Gays And Lesbians Quotes

God did not create gays and lesbians so He could have something to hate! ~ Troy Perry

I don't think there is any good answer to the question why shouldn't gays and lesbians who want to serve their country be allowed to do it. ~ John Bolton

It is my position that allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly would be the right thing to do. No matter how I look at this issue, I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens. ~ Michael Mullen

Like me, the great majority of Americans wish both to preserve the traditional definition of marriage and to oppose bias and intolerance directed towards gays and lesbians. ~ Mitt Romney

Despite our founding principles and the many ways our constitution has protected individual liberties, we do, let's admit it, have a long history of shutting people out
african americans, women, gays and lesbians, people with disabilities
and throughout our history, we have found too many ways to divide and exclude people from their ownership of the law and protection under the law. ~ Hillary Clinton

If you had told me 28 years ago that the largest organization in the world touching the lives of gays and lesbians would be a church, I would not have believed you. ~ Troy Perry

For many years now, I have been an outspoken supporter of civil and human rights for gay and lesbian people. Gays and lesbians stood up for civil rights in Montgomery, Selma, in Albany, Ga. and St. Augustine, Fla., and many other campaigns of the Civil Rights Movement. Many of these courageous men and women were fighting for my freedom at a time when they could find few voices for their own, and I salute their contributions. ~ Coretta Scott King

God says in the bible that we should love our neighbor and he created us all as equals. I know in my heart that gays and lesbians should have the same government rights that Spencer and I will when we get married. So, yes, this blonde Christian believes in gay marriage. ~ Heidi Montag

There are gays and lesbians in every country, so there should be no discrimination against them just because of their destiny. ~ Hun Sen

My father tried to get me to be around gay people a lot when I was young. He owned a gay bookstore and it had a lot of gay literature and art books and he wanted me to be taken care of by the young gays and lesbians who worked for him. ~ Margaret Cho

Over the past seventy years the various identity struggles have to some degree remediated the great wrongs that have been done to workers, people of color, Indigenous Peoples, women, gays and lesbians, and the disabled, while helping to humanize our society overall. But they have also had a shadow side in the sense that they have encouraged us to think of ourselves more as determined than as self-determining, more as victims of 'isms' (racism, sexism, capitalism, ableism) than as human beings who have the power of choice. For our own survival we must assume individual and collective responsibility for creating a new nation - one that is loved rather than feared and one that does not have to bribe and bully other nations to win support. ~ Grace Lee Boggs

We have become a nation ruled by fear. Since the end of the Second World War, various political leaders have fostered fear in the American people
fear of communism, fear of terrorism, fear of immigrants, fear of people based on race and religion, fear of gays and lesbians in love who just want to get married and fear of people who are somehow different. It is fear that allows political leaders to manipulate us all and distort our national priorities. ~ Mike Gravel

There is so much work to be done to treat gays and lesbians and gay and lesbian couples with the respect that they're entitled to. They deserve, in my judgment, partnership benefits. They deserve to be treated fairly when it comes to adoption and immigration. ~ John Edwards

Securing for gays and lesbians the basic right to have their relationships and families recognized as part of a community makes all of our communities stronger. ~ Paul Singer

I think what you're seeing is a profound recognition on the part of the American people that gays and lesbians and transgender persons are our brothers, our sisters, our children, our cousins, our friends, our co-workers, and that they've got to be treated like every other American. And I think that principle will win out. ~ Barack Obama

Martin hesitated. This was a definite yes and no answer. Yes, gay guys picked up strangers on the street, for that matter sometimes so did lesbians. And certainly straight people did whether they'd admit it or not. Of course, straight people were encouraged not to pick up people on the street, while gays and lesbians were encouraged not to exist at all. But none of that was the point. ~ Marshall Thornton

I know that of all the great shifts that have occurred in America
the freedom of slaves, the rights of women, the equality of gays and lesbians
none has happened easily, and certainly none has happened instantly and without serious attacks and backlash. But the reason we have these things is because the fair-minded people who came before us would not give up. In my life, I have seen elections stolen
either outright or through the electoral college. I have seen wars fought because there was no other way to get peace. I have seen the rich get richer and I have seen the poor get poorer. I have seen facts get harder and harder to hide
and easier and easier to manipulate. I have been angry and I have been frustrated and I have been ecstatic and I have been proven right and wrong and back again. I have given up on some things, but I have refused to give up on most things. And I can honestly say that all of it
all of it
seems to have led me to where we are, here and now. ~ David Levithan

A group trying to curtail the civil rights of gays and lesbians portrays itself, in this rhetorical twist, as victims of an effort to curtail the civil rights of Christians. One ~ Chris Hedges

Right now the institution of marriage feels very one-sided, and I want to live in a country where we all have equal rights. I have so many friends who are gays and lesbians who would so badly want to get married, that I wouldn't be able to sleep with myself [if I got married before they could]. ~ Charlize Theron

What I believe is that marriage is between a man and a woman, but what I also believe is that we have an obligation to make sure that gays and lesbians have the rights of citizenship that afford them visitations to hospitals, that allow them to be, to transfer property between partners, to make certain that they're not discriminated on the job. ~ Barack Obama

Suddenly you're at church and you hear someone pray, "For gays and lesbians, that they might realize their [sins] ... " That's happening less and less now, but all it takes is one of those when you're nine, ten, eleven, twelve - and it's hard to describe to people who aren't, because of course if you're not gay, an eleven- or twelve-year-old wouldn't even remember that that happened. ~ Stephen Karam

As a lifelong pacifist, Quaker, and a gay man, I despair that gays and lesbians are expending energy trying to get into the military when they should be using that same energy getting rid of the military completely. ~ Ned Rorem

I support same-sex civil unions and I believe no should be denied their rights ~ George W. Bush

No country should deny people their rights because of who they love, which is why we must stand up for the rights of gays and lesbians everywhere. ~ Barack Obama

There are other grounds for believing that gays and lesbians should be respected and protected from oppression: their right to privacy and freedom of action
and expression; the "victimless" nature of homosexual relations; and the many valuable contributions that gays and lesbians make to society. ~ Simon LeVay

Hip-hop is contributing to American society's misogyny and racism, hyper-sexuality anti-Black representations. Hip-Hop isn't setting the standard for misogyny. No one reduces the presidency to misogyny, although we've had misogynistic presidents. No one reduces our government to being solely homophobic, although we have a government with a don't ask, don't tell policy for gays and lesbians in the military. ~ Bakari Kitwana

The great tragedy in the new feminist theory in America is the loss of a sense of public commitment ... Hungry women are not fed by this, battered women are not sheltered by it, raped women do not find justice in it, gays and lesbians do not achieve legal protections through it. ~ Martha C. Nussbaum

I opposed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. It should be repealed and I will vote for its repeal on the Senate floor. I will also oppose any proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban gays and lesbians from marrying. ~ Barack Obama

Gays and lesbians began to gain civil rights when Americans realized that their brothers, cousins, daughters were gay. ~ Nicholas Kristof

I don't think it's the responsibility of gays and lesbians to reinvent the family. ~ Dan Savage

This informal "pre-exclusion" is probably the more powerful and widely exerted form in many churches. It is in my denomination. As the divorced and remarried don't seek communion at a Roman Catholic parish, gays and lesbians don't seek to participate in most evangelical churches. ~ Ken Wilson

In Indiana, gays and lesbians can be fired from their jobs with impunity, and in Arkansas, it's the same thing. We need those protective laws to truly have an equal society. ~ George Takei

When a politician like Marco Rubio is willing to sacrifice his career defining immigration reform legislation solely to insure that gays and lesbians are denied equal protection under the law, we have to admit that we're under attack. This is not pragmatic politics at work. These are the policies of bias, exclusion and unfairness. ~ Harvey Fierstein

[Gays and lesbians should be] Punished, in fact, killed. The people involved should be killed in the worst, most severe way of killing. ~ Ali Al-Sistani

A world that becomes more Muslim becomes less everything else. First it's Jews, already abandoning France. Then it's homosexuals, already under siege from gay-bashing in Amsterdam, 'the most tolerant city in Europe'. Then it's uncovered women, targetted for rape in Oslo. And if you don't any longer have any Jews or (officially) any gays or (increasingly) uncovered women, there are always just Christians in general, from Nigeria to Egypt to Pakistan. More space for Islam means less space for everything else, and in the end for you. ~ Mark Steyn

Originally I was opposed to gay assimilation and targeted gay marriage as just another effort on the part of gays to resemble their straight neighbours. ~ Edmund White

I've been told that I am evil. I've been told that I am behind the persecution of millions of Americans. That I have encouraged hate toward gays. I've received both very brief and obscene messages, and very long and literate messages that tell me a vote for Crash was vote for homophobia. ~ Roger Ebert

Rev. Pat Robertson says that if more states legalize gay marriage, God will destroy America. He did say that afterwards, gays will come in and do a beautiful renovation. ~ Conan O'Brien

I'm not unaware of the fact that probably my biggest audience is lesbians, and is probably the main reason why I've attained the success that I have, ~ Sharon Gless

My own feeling about JJ, without knowing anything about him, was that he might have been a gay person, because he had long hair and spoke American. A lot of Americans are gay people, aren't they? I know they didn't invent gayness, because they say that was the Greeks. But they helped bring it back into fashion. Being gay was a bit like the Olympics: it disappeared in ancient times, and then they brought it back in the twentieth century. Anyway, I didn't know anything about gays, so I just presumed they were all unhappy and wanted to kill themselves. ~ Nick Hornby

I don't understand the whole Christian conservativism doesn't make sense to me because I was raised very Christian and its kind of an odd thing but my parents, my family is also very conservative in their own way but I understand the bible and I studied Christianity very well and I don't see where the hatred of gays comes from because it really defeats Christ's purpose. ~ Margaret Cho

Coming out to gays is a way of affirming sanity and self-worth. ~ George Weinberg

We've got a Muslim for a president who hates cowboys, hates cowgirls, hates fishing, hates farming, loves gays and we hate him! ~ Hank Williams, Jr.

They needed some Jews or gays or something to spice things up, to add a bit of theater and a couple of interesting bistros. ~ Harlan Coben

In the past, when gays were very flamboyant as drag queens or as leather queens or whatever, that just amused people. And most of the people that come and watch the gay Halloween parade, where all those excesses are on display, those are straight families, and they think it's funny. But what people don't think is so funny is when two middle-aged lawyers who are married to each other move in next door to you and your wife and they have adopted a Korean girl and they want to send her to school with your children and they want to socialize with you and share a drink over the backyard fence. That creeps people out, especially Christians. So, I don't think gay marriage is a conservative issue. I think it's a radical issue. ~ Edmund White

I had no issues with lesbians, but I didn't swing the bat that way, and I kind of resented getting molested. ~ Gini Koch

The percentage of gays is the same, probably, as anywhere. Most bodybuilders are straight, regular street guys, though a lot aren't serious. Many in California are punks, beach bums just lying around in the sun and maybe collecting unemployment. ~ Arnold Schwarzenegger

The difference between the butch and the queen is rooted in the system of male supremacy. Gay male camp is based not simply on the incongruous juxtaposition of femininity and maleness, but also on the reordering of particular power relationships inherent in our society's version of masculinity and femininity. The most obvious cause for the minimum development of camp among lesbians was that masculinity was not and still isn't as incongruous as femininity in twentieth century American culture and therefore not as easily used as a basis for humor. Concomitantly although individual women might be able to sexually objectify a man, women has a group did not have the social power to objectify men in general. Therefore, such objectification could never be the basis for a genre of humor with wide appeal. But why didn't camp develop and thrive within the lesbian community itself? Because the structures of oppression were such that lesbians never really escaped from male supremacy. In lesbians' actual struggles in the bars or out on the streets, authority was always male. For queens to confront male authority was a confrontation between two men, on some level equals. The queen was playing with male privilege, which was his by birthright. For women to confront male authority is to break all traditional training and roles. Without a solid organization of all women, this requires taking on a male identity, beating men at their own game. Passive resistance or the fist is most appropriate f ~ Joan Nestle

It's very hard for a woman in comedy. It's hard for women to be bold and not care what anyone, particularly men, think. Maybe that is why so many women comics are lesbians. ~ Margaret Cho

Black Lesbians are not a threat to the Black family. Many of us have families of our own. We are not white, and we are not a disease. We are women who love women. This does not mean we are going to assault your daughters in an alley on Nostrand Avenue. It does not mean we only think about sex, any more than you only think about sex. Even if you do believe any of these stereotypes about Black Lesbians, begin to practice acting like you don't believe them. ~ Audre Lorde

If religion is the cornerstone of morality, how come I so often find myself explaining why I don't hate god to someone who's expressed hatred for atheists, scientists, feminists, gays, intellectuals, and all other forms of infidels? ~ Lindsey Brown

Naturalness?' I said, loudly. 'This lot'll tell you anything is natural; they'll tell you greed and hate and jealousy and paranoia and unthinking religious awe and fear of God and hating anybody who's another colour or thinks different is natural. Hating blacks or hating whites or hating women or hating men or hating gays; that's natural. Dog-eat-dog, looking out for number one, no lame ducks . . . Shit, they're so convinced about what's natural it's the more sophisticated ones that'll tell you suffering and evil are natural and necessary because otherwise you can't have pleasure and goodness. They'll tell you any one of their rotten stupid systems is the natural and right one, the one true way; what's natural to them is whatever they can use to fight their own grimy corner and fuck everybody else. They're no more natural than us than an amoeba is more natural than them just because it's cruder. ~ Iain M. Banks

It's kind of ironic that my character is a doctor who acts very gay with his best friend. I don't see how gays could ever be doctors, they spend too much time whining about everything. Just get off your soapbox and go back to designing floral arrangements ~ Zach Braff

To deny an entire group of people the ability to be legal couples is anti-American and anti-freedom. As a devoted husband and father of two, I can't imagine the state of Minnesota not recognizing my love for my wife Isabelle. We would welcome and respect the equal rights for gays to experience the same joy and privileges of marriage that we do. ~ Chris Kluwe

Perhaps the most radical aspect of queer politics was its claim not only to transcend the homo/hetero boundary but to do so in such a way as to challenge the sexual regulation and repression of heterosexual desire, above all female desire. Queer politics, it was claimed, had a lot to teach those accustomed to the narrow confines of 'male' and 'female' heterosexual roles in relationships. The re-working of notions of monogamy and the send-up of marriage through queer weddings, the greater sexual adventurism, the rejection of the concept of gay men and lesbians as 'victims' in favour of assertiveness and redefinition, and the emphasis on the creation of more egalitarian relationships in the domestic, sexual and social spheres, were all cited as examples of how queer could contribute to a new sexual agenda of empowerment. ~ Richard Dunphy

If gays are granted rights, next we'll have to give rights to prostitutes and to people who sleep with St. Bernards and to nail biters. ~ Anita Bryant

The US "Down Low" is thronging with young Black males who live double lives in the homosexual urban underground. These "Black" and "queer" young males, who have sex with men and live straight lives, reject "gays" as "faggots who dress, talk and act like girls", thereby ascribing a White effeminacy to gayness and embracing a Black hypermasculinity. ~ Chantal Zabus

Some people go to the West and claim they are gays and that their lives are at risk in the Gambia, in order for them to be granted a stay in Europe. ~ Yahya Jammeh

There's a tendency today to absolve individuals of moral responsibility and treat them as victims of social circumstance. You buy that, you pay with your soul. It's not men who limit women, it's not straights who limit gays, it's not whites who limit blacks. What limits people is lack of character. What limits people is that they don't have the fucking nerve or imagination to star in their own movie, let alone direct it. ~ Tom Robbins

'But it's weird, right? It's like we're a gay bug zapper and all the gays keep flocking to us because they think we're bright and shiny, but all I want to do is electrocute most of them because they annoy the crap out of me with their high-pitched whining.' ~ T.J. Klune

I love gay and lesbian parents. But I think we need a law that says lesbians and gay men have to raise their children together. This way, the kids would not only know how to build bookshelves, but they'd also instinctively know how to decorate them. ~ Joan Rivers

I don't get this shitty attitude that only gays should care about gay issues and only women should care about women's issues. ~ Sarah Silverman

There are a lot of very fine upstanding gays who are good citizens and all that. I am not making a decision for individual people. But when it comes to a societal policy, I think there are not enough babies for adoption to go around. I think a preference should be given to families with a mother and father who have a lifetime commitment. ~ Phyllis Schlafly

Some women have 'always' been lesbians. Others, like myself, have 'become' one. As much a sociocultural construction as it is an effect of early childhood experiences, sexual identity is nether innate nor simply acquired, but dynamically (re)structured by forms of fantasy private and public, conscious and unconscious, which are culturally available and historically specific. ~ Teresa De Lauretis

Loads of my friends are lesbians, and it really annoys me that gay people aren't allowed to get married in most parts of America. I'd go on a march for gay rights any time. ~ Pink