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Huckleberries Online

Andrew Sullivan: Outing Gay Repubs Wrong

Andrew Sullivan is a gay conservative blogger. Below, he denounces the tactics used by gay activist Michael Rogers on Ed Schultz's national radio show to claim Repub U.S. Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho is a closeted gay. You can read his Daily Dish blog here.

The outing crusade gains momentum. Look: I loathe the closet. I despise the hypocrisy in the Republican party. But a witch-hunt is a witch-hunt. If the gay left thinks it will advance gay dignity by using tactics that depend on homophobia to work, that violate privacy, that demonizes gay people, then all I can say is: they are wrong. They will regret it. It will come back to haunt them. And they should cut it out. The fact that their motives might be good is no excuse. Everybody on a witchhunt believes their motives are good. But the toxins such a witchhunt exposes, the cruelty it requires, and the fanaticism of its adherents are always dangerous to civilized discourse. What you're seeing right now is an alliance of the intolerant: the intolerant on the gay left and the intolerant on the religious right. The victims are gay people - flawed, fallible, even pathetic gay people. But they are still people. And they deserve better -- gay blogger Andrew Sullivan/The Daily Dish.

Question presented by liberal Daily Kos: "Do you agree with outing gay Republicans? Response: Do you agree with outing Gay Republicans? Yes -- 64%, No -- 35%, Votes: 6887.



Huckleberries Online

D.F. Oliveria started Huckleberries Online on Feb. 16, 2004. Oliveria's Sunday print Huckleberries is a past winner of the national Herb Caen Memorial Column contest.