| Andrew Sullivan wrote a fairly scathing piece last night mocking Obama's upcoming speech this weekend to the Human Rights Campaign Dinner, echoing the same tired criticism that HRC has failed to accomplish anything. Usually, the criticism refers to the federal level. In his case, it's "in the twenty years I've been observing them", but I've heard "since they were founded in 1980". Putting aside that HRC has dumped lots of resources into successful state campaigns and helped elect pro-LGBT candidates up and down the ballot, let's take a closer look at this.
When elections happen that change control of the White House or Congress, advocates always say things like "the Supreme Court is at stake!" or "the future of our environment hinges on it!" Then, when a major electoral victory occurs, like George W. Bush winning the White House, advocates sorrowfully say things like "well, health care reform is off the table for the next four years". And generally, they're right.
HRC is seemingly the only group excluded from this. Back in 2000, I heard "well, we're definitely going nowhere on LGBT rights under Bush" and then, eight years later, "HRC has accomplished nothing!!" from the exact same people. It doesn't add up.
I have my own share of problems with HRC, and I think they've made mistakes in the past, but I don't get why some of my friends in the LGBT rights movement think it's okay to give a free pass to environmental/pro-choice/health care advocates/others when Republicans are in charge... yet repeat the line that HRC has failed to accomplish anything over the same time period. Take 2001-2007. What exactly has ANY progressive issue movement legislatively accomplished, excluding successfully playing defense (e.g. Social Security privatization) in six years of conservative Republican control of Congress and a conservative Republican in the White House? I haven't seen anything major. I don't think I should be surprised, either.
And it's not just during 2001-2007 that were the dark ages for progressive issue movement. Health care advocates "failed" in 1993-94. The environmental lobby "failed" to pass Kyoto out of the Senate in the late 90s. Yet I haven't seen anything like the vitriol that is spewed at HRC, year in and year out, without regard to the political dynamics around their existence. It's not like HRC was handed a pro-LGBT Congress and President and hundreds of millions for the last 29 years and they managed to fumble the ball, so stop talking like that's what happened.
In fact, only for two years and eight months of its existence since 1980 has there been a Democratic trifecta, and only eight months of that I would actually consider a pro-LGBT Congress- e.g., 2009. Considering that some 90%+ of Congressional Republicans routinely vote against LGBT rights, and that we've had homophobes like Reagan and Bush inhabiting the White House, it is kind of pretty important that Democrats control the branches of government for LGBT rights to advance, so it's not exactly what I would call a fair playing field for arguing HRC has squandered millions or whatever.
OK, some would say, what about today? We're nine months into a new administration and have zero to show for it. Sure. But there are a zillion other issues on the agenda that are of more important to most Americans and the Dem leadership- and frankly, there probably should be. HRC doesn't have any weapons in its arsenal to make more Americans care about hate crimes than they do about getting laid off, or health insurance. For many Americans, LGBT rights will- like medical marijuana, or Electoral College reform- always be just below whether their recycling gets picked up once or twice per week on the list of issues they care about. And this is HRC's fault how? And if they do get blame, why don't I hear other groups get the same blame?
If HRC is to blame for Republican control of the House that prevented any LGBT rights legislation from coming to the floor, or an anti-LGBT President being elected multiple times, then we are all accountable for allowing that situation to occur. It's not like HRC was the only player on our team in elections progressives have lost. Stop pointing fingers at HRC and look around.
I am all for accountability. But sometimes I think advocates look for someone/something to blame when there really is no one actor at fault (or themselves), so they point to the biggest player with the biggest name recognition and the most amount of money and shout "they screwed up!" Some in the netroots are currently doing this with Health Care for America Now. It accomplishes exactly nothing. If there is a major strategic mistake when an organization had the opportunity, then say so. Otherwise, stop the "they have failed to accomplish" without including most of the progressive movement in that, and without taking political dynamics into account. |
