Republicans embracing gay lifestyle at RNC?

[Papias]

For the first time in history, the Republican leaders have asked an openly gay man (Peter Theil) to urge Republicans at the RNC to embrace gay rights.

The tech billionaire will declare to the Republican National Convention that he is proud to be gay, a source familiar with Thiel's remarks told CNN. He'll be the first speaker in the party's history to do so at an RNC.
He plans to warn the party against fighting unnecessary culture wars, the source said, and tell Republicans to let people use whichever bathroom they want to use.​

More here: http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-...ch-entrepreneur-peter-thiel-speak-rnc-n614191

Thoughts?

Papias

 

[SkyWriting]

For the first time in history, the Republican leaders have asked an openly gay man (Peter Theil) to urge Republicans at the RNC to embrace gay rights.

The tech billionaire will declare to the Republican National Convention that he is proud to be gay, a source familiar with Thiel's remarks told CNN. He'll be the first speaker in the party's history to do so at an RNC.
He plans to warn the party against fighting unnecessary culture wars, the source said, and tell Republicans to let people use whichever bathroom they want to use.​

More here: http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-...ch-entrepreneur-peter-thiel-speak-rnc-n614191

Thoughts?

Papias

Likely we've already had at least one gay president.
A handful are rumored.

 

[High Fidelity]

If anything this will likely further distance Republican politicians from the conservative religious voters they likely rely on heavily in areas.

Maybe the party is changing brand.

 

[crjmurray]

I thought this thread was going to be about all the Craigslist casual encounters ads that have popped up there.

 

[Paulos23]

It is trying to put lipstick on a pig.

If they where serous they would change their platform on LGBT issues.

 

[Goonie]

For the first time in history, the Republican leaders have asked an openly gay man (Peter Theil) to urge Republicans at the RNC to embrace gay rights.

The tech billionaire will declare to the Republican National Convention that he is proud to be gay, a source familiar with Thiel's remarks told CNN. He'll be the first speaker in the party's history to do so at an RNC.
He plans to warn the party against fighting unnecessary culture wars, the source said, and tell Republicans to let people use whichever bathroom they want to use.​

More here: http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-...ch-entrepreneur-peter-thiel-speak-rnc-n614191

Thoughts?

Papias

Interesting article on Peter Thiel

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jul/21/peter-thiel-republican-convention-speech
Looking to save capitalism from democracy.

 

[Sultan Of Swing]

Likely we've already had at least one gay president.

Who?

 

[cow451]

Who?

You just can't help yourself. You just had to take the bait.

 

[Sultan Of Swing]

You just can't help yourself. You just had to take the bait.

I can't help it.

 

[The Cadet]

Dan Savage wrote an excellent article, not exactly about Thiel per se, but more about the Log Cabin Republicans and their ilk. I can't link it here; it's pretty NSFW, but the gist of it is pretty straightforward:

Gay Republicans are praised for trying to "change their party from within" and then...

Nothing changes. Their party never changes. All the GOP candidates for president take the same old bigoted positions. It never gets any better. But no one who writes up the efforts of Log Cabin Republicans to change their party ever thinks to examine the results. There's never an accountability moment for the [gay] wing of the "party of personal responsibility."

[...]

Whatever the Log Cabin Republicans think they're doing "inside" the Republican Party, it isn't working, it has never worked, and they need to stop pretending it'll ever work. Today's Republican Party, as Andy Towle pointed out, is an anti-LGBT hate group. Period. And the sanity and/or motives of any queer person who belongs to today's GOP are suspect—same goes for yesterday's GOP and most likely tomorrow's GOP.
​

The fact is that Thiel is wasting his time. Anyone - anyone! - who is homosexual and willing to vote republican is clearly utterly uninterested in their own rights. They are going to vote republican no matter how virulently anti-gay the party becomes. So why bother catering to them? Why bother taking even the slightest step in the direction of gay rights, when anyone who cared about their own rights is voting democrat, and it can still be used as a wedge issue for hateful, spiteful bigots who find Brian Fischer reasonable.

 

[Sultan Of Swing]

Dan Savage wrote an excellent article, not exactly about Thiel per se, but more about the Log Cabin Republicans and their ilk. I can't link it here; it's pretty NSFW, but the gist of it is pretty straightforward:

Gay Republicans are praised for trying to "change their party from within" and then...

Nothing changes. Their party never changes. All the GOP candidates for president take the same old bigoted positions. It never gets any better. But no one who writes up the efforts of Log Cabin Republicans to change their party ever thinks to examine the results. There's never an accountability moment for the [gay] wing of the "party of personal responsibility."

[...]

Whatever the Log Cabin Republicans think they're doing "inside" the Republican Party, it isn't working, it has never worked, and they need to stop pretending it'll ever work. Today's Republican Party, as Andy Towle pointed out, is an anti-LGBT hate group. Period. And the sanity and/or motives of any queer person who belongs to today's GOP are suspect—same goes for yesterday's GOP and most likely tomorrow's GOP.
​

The fact is that Thiel is wasting his time. Anyone - anyone! - who is homosexual and willing to vote republican is clearly utterly uninterested in their own rights. They are going to vote republican no matter how virulently anti-gay the party becomes. So why bother catering to them? Why bother taking even the slightest step in the direction of gay rights, when anyone who cared about their own rights is voting democrat, and it can still be used as a wedge issue for hateful, spiteful bigots who find Brian Fischer reasonable.

Nothing changes... and yet here for the first time in history, an openly gay man Peter Theil is speaking at the Republican convention urging them to embrace gay rights?

And he's been invited by the party leaders, Trump, etc., who by inviting him I suspect also want their party membership to move on.

How is that 'never changing'?

 

[ThatRobGuy]

If anything this will likely further distance Republican politicians from the conservative religious voters they likely rely on heavily in areas.

That's a separation that's needed to happen for a while...

The strategy of appealing to far-right evangelicals made sense in the 80's when nearly 60% of the US population identified as evangelical.

Now that number is down just under 40% and that group, alone, can no longer single-handedly carry an election for the GOP.

I said last election cycle that, even if it means you lose the next election cycle or two, it's a separation that needs to happen in the interest of longevity of the party. It makes zero sense to alienate nearly 60% of the population in order to pander to a demographic that's shrinking by the year.

Much like the Democrats saw the strategic need to separate themselves from the segregationist movement, the Republicans have a need to separate themselves from the "moral majority". To be clear, I'm not implying that the religious right are the same as the segregationists...I'm merely pointing out that the GOP is currently bound to an ideology that's appealing to less and less of the population as years go by.

If the GOP strategists were smart (and I have my doubts based on the decisions they've made in the last 15 years), they'd "rip off the band-aid" so to speak (even though it'll sting for a short while), and start re-branding themselves to be more like what the currently Libertarian ticket is (The Johnson/Weld style of libertarianism...not the full blown anarchism that some in the libertarian party advocate)

If the Republican Party were this:

...they'd stop losing ground to the democrats.

 

[The Cadet]

Nothing changes... and yet here for the first time in history, an openly gay man Peter Theil is speaking at the Republican convention urging them to embrace gay rights?

He's a hypocrite.

I'm sorry, there's really no nice way to put this. Given the republican party platform of 2016, the republican party is an anti-gay hate group. It's pretty much all there. Gays shouldn't be parents. Gays shouldn't be allowed to get married. Parents should be able to subject their children to therapies that don't work and are demonstrably harmful in order to try to change them into "not gay".

That is the party platform.

Now I ask you. What is Peter Thiel doing there? No, really. What, exactly, does he hope to accomplish? Stand up for gay rights? Yeah, given the party platform, that's real likely. No, I'll tell you why he's there. He's there so that the republicans can trot out their token gay, and say, "See, we're not homophobes, this guy likes us! Never mind the entire party platform bashing homosexuals, you should vote republican, they're not homophobes at all!"

And he's been invited by the party leaders, Trump, etc., who by inviting him I suspect also want their party membership to move on.

How is that 'never changing'?

What effect do you think Peter Thiel is going to have?

No, really. What effect?

Is he going to change the party platform?
Is he going to demand that the GOP stop catering exclusively to hateful bigots like Brian Fischer?
Is he going to stand up for gay rights?

No.

What Peter Thiel is going to do is stand up, as a gay man, and essentially say, "The republican party is against equal rights for people like me. However, you should vote for them anyways."

So you tell me. What's changed? I can think of one thing: the Republican party has seen the value in a good Uncle Tom. No less, no more. They've figured out that the "gay issue" isn't going away, so it'd be best if they could find at least one gay person who supported them to blunt the impact of their rank bigotry. But the fact is that Peter Thiel, like the Log Cabin Republicans, like GOPride, and like every other homosexual who votes republican, is willing to put party affiliation or some vague policy plan above his own well-being and his own rights. And not just his own, but the rights of everyone else like him.

I'd like to hope that as a result of this, Peter Thiel has trouble finding a lover.

 

[Gene2memE]

Can someone explain to me please, what the 'Gay Lifestyle' is?

I've got gay friends, I've got gay acquaintances, I've got (at least) one gay relative, I've lived in a share house with four lesbians, some of my work colleagues are gay, as are a couple of the students I train martial arts with.

Apart from same-sex attraction, nowhere in my experience do any of them have a 'lifestyle' that is noticeably distinct from the rest of society.

 

[USincognito]

I thought this thread was going to be about all the Craigslist casual encounters ads that have popped up there.

Me too. Heh.

 

[HannahT]

Now I ask you. What is Peter Thiel doing there? No, really. What, exactly, does he hope to accomplish? Stand up for gay rights? Yeah, given the party platform, that's real likely. No, I'll tell you why he's there. He's there so that the republicans can trot out their token gay, and say, "See, we're not homophobes, this guy likes us! Never mind the entire party platform bashing homosexuals, you should vote republican, they're not homophobes at all!"

Platforms change, and so do viewpoints. Hillary not to long ago was - what you call it a homophobe too. Obama as well.

There are GOP - just like DEMS - that don't all think alike. I realize that goes against the current group think mentality, but it is none the less true.

Trump - who is the head of the ticket at this point - does not view homosexuality they way you are speaking of it. He also doesn't care what bathroom a Trans person uses either. People do speak in opposition to their own parties at times, and YEP it happens also on both sides.

 

[tulc]

Oh yeah, it's totally not a homophobic platform:
http://www.washingtonblade.com/2016/07/18/gop-delegates-ratify-platform-support-anti-lgbt-language/

LGBT advocates blasted the platform upon its ratification by delegates. The Log Cabin Republicans, which had previously dubbed the platform the most anti-LGBT in the party’s 162-year history, placed a full-page ad Monday in USA Today with a message denouncing the document.

“LOSERS! MORONS! SAD! No, these aren’t tweets from Donald Trump,” the ad says. “This is what common-sense conservatives are saying about the most anti-LGBT platform the Republican Party has ever had. Out of touch, out of line, and out of step with 61% of young Republicans who favor same-sex marriage.””

and those are members of the Republican Party.
tulc(needs more coffee)

 

[Frisky Wren]

Peter Thiel is the Co-Founder of PayPal. Ring any bells? He didn't impress the LGBT community apparently. Article

The homophobe sticker is a lie. It's thrown at Christians for holding to their religious values. A community that demands tolerance and civil rights label those who are Christian homophobes because those labelers are intolerant of Christains exercising their religious civil rights. '

The phobe is the one that labels Christians with a bigoted pejorative because of the hate that bigot has for Christians and for their faith.

Christians aren't afraid of gays. That's what phobia indicates. homosexual phobia.
Christians believe homosexuals and all sinners should repent as God calls them to do.
That's not fear of gays. That's asking gays to fear Hell if they don't repent.And calls them to seek the embrace of Jesus so they see Heaven instead.

 

[rambot]

What party supported that lady who didn't want to let those gay and lesbian folks get married in that state that time? I can recall voices of condemnation for her move from all parties I just can't remember which Republicans denounced the move.

L'il help?

 

[TLK Valentine]

Who?

Noting is certain, but Buchanan is the odds-on favorite.