Her Sexual Orientation Above All

Andrew Sullivan cites some homophobes (Focus on the Family, American Family Association, Americans for Truth - what an assembly of oxymoronic names!) as the reason that Elana Kagan should come out - that is, if she is a lesbian.

Her Sexual Orientation Above All

The days are past when this could be brushed under the rug. Let's have an honest debate, can we? The way to counter prejudice is through truth - not avoidance. For the right to oppose Kagan merely because she is gay - if she is - would be one more step toward their self-destruction. By staying mum, the Obamites may be playing yet another rope-a-dope. I just cannot see how in 2010, ambiguity is an option. I mean: who would claim that John Roberts' heterosexuality is somehow private? It is a demonstrably reported fact that there would now be no Protestants on the court - just Catholics and Jews. Why is this not an invasion of privacy, if asking someone about their sexual orientation is?

But why should Elana Kagan (or anyone else for that matter) come out because of the lies and twisted sexual identities of a bunch of right-wing homophobes?

Elana Kagan's sexual orientation (or her religion) are not "above all." I believe that they are not relevant to whether she would be a good Supreme Court justice. I simply do not like Sullivan's attitude that everything about one's identity must be politicized - one's sexual orientation, one's religion.

I would have thought that a real conservative, which is what Sullivan claims to be, would be willing to accept some realm of privacy in an individual's life. He reminds me of the people I used to know when I was a student at UC Santa Cruz in the late 1970s - if you weren't sure what your sexual orientation was (especially if that uncertainty meant that you were going out with both men and women), you were condemned as giving in to the heterosexist patriarchy. Remember - the personal is political? Remember - feminism is the theory, lesbianism is the practice? Sullivan, in my opinion, is acting all too much like the self-righteous, holier-than-thou, anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist pseudo-radicals of the 1970s. In short, not anything like the conservative he claims to be.

And yes, my third post of the day on Andrew Sullivan. Definitely becoming an obsession.