It seems plausible to infer that Lindsey Graham is gay, and that he is regularly serviced by male sex workers. He is a huge hero to the homophobic fundagelicals—people who want to enable discrimination against non-hets (and other people, but that’s a different post) in terms of employment, civil rights, housing. Critics of that agenda say that both Graham and homophobic fundagelicals are hypocrites, since they continue to employ someone who persistently works for the persecution of people like him.
It isn’t hypocrisy. I’m not saying it’s good or okay–I’ll argue it’s a rejection of Christ—I’m saying that voting for Graham doesn’t violate their understanding of what homosexuality is and how it should function in our culture, and it doesn’t violate any principle of theirs because they don’t have a political agenda grounded in any particular principle.
That’s partially because they’ve lost the thread of their own argument. Homophobic fundagelicals are like that uncle at Thanksgiving who started out defending a position about which he feels strongly, but also about which he’s never thought particularly carefully. And now he’s had too much to drink to remember exactly what he’s said so far in its defense, or even what exactly his position is. But he’ll defend it, or something like it, by God.
At one time, the argument was that homosexuality and pedophilia were identical, and therefore it was necessary to criminalize and pathologize homosexuality in order to protect children. Then there was the Sodom argument. Both of those finally collapsed as indefensible, but many people still held on to the notion that homosexual desire was Satanic, and could be prayed away. After a while, they gave up on that argument too, and started making the analogy to addiction—you might be an alcoholic, but that doesn’t mean you can’t stop drinking.
There’s an old joke among Baptists—who supposedly don’t drink—as to “what mile” a Baptist is. A ten-mile Baptist doesn’t drink within ten miles of his church. A one-mile Baptist only waits a mile.
They see Lindsey Graham as a ten-mile gay, and they’re good with that. He supports their homophobic political agenda, and he isn’t open about his sexuality.
At this point, most (all?) fundagelicals who support a homophobic political agenda all have relatives whom they know are queer in some way or other, and they just want the person not to say it out loud. And that is the important part—they are fine with queer people who don’t talk openly about being queer. Supporting Graham is consistent with the principle that queer people are okay if they aren’t out, and they support a homophobic agenda.
These same people say that they are victimized when they aren’t allowed to use taxpayer money and governmental institutions to try to convert people to their religion. They don’t just want to be open about their beliefs and practices—they want to be able to pressure people to convert. Queers should be out of the public space, and fundagelicals should be at the center of it.
In other words, they do not do unto others as they would have done unto them.
They reject the guy who said that was important.
They don’t violate their own principles, but they violate his.
By supporting Lindsey Graham while also supporting a homophobic policy agenda, they don’t violate their own principles, because their principle about homosexuality is that it’s fine if it’s in the closet, and Graham is, but they violate the pretty clear principle set out by that guy whom they reject. And that is the problem.