Obama's order on gay hospital rights
The President has issued an order requiring most hospitals to let patients receive visits from same-gender partners and to respect patients' choices on whom to delegate their health-care decision-making ability. The order applies only to hospitals which receive federal funding, but there are few that do not.
The order alleviates a serious humanitarian problem. Since gays cannot yet marry in most states, partners do not automatically have these rights, the way spouses of heterosexual patients do. Patients have gone through hospital stays or even died without being able to see the person who is most important to them, while homophobic family members use their automatically-recognized rights as blood relatives as one more opportunity to torment and divide a couple.
In what will doubtless be just the first of many responses from Christian hate groups, the Family Research Council denounced the order as "pandering" and "undermining the definition of marriage", even though it says nothing about gay marriage. Humanitarian concerns mean nothing to these bigots; their sole concern is to protect the "right" to bully and discriminate.
The order alleviates a serious humanitarian problem. Since gays cannot yet marry in most states, partners do not automatically have these rights, the way spouses of heterosexual patients do. Patients have gone through hospital stays or even died without being able to see the person who is most important to them, while homophobic family members use their automatically-recognized rights as blood relatives as one more opportunity to torment and divide a couple.
In what will doubtless be just the first of many responses from Christian hate groups, the Family Research Council denounced the order as "pandering" and "undermining the definition of marriage", even though it says nothing about gay marriage. Humanitarian concerns mean nothing to these bigots; their sole concern is to protect the "right" to bully and discriminate.
posted by Infidel753 at 4:05 AM
6 Comments:
Another step forward, slow but sure. Progress always makes some people angry. So be it.
Good Morning Mr.Infidel!
GEEEEEZZZ ... Yes, I have read this elsewhere's as well today .... but what was "shocking" to me was that there are actually "rules" that same sex partner's cant visit their partner's in hospital's to begin with? I mean .... do they realize how many openly gay nurses work in American hospital's? Hell, just go into a gay club an hour after shift changes and see how many are still wearing their work smock's! I had NO IDEA of this. I'd visit any damn way .... fuck them and their rule's/ law's .... and thanx at least for the President stepping in on this .... I hadnt any idea .... that is really over the top! The shit that gay's lesbian's, and bi's, and TG's have put up with for year's is incredible, and one of the reason's I alway's said that they should only have to pay half/tax because they obviously get only half the benefit's of any other tax paying citizen!
Thanx Guy ...........
Good for our President. I like to see this man in action.
The reaction of the bigots is not surprising. Change is always threatening to the ignorant.
HE: Yes -- if it didn't make some people angry, it would already have been done, long ago.
RC: I think it's like how they made black people sit at the back of the bus in the old days. Some people boost their own sense of self-worth by pushing down somebody else.
TNLib: It's the most meaningful step he's yet taken in this area. Now all we need is a good Supreme Court pick.
This is a good, positive step. I have heard some absolutely heartbreaking stories of life partners denied the ability to say goodbye because only "family" was allowed in the ICU -- that's the most important thing marriage does, it creates kinship, and all the rights that come with it. This is why civil unions are such an insult, no matter how many anti-marriage-equality people claim that it's the same, it's just nowhere near.
And we know that separate is inherently unequal (Brown v. Board of education) and that marriage is a basic civil right (Loving v. Virginia), so this upcoming SCOTUS nomination really is a huge deal.
I think it's incredibly positive that President Obama has fully worked through his good intentions toward bipartisanship and come to grips with the fact the only way he can change things is with sheer numbers.
But, the biggest problem we face with all this, is the anti-choicers -- if any blue dogs get a whiff of a potential nominee being in favor of a woman's right to choose, well, it could get dicey for any progressive choice.
Still, excellent progress.
GL: Indeed so. I've heard those stories too. Most people have no idea how much cruelty is perpetuated by their hand-wringing vague anxieties against gay marriage. (Well, I think the Christian bigots do know, and for them, the cruelty is actually the point.) But this order will do a lot to improve the lives of people, quickly.
The Supreme Court pick will tell us a lot about how much progress Obama has made in escaping his delusions about bipartisanship. If he chickens out and makes a "safe" "moderate" choice, the Republicans will fight tooth and nail anyway, so he might as well have the guts to choose somebody solid like Wood or Clinton.
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