07/04/2008
Ding Dong...Former Senator Jesse Helms is dead.
Former U.S. Senator Jesse Helms, a North Carolina Republican who opposed civil right, the MLK holiday, extending voting rights, the United Nations, the Test Ban Treaty, affirmative action, arts funding, and anything at all to do with gay rights is dead. Not until his last year in the senate, under the persuasive powers of U2s Bono did he support any AIDS measures, and then only for Africa with predominantly heterosexual transmission.
From the International Herald Tribune: "He fought bitterly against U.S. government aid for AIDS research and treatment, saying the disease resulted from "unnatural" and "disgusting" homosexual behavior.
'Nothing positive happened to Sodom and Gomorrah," he said, "and nothing positive is likely to happen to America if our people succumb to the drumbeats of support for the homosexual lifestyle.'"
To all those people who died too soon or who lived without being able to live life to its fullest as a result of Jesse Helms and his influence, may you rest in peace.
Andy's still on vacation.
--Michael
Previously on Towleroad:
Jesse Helms "Hands" ad playing to racist fears (1990):
Fighting Back: ACTUP Activists put Condom Over Jesse Helms' House (1991)
Posted 6:26 PM EST by Michael Goff in Republican Party | Permalink
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burn in hell you racist, homophobic, fat fuck....and may all these bastards who sing your post-mortem praises join you asap...
Posted by: ronoliver | Jul 5, 2008 3:27:43 AM
I am with Nick. I am not particularly torn apart that he died, but I don't think anyone's death is celebratory. I think if anything, it's a shame he didn't come around before passing.
Posted by: Britt | Jul 5, 2008 4:19:36 AM
May that miserable prick NOT rest in peace. May his soul burn in the fires of hell forever.
Posted by: mike | Jul 5, 2008 6:47:20 AM
Hell burns a little hotter with this hateful hurtful piece of shit feeding the embers of the hellfires. I hope he never has a moments peace in the afterlife but instead is tomented forever by those whos lives he cut short with the filibustering of countless AIDS funding bills. Truely an evil evil man.....He was in no way a public servant.And...I hope he suffered. They say he had dementia in the end...I ask....how could they tell?
Posted by: Tex... | Jul 5, 2008 8:27:19 AM
Nick,
The nation has lost something? Are you insane?
A supporter of Jim Crow is a loss worth mourning? Someone who attacked our own communities with glee, fostered and rejoiced in our deaths? The only sadness is that there's no hell in which he will burn.
Posted by: MAJeff | Jul 5, 2008 9:07:39 AM
NICK,
when you regain your normal complexion, after you taken to your bed, of course, you may consider that Helms, or "Senator No" as he became known, was against civil rights and affirmative action, choice for women, gay rights, funding for the arts, nuclear arms reduction (SALT II), school busing, the Panama Canal Treaty, and the U.N. in fact, everything that might have advanced comity among the ethnic groups in this country and international relations.
his views were not only far from helpful, they were destructive. he called the Civil Rights Act of 1964, "the single most dangerous piece of legislation ever introduced in the Congress." he supported Chile's Pinochet and the right-wing death squads in El Salvador.
Maybe his family (some of them) have suffered a loss, but has this country? far from it. remember, Mussolini was also a public servant. he kept the trains running on schedule, after all.
QUEENDRU,
not only how dare you, but how fuckin' dare you, compare Helms to Sen. Byrd!? Helms died a largely unrepentant bigot. Sen. Byrd, over time, changed his position on race:
In the NAACP Congressional Report Card for the 108th Congress (spanning the 2003–2004 congressional session), Byrd was awarded with an approval rating of 100% for favoring the NAACP's position in all 33 bills presented to the United States Senate regarding issues of their concern. Only 16 other Senators of the same session matched this approval rating. In June 2005, Byrd[45] proposed an additional $10 million in federal funding for the Martin Luther King memorial in Washington, D.C., remarking that "With the passage of time, we have come to learn that his Dream was the American Dream, and few ever expressed it more eloquently."
On May 19, 2008, Senator Byrd endorsed Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential primary, over rival Senator Hillary Clinton.
i would prefer to mourn AND celebrate a life well lived no matter how short (Lincoln, RFK, JFK, LBJ, MLK, Cesar Chavez) than to render empty apologias over an existence wasted. while i may not rejoice at the death of Helms, i deplore his existence.
Posted by: nic | Jul 5, 2008 9:38:52 AM
I feel no pity for this evil man's rotting soul.
Posted by: Timothy | Jul 5, 2008 10:05:19 AM
I have nothing but sympathy for the late Senator's family and loved ones.
Respect is earned, not given; Helms the man earned nothing less than my contempt. His passing is one more sign, here in the politics of the South at least, of our slow crawl out of the Late Cretaceous.
Posted by: Laurence Ballard | Jul 5, 2008 10:28:48 AM
Good riddance to another racist, homophobic "conservative Republican." May he rest in hell forever.
Posted by: Sebastian | Jul 5, 2008 10:41:29 AM
Say it with me bois,
"ALL WE LOATHE, WE LOOOOOOATHE HER"
The reason to rejoice is that Dem or Rep, this is the evil fucker who wanted us to be packed into the trains and killed in the camps while we were tortured and they found the non-existent cure for 'GAY'; to protect their kid's kids. Good riddance to bad filth.
Posted by: lexxicuss | Jul 5, 2008 11:50:16 AM
Well, there is certainly some room for compromise here.
Because Nick's and everyone else's opinions here are equally respectable.
How's this:
Rest in Peace, Jesse. May we take comfort in knowing that wherever you are now, you do finally understand the consequences of your actions here on earth, even better than we do. I imagine you're hanging out right now with the eternal soul of some gay teenager from Georgia or Texas who committed suicide at 14, spurred in part by one of your acidic rants against what he already knew he was. I believe that you have now come to the wisdom you always claimed to follow in mortality; I know that you'll only be able to weep for eternity now having come into full understanding of what you've done to so many people. But rest in peace, Jesse. It's over now.
Posted by: JeffRob | Jul 5, 2008 12:10:12 PM
I have sympathy for his family, presuming that he treated them better than he treated us. Otherwise, good riddance.
Queendru, is there a bigoted Republican you won't defend? So, some of the responses have been less than mature and charitable here. He's dead, he doesn't care. And he certainly didn't care about us while he was alive, except to say what vermin we were. Some people simply don't merit respect, and he never gave us any however politely we behaved. The anger is justified.
Posted by: Ernie | Jul 5, 2008 12:14:17 PM
My father, who's in his 80s and lived part of his life in NC, broke out the champagne to celebrate, as he put it, "the old codger's trip straight to hell." He also wonders how they knew he had vascular dementia. Was there really any change from his earlier evil, demented self?
Posted by: Kevinvt | Jul 5, 2008 12:30:49 PM
We just have to pray he stays dead. As long as they sever his head and stuff his mouth with garlic, we may be safe.
Posted by: Scooter | Jul 5, 2008 1:11:53 PM
I'm sorry but all of you who are shocked at people being glad this man is dead don't know the extent of his vileness. I suggest you all do a little research. I just wish he would have died sooner, before he did most of his evil deeds.
Queendru--are you actually a gay man or lesbian? If so I feel really sorry for any of your intimates.
Posted by: DanielM | Jul 5, 2008 2:59:10 PM
As they've been singing over at JMG's...."Ding, Dong the witch is dead!".
Posted by: Weezy | Jul 5, 2008 3:15:25 PM
Ding Dong! The Witch is dead. Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch!
Ding Dong! The Wicked Witch is dead.
Wake up - sleepy head, rub your eyes, get out of bed.
Wake up, the Wicked Witch is dead.
She's gone where the goblins go,
Below - below - below.
Yo-ho, let's open up and sing and ring the bells out.
Ding Dong' the merry-oh, sing it high, sing it low.
Let them know!
The Wicked Witch is dead!
Posted by: Br!on | Jul 5, 2008 3:29:28 PM
When I heard about his death, my first thought was good riddance - but the more I thought about it for me the whole episode is a shame. We're all on this earth for a very short time, and to think someone of his stature, a US Senator, used his energies to be hateful and hurtful. In the end, what good did it do for him, except maybe to inflict pain on others. It served no constructive purpose. Now he's dead and his attitudes are shown to be bigoted and racist. Not exactly a good epitaph for ones life. There is a lesson to be learned here for all these other anti-gay folks... but unfortunately they aren't paying attention. Here is the first paragraph of his obituary from the Washington Post:
Jesse Helms, the North Carolina Republican senator whose uncompromising conservatism made him one of America's leading crusaders against communism, liberalism, tax increases, abortion, homosexuality, affirmative action and court-ordered busing to integrate schools, died yesterday at Mayview Convalescent Center in Raleigh, N.C.
Posted by: Mike | Jul 5, 2008 5:41:23 PM
I'm a former Republican myself, though never a supporter of Sen. Helms. But as a Christian gay man, I cannot and will not rejoice in anyone's death. I can (and do) disagree with his politics and beliefs, yet it is not in me to hate anyone for any reason. I cannot say I'm sad to see him die, but neither am I rejoicing or wishing he died of AIDS or is suffering in hell or any of that. Instead, I will pray for his family as they grieve the loss of a loved one, and also pray that they will learn to view the world and us gays differently than he did.
Look at the irony of VP Dick Cheney: he's very homophobic yet has a daughter who is openly Lesbian. Who knows? Maybe the same is true for one or more members of Helms' family as well! And I believe it was the very racist Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-NC and political kin to Helms) who learned that he had an ancestor who was a Negro slave! Isn't that what we call poetic justice?!
Posted by: timotito | Jul 5, 2008 6:40:47 PM
correction: Sen. Thurmond was from SC, not NC as I incorrectly stated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strom_Thurmond
Posted by: Timotito | Jul 5, 2008 6:46:01 PM
No, Thurmond didn't learn he had a black ancestor, he had a black child.
When he was in his twenties, he got one of the family's black servants--a teenage girl--pregnant (I'm being more polite than the racist old rapist deserves), and he fathered a black child, paying mom hush money for decades. It never came out til the end.
Posted by: MAJeff | Jul 5, 2008 6:59:31 PM
Timotito, there are innumerable awful things that can be said about Dick Cheney, and I am hardly a fan. But he is not homophobic in his personal life and has never mustered much support for antigay policies. As defense secretary he called the military's ban on gays "an old chestnut" and indicated that he'd be willing to consider revising the policy. He was quickly shot down by the military's old guard. Most antigay White House policies in recent years have been driven by Karl Rove. Hell, as governor of Texas even Dubya had openly gay staff members.
Moreover, Mary (the lesbian) is by far Cheney's favorite daughter. I know this because my mother used to work for him, and staff were told that calls from Mary were ALWAYS to be put directly through. He didn't even extend that policy to his shrew of a wife, Lynne (who by all accounts is a monster). Moreover, his chief of staff and later Defense Department spokesman during the first Iraq war, Pete Williams, was widely known to be gay long before he was officially outed. He used to tapdance in the office for chrissakes. My parents used to joke about him at the dinner table, but when I told my mother he'd been outed she was very upset. I couldn't remember Pete's name and so had to do a search. I don't know anything about this site and so can't vouch for it, but most of this article is quoting Randy Shilts, who I think is a pretty safe source:
http://www.gaypatriot.net/2008/02/19/dick-cheney-gays-in-the-military/
As for Helms, I'm amazed that I never heard about his house being covered with a condom, not least because I lived in Virginia at the time. The clip suggests that they didn't get arrested, which seems impossible to believe. That bitch neighbor was unbelievably irritating.
Posted by: Paul R | Jul 5, 2008 7:48:39 PM
Burn in hell, fucker! Too bad he couldn't have the world and favor and stopped breathing decades ago!
And fuck you, I have the right to celebrate this bastard's death. How many of your friends died while he did nothing?
Posted by: christopher | Jul 5, 2008 8:01:35 PM
Never forget that it was a GAY man who made Jesse Helms a success at destroying our gay lives.
Arthur Finkelstein, an asshole in the Boston area who with his gay partner has raised adopted kids, is a fucking GAY MAN who led the heinously evil campaigns of Jesse Helms and other viciously anti-gay politicians: http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1996/news/9610/10/karl.finkelstein/index.shtml
Posted by: Hephaestion | Jul 5, 2008 8:02:52 PM
Ding Dong the evil Bitch is Dead!! Thank God! Now, he's satan's bitch -- like W. Rehnquist before him!
Posted by: Paul B in San Diego | Jul 5, 2008 8:11:28 PM