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I'm starting to think San Francisco is another world onto itself. First there was the attempt to ban circumcisions. Then fast food toys. Now a candidate for city mayor who decided to show images of himself with his own child in his campaign ad has been accused of exploitation.
So what did Bevan Dufty do? Make his 5-year-old daughter pose naked? Make her work long, grueling hours with no food? Nope. He just dared to be a gay man having fun taking daughter Sidney on San Francisco's municipal transportation system. For shame! Everyone knows a 5-year-old deserves to cab it! Er ...
The ludicrous complaints come, not surprisingly, from the people terrified that Dufty may become the first openly gay mayor in the town known for giving California its first gay public official (you may have heard of him: Harvey Milk?). Toting out his daughter, they say, is tantamount to saying, "Yay, look at me, I'm a gay man and I have a kid! I can have it all bee-yotch! Nanny nanny boo boo." And making them uncomfortable has been termed "exploitative" of the child.
So let's think about this for a second, shall we?
I would need more than the 10 fingers on my right and left hands to count the number of photos and commercials I've seen in the past few weeks featuring politicians stumping for my vote and their own families. Let me guess: that's OK because they're all straight parents? They must love their families more? And take better care of them, right? I imagine they'd NEVER force their 5-year-old to ride ... public ... transportation.
Uh huh.
Or they're just regular Americans who never have to think about whether or not they can have a child because in this country, just about any moron can become a parent (and often do). It's one of those "inalienable rights" cited in the Constitution, the kind not tied to any law but simply there for us straight folks. Hence most candidates use imagery of their kids to show "hey, this is part of who I am."
They simply acknowledge a child's existence, and they're labeled "family values" candidates. A gay man acknowledges his child's existence, and he's labeled "exploitative."
Sorry folks, you can't have it both ways!
If a gay man wants to use his (biological) daughter in a campaign ad to illustrate that he likes to ride the trains with his kiddo, that's not exploitation. Unless it's exploitation for Michele Bachmann to talk about her 23 foster kids? Or how about that time Andrew Giuliani went bounding across the platform at Rudy's first mayoral inauguration? And what about Jon Huntsman's daughters, who just so happened to pop up in the pictures of his announcement that he was running for president? Is all that exploiting the kiddos too?
The fact that Dufty's ad makes him the first gay candidate to feature their own child in a campaign ad isn't exploitative. It's sad. An estimated 3.8 percent of the population is gay, and that includes plenty of politicians. Yet gay candidates have been forced to pretend they aren't like everyday average Americans with loving families because then all those straight candidates wouldn't get to claim they're the only one with good family values!
Take a look at Bevan Dufty and little Sidney taking the Muni and tell me what you see. Because I see a dad and a daughter. Is that exploitation?
See this video on The Stir by CafeMom.
Image via YouTube
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