For those expecting some snide, sarcastic commentary on Spokane Mayor Jim West’s bombshell of a scandal, don’t think I haven’t considered it. There is something irresistibly ironic about a gay bashing, conservative politician being caught with his pants down (metaphorically,) soliciting sex from young men.
I’ll leave such commentary to others. But I shall resist.
For Mayor West’s personal tragedy, is… well… tragic — not just for the alleged victims who now accuse him of molesting them as children nearly three decades ago — but also for West himself. To ridicule him as a hypocrite — and he most definitely is — might generate the easy laughs of a Leno monologue… but it would miss the point entirely. For the comic irony of his hypocrisy is much less compelling than the tragic irony of a closeted, gay politician trapped and tortured by the very same anti-gay attitudes he pandered to and perpetuated.
Jim West is the poster child for the tragic consequences of a society that condones discrimination against gays: a man so ashamed of who he was that he assumed the mantel of his persecutors… a man so embarrassed by his own sexuality that even after being forced to admit to soliciting sex from young men, he still denies that he is gay.
For those of us who are straight or openly gay, imagine for a moment not being able to express your love in public… unable to take your vows in front of friends and family… never knowing the simple, everyday joy of holding your beloved’s hand as you sit in a restaurant or walk down the street. That is the life that Jim West led… a life so twisted by fear and self-loathing that he felt he could only express his desires through anonymous encounters set up on internet chat rooms… or much, much worse.
No wonder West joined the right-wing moralists in their crusade against sex, for to him it must have always seemed loveless and dirty. What a sad life to live. What a sad lie. Too sad to warrant my usual sarcasm.
Amen, Brother.
What he said.
Kind of typical of uSP. I posted a short note concerning the Spokane situation at 5:40pm on the 5th. Not a single peep or outrage from anyone. Guess if someone makes their party look bad, they just look away, no comments, no remorse, no problem. Out of sight, out of (feeble) mind
hey since when can’t gays hold hands in public? Also, There IS an openly gay, elected congressperson in Olympia. I have never heard of anyone being arrested for being/acting gay in this state. No one says you cannot be gay, people just don’t think you should force your ‘sexual orientation’ into every institution private or public. Drama once again from the same hypocrites that have NO tolerance for Christians.
where is the friday open thread?
chardonnay @ 4
You have convincingly demonstrated your third-grade reading comprehension. Try reading Goldy’s post again, slowly, several times. Come on, chardonnay, we are all rooting for you; we know you can get that comprehension up to at least a fifth-grade level.
Working on my own reading comprehension here Char… by saying that you oppose homosexuals in “every institution private or public” do you mean that you support excluding all homosexuals from public and private institutions that you dean appropriate?
Ooops… apparently it is writing that I need to work on… dean=deem obviously.
“even after being forced to admit to soliciting sex from young men, he still denies that he is gay.”
He denied soliciting sex from young men, he said he’d only had encounters with adult men, just a little reality/fact check for Goldy
“…for to him it must have always seemed loveless and dirty.”
As it should!
‘young men’ does not equal ‘minors’, you goofball!
Has he done his “I got caught, and I’m very pissed off about it!” speech yet, where he blames all of his problems on the Dems?
I happened to be in my car this morning driving to my doctor’s appointment, it was about 8:30 am. I switched to KVI which I never listen to but for some reason I needed a good laugh.
The subject was “Can a Gay republican get elected”.
When I tuned in they somehow managed to bring Bill Clinton into the discussion. I swear these folks just won’t get over Bill.
As to the question at hand I think the answer was that an OPEN gay would not be elected.
So it makes me wonder why if your gay, why would be a Republican…SOMETHING you DO have a CHOICE in making.
Boy that doesn’t make any sense to me.
The question is, how many little boys DOES it take to get the elephant out of the closet?
…and wasnt Rush just on the other day saying how veril republican men are? How many Repbs has it been now that have been shoehorned out of the pervebal closet in the past few years? Yet the continue to harrass ole Bill cause he got his junk sucked…in office! Maybe its a tad bit-o-jelosy their “men” arent getting caught doing that with women?
Hmmmm….
Brian Suits had a great discussion about this on KVI last night.
I believe that ultimately, any one who is in the closet is subsidizing the racism that they detest. If you are truly gay, simply be open and nochalant about it. In the long run, the only way we are going to get tolerance for any racist issue is to treat them as non-issues.
This is what Dr. King wanted. Not a bunch of pandering to minority status that only serves to highlight our differences and continue racism, but a colorblind society.
I’ve got lots of gay friends, but I don’t look at them as being gay. I’ve got black, brown, yellow and tattooed friends, but they are simply my friends.
I don’t get what’s so hard about this. But one things for sure, anyone who hides behind racism in either direction, is only making it worse.
You know I’ve got something else to say on this too.
Jim West’s situation, if it is as Goldy describes is sad, but not in a deserving way, in a pathetic way. First of all, it’s pretty ridiculous to think of all Republicans as gay hating, intensely religious WASPs that are out to get us. There are a lot of secular Republicans, in fact more than there are Religious ones. And there are also a lot of moderate to center secular Democrats, that are pretty close to being conservatives in their fiscal views. So to cast West as simply having “joined that side” is shrill.
Second, West made a choice. It was his own fault for being ashamed of who he is, and his own fault for building two very different lives. I don’t feel any more sorry for him than I do for anyone else that builds a separate life of deceit, whether it be a drug addict, someone who pledges their monogomy and then cheats, someone who doesn’t pay taxes, etc.
West is living on the latter side of a culture that has in the past been very intolerant, and that’s a shame, but catering to that intolerance has only made his life worse. That’s just plain stupid.
Gays are just people like us all. Let’s move on.
Jeff B,
There is a difference between being empathetic and sympathetic. I was attempting to be the former. The fact is, people like West are both a symptom and a cause of what I see as a very grave societal ill.
I’m guessing from your comments that you would agree with me that West should have been allowed to be openly gay, and a staunchly conservative Republican… which apart from the issue of gay rights, are not mutually exclusive. But let’s be honest… yesterday’s revelations have instantly cost him the support of the bulk of his Christian conservative voters.
Goldy,
Yes, I totally agree that it is a societal ill, the question is what to do.
I also agree that suddenly announcing that one is gay and in politics will cost them a percentage of voters who are either staunchly religious, or fearing of difference, or ignorant or some combination of the above.
However, with respect to my first sentence, sooner or later we simply have to confront the reality that there are people that may be physically different in some way from us, but that otherwise share our ideas. I think that time has come.
I think that there are a lot of people like myself who are far more objective in their views of the world. And it lands them in a mostly centrist place politically. Some might call these people social moderates and fiscal conservatives, or some variation of the above, but really they are realists. Or perhaps more philosophically grounded in their understanding of the alsolutes of reality than simply realism. The effect being that they realize both that racism against gays is just ludicrous, but at the same time in no way deserving of anything more than simply educating people that racism in all of its forms is wrong.
In general, there are many new political movements of younger people raised with different persepctives. While we probably disagree on many things, on the whole we are far more tolerant of difference than previous generations. By the same token that many of us 30ish and younger folks are completely accepting of new technology, we really don’t care if the person sitting next to us is black, gay or has blue hair.
This group is becoming the majority, if not already. It’s reshaping both the left and the right.
So with respect to Jim West, I would be far more concerend about what he has done for Spokane, than whether he is gay. But I’m also worried about the fact that he would lead a double life, how can you ever fully trust someone who has deceived you?
In closing, my message is simple; to all gay Republican politicians or aspiring politicians, come out right away, if you have not already. Be yourself, and tell us what your ideas are. If your ideas are good, you will probably do pretty well regardless. If you try to lead a double life, it’s going to come back to get you in some way, even if all it does is eat you up internally.
There is no hiding from oneself.
However morally offensive or political unacceptable the RECENT conduct of Mayor Jim West has been, I don’t see anything illegal about it. Even if the person he communicated with on-line had really been 17 years old.
For better or worse, the age of sexual consent in Washington is generally SIXTEEN years of age. See RCW 9A.44.079
EIGHTEEN years is the magical age only when the perpetrator is abusing a supervisory postion or is an employee of the school that the victim attends. See RCW 9A.44.093
Some examples of the abuse of a supervisory position can include a supervisor at work (i.e McDonald’s manager messing with the underage staff) or a leader of educational or recreational activities (i.e. a Boy Scout master). See RCW 9A.44.010(8),(9)
If West was trying to seduce a 17 year old boy, then his criminal liability would depend on the facts of the situation.
AS for federal law, it is true that federal law imposes criminal liability for child pornography under the age of 18, just like state law does. But the federal age for sexual consent is generally 16.
The federal internet luring statute makes communication with a minor a crime only if the minor is less than 16 years of age AND the intended sexual conduct would be a violation of the law. 18 USC 2425
Naturally, it is highly offensive morally to engage in sexual activity with a child under 18 years of age, even if it might be technically legal. Authorities, when given enough motivation, will always try to dust off the more arcane and obsolete criminal statutes to punish such behavior.
Maybe the age of sexual consent in Washington should be 18 for all purposes (with the exception of younger people reasonably close to each other in age). Would you want your local mayor (say a man in his mid-50’s) doing your 16 year old son? Or your 16 year old daughter for that matter?
Interestingly enough, Jim West did back increasing the age of sexual consent to 18 years old when he was in the state senate. But the Democrats in Olympia (as well as the gay rights lobbies) opposed this increase, and it didn’t go anywhere.
As for the Boy Scout allegations from the 1970’s, any criminal statute of limitations to prosecute West has long since expired. However, the alleged victims are now 31 and 36, and claim that it happened sometime in the late 1970’s or early 1980’s. The sexual exploitation law for 16 and 17 year olds was not in effect (that part did not become law until 1988), but it would appear likely that those alleged victims were well under 16 at the time. But then again, these are only allegations, and if true, should have been brought out many years ago in all fairness.
Jim West is probably politically dead in the water. But it doesn’t appear he has done anything to justify being removed from office involuntarily before the next election. And if he doesn’t have a good job offer lined up, it might be best for him to stay on as Mayor of Spokane, and collect his salary through December 2007 (or whenever his term ends). And maybe frequent gay bars to find young men (at least they should be 21!), instead of looking for love on the internet and getting set up.
Well, Sound Politics has posted their comment on this situation. It was pretty thoughtful and lacked the spite of your posts on the subject, Goldy. Here is the money quote:
“For that lapse alone, West should resign immediately, despite his significant achievements so far as mayor.”
This doesn’t look like Republicans circling the wagons to hypocritically protect one of their own to me.
I wonder what it would take, Goldy and minions, to cause you to ever apologize for something you wrote about someone?
Richard Pope, excellent comments. Matt Rosenberg has some fantastic comments over at SP on the matter.
I think Goldy erred in faulting SP for not immediately responding to this story. From where I stand, most people are in pretty strong agreement here. Jim West made some very poor decisions, but it’s not some kind of Republican catasrophe.
I wonder what it would take, Goldy and minions, to cause you to ever apologize for something you wrote about someone? -Comment by Demographa— 5/6/05 @ 1:25 pm
Hell freezing over?
I don’t have any sympathy for West, and feel no compulsion to take the high road. In fact, I’m laughing my ass off. Let the poor bastard twist slowly in the wind.
Oh, and by the way, I love the part about using the trappings of the mayor’s office to lure young men for sex. I’m going to have to search my porno library for that book about the Hot Stud Mayor.
I really do not think that the major problem is that West is now ‘out’. I believe that by him offering internships, trips to DC, etc, and using his office as a ‘magnet’ is where the difficulty lies.
Kinda like Congressman Barney Fag, huh?
Nah, more like “Jeff Gannon,” White House whore.
Congressman Frank was censured a number of years ago, admitted error and moved on.
At least Frank wasn’t some christian nutcase hypocrite.
C-
Agree with you there.
Barney Fag was just a predator using his office and power to get his fudge pushed!
Jim West’s sexual orientation, whether bi or gay would be of much less consequence if the Jim West’s of the U.S. didn’t exploit the issue to begin with. And if the Mr. Cynical’s of the U.S. weren’t so proud to speak out with hatred. If there weren’t the need on the part of some group to view another group as de-humanized for some reason, there would be no political capital to be gained from gay bashing. And if public figures like Jim West and Rush Limbaugh didn’t garner their influence and power by raising this destructive discourse
I can imagine Goldy is right in terms of viewing Mayor West as a sad case. What I can’t decide is how much, if any, of Jim’s gay bashing was driven by self-loathing and how much was driven by a desire to gain influence in a part of the state where very conservative people live? West was a powerful member of the state congress for a while. Quite a lot of his power came from his outspoken anti-gay rhetoric.
This is an important element of the debate here. Is the Republican Party using gay bashing the same way it has used redbaiting or attacking opponents as communists in the last century? Of course they are. Is Jim West a victim here? He may well be. He is also a victimizer.
Mr. Cynical, that’s a typical Republican lie. Frank behavior was ridiculous, but it was completely incidental to his job. He never used his office and his power in that situation. Not that the truth matters to you people.
As for why West has been a gay basher, I frankly don’t care why. He’s a Republican hypocrite. He’s gay in private and anti-gay in public, like so many of the rest of them. The reasons are irrelevant. Nail his “sorry” hide to the wall and let him deal with the consquences on his own. I think it’s what we call the chickens coming home to roost.