To understand the reason for this headline, all you have to do is listen to why LGBTQ+ Log Cabin Republicans say they support Donald Trump. Their main reason for supporting the Republican presidential candidate is that they identify as conservative and believe the candidate represents their conservative values. They feel that Republican values reflect their own more closely than Democratic ones, and that Trump embodies those conservative values.
They can’t understand why most of the LGBTQ+ community believes it’s OK to be conservative or a Republican, yet still condemns them. It’s your choice to hold conservative views, but that choice crosses the line when your actions harm all of us — especially when you support someone who could very well take away your marriage rights. That is the ultimate form of self-hate: putting Trump ahead of your spouse.
The reason you are such a small minority within our community is that most of us take pride in our marriages and our partners. Your “conservative views,” which you say align with the Republican Party, are why you deserve pity. That party sees you as second-class citizens. They support anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, like banning LGBTQ+ books and “Don’t Say Gay” laws, which would prevent LGBTQ+ teachers from even mentioning their marriages — something not imposed on heterosexual teachers. They want to push you back into the closet and make you invisible.
Most of us are proud of who we are, and we want to protect our marriages and our right to be out, contributing citizens. The fact that you wish to assimilate into an organization that wants to strip away your marriage rights, reduce the thousand benefits of marriage equality, and keep you in the closet so you don’t influence “young, impressionable minds” is troubling. This rhetoric is simply coded language for the old “gays are recruiting our young” trope.
There was a time when the Log Cabin Republicans contributed to our community — like when George W. Bush ran for re-election on a platform that included a ban on LGBTQ+ marriage, and Log Cabin Republicans refused to endorse him. There is a need for an LGBTQ+ conservative or Republican group that can engage with conservatives, educate them about the LGBTQ+ community, and build support for marriage equality, allowing individuals to be out, proud members of society. Instead, you support a candidate who will take your marriage away.
To lack joy, love and support in your marriage is truly something to pity. The answer is self-hate. Case closed.