these marginalized groups constitute a significant majority of the American population. (At 50.8 percent, women actually constitute a majority all their own, while all racial and ethnic minorities recently topped fifty percent of live births.) And yet, our potential strength, in terms of numbers, has not translated into real power in the form of political representation. Many of us don’t vote; some of us can’t or are denied the right to vote; and too often, when we do vote, our votes are either discounted in some way or taken for granted.
Then there are those who routinely vote against our collective interests, clinging to the dangerous delusion that the Republican Party, in its current state, has the will or the capacity to be the “big tent” that it pretends to be every election cycle. For our community, the Log Cabin Republicans are at least as detrimental as the closet, trading a space of corrosive invisibility for one of collusive inequality. The truth is that the modern “Party of Lincoln”—a grotesque mutation of its imperfect 19th-century antecedent—will never set us free. And there’s absolutely no evidence to suggest that Mitt Romney and the current GOP leadership will do anything at all to change this situation. Insofar as our lives, loves, and aspirations are concerned, Republicans stand firmly on the wrong side of history. So when it comes to party politics, alas, we have little choice but to cast our lot with the Democrats.*
As a candidate, Barack Obama promised us lot—which was not especially noteworthy in itself. In recent elections there have been a number of candidates—including both Bill and Hillary Clinton—who have talked a similarly good campaign game. What’s different about Obama is that, as president, he has delivered on a surprising number of these promises. I often joke, rather sharply, that Bill Clinton loved us and left us, while Barack Obama wanted to date a little while longer before making a commitment. (I’d like to think Hillary would be more like Barack than Bill, perhaps even better than both, and I hope she’ll get the chance to prove that.) When it comes to politics and public policy, queer folks have long been accustomed to being thrown under the bus. But unlike his predecessors, President Obama has finally invited us along for the ride. I wouldn’t go so far as Andrew Sullivan (in Newsweek) and call him “America’s first gay president,” but it’s clear now that Barack Obama is far more often with us than against us. Regardless of whether this has more to do with politics or principles—and the jury is still out—this is certainly some change we can believe in. The record of accomplishment speaks for itself. For starters, President Obama has signed into law two significant pieces of pro-GLBT civil rights legislation: the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr., Hate Crimes Prevention Act in 2009, and the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Repeal Act in 2010. Although he has yet to spend any serious political capital on them, he has also expressed strong support for the passage of a trans-inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) and the Domestic Partners Benefits and Obligations Act, as well as the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which was signed into law by President Clinton in 1996. Admittedly, much of the pro-gay work of the Obama Administration has occurred somewhat under the radar, at the department and agency level. Among these changes, the President has directed the Department of Health and Human Services to require all hospitals receiving Medicare and Medicaid funds to grant visitation and medical decision-making rights to GLBT patients and their families; empowered the Department of Justice to stop defending DOMA in federal courts; and instructed the Office of Personnel Management to include gender identity in its non-discrimination policy. With a record level of openly GLBT appointments, the Administration has lifted the discriminatory international travel ban on people with HIV; extended federal benefits to GLBT employees, same-sex couples, and their families; hosted the first White House Conference on Bullying Prevention; extended the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990), the Family and Medical Leave Act (1993), and the Violence Against Women Act (1994) to include GLBT people; initiated the first-ever national study of anti-GLBT housing discrimination; created the National Resource Center for GLBT elders; and developed the first comprehensive strategic plan to prevent and end homelessness, including among GLBT youth. In the realm of symbolism, which is also very important, the President recorded his own “It Gets Better” video, and he frequently refers to GLBT people in a favorable light in speeches and interviews. And, of course, he recently embraced same-sex marriage—dramatically, after slowly “evolving” on the issue. Marriage equality is one of the few of our issues on which he had shown a frustrating lack of leadership. Of course, we can still debate the pace and scope of the President’s policies, but only a cynic or fool could deny that Obama is the most pro-GLBT president in American history. In addition to supporting Obama’s re-election this fall, we should also dedicate our time and treasure to supporting other candidates who are running for office at the local, state, and national levels, especially GLBT candidates (for a good listing, see www.victoryfund.org), as well as non-GLBT candidates, such as Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who stand with us on key issues and who will help win Democratic majorities in the Senate and the House. And we should work as hard as we can to defeat upcoming anti-GLBT ballot initiatives in states like Washington, Minnesota, Maryland, and Maine. Election outcomes have real-life consequences for all of us. But politics is not just about elections. One of the key reasons that President Obama has moved so far and so fast to embrace a broad range of pro-GLBT positions is that he’s had a highly energized and well-resourced movement pushing him at every turn. As we know from American history, no American president has embraced significant advances in civil rights without persistent pressure and criticism from the people. The same is true for Barack Obama. The difference is that Obama is the first president who owes his very political livelihood to a social movement—the black freedom struggle—that has long fought to open up the halls of power and privilege to those who have been historically excluded from them. An eager student of the American past, President Obama must understand that he will be judged very harshly—far more harshly than his predecessors, because he should know better—if he fails to stand on the right side of history when it comes to the civil rights of all American citizens. And that is why GLBT people need to broaden our political imagination at this moment in history. We can begin by recognizing that our liberation, to use a dusty old phrase, will never come in the form of mainstream politicians (even GLBT ones) or incremental policies, however “progressive.” Notwithstanding the real legal and legislative progress that we’ve made in recent decades, we still have to contend with enduring forms of stigma—the deeply rooted prejudices that continue to animate a range of discriminatory practices against those who challenge society’s predominant norms of sexuality and gender, race and class. Take, for instance, the phenomenon of bullying. Some kids are bullied not simply because they’re perceived as “gay”—in fact, many of them have not yet arrived at or acted on their sexuality—but because they’re seen as “abnormal,” unable or unwilling to conform to the constraints of society’s gender binarism. Such nonconformity triggers a toxic mix of anxiety, discomfort, and hostility that often overpowers the norms of “tolerance” that might be official policy at many institutions. Equal rights are far less meaningful if they do not translate into equal lives. At this moment in history, we are experiencing a paradox of progress, where certain advances in gay rights do not always or necessarily correspond to a genuine lived equality for all GLBT people. For instance, even as we pour our riches into campaigns for marriage equality, a troubling number of gay people, young and old, are living on the streets in poverty and isolation. As we repeal the discriminatory ban on gays and lesbians in the military, too many from our community continue to be casualties in other wars with drug addiction and mental illness. As we celebrate the passage of a federal hate crimes law, we witness the increase in bullying in schools across the country. While celebrities record “It Gets Better” videos, queer youth are taking their own lives at alarming rates, because they see no hope for a better day. Even as some of us can afford the very best health care and retroviral medication, HIV rates are rising in America’s prisons and among communities of color. Even as President Obama appoints an unprecedented number of openly GLBT officials—what I call “gays in high places”—millions of Americans can be fired or denied housing because of their sexuality and gender presentation. Even as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton proclaims “gay rights are human rights,” gay people are routinely subjected to harassment, torture, imprisonment, and execution across the globe. Given these realities—this dangerous dance between progress and prejudice, success and stigma, victories and violence—it is time for us to re-imagine our politics. In doing so, we must not only devote ourselves to electing the best politicians to represent us (a means rather than an end), but also deepen our analysis of the stigmas and institutions that continue to oppress us, dedicate ourselves to forging new bonds of solidarity and struggle with other similarly oppressed people, and dream much bigger dreams. As queer people, our aspirations must never end with mere tolerance, or even equal rights. At its best, our movement sought liberation, nothing more—and certainly nothing less! Now is the time to embrace our radical roots. If we manage to do this, we won’t need Democrats or Republicans or even Barack Obama. We will be able, at last, to free one another. * That said, every American citizen is of course free to choose not to vote, or to vote for an unelectable third party candidate, or to write in a candidate. As someone who has exercised his right to the second and third of these options—though never the first—I have long since abandoned the silly and unsubstantiated notion that there is “no difference” between Democrats and Republicans, especially when it comes to civil rights. In fact, the two parties’ stands on civil rights may well be the biggest difference between them. Timothy Patrick McCarthy is a lecturer on history, literature, and public policy at Harvard University. His forthcoming book, Stonewall’s Children: A Modern Story of Liberation, Loss, and Love, will be published by the New Press next year.
