Identity politics as therapy

[kweerwolf]

POLITICS AS THERAPY. That’s how Rich Tafel, the former head of Log Cabin Republicans, incisively described the focus of many left-liberal political activists and organizations that presume to speak for gay men and women (or lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgendered persons, in their politically correct mouthful).

The latest self-inflicted wound suffered by these practitioners of identity politics involves a faculty senate-style controversy around a decision made by Democratic National Committee Chair Howard Dean. ("Faculty senate politics," as in the decibel level of debate being so high, because the stakes are so low.)

Dean has apparently dissed some members of our gay faculty senate with his reorganization of the DNC’s political outreach operation, to focus less on identity groups and more on actual individual voters and state political party organizations.

I KNOW A little about such efforts, because I was press secretary at the DNC in the mid-1980s when we did something similar.

http://www.southernvoice.com/2006/2-17/view/columns/retool.cfm

[applegrove]

1. Right. When we "bond" it is some sort of illness. As opposed to

people for-going prayer to sign the anti-gay petition on the tables along the sides of the MEGA-church.

Right......

[xchrom]

2. i'll tell you what this reminds me of

a calculated attempt to divide the lgbtq voters.

there really are those among us{in the lgbtq community} -- you hear them on du -- who simply think that lgbtq vote has too many people who aren't ''right''.

that by their very presense makes the dems look fringe.

howard dean is going to have to see that in their{the democratic party} outreach to the ''massess'' -- going after every voter -- that the party also reaches out to the lgbtq community.

it's going to be hard to do that -- you simply decide that no one responds to identity politics -- and play the great field.

i contend that we reach out to each other better when we have a safe room in the big house.

[kweerwolf]

3. Agree with you entirely, xchrom

Did you ever notice that the people who accuse others of playing "identity politics" are ones whose "identities" are already constitutionally protected?

Damn right my identity plays a major role in who I vote for ... and who I vote against. And if I hear any more DINOs who suggested we should fall on our swords for "the good of the party," my response will be: "Sure ... but you first, asshole!"

[Democrats_win]

4. "Identity" is a terrible word here. Used by ex-gay programs.

"Gender Identity Disorder" has an obvious meaning, but it's used by parents to force their gay kids into institutions that try to make them straight. Only problem is, gay kids don't have Gender Identity Disorder! They're gay!

The American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses over 25 years ago. But Gender Identity Disorder remains an approved diagnosis.

Maybe im being overly PC, but given that a former Log Cablican said this, he has his own identity problems.

[Lt. Governor 2B]

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[Brian_Expat]

6. Silly excuses from a "party man"

One who was a DNC press guy in the 1980s and likely responsible for the electoral strategy which delivered landslide victories to Jimmy Carter in 1980, Walter Mondale in 1984 and Michael Dukakis in 1988.

[dsc]

7. On what planet do you think press guys run campaigns?

It should be noted that Carter kept his sucessful team from 76. Mondale used national talent and Dukakis kept the team which ran his sucessful primary campaign except his top aid who had distributed Biden's plagerized speech and then lied about it.