http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=3&art_id=qw1128493623292B222
Gay community divided about 'outing' campaign
October 05 2005 at 04:59AM
By David Crary
New York - Though decried by many gay-rights leaders, "outing" - the
practice of exposing secretly gay public figures - is expanding into
new terrain as Internet bloggers target congressional staffers,
political strategists, even black clergy whose sermons and speeches
contain anti-gay rhetoric.
Few issues are as divisive within the gay community. Numerous gay
organisations, such as the Human Rights Campaign and the Log Cabin
Republicans, staunchly oppose outing, yet many other activists
support it when the targets are public figures - or their aides -
who work against gay rights or condemn homosexuality.
"It's not the gay thing that's the problem - it's the hypocrisy,"
said Michael Rogers, creator of a web log (also referred to as a
blog) that has been at the fore of several recent outing campaigns.
"I'm going to be calling out the politicians who vote against us
and work against the interests of the very community they come
from."
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'There's nothing wrong with investigating'
Christopher Barron, political director of the Log Cabin Republicans,
said he understands the anger that activists such as Rogers feel
but believes they are wasting their energy.
"Outing is not an effective tool," Barron said. "I don't know a
single vote on gay-rights issues that was changed because of
outing... Folks should be focusing on the hard work that needs to
be done and not get bogged down in personal attacks."
Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said outing
can backfire by distracting attention from more substantive
political issues or by prompting conservative politicians to
harden their anti-gay views after aides and associates are outed.
Two black gay-rights activists are now taking aim at prominent
black pastors who - in the activists' view - have gone too far
in assailing homosexuality from their pulpits.
In a campaign begun on their websites last week, activists Jasmyne
Cannick and Keith Boykin are soliciting information about the
pastors' private lives - including whether some might be gay.
Not all outing campaigns gain traction
So far, the pair has collected only uncorroborated "tips," not
any solid information that any of the pastors is gay, but Cannick
defended the campaign.
"We know there are people who preach one thing and do another,"
he said. "There's nothing wrong with investigating."
Many other recent outing targets have been Republican politicians
and operatives. Among the cases:
A Republican congressman from Virginia, Edward Schrock, dropped
out of his re-election race in 2004 shortly after allegations
were published on Michael Rogers' web log that he solicited sex
with another man on a gay phone dating service.
Schrock, a married ex-Navy captain, was an outspoken foe of gays
in the military and supported a constitutional ban on same-sex
marriages. He did not comment specifically on the allegations.
In 2003, US Representative Mark Foley, a Florida Republican,
called a news conference to denounce a report in an alternative
newspaper that he is gay.
Foley declined to answer questions about the subject, saying his
sexual orientation was irrelevant to his political duties. He
contended the story was circulated to derail his US senate
campaign, which he abandoned four months later.
The Republican mayor of Spokane, Washington, James West, faces a
recall election prompted by newspaper articles accusing him of
offering City Hall jobs, sports tickets and cash to young men he
met in an online gay chatroom.
West, who as a state legislator often opposed gay-rights bills,
acknowledged poor judgment but denies doing anything illegal.
Not all outing campaigns gain traction. A cadre of activist
bloggers and alternative-media journalists have been contending
for more than a year that another Republican congressman is gay
and yet has often voted against gay-rights legislation.
Thus far, the mainstream media - both national outlets and those
in the congressman's home region - have declined to report on
the campaign, although the effort is common knowledge among
political reporters and on Capitol Hill.
Representative Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, who in
1987 became the first member of Congress to voluntarily make his
homosexuality public, said he does not know if the targeted
congressman is gay or not.
However, Frank contended that the perception that the congressman
might be gay had damaged his standing with some fellow
Republicans in the House - and Frank said this issue of bias
should be aired publicly.
"I think he's wrong to be silent about this," Frank said of the
congressman. "You should not cover up this act of prejudice."
Frank is now one of three openly gay members of Congress, and
there are about 300 openly gay elected officials nationwide,
according to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund. The president of
the fund, which recruits out-of-the-closet gay and lesbian
candidates to run for office, has mixed feelings about outing.
"If we ever outed anyone, we'd lose our credibility with the
people we work with," said Chuck Wolfe.
"On the other hand, who can condemn people for using whatever
weapons they have to fight for equality and point out
hypocrisy? It seems exactly why we have a democracy." - Sapa-AP
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