Your Obsession Is Showing
by Rev. Dr. Robin H. Gorsline, President
The past ten days have been topsy-turvy, to say the least. Last week Sunday, Vice President Biden spoke up for marriage. Then, on Tuesday, North Carolina voters dealt marriage a heavy blow. Then on Wednesday, the President spoke up for marriage, standing foursquare with Biden.
Today, in the middle of the night, the House of Delegates in Virginia went back, saying “No” to the nomination of Tracy Thorne-Begland for a district court judgeship in Richmond, and saying, in effect, if you are gay, don’t expect to be approved for any office. For many of us, it felt like a request that we simply leave “their” commonwealth.
What has been done to Tracy Thorne-Begland is shameful. The opposition in the House—all Republicans—have taken the good name, the sterling reputation, of a decorated Navy “top gun” airman and dedicated public servant and dragged it through the mud. Fortunately, his character is strong, and too many people know him well so that the mud will only stick to his critics.
A truly unsettling aspect to this is how easy it is for people to twist the act of a patriot in challenging unjust laws into some sort of nefarious and dangerous activism. The truth of Tracy’s advocacy against discrimination in the military is that he was right in 1992 and it only took Congress, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and others 19 years to finally catch up to him. That is of course the real truth here: the 31 Republicans who voted against his confirmation (and probably some who hid and did not vote) really yearn for a return to the good old days of anti-LGBT military policies. And based on their votes against women’s reproductive health needs they want to return to a few other old ways as well.
Perhaps even more unsettling is the statement by Delegate Bob Marshall that “if a polygamist had an otherwise sterling reputation he would not be qualified because that is against the law - likewise Thorne-Begland admits he has a partner and Virginia has a marriage law therefore he is not qualified.” This is of course, is both insulting and utterly wrong legally. And the claim is a direct contradiction of what Marshall said in 2006 when he was promoting the anti-marriage amendment he had written.
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