The falled Illinois marriage vote blame has begun, and guess who getting the blame. Black folks! ding, ding, ding!
But the funny thing is, you can't blame the Black caucus. In fact, two members of the Black Caucus — Rep. Ken Dunkin and Rep. LaShawn Ford spoke out about it:
“It’s larger than that. We have 118 members and we have 71 Democrats who could have passed this bill,” Ford said. “So the fact that we didn’t pass it is not the fault of the Black Caucus. What happened is that we had democracy at its best and the people spoke and their representatives listened.”
In addition, Dunkin said marriage equality is not a civil rights issue and marriage equality advocates may have offended black lawmakers when they equated the two.
“Sorry, this is not the Black Caucus’ burden issue,” he said. “We shouldn’t be wearing the jacket for this. That would be unfair and disingenuous to have the Black Caucus wear the jacket because there are 71 Democrats.”What's been disheartening is how several LGBT bloggers and activists blame them without knowing everything that happened.
I'm not siding with the Black Caucus because I'm Black. I"m just saying it's lazy and irresponsible to do so if you don't have all the facts.
So, to those who completely blamed the Black Caucus, shame on you.
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2 comments:
Yes, but the Black caucus is also incorrect when they say that marriage equality is not a civil rights issue. it is PRECISELY a civil right issue.
It is very curious that people first jump to pitting minority groups against each other instead of simply doing the math. There are 71 Democrats and 47 Republicans. 2 Republicans said they would vote for it and 50-something Democrats...
This whole situation has disaster written all over it. There still seems to be those within the black fold sabotaging social progress, but there are outsiders quick to blame every black person around automatically. Disingenuous going around on all sides.
FYI, Dunkin ought to know by now that marriage equality is now as much a civil rights issue as interracial marriage was back in the 1960s.
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