I see that today has been a busy one for the anti-gay industry.
Adoption - This weekend, I wrote about how Paul Cameron was trying to retread his lie that gays have a short life span. It would be the third time he tried and like the first two, his observations are built on distortions (see Friday’s posts).
Today, Cameron sent out another press release claiming that since he proved that gays have a short life span, they should not adopt children:
“The life span of gays is 20-plus years shorter than the life span of heterosexuals,” states Dr. Paul Cameron of the Family Research Institute, a Colorado-based think tank. “This shortened lifespan,” he warned, “has profound implications for adoption. On average, in Norway and Denmark — where same-sex marriage is legal – married lesbians lived to age 56 and married gay men to age 52. So the chances that a gay-adopted child will lose one or both parents before graduating from high school are much greater than they would be with a married man and woman.”
How convenient for Cameron that the anti-gay industry is trying to use the issues of gay adoption and foster care as cash cows, much like that of same-sex marriage. Arkansas is just one state that has to deal with the issue.
And don’t be so quick to laugh Cameron away. While it is true that he has a dubious reputation, are we doing a good job in making sure people know about him; especially those who will cite his so-called research.
Because slowly but surely, Cameron’s recent press release is being passed around, read, and believed.
Hate Crimes Legislation - The anti-gay industry have been lying about hate crimes legislation, claiming that it will lead Christians to be put in jail simply for saying that homosexuality is a sin.
This, of course, is a lie. But now they have stepped up the game.
A group, Faith2Action is now claiming that the addition of lgbts to hate crimes legislation means that a crime committed against a grandmother would rank less than a crime committed against an lgbt.
As proof of this, Faith2Action is distorting the recent court case of the protestors arrested during a gay pride parade in Philadelphia. They are even asking for money for commercials featuring the protestors who just happen to be grandmothers.
Faith2Action’s efforts are being led by one Janet Folger. Folger made a name for herself in 1998 in the failed media blitz of the ex-gay groups trying to publicize the notion that gays can “change.”
The media blitz failed partly because Folger admitted in a debate with gay columnist Andrew Sullivan that she supported the sodomy laws; laws that could jail lgbts for private sexual behavior.
How ironic and hypocritical of Folger.
Day of Silence - The Day of Silence, an excellent way for lgbt students to express themselves, is under fire yet again. This time, a group of so-called “pro-family” groups are encouraging families to have their children boycott the day.
The schools participating in the Day of Silence are listed in no doubt a sly way to encourage folks to call them and badger administrators with lies of a “gay agenda.”
And for those who will not protest the Day of Silence, there is the Day of Truth, or a day when students are encouraged to repeat Paul Cameronesque lies about the lgbt community.
The person who seems to be at the head of all of this is Linda Harvey of Mission America.
Unfortunately, Miss Harvey’s mission has nothing to do with truth:
“When people have views supporting homosexuality they should not be involved with youth in any way, period. Because they:
will provide inaccurate, misleading information to kids;
may limit a student’s opportunity to hear warnings about the behavior;
may advocate or model inappropriate behavior;
may be directly involved in the molestation of kids themselves; or
may be in a position to allow others to do so” - Fairy Tales Don’t Come True, February 13, 2006
Harvey has no training in anything remotely having to do with child care or sexual orientation issues. Her webpage lists her as a former ad executive. In other words, this woman does not know what the hell she is talking about.
Apparently Harvey thinks that being a Christian excuses her for being ignorant.
I hope no one accuses me of being paranoid when I say that these events happening so close to each other does not strike me as coincidental.
This three-prong attack didn’t happen spontaneously.
I don’t think that Paul Cameron just happenstance decided to create his study and try to use it against gay adoption.
Nor do I think that Harvey and Folger just came up with their campaigns to lie and silence lgbts.
This three-prong attack seems to be the result of slow, meticulous planning.
So what are we doing about it?
There have been some who think that we should protest, march, and get arrested in order to show our anger as to how our community is being victimized.
Sometimes I wonder if being loud and showy the result of lazy behavior; trying to get what we need in one angry rush.
While we are doing all of this “demonstrating,” the anti-gay industry is weaving a tapestry based on lies and distortions. We have to be there at the beginning, exposing the lies and dismantling the distortions. And I don’t mean that namby pamby bullshit of “trying to win hearts and minds.”
There is nothing wrong with calling a liar one to his or her face, as long as you have the proof to back it up.
If we don’t do this, then all of the yelling, screaming, and protesting in the world will not help us.
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March 28th, 2007 at 12:44 pm
I read about another young person wearing an anti gay t-shirt to school. A girl this time.
And the mau maus, like the ADF say it’s a compromise of her free speech.
When Chase Harper wore his shirt, it was specifically on the Day of Silence.
Evidently these Christian groups have no sense of consistency or moral equivalence.
Would it KILL these children to NOT express their disdain for their gay peers in this way?
We know that this judgement kills gay kids, doesn’t it?
So the urgency of protest or expression by the young people on the Day of Silence bears far more legitimacy.
Reality should trump religious belief and these children should learn about the profit of their expression as opposed to the deficit.
What does it profit them to wear the shirts and give offense?
The school is being just a responsible if a kid wanted to wear a Nazi expression on Shoah.
That is moral equivalence on their part.
Interesting that this same expression isn’t taken to consistent conclusions. Disdain for the children of divorced parents for example.
I rarely see these same Christians picketing family courts where divorce proceedings are conducted.
If at all.
See, what would happen is if they WERE consistent, someone would tell them how very cruel they were, and in being reactive. Instead of consulting those who they direct their disdain at, and LISTENING to them.
How cruel a person it is, indeed, how morally bankrupt to NEVER listen to someone else’s experience and try to understand if they are in pain.
And learning about it.
NOT LISTENING is stock and trade of these groups.
And that shows their lack of moral character in itself.
That they only react, and have no ability in making the measure of another human being correctly.
March 28th, 2007 at 12:55 pm
I agree on showing when someone is a liar and a hypocrite…or completely illogical.
Ultimately EVERY anti gay argument will be one or all of these.
The proof in doing so isn’t that hard, really.
Sometimes just calling them on how they know so much, from the opposite source.
I challenged someone on a man lecturing a woman on childbearing.
His answer:
That a male gynocologist WAS qualified.
And this while at the same time upbraiding me for knowing anything about his FEELINGS.
My response, a MAN cannot and NEVER will know what it FEELS like to bear a child.
NEVER.
So a gay person cannot lecture a gay person on HOW IT FEELS.
If you know a person can’t tell YOU how you feel, than how is it possible you can lecture a gay person?
I told him he knew how he felt about gay people. A gynecologist only knows what a woman will tell him.
But he’d be a fool to NOT BELIEVE her, just as this man was a fool to NOT BELIEVE a gay person.
He did what most of them do. He found something else to argue about. He ran.
He ran from the point.
There is truth on our side, if only the fact that gay people know better than anyone what’s what, and no straight person is in any place to deny it or call a gay person a liar.
Experience is a great teacher, and no straight person can say THEY are the ultimate experience or teacher on being gay or ABOUT gay people.
And almost exclusively, when trying to cite scientific or social research, their resources are also exclusively straight people with an anti gay bias.
And little experience, except second hand information or first hand information from gay people with some kind of pathology that narrows the demographic.
That they get away with doing so, is beside the point.
It would be so much easier for everyone, if these people would just LISTEN to the most reliable source and believe it’s fair and accurate.
But these are also people comforted by their own denial and delusion.
And breaking through it, is a bitch.