GOP Should Be Tolerant of Homosexuals, Gingrich Says

Homosexuality is an orientation “like alcoholism is an orientation,” House Speaker-to-be Newt Gingrich says in an interview to be published in a gay newspaper. The Republican Party’s position, he says, should be “toleration.”

“I think that on most things most days, the vast majority of practicing homosexuals are good citizens,” the Georgia Republican said in an April 16 interview to be published in Friday’s edition of the Washington Blade. “So why would you then say that, of all the different groups you can pick on, this is the one group you’re going to single out?”

The GOP’s position “should not be promotion, and it should not be condemnation,” he said. “I don’t want to see police in the men’s room, which we had when I was a child, and I don’t want to see trying to educate kindergartners in understanding gay couples.”

Gingrich’s comments echo what he has said in other forums about homosexuality. He also said he has no trouble being friends or working with homosexuals. In fact, one of his sisters is a lesbian.

Candace Gingrich, 28, said her sexual orientation is not a secret, but she has not previously discussed it publicly. She told the Associated Press that her brother’s response was that “I have every right to live my life the way I want to.”

Gingrich told the Blade that the Republican Party and society are moving toward the position that “consenting adults can have private relations without in any way the political system being involved.” But he called it “madness” to suggest that families are anything other than heterosexuals.

“Over time, we want to have an explicit bias in favor of heterosexual marriage,” he said. “If you look at the pathologies and weaknesses of America today, re-establishing the centrality of marriage and of the role of a male and female in that relationship is a very central issue of the next 20 years.”

On Wednesday, a gay Republican group pointed to Gingrich’s “contract with America” as evidence that the GOP is moving away from the far-right social agenda that has historically repelled gay voters.

Rich Tafel, executive director of the Log Cabin Republicans, cited exit polls conducted for the New York Times that showed one in three gay, lesbian or bisexual voters voted Republican on Election Day.

In the interview, Gingrich said that he believes homosexuality is “an orientation in the way that alcoholism is an orientation.”

“If you’re asking me do I believe there are very many people who are compelled to that lifestyle, I think the answer is basically no,” he said. “I think there’s a bias in that direction . . . just like there’s a bias towards lots of behaviors.”