Photograph by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons
October 26, 1947– Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton:
“Resist, insist, persist, enlist.”
In June 2000, then candidate for the U.S. Senate Hillary Clinton, marched in NYC’s Gay Pride Parade, the first First Lady to ever march. She walked beside a guy wearing only a pink tutu. Yet, when she first ran for POTUS in 2008, Clinton had the chance to become the undisputed biggest ally for the LGBTQ Rights Movement. But, she didn’t take that chance.
While preparing for a forum on the Logo television network, she asked for advice from her lesbian friend Hilary Rosen, a noted political consultant. Rosen was very frustrated that no mainstream political figures supported Marriage Equality, and she challenged Clinton to speak out for the LGBTQ community that strongly supported her. Rosen:
“We took it personally, You try not to because it’s politics, but in this case, the politics is personal. I know her heart is in the right place.”
Clinton eventually got there, though her change of heart came a year after shifts by President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden. I don’t fault her for that. I suppose she had to wait until support for same-sex marriage was politically safer. Plus, I don’t care; as long as people do eventually change their minds.
Last year, as the presidential nominee for the Democratic Party, Clinton ran as a strong advocate for the LGBTQ community and a full-fledged supporter of Marriage Equality.
Inauguration Day 1997, White House photograph
I also understand why many LGBTQ people were disappointed with the Clintons. William Jefferson Clinton was one the first politicians to reach out to the LGBTQ community for support and as a donor base, but he was unwilling to stand with the community on one of its biggest Civil Rights issues.
The sticking point for many like myself was the Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA), the 1996 law signed by President Clinton right before his reelection effort that prohibited the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages. Hillary Clinton didn’t speak out about her husband’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy for gays in the military either. Maybe, because her influence was so diminished after her failed attempt to fix our health-care system. Still, many LGBTQ activists hoped that she would be the voice for them in the White House. With Republicans threatening to take away funding for HIV/AIDS research, the Clintons offered the best way to have any influence at all.
In 2000, Hillary Clinton said:
“Marriage has got historic, religious and moral content that goes back to the beginning of time, and I think a marriage is as a marriage has always been, between a man and woman.”
Yet, give her props, as a Senator she did oppose George W. Bush’s support for a Constitutional Amendment limiting legal marriage to one man / one woman. For me, it was confusing to know where she stood on LGBTQ issues.
Jason Collins, the first professional basketball player to come out of the closet, was friends with Chelsea Clinton while living in the same dorm with her at Stanford University. He remarked about just how totally comfortable the Clintons were dancing beside gay couples at Chelsea’s 30th birthday party in 2010. Collins:
“Chelsea kept a diverse inner circle and you know that probably had an effect on her parents’ thinking.”
When Collins come out in 2013, he went to the Clintons for support and advice. Hillary Clinton told Collins:
“There’s going to be a moment where everything is going so fast it feels like it’s moving at a million miles per second. At those moments, just take a breath, and keep going forward.”
When she became Secretary of State, Clinton changed the protocol so that same-sex partners of Foreign Service officers could have the same travel benefits at married couples.
She gave a speech in 2011 where she said:
“Gay Rights are Human Rights and Human Rights are Gay Rights.”
You didn’t hear Mitt Romney saying anything close, yet, in 2012, when Biden declared on television that he was “absolutely comfortable” with same-sex marriage, and Obama soon followed, saying: “same-sex couples should be able to get married”; Clinton stayed silent.
With Japanese Foreign Minister Sei Jo Maehara 2013, phto by Master Sgt. Cohen Young, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
In 2013, before the SCOTUS struck down DOMA, Clinton released a video with the Human Rights Campaign stating that she had at last reconciled her feelings and she now was fully behind Marriage Equality. Finally!
I figured that if she could “evolve”, so could I. I openly supported Clinton in 2016, even giving her money. November 8, 2016, was one of the saddest and most freighting evenings of my life. I had suspected that she wouldn’t win, but after PussyGate, I had grown so excited at the prospect of a smart female President who would be a certain ally for LGBTQ people.
Reading about her and watching her for the past year, my admiration has grown.
So, in 2017, let’s let go of the election and consider Hillary Clinton the Fashion Icon. Her 2016 campaign was marked by, among other things, her fashion choices. Every color and style of pantsuit, jacket, and hairstyle was planned, sending a message to her supporters and pushing-back at critics who had been insulting her appearance since she was First Lady. She had to endure comments that even the type of man who wears too-large suits and who uses Scotch tape instead of a tie clip rarely endures. Remember when POTUS wore the pants and jacket from two different suits at a meeting with Senator Tim Scott at the White House in September? Now that was a look.
At an event for International Women’s Day on March 8, Clinton wore a stylish bright red pantsuit, the color associated with the protest as thousands of women marched. I am certain it was meant to show her solidarity with the women and the movement, but she also chose to wear a multi-colored patterned shirt underneath her suit, bolder than any mix of colors that Clinton had worn as a candidate. Maybe solids just do better with independent voters.
Our unstylish, lumpy orange POTUS attacked her as lacking that “presidential look” during the campaign, but he can’t really get away with calling her a pig, dog, or slob when she shows up in a cream-colored wool Oscar de la Renta suit with big chunky gold jewelry like she did at an event last month.
As a guest on Graham Norton’s show last week, Clinton was more relaxed and funny than I had ever seen her. She also had a new hairstyle with bangs, something that wouldn’t have happened during the election unless a major P.R. procedure had been in place. Now, a year later, with a lost election, and some hiking in the woods, Clinton seems to have found a new, bolder, stronger approach to her style and her attitude.
With Graham Norton, SO TV, via YouTube
Hillary Rodham Clinton: Secretary of State, Senator, FLOTUS, lawyer and law professor, activist, volunteer, author, mother, grandmother, Fashion Icon. She now dedicates herself to her Onward Together organization, encouraging people to organize, get involved, and run for office. Onward Together advances progressive values and works to build a brighter future.
Clinton:
“Citizen engagement at every level is central to a strong and vibrant democracy. In recent months, we’ve seen what’s possible when people come together to resist bullying, hate, falsehoods, and divisiveness, and stand up for a fairer, more inclusive America.”
“From the Women’s March to airports where communities are welcoming immigrants and refugees to town hall meetings in every community, Americans are speaking up and speaking out like never before.”
“The challenges we face as a country are real. But there’s no telling what we can achieve if we approach the fights ahead with the passion and determination we feel today, and bring that energy into 2017, 2018, 2020, and beyond.”
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