Make America Great Again Hat Pride
For iii years, President Donald Trump has rolled back LGBTQ equality in unprecedented ways. This makes his ongoing and preposterous attempts to portray his White House as a supporter of LGBTQ rights fifty-fifty more than infuriating. Example in bespeak, his campaign'southward LGBTQ pride merchandise, including rainbow-themed "Make America Bully Again" hats and T-shirts. According to the Donald Trump website, the pride hat is currently sold out.
But who is buying this gear? The Trump rainbow apparel is not only monumentally hypocritical and insulting; it's also part of a long list of attempts to catch media attention that momentarily makes Trump appear as an ally of LGBTQ people — at least to those who don't read past the headlines.
The Trump rainbow apparel is function of a long list of attempts to grab media attention that momentarily makes Trump announced as an ally of LGBTQ people.
This is a cynical effort to court heterosexual voters who might exist turned off past blatant bigotry. And, ironically, it's a testament to the smashing progress on LGBTQ rights over the past two decades: An assistants that bows to anti-LGBTQ extremists in its base nonetheless fears being perceived as harsh, especially heading into an election year.
This was true when Trump sent a tweet supporting LGBTQ pride last June, and when his ambassador to Federal republic of germany last February announced a supposedly new campaign to fight the criminalization of homosexuality around the world (which turned out to merely be the continuation of an existing Obama-era policy). But these pronouncements, like the selling of Pride merchandise, paper over the fact that Trump has been among the most hostile presidents in history on LGBTQ rights.
In the past, blatant anti-LGBTQ policies — and a refusal to even acknowledge queer people — were more politically and culturally acceptable. For years, they could even assistance candidates running for national role. At present, as back up for equality has dramatically shifted, a large portion of the electorate is repelled past anti-LGBTQ attitudes in a manner similar to how they perceive the overt shunning of other minorities.
And that explains why the superficial embrace of LGBTQ people by Trump isn't actually targeted to LGBTQ voters. Trump and his campaign advisers know that the vast majority of LGBTQ people, afterward witnessing Trump inquire the Supreme Courtroom to allow bigotry confronting them in employment, and after seeing Trump move to strip anti-discrimination protections from them nether the Affordable Care Act, aren't going to vote for him. Indeed, according to exit polls only 14 percent of LGBTQ people cast a vote for him in 2016.
The larger groups that Trump's campaign is worried about include much-coveted directly suburban voters, many of whom support LGBTQ rights and have moved away from Trump and the GOP. The campaign is hoping these voters aren't paying much attention to the deep rollbacks on civil rights — which oftentimes get brusque shrift given how much anarchy emanates from this assistants — while Trump makes empty gestures of support for LGBTQ people and other minorities.
Trump's aides are also ofttimes shameless in the claims they make, attempting to gloss over the horrendous damage he'southward done.
"President Trump has never considered LGBT Americans second-form citizens and has opposed bigotry of any kind against them," White House spokesman Judd Deere recently told The New York Times, even equally Trump'southward executive orders and other actions have been aimed at assuasive bigotry in the name of "religious freedom."
Trump'south aides are also often shameless in the claims they make, attempting to gloss over the horrendous impairment he'south washed.
Height presidential adviser Kellyanne Conway even claimed in 2018 that Trump came into office "approval of the gay marriage." In fact, Trump courted religious conservatives throughout his 2016 entrada, stating emphatically that he was opposed to marriage equality at the federal level and promising to place judges on the Supreme Court who might overturn it. While he has given a variety of interviews on the topic since then — maxim he is "groovy" with Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg's aforementioned-sex marriage, for example — his record can past no means be construed as proactively in favor of same-sex marriage or other rights.
Indeed, the all-time mode to approximate Trump's record is by looking at his biggest supporters. The religious right hasn't reacted at all to Trump'due south attempt to appear LGBTQ-friendly, considering anti-LGBTQ leaders know that Trump has no desire to really further equality. This is all only for prove.
I was nowadays at the 2016 GOP convention in Cleveland. Right afterwards Trump's acceptance speech vowing to protect the "LGBTQ community," I interviewed Tony Perkins, president of the anti-LGBTQ Family unit Research Council. He, besides, was confident Trump would push button his agenda, no matter statements like the one he had but fabricated from the stage.
"[Trump] has said that these issues should exist dealt with at the state level and he has not been for the regime forcing it on people," Perkins told me of LGBT rights. And that's something Trump has certainly followed through on: Dismantling federal protections for LGBTQ people while paying lip service to equality in the abstract.
That'due south why LGBTQ activists, equally well every bit those in the media, must be vigilant. The horrendous truth must band out louder than any rainbow-colored Trump entrada T-shirt.
Related:
- Trump's lies and cruelty have lead to a reckoning: Welcome to the real resistance
- Is there a 'gay gene'? The problem with studies connecting genetics and LGBTQ identity
- Whitney Houston confidante Robyn Crawford confirms their queer relationship — and reclaims her time
Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/trump-s-lgbtq-pride-merchandise-hypocritical-insult-queer-americans-ncna1098701
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