Gerry Studds: “somebody may wonder why I or my colleague from Massachusetts [Mr. Frank] have not taken greater personal umbrage at some…”

“somebody may wonder why I or my colleague from Massachusetts [Mr. Frank] have not taken greater personal umbrage at some of the remarks here. I was thinking a moment ago that there might even be grounds to request that someone's words be taken down because my relationship, that of the gentleman from Massachusetts and, I suspect, others in the House, was referred to, among other things, I believe, as perverse. Surely if we had used those terms in talking about anyone else around here, we would have been sat down in one heck of a hurry. I am not taking this personally, because I happen to be able, I hope, to put this in some context. I would ask those, anyone listening to this debate this hour of the morning, to listen carefully to the quality and the tone of the words over here and the quality of the tone of the words over here. I would also ask people to wonder how in God's name could a question like this be divided along partisan lines. There is nothing inherently partisan that I know of about sexual orientation. I do not believe that there is some kind of a misdivision of this question between the aisles, and yet there is a strange imbalance here in the debate and the tone and quality of the debate.”