Strengthening Constitutional Self-Government

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Afropublicrats

This author explains why black voters were so overwhelmingly for that proposition in California. They are predominately women, religiously observant and morally conservative, very concerned about strengthening marriage as an institution, and very suspicious of interracial marriage. The argument the author gives that, he thinks, might incline those voters to accept same-sex marriage is pretty tortured and unconvincing, although it is based on genuinely troubling statistics. He acknowledges, in effect, that the "civil rights" argument so attractive to sophisticated whites can’t be made to appeal to them at all. These women, it seems to me, might be future Republicans, with the right kind of statesmanship. (Thanks to John Seery for calling this very interesting analysis to my attention.)

Discussions - 4 Comments

At the Hillsdale College Churchill dinner I sat next to Star Parker, an audacious and insightful black social commentator. She claims that blacks deliberately voted for Prop 8 as a way of expressing their disgust at the homosexual lobby's equation of gay rights with black civil rights. In fact blacks are more laissez-faire on morality than Mr. Blow claims they are, Parker argues, but they resent being used by gays. It is blowback time, so to speak.

I don't buy the resist being used line. African Americans are tradionaly more religious and socially conservative and if it were not for the federal government making it so that you could not get aid if the father was in the home way back when would be the most family oriented social group. How else do you explain how a group that went to such lengths to maintain family after slavery ended has become the modern Urban family were fathers are not around. Unless you all believe in some sort of Eugenics thing?

To even begin to compare the plight of African Americans in this country to the plight of gays in this country is an expression of an educated moron. Anyone who attempts this comparison is a complete idiot lacking in any knowledge of American History much less World History. Keep in mind that a black man could not marry a white woman or that a black woman could not marry a white man. It was not about a black man marrying a white man or a white woman marrying a black woman, etc. Giving a green light to inter-racial marriage DID NOT CHANGE THE FACE OF MARRIAGE. Gays and members of the judicial branches of state government, like the Supreme Court of Clowns of California are trying to re-engineer a social tradition that has been grounded in history for thousands of years. This social tradition is the backbone of any society. You disagree? Cool - just look at the statistics - you grow up in a single parent family and your changes of dropping out of school, never going to college, having sex and a child before marriage and living in poverty for the rest of you life is about 90% - don't believe it - just ask all the people in the prisons across this country if they know who their father was. Children need a Father and a Mother in order to become productive members of society and that is what marriage is all about. It is not about love - if it was, then why has it just been tradition to marry your mother, father, cousins, sisters, brothers, dogs, cats, horses, mules etc because you "love" them. Or why not be able to marry six men, three women, two dogs and five horses because you love them? If you are going to re-engineer marriage then why is it only for gays and not for everyone else?

Peter, I agree that African American women who are "religiously observant and morally conservative, very concerned about strengthening marriage as an institution, and very suspicious of interracial marriage" may be Republican constituents someday. In my conversations and friendships, the concern for raising children who excel in a coarse society is very strong, as is finding and keeping a responsible man and father (ie, strengthening their own traditional marriage.

A shame, then, that a prominent Regean-era attack on the welfare state and its consequences took the racialized form it did (Welfare Queens). Whereas upstart Black and white conservatives circa 1980 thought they were "telling truth to power" regarding the problems or failures of liberal federal programs, much of the Black community saw it as yet another assault by the powerful on their dignity. White liberals where all too happy to exploit this for 25+ years.

See Michelle Singletary's Washington Post column, The Color of Money. (after clicking, erase noleftturns.com and the link will work) She spoke on a Post panel last month with Thomas Friedman and Barbara Ehrenreich about financial collapse. Singletary-Ehrenreich exchanges are classic -- socialist critic for poor working class victims meets raised poor but not a victim Black woman who teaches others how to succeed despite all those academic-named barriers. (Not that socialists are all wrong about the state of affairs...)

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