National security advisor: ‘America’s support for LGBT rights’ is a ‘global enterprise’
June 25, 2014
National Security Advisor Susan Rice said on June 24 that “America’s support for LGBT rights is not just a national cause but it’s also a global enterprise.”
“President Obama has specifically directed that American diplomacy and American assistance promote and protect the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender men and women, all around the world,” she said in an address to the first White House Forum on Global LGBT Human Rights.
“Universal human rights are not bestowed by governments or powerful majorities, they are God’s gift and the birth right of all people,” she added. “They belong to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender men and women as surely as they belong to anyone in the human family. As President Obama has said so eloquently, ‘If we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.’”
She continued:
So protecting our LGBT brothers and sisters is among the most challenging human rights issues we face. Prejudice has deep roots, and the laws limiting gay rights frequently enjoy strong popular support … For the faith community, how can we reinforce to religious groups that God loves all the children of his creation equally? For the human rights community, how can we help activists work together to advance social justice for everyone? Because, if you care about equal rights for women or ethnic or religious minorities, you should care about LGBT human rights too. It’s all the same.
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Further information:
- Remarks by National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice at the White House Forum on Global LGBT Human Rights (White House)
- FACT SHEET: Advancing The Human Rights Of LGBT Persons Globally (White House)
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Posted by: claude-ccc2991 -
Jun. 26, 2014 10:22 AM ET USA
True human rights proceed from Being. In the case of humans, the full expression of Being is male and female. It is unmistakable from their structure that male and female are meant for one another. And so authentic sexual expression is male-female. Any other sexual expression is not based on Being, and so is not entitled to any special recognition or rights.
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Posted by: samuel.doucette1787 -
Jun. 26, 2014 8:13 AM ET USA
The policies of the government I work for are truly evil. 17 years ago, I took an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Little did I suspect that the very government I work for would turn out to be an enemy of the natural law.
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Posted by: geoffreysmith1 -
Jun. 26, 2014 7:29 AM ET USA
“America’s support for LGBT rights is not just a national cause but it’s also a global enterprise.” Translation: America will continue to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries. And some people are puzzled why America is so hated in many parts of the world.
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Posted by: jimr451 -
Jun. 25, 2014 8:19 PM ET USA
Ms Rice, you say, "God loves all the children of his creation equally" - does that include children in the womb?
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Posted by: garedawg -
Jun. 25, 2014 11:19 AM ET USA
Well, that should certainly endear us to the Middle East, Asia, and Eastern Europe.
