Obama homophobic?

i’m actually more concerned that biden even mentioned someone else being tested. besides being unnecessary, it was a huge invasion of barack’s privacy, and probably a violation of hippa.

Yeah, I figured he was trying to clarify that he wasn’t Clintoning around on his wife.

Though I can see the sensitivity here, I feel pretty strongly that Obama isn’t a homophobe. No more so–arguably much less so–than Hillary was for her initial refusal to state that she doesn’t see homosexuality as sinful, or whatever right-wing vomit spew was dominating the news cycle that day.

I’m not sure what was going on, I didn’t watch it and I’ve only read the accounts here, but I doubt homophobia has anything to do with it. There’s a subtext that we’re not privy to, but all-in-all, it seems rather trivial, like an Edwards’ haircut kind of story. Why are we devoting a story to it here? If this blows up into the media alleging for weeks that Obama’s been unfaithful, especially considering the complete lack of interest in Republicans’ infidelities, I’m going to be livid.

I agree…

Here’s my take:

I doubt that Biden meant it the way it came out, but I felt that Biden’s words implied a racist sexual predator connotation.

Obama’s reaction to me seemed to suggest “Thanks a lot Joe for perpetuating racist stereotypes.” His expression conveyed a “There you go again with your unintentional racist remarks, you dope,” I thought.

And then Obama, being smart, looked to find a way to defuse this impression and — being very quick on his feet, I thought — used humor to make it clear that he had been tested with Michelle. Making clear that he’s a happily married man, not a promiscuous stereotype.

I have no idea why some thought that Biden’s comments suggested that he and Obama had gotten tested together — that Biden and Obama were somehow gay lovers or something. I don’t think the transcript supports that interpretation.

Now, I’m fairly certain that Biden actually had meant to mention Obama as a compliment to him for being willing to be public about testing which can have such a stigma attached to it.

It is an important preface to my reaction – based on transcripts, not watching the debate itself – that I thought Biden referring to Obama’s test was bizarre and inappropriate. Not because of any stigma about HIV or HIV testing, but because it is personal medical information and is no business of Bidens and not his to disclose – I wouldn’t want someone else making public that I take cholesterol meds, for example. It just feels like an invasion.

So my reaction to Obama is that he felt the moment was awkward, and it was ambiguous – was Biden hinting Obama was unfaithful? that Biden and Obama were tested together? – and on the fly he was trying to pull the debate back from that discomfort by lightening the moment. I don’t see anything homophobic about an absolutely true statement that clarifies any ambiguity: he was tested with his wife, when they were in Kenya.

If Obama were inclined to make the same sort of hasty leaps, it would be just as correct to argue that those who call him homophobic based on last night’s comments are clearly racist for jumping on him the way they did.

Have I mentioned this sort of circular firing squad is why the left has such a bad Presidential Election track record since 1968?

After what happened to Harold Ford, I can understand Obama being a bit apprehensive about the insinuation of extra-marital affairs. I don’t get a homophobic vibe from it at all.

Plus he linked it to his African visit which was in part to raise HIV/AIDS awareness and to combat the stigma of getting tested.

I do think Biden needs to limit the discussion to his own medical records, though.

As a gay man, I was not offended – though the possibility of offense was there. But it was clear to me that Obama was reacting to being put on the spot by Biden. I agree with Zeitgeist that Biden’s comment was offensive because he was revealing someone else’s personal information without consent. This tells me that he uses poor judgement, and I don’t want that in the Oval Office.

But I have to put Obama’s joking in context. First, it was highlighted within the debate that african-american women have a higher rate of HIV than their white or euro-american counterparts. So, as an african-american, knowing his HIV status is an important health issue (though it should have been a private one if that’s what he wished). Second, I took his joke as a play on his strong marriage to Michelle and that there is no question of cheating on her. And lastly, IF it was a joke about not being on the downlow, well… he is a very attractive man to a lot of guys too, but he is married, has two daughters, and lives in a media fishbowl. I didn’t hear this as a slam on gays in any way; I heard it as a statement of faithfulness to his wife regardless of whether he’s hetero-, homo-, or bisexual. Commitment! Cool!!!

Obama got tested in Africa, and issued a press release about it for AIDS awareness. There was no subtext from Biden, and there was no invasion of privacy.

It was a public act that Biden referred to, and nothing more.

I didn’t watch the debate–I was busy reading a book. But as a gay man who has lived with HIV for over 15 years, I didn’t see anything homophobic in the transcript, either.

I seem to remember reading about Obama and his wife and the testing photo op in Kenya, so I don’t think it was necessarily privy knowledge, but it was crass and rude of Biden to bring it up in that way. If Obama had wanted it mentioned during the debate, he would have mentioned it. Biden stepped way over the line.

I’ve always been of two minds about outing, whether it’s sexuality or HIV status, and I can see where, at times, it can be fully justified. This wasn’t one of those times.

Obama and his wife got tested in Kenya because they’re superheroes there, and they wanted to help combat the stigma being tested has in that country. They did not get tested because they thought they were at risk.

This was completely public. I see no reason anyone should refrain from mentioning it. It’s not a violation of Obama’s privacy to mention something he did more or less as a PSA—in fact, the more publicity, the better. Might do some good in our oh-so-sane-and-prejudice-free society, eh? *pauses to scrape sarcasm off the windshield before continuing*

So I didn’t think Biden was being inappropriate. I did think Obama was being funny. I don’t think he was really worried that people would think he was sleeping with Joe Biden, which is what he was pretending to worry about.

I don’t think it was homophobic, either. I’m a gay man, and I certainly wouldn’t want anyone thinking I was sleeping with Joe Biden!

i remember the Kenya press coverage, which is why i find it all the more amazing anyone would find that Obama was reacting in way based on, or reinforcing, a stigma. and while Obama made that test public, i still am very uneasy with Biden discussing someone else’s medical information when the door had not been opened in that particular discussion. i just think it is really bad form.

Here’s the story: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14500535/

NAIROBI, Kenya – U.S. Sen. Barack Obama arrived in Kenya Thursday where he will take a public HIV test this weekend at a remote clinic in an effort to promote the need for safe sex in a country where 700 people die on average per day from HIV/AIDS.

Obama, the only African-American in the U.S. Senate, will take the test at a clinic near the western village of Nyangoma-Kogelo, where his father – a goat herder who went on to study at Harvard – grew up and his grandmother still lives, a U.S. embassy official told The Associated Press.

I think this is off-key. Like it or not, AIDS still has a bad perception in a large part of the community, as do basically all of the risk factors for contracting AIDS (some deserved more than others). If Obama had an AIDS test, what’s to keep people from guessing that he might have had sex with someone who had been to prison? That he had been incarcerated? That he had used intravenous drugs? That his wife had done any of these things? I also think it’s fair to add that my brother and I are both stufying for the bar exam right now, and I can tell you that in New York, it’s still slander per se to call someone a homosexual, and it’s up for debate whether that’s out-dated or not. Like it or not, a large portion of the voters still have a problem with that.

It really adds a lot to our understanding to have the context that he took the test with his wife, and that he took it in Africa. So it could have been totally have been part of an outreach thing, a “hey, look, I’m a prominent American and I’m getting an AIDS test. You shouldn’t been scared of stigma if you think you need a test.” And if it was done for an audience, it might have been a really rural African audience that has no idea that sex is often more or less a little different (a little less promiscuous) in America than in some of those AIDS-ridden African areas. It could be no big deal for an African to assume that Obama and his wife were at a lot higher risk for AIDS than they actually are, and to assume that they need to get an AIDS just as much as the average person in rural Kenya they were appealing to.

The point about being concerned that Biden might have left the impression that he got an AIDS test because he’d had sex with someone else is also a good point.

Uptown wrote: The whole episode sounded it like it took place in a gradeschool playground. Not one of Obama’s best days.

He’s absolutely right. The word immature comes to mind.

28 & 29 I think are a bit unfair – this was not Obama’s doing, he had to react on the fly to Biden’s bizarre comment. If you’ve ever argued with someone who occasionally comes completely out of nowhere with stuff, you know that if it often much harder than arguing with a good adversary. I thought Obama handled the situation that was handed to him fairly well, probably better than most would.

For me to think this was homophobic I’d have to think Obama bought the AIDS is a “gay” disease myth. I don’t, so I don’t. And as much as I hate to say it, in DC there is still the perception that it is a “gay” disease, hence the continued rise of the disease, particularly among A-A women. Ignorance = Death is still true.

BTW, the city ran a big “Get tested if you care” (paraphrasing) campaign last year, so I read his comments as an echo of that sentiment.

I’m sorry, but this just seems stupid.

Maybe it’s because I’m a bit younger, but most of the people I know see AIDS and HIV as an issue for everyone rather than people of a particular gender, race or sexual orientation.

When I read Sen. Biden’s words, I wondered What the heck he was thinking?

On paper, Sen. Obama’s response seemed fine; I didn’t sense anything homophobic about it.

I didn’t see the debate or a recording but, after the Clintons, I can understand how he might wish to make it clear that he’s faithful to his spouse. I mean, no matter how you look at it, why does someone in a long-term, monogamous relationship get tested for HIV? All of the usual reasons not what I’d want to discuss during a political campaign. (Kudos to Obama for doing it to increase public awareness.)

When my current partner (going on 12 years) and I decided that we wanted to get things serious, she and I went to the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center and had ourselves tested (since their test was free, totally confidential, and the fastest of any in town). This was because both of us, as “children of the Sixties” knew we had very likely put ourselves in a position to have possibly been exposed before being with each other. We were both negative. We have remained in a committed, monogamous relationship, which – whatever the sexual orientation of the couple involved – is the one single most solid prevention one can take with the question of AIDS.

We did this on the example of our gay friends, who were doing the same thing for the same reason. I suspect Obama and his wife, being the kind of intelligent people they are, did it for similar reasons.

Unfortunately, given the homophobia in the black community, it likely was entirely necessary for Obama to make the statement he did. Not out of homophobia on his part, but to deflect the possible assaults on his character he could easily foresee had he not done so.

It is unfortunately true that even in the liberal parts of this country, one needs to make explanations like he did then and I did here. I hope to live long enough to see the day when such will not be necessary for homosexual or heterosexual people, but given my age (as evidenced from comments above) I doubt that will happen. But I know the day will come when it will happen. Until then we just have to deal with it and know where our hearts and desires are. (My family spent 175 years working generation to generation for the end of slavery – we need to see that sort of committment on this issue, most likely).

I find it a bit funny that people all falling all over themselves to defend Obama. Hadn’t he just said something like along the lines of “we have to deal with our homophobia”? Why is it so impropable then that he may have made a slightly homophobic joke when his AIDS test came up? Biden, by the way, did nothing wrong. The whole idea of politicians taking public AIDS tests is to help society overcome the stigma associated with AIDS.