Oh, those silly Republicans. Why are they so often the ones who are homophobic closet cases? The latest one joining the ranks of Mark Foley and Larry Craig is California state Sen. Roy Ashburn, who was arrested last week after leaving a gay bar, with an unidentified male in the passenger seat.
And why are they always white men? (Rhetorical question, no need to answer. Has to do with years of privilege and oppression.)
Earlier this week, Ashburn came out, ending years of speculation that the man who had consistently voted against gay rights — he claims it was what his constituents wanted — was himself gay.
Enough with the homophobia already. Stop blocking gay rights and come out of the closet. All of you.
Ashburn has reportedly earned a zero rating from Equality California, an advocacy group that works to gain civil rights for sexual minorities in the Golden State.
According to the group’s Web site, “Sen. Ashburn has consistently received a zero percent on Equality California’s Legislative Scorecards since 2004, with the exception of 2007, when he scored 10 percent.”
He voted against efforts to expand antidiscrimination laws and recognize out-of-state same-sex marriages and opposed a bill to establish a day to honor Harvey Milk. (That last one is disheartening. Milk was murdered, for heaven’s sake, and that movie was so good.)
At least the divorced father of four had the decency to own it.
This wasn’t the only gem this week in LGBT news. A few other highlights/lowlights, depending on your perspective, included the Catholic school that kicked out a lesbian couple’s children because of the parents’ sexual orientation, the backlash the Washington Post received for printing a photo of a same-sex couple after gay weddings started in the district, and the attorney general of Virginia stating that colleges in the commonwealth were precluded from banning discrimination based on sexual orientation.
And then we have U.S. Rep. Eric Massa (D-N.Y.), who resigned after it became public he was being investigated on sexual-harassment claims from a male staffer.
Massa denied allegations that he had sexually groped a staff member, acknowledging only that he groped a male staffer but that it wasn’t sexual.
“Not only did I grope him, I tickled him until he couldn’t breathe and four guys jumped on top of me,” Massa told Fox’s Glenn Beck on Tuesday.
Apparently, not all parties felt the same way.