HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"I never believed this would happen in my lifetime when I wrote my first several TNR essays and then my book, Virtually Normal, and then the anthology and the hundreds and hundreds of talks and lectures and talk-shows and call-ins and blog-posts and articles in the 1990s and 2000s. I thought the book, at least, would be something I would have to leave behind me – secure in the knowledge that its arguments were, in fact, logically irrefutable, and would endure past my own death, at least somewhere. I never for a millisecond thought I would live to be married myself. Or that it would be possible for everyone, everyone in America. But it has come to pass. All of it. In one fell, final swoop. Know hope." - Andrew Sullivan, returning to his blog to spike the ball.

Andrew Sullivan To Stop Blogging

Citing recent health issues, his marriage, and the stresses brought on by 15-hour days over 15 years, Andrew Sullivan today told his readers that he will soon stop blogging.

I am saturated in digital life and I want to return to the actual world again. I’m a human being before I am a writer; and a writer before I am a blogger, and although it’s been a joy and a privilege to have helped pioneer a genuinely new form of writing, I yearn for other, older forms. I want to read again, slowly, carefully. I want to absorb a difficult book and walk around in my own thoughts with it for a while. I want to have an idea and let it slowly take shape, rather than be instantly blogged. I want to write long essays that can answer more deeply and subtly the many questions that the Dish years have presented to me. I want to write a book. [snip]

How do I say goodbye? How do I walk away from the best daily, hourly, readership a writer could ever have? It’s tough. In fact, it’s brutal. But I know you will understand. Because after all these years, I feel I have come to know you, even as you have come to see me, flaws and all. Some things are worth cherishing precisely because they are finite. Things cannot go on for ever. I learned this in my younger days: it isn’t how long you live that matters. What matters is what you do when you’re alive. And, man, is this place alive. When I write again, it will be for you, I hope – just in a different form. I need to decompress and get healthy for a while; but I won’t disappear as a writer. But this much I know: nothing will ever be like this again, which is why it has been so precious; and why it will always be a part of me, wherever I go; and why it is so hard to finish this sentence and publish this post.

Man, do I get this. Anybody who does live news blogging knows all too well the havoc this kind of work can wreak upon your personal life. Sure, there's great freedom to be able to work wherever you are and any time. But you also have to work wherever you are and at any time. I've blogged from trains, planes, buses, ferries, taxis, airports, "vacation" hotel rooms, and from the backseats of cars. I've angered and hurt close friends by leaving parties to update a breaking story or by turning down invitations because something is about to happen. (These days those invitations often close with a tart "if you can leave your computer.") I do love what I do, but yeah, I get you Andrew Sullivan. I've strongly disagreed with you on many occasions, but this, I get.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"If you run a public accommodation and use it to refuse service to a minority, you’re on the wrong side of the law (at least since the Civil Rights Movement). So why am I concerned by the latest case of a lesbian couple suing a family business that refused to rent out their property for a same-sex wedding? Simply because they got married elsewhere, with no problems, and because it makes sense to me – as someone interested in a civil society – not to press conflict on culture war issues when a less aggressive and counter-productive strategy is perfectly possible. Also because you deny the New York Post and the victimhood-right a chance to crow about gay suppression of religious freedom. We are winning the argument; we are winning the culture. There’s no point on forcing our opponents to lose face as well as losing the debate. Magnanimity, restraint and gradual progress. It’s gotten us a very long way already. We should trust this strategy to the end." - Andrew Sullivan, writing for his blog.

Sullivan Backs Matthew Shepard Truthers

"The question here is whether the crime was solely a function of the homophobic hatred of two strangers who beat up and brutally murdered someone merely because he was gay. That’s the official line of the Matthew Shepard Foundation and the Human Rights Campaign. Of course these motives could also have been involved. I’m arguing that meth can explain all of it, but may not be the only factor involved. I can’t read the meth-addled minds of the foul murderers. I can detect bullshit from the gay rights establishment. No one wants to confess a meth robbery gone haywire, and they may have thought the gay panic defense might work – and it didn’t. The Matthew Shepard Foundation and the Human Rights Campaign should not be smearing and demonizing good faith work by a courageous openly gay journalist. They need to apologize, and correct the record. At some point, their convenient untruth must stop." - Andrew Sullivan, responding to the uproar that followed after the Guardian this week published an essay in praise of the widely-debunked book which claims that Shepard's murder was not an anti-gay hate crime. Sullivan has long opposed hate crimes laws.

RELATED: Media Matters' Carlos Maza reports on the flap.

On October 25, The Guardian published an article by columnist Julie Bindel titled "The truth behind America's most famous gay-hate murder." The report focuses on the widely discredited 2013 book The Book of Matt, in which author Stephen Jimenez attempts to make the case that Matthew Shepard's brutal murder in 1998 was drug-related and not, as it is widely believed, motivated by anti-gay hate.

The book has been criticized for relying on shoddy sources and omitting key facts about the case, prompting the Matthew Shepard Foundation to condemn the book for being based on rumors and innuendo. Jimenez's book has been described as "fictional" by the lead detective in the case. People familiar with the murder - including one of the killer's appellate attorneys, Albany County Sheriff Dave O'Malley, and Albany County Undersheriff Robert Debree - have condemned the book as factually challenged.

But Bindel didn't include those criticisms in her piece. Instead, she portrayed Jimenez as a victim of gay activists' blind desire to hide the truth about Shepard's murder. It's unclear why Bindel failed to mention the numerous flaws with Jimenez's book. She has previously been criticized for claiming that she chose to be gay and for making inflammatory comments about the transgender community.

Excerpts from the book have been published on many anti-gay sites and hate groups leaders frequently cite it as evidence that hate crimes laws are unneeded and exist only to stifle Christianity.

Andrew Sullivan Writes About PrEP

"Here are your options: the blue pill or the red pill. Take the one-pill-a-day Truvada and never get HIV; take the often one-pill anti-retroviral pill, and you will never give someone HIV. To make doubly sure, you can always use a condom. Except almost every man who ever had sex hates condoms – and, unlike a pill you take every day, wearing a condom means making a decision in the middle of sexual desire and passion when your rational self is at its weakest. [snip] The discourse around this new breakthrough has long been about risks and expense and compliance and how to make sure men don’t get too promiscuous again. And all that has its place. But we fail to understand this moment if we do not understand the liberation that comes with ridding gay sex of the terror and stink of death, the liberation that comes with leaving a world where another man – before he can be anything to you – has to be put in a 'positive' or 'negative' box. Sex is about intimacy; it is about love; it is about relief. And for the first time since the early 1980s, we have a chance to rid it of fear. Why are we not rushing to embrace this? What is still preventing us from becoming collectively a force for love and friendship that is no longer limned with terror?" - Andrew Sullivan, writing for his site.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"One of the greatest bodily regrets of my life – apart from having my foreskin chopped off as an infant because it was allegedly too ample – is that I have no back hair. My brother? An ape. God knows why this aspect of manhood has loomed so large in my erotic imagination … but there we are. The earliest porn I ever saw I had to create myself. I drew sketches of the men I longed for in a scrapbook and they were all covered in fur. Maybe it’s because body hair is such a powerful visual indicator of testosterone and maleness; maybe I’m just a perv. Or maybe because when a man allows his body to be what it is, and doesn’t try to micromanage every inch of it, he’s inherently sexier than the manscaped, plucked and trussed twink version." - Andrew Sullivan, responding to Slate writer Mark Joseph Stern's embrace of his back hair.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"Walking around Williamsburg last night, I was also reminded of one of the unique charms of NYC in the summer: vast piles of rotting garbage piled on the sidewalks, with that sweet yet nauseating smell of decomposing groceries sitting in the humid fetid air, and rancid food juices oozing over the sticky sidewalks. With my windows open to counter the stuffiness, I could occasionally catch a whiff of the stench outside. People actually like living in this chaotic, fetid monument to incompetence? Beats me." - Andrew Sullivan, who must be a little happier today since the temperature is back in the mid-50s.

Andrew Sullivan On Sterling's Ban

"If Brendan Eich had made comments telling his friends to keep away from faggots, if he’d used any such terminology or had ever been shown to have discriminated against gays in the workplace or in his daily interactions, then his case would be very similar. But no such comments are in the public or private record, and there’s zero evidence that he ever acted in the workplace to harm gay employees. Au contraire, which is why gay Mozilla employees were divided about his ouster, with some supporting him. Sterling’s remarks, in contrast, reveal him to be a crude, foul bigot – which is why there is no division at all among African-Americans in the league – or beyond the league – about his fate." - Andrew Sullivan.

Homocons Co-Sign Statement Denouncing "Punishment" Of Mozilla's Former CEO

A coalition of well-known homocons and others today released a public statement on the resignation of former Mozilla CEO Brandon Eich. The statement is titled, "Freedom To Marry, Freedom To Dissent: Why We Must Have Both." An excerpt:

Is opposition to same-sex marriage by itself, expressed in a political campaign, beyond the pale of tolerable discourse in a free society? We cannot wish away the objections of Christian, Jewish, and Muslim faith traditions, or browbeat them into submission. Even in our constitutional system, persuasion is a minority’s first and best strategy. It has served us well and we should not be done with it.

Much of the rhetoric that emerged in the wake of the Eich incident showed a worrisome turn toward intolerance and puritanism among some supporters of gay equality—not in terms of formal legal sanction, to be sure, but in terms of abandonment of the core liberal values of debate and diversity.

Sustaining a liberal society demands a culture that welcomes robust debate, vigorous political advocacy, and a decent respect for differing opinions. People must be allowed to be wrong in order to continually test what is right. We should criticize opposing views, not punish or suppress them.

The freedom—not just legal but social—to express even very unpopular views is the engine that propelled the gay-rights movement from its birth against almost hopeless odds two generations ago. A culture of free speech created the social space for us to criticize and demolish the arguments against gay marriage and LGBT equality. For us and our advocates to turn against that culture now would be a betrayal of the movement’s deepest and most humane values.

The statement does not address the fact that all LGBT groups remained completely silent as the controversy unfolded and came to its conclusion. Nor does it note that the campaign against Eich was spawned by Mozilla staffers and developers themselves. Instead, the "blame" for Eich's resignation is laid squarely at the feet of phantom gay activists.

Homocon signers: Ken Mehlman, Peter Thiel, Rich Tafel, William Saletan, Jamie Kirchick, Jonathan Rauch, and former GOP Rep. Jim Kolbe. Among the others: Andrew Sullivan, John Corvino, David Blankenhorn, and Box Turtle Bulletin bloggers Jim Burroway, Timothy Kincaid, and Rob Tisinai.

Sullivan Doubles-Down On Mozilla Flap

Yesterday Andrew Sullivan acknowledged that the resignation of Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich was not the work of gay activists but came as the result of pressure from the "techie straight left." (Ben Shapiro appears to concede that point as well.) But Sullivan remains outraged.

A civil rights movement without toleration is not a civil rights movement; it is a cultural campaign to expunge and destroy its opponents. A moral movement without mercy is not moral; it is, when push comes to shove, cruel. For a decade and half, we have fought the battle for equal dignity for gay people with sincerity, openness, toleration and reason. It appears increasingly as if we will have to fight and fight again to prevent this precious and highly successful legacy from being hijacked by a righteous, absolutely certain, and often hateful mob. We are better than this. And we must not give in to it.

Sullivan says he's gotten hundreds of emails from readers who "overwhelmingly disagree" with him about the controversy.

Frank Bruni On The Mozilla Flap

"A leading supporter of gay marriage, [Andrew] Sullivan warned other supporters not to practice 'a fanaticism more like the religious right than anyone else.' I can’t get quite as worked up as he did. For one thing, prominent gay rights groups weren’t part of the Mozilla fray. For another, Mozilla isn’t the first company to make leadership decisions (or reconsiderations) with an eye toward the boss’s cultural mind-meld with the people below him or her. And if you believe that to deny a class of people the right to marry is to deem them less worthy, it’s indeed difficult to chalk up opposition to marriage equality as just another difference of opinion. But it’s vital to remember how very recently so many of equality’s promoters, like Obama and Clinton, have come around and how relatively new this conversation remains. [snip] Sullivan is right to raise concerns about the public flogging of someone like Eich. Such vilification won’t accelerate the timetable of victory, which is certain. And it doesn’t reflect well on the victors." - Frank Bruni, writing for the New York Times.

JMG Reader Email On Andrew Sullivan

Yesterday's quote from Andrew Sullivan generated a firestorm of scathing responses here on JMG - as posts about Sullivan typically do. At this writing there are over 500 comments on that post. This morning a JMG reader emailed to complain about the tone of many of those comments. Here is his message is full:

The reader comments for your latest Sullivan quote were truly disheartening to me. While they may not be representative of the entirety of your readership, they are plentiful, and nearly in unison. That's not a readership I'd like to be associated with. In fact, would be embarrassed to be associated with. I believe everyone is entitled not only to their opinion, but that they also have the right to express it. And while I also predominantly agree with Sullivan re: Brendan Eich- the issue is lost in the tone, and lack of critical thinking in your readership's comments. Disagreement I can deal with, ignorance is unacceptable to me.

In my opinion, worthless as it may be to you, you could do your blog, which I believe can be a great vehicle for elevating dialogue, and yourself as a thoughtful writer, a favor by addressing this with your readers. Maybe they could then parrot something more constructive to the dialogue. One further note.... The commenters stating that AS owes a debt to nameless individuals for his right to marry another man? Really? Do they read anything other than your blog and TMZ? The man wrote the book on the case for gay marriage. Literally.

In his final line, the reader raises an excellent point as some activists point to Andrew Sullivan's 1989 cover story for the New Republic as the first salvo of the marriage equality movement. (The reader is probably referring to Sullivan's 1995 book Virtually Normal, which also addressed marriage.) The degree to which that 1989 article set the stage was for what was to come is certainly arguable, but that it has a place in the history of this battle is not.

Now, about the tone of the comments in yesterday's post...

As longtime JMG readers know, I rarely moderate comments but I do occasionally issue pleas for relative restraint, especially regarding our own people, and I regularly restate our few rules here about acceptable comments. I've always believed that unmoderated comments have played a big part in the success of this blog even though several times in recent years, ill-considered comments by JMG readers have caused our enemies to claim I, personally, have made "terroristic threats" against Christians and churches.

Last year, for example, hate group leader Matt Barber called for my arrest by US Attorney General Eric Holder in a World Net Daily article. Laughable calls for the FBI to raid Chez JMG are a small price to pay for what I believe to be, in general, the most lively comments section in the gay blogosphere. And while nobody here has made threats against Andrew Sullivan, the above email reminds me to ask our newer readers hit that rules link.

There's only one banned word in this blog's Disqus filter, so call out the haters and work that potty mouth of yours. But do keep in mind that even though folks like Sullivan may infuriate you at times, people that want almost everything that you want are not always our enemies. Demands for ideological purity are killing the Republican Party and are no less a danger for the LGBT rights movement.

UPDATE: A couple of other thoughts in response to emailed reactions to this post....

The banned word I mentioned is the N-word. Call it white guilt, call it hypocritical to ban the N-word while allowing "faggot" - but that word just makes my skin crawl, even when I read it in thoughtful articles which denounce racism. Other readers point out that I regularly eviscerate homocons, who are "our own people," as I said above. But homocons don't "want almost everything that you want" and often actively work against the civil rights of their own people. No apologies there.

But Andrew Sullivan is no homocon - at least not today - even though we disagree with him on some issues and as I do regarding the Mozilla controversy, although (as I said yesterday) I fear that it may strengthen opposition to our movement among some who previously had wavering opinions on LGBT issues. An email from a reader who attacks the JMG community might not have been the best tool to address commenting civility in general, but I've long been troubled by readers who mock Andrew Sullivan's HIV+ status and dredge up an ancient serosorting story. Please don't do that.

My larger point is that there is room for people for have different ideas about how to get to the same place. Every social movement in history has been torn by infighting and ours is definitely no exception. So yes, call out our own and call them out strongly when you think they are wrong about tactics. We can do that without the same vitriol we direct at our actual enemies.

Signorile Vs Sullivan

Yesterday Andrew Sullivan denounced the campaign against now-former Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich, declaring that if the Eich controversy represents the gay rights movement today, he no longer wants any part of it. Michelangelo Signorile responded to Sullivan this morning in a post which contends that it wasn't Eich's donation to the Prop 8 campaign that did him in. An excerpt:

Eich only announced he was stepping down after it was revealed late Wednesday that he'd given money to Pat Buchanan's presidential campaign in 1992, and later to Ron Paul's campaign. Suddenly, in addition to defending a CEO who gave money to homophobic efforts, Mozilla would have to defend a CEO who supported Buchanan, a far right extremist and isolationist who's been accused of racist and anti-Semitic attacks, and who also was, rightly, driven off MSNBC -- though that took years longer to accomplish than the few weeks it took to purge Alec Baldwin.

It all just became too much for Mozilla to bear, and who knows what else may have been dug up on Eich? None of this is about government censorship. It's about a company based in Northern California which has many progressive employees, and which has a lot of progressives and young people among the user base of its Firefox browser, realizing its CEO's world view was completely out of touch with the company's --and America's -- values and vision for the future.

Hit the link and read Signorile's full response.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"The guy who had the gall to express his First Amendment rights and favor Prop 8 in California by donating $1,000 has just been scalped by some gay activists. Will he now be forced to walk through the streets in shame? Why not the stocks? The whole episode disgusts me – as it should disgust anyone interested in a tolerant and diverse society. If this is the gay rights movement today – hounding our opponents with a fanaticism more like the religious right than anyone else – then count me out. If we are about intimidating the free speech of others, we are no better than the anti-gay bullies who came before us." - Andrew Sullivan, writing tonight for his blog.

Andrew Sullivan On "Homosexual"

"I like the term 'homo'! I use it all the time – about myself and others, although I also often use 'fag' as well. The gay thought-police would be aghast, but the intent is what matters. Mine is mostly benign. Mostly. But mainly, one great legacy of the gay community has been our love of freedom, especially of speech. For centuries and decades, the right to free speech was our only truly secure constitutional right. We were always about enlarging what was sayable, rather than restricting it. Banning 'homosexual' also reeks of insecurity. We are not so tender we cannot handle a clinical, neutral term, or even a slur or the re-appropriation of a slur. 'Queer' was one such reclamation, although that’s much more pointed than 'homosexual' and certainly doesn’t reflect how I feel about my orientation. There’s nothing queer about being horny and falling in love or lust or getting married. They’re among the most common activities known to humankind. But I sure don’t mind others using it – and more and more heteros want to call themselves 'queer' too. But my main objection to getting rid of 'homosexual' is that we would lose a not-too-easily replaced non-euphemism." - Andrew Sullivan, writing in response to the New York Times article about the "vanishing" usage of "homosexual" by the media thanks to prodding by groups such as GLAAD.

Sullivan and I agree about "homosexual" but not quite for the same reasons (many of you here strongly disagreed with mine). He goes on to express blistering contempt for "LGBT."

God I hate that “word”. It describes no single person; it cannot be spoken easily; it reeks of bullshit. No one started using that word of their own accord as a way to describe herself. It was created by leftists who believe that all oppressed groups are primarilly defined by their oppression and that the very different lives and identities of gay men, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender are somehow all one. I know it’s an effort at inclusion. I appreciate the good intent. And if it had any wit or originality, instead of sounding like a town in Croatia, I could live with it. But it doesn’t.

I like LGBT - most of all for its writing utility as an umbrella term. But while I grok why it's done, I do sometimes feel that the ever-growing number of letters sometimes tacked onto the end of LGBT are worthy of the eye-rolling it receives from inside our community and mockery it gets from our enemies. Which takes me back to my appreciation for the catch-all "queer," which to me simply means anybody who isn't heterosexual.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"Robertson is a character in a reality show. He’s not a spokesman for A&E any more than some soul-sucking social x-ray from the Real Housewives series is a spokeswoman for Bravo. Is he being fired for being out of character? Nah. He’s being fired for staying in character – a character A&E have nurtured and promoted and benefited from. Turning around and demanding a Duck Dynasty star suddenly become the equivalent of a Rachel Maddow guest is preposterous and unfair.What Phil Robertson has given A&E is a dose of redneck reality. Why on earth would they fire him for giving some more?" - Andrew Sullivan, writing for his blog.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"It has been fascinating lately to watch Fox News go after the Pope for reiterating long-standing Catholic and Christian doctrine about the false god of materialism. By echoing Jesus’ insistence that you cannot know the kingdom of Heaven if you are bound up in wealth and possessions, the Pope drew charges of Marxism (which is anathema to Christians for the same reasons that unrestrained market capitalism is) and engaging in politics (from a channel that has long insisted that Christianity cannot and should not be relegated to the private sphere). [snip]

"When you absorb the constant racial undertones on Fox, and its constant worship of the god of money, when you absorb their long list of fears about the 'other', whether immigrants or gays or the poor, when you recall their glee at the torture of human beings, or their passion for the death penalty, you can’t help but wonder if they are not one of the most powerful forces against Christianity in our culture. They have competitors out there, but Roger Ailes is never satisfied with being Number Two, is he?" - Andrew Sullivan, writing for his blog.

Alec Baldwin Blames Firing On GLAAD And Andrew Sulllivan (Plus Himself)

"Martin Bashir's on the air, and he made his comment on the air! I dispute half the comment I made If I called him 'cocksucking maggot' or a 'cocksucking motherfucker'... 'faggot' is not the word that came out of my mouth. That I know. But you've got the fundamentalist wing of gay advocacy— Rich Ferraro and Andrew Sullivan—they're out there, they've got you. Rich Ferraro, this is probably one of his greatest triumphs. They killed my show. And I have to take some responsibility for that myself." - Alec Baldwin, speaking to Gothamist.

GLAAD Vice President Rich Ferraro emails us: "I consider GLAAD's campaigns to end the Boy Scout of America's ban on gay scouts, raise national visibility of the violence and inequality facing transgender people, and battling for marriage equality to be among my 'greatest triumphs.' But if a teacher, coach, local radio show host, or parent realizes that anti-LGBT slurs are outdated and unacceptable because of this Baldwin issue, I guess we'll call it a win. Alec Baldwin's team has not been open to turning this incident into an opportunity for public education and that's unfortunate."

Sullivan On Baldwin

"Just as Mel Gibson revealed his true feelings about Jews in his drunken rant, so Baldwin keeps revealing his own anti-gay bigotry. These outbursts reveal who he actually is. I should add that this is a free country and he has an inviolable right to use these words. But he has no right to pretend in any way to be a tolerant liberal when he is anything but, when it comes to gay people. So many liberals, of course, give him a pass when they would never dream of doing so with anyone who was conservative or Republican. Even after his bigotry was on full display, MSNBC hired him for a new show as a liberal pundit. For too many of them – especially gay establishment liberals, like the tools at GLAAD or the terminally naive like Hilary Rosen – there is a glaring double standard here. It seems to me that this double standard cannot stand any more. And this raging, violent bigot cannot be defended any longer." - Andrew Sullivan, writing for his blog.

HomoQuotable - Andrew Sullivan

"I loved New York City with a passion until I tried to live here. It’s been over a year and I am horribly home-sick. So we’re going to move back to DC next month. I miss my DC apartment (1500 square feet of a school classroom I got for a steal in 1991); I miss my friends, many of whom I’ve known for decades, and some of whom I bonded deeply with during the plague years of my 20s and 30s; I miss the relative calm; I miss the green; I miss the increasing vibrancy of the city – which somehow doesn’t make it harder to live in. I miss the oases of quiet and the energy of a new emerging city that is both a second Brooklyn and a global hub of media and politics. But I’ll be commuting to New York City for up to two weeks a month – as a visitor. So it’s more like finding a home I love while keeping New York close. I realize I’m married to Washington, and it’s best for me to think of New York as a mistress." - Andrew Sullivan, writing today on his blog.