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| Dear Tony Perkins, a BAD liar is of use to no one. |
1. The first incident has to do with a Colorado bakery being found not guilty by the the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies of violating a potential customer's rights by refusing to put anti-gay messages on a cake. The bakery still served the potential customer and offered to sell him the equipment so he could put the message on the cake.
Now in the eyes of the anti-gay right, this is equivalent of not serving a customer for being an lgbt, a so-called right of 'religious freedom':
The "Religious Freedom" Case That Wasn't -- Right-Wing Media's Slippery Slope Argument Debunked - But as shown by Media Matters, that idea is a false equivalency.
Stop. Lying. Tony. Perkins. - And of course where would this false narrative be without Tony Perkins and the Family Research Council? The lie he pushed in this tweet is simply SAD. Are you slipping, Tony.
2. Now the second incident is rather simple. For all of their talk about protecting the 'religious freedom' of folks who believe that homosexuality is a sin, one wonders how does the anti-gay right feel about protecting the 'religious freedom' of those who do NOT think that homosexuality is a sin?
Does one have to ask?:
Perkins: LGBT-Affirming Christians Committing 'Heresy' - Heresy? I haven't heard that word since last week when I watched the documentary on why Mary Tudor of England had over 280 people burned at the stake. Apparently they were "committing heresy."
Barber & Staver: Baptist College President Must Be Fired For Allowing Lesbian Pastor To Speak On Campus - The only "religious freedom" Matt Barber and Mat Staver believe in is for their beliefs. Sad.
The entire point of today's news briefs is this - We have to do more. I get constantly frustrated because it seems that the lgbt community waits for the anti-gay right to define the narrative. And when they are being blatantly hypocritical, we don't capitalize on it.
The only reason why the anti-gay right gets away with a lot of the stuff they do is because we let them. It's not enough to KNOW that the anti-gay right is lying or being deceptive. We have to let people know. We have to aggressively educate people on what's really going on in this so-called culture war.
I'm not sure what we can do to change the conversation. The reason the right-wing dingbats control the narrative is because the media rarely communicates the views of the LGBT community. Their happy to interview hate groups and their leaders constantly but apart from the occasional interview of Dan Savage, we rarely see our community represented except in blogs like yours. It would be nice to see national groups like HRC step up as much as FRC does.
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ReplyDeleteThe "Religious Freedom" Case That Wasn't -- Right-Wing Media's Slippery Slope Argument Debunked - But as shown by Media Matters, that idea is a false equivalency.
That article leaves me confused and I read through it a few times. The only part I got was the false equivalency part about comparing the “offensiveness” of someone wanting a cake baked for a wedding with someone who would want a Jewish baker to make one with a swastika, or: “should a Native American printer be legally compelled to make posters with an Indian mascot that he finds offensive, or an environmentalist contractor to work a shift at a coal-fired power plant?” and "the black owners of a T-shirt business" from having to print KKK imagery.
The wedding cake is for a celebration that harms no one, the others seem inflammatory to the business owner for the sake of it and have the potential to spread hatred - which leads to violence. Big difference, but I’ve heard those examples on the news shows and the moderators just let them pass right by.
Exciting conclusion:
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Brad: "The reason the right-wing dingbats control the narrative is because the media rarely communicates the views of the LGBT community."
I think the views of the LGBT community get ample coverage, the problem as I see it is that when they interview those who are anti-gay, they don’t call them out on their hypocrisy and lies, whether it be in regard to their Biblical "arguments" or flat out pants-on-fire propaganda. The interviewers aren’t educated enough on these issues and clearly don’t make the effort to become educated on them.
I’ve been at this for over ten years now and can refute every Biblical and secular "argument" six ways from Sunday.
A few examples: 1) The Bible doesn’t even condemn homosexuality. All but one verse they use to bash us with is in reference to men on men only (and they have to twist their original meanings to get even that far), yet by saying they are in regard to homosexuality, lesbians, bisexuals and the transgendered get tacked on by implication and no one questions it. The only one that references women is in Romans which says God gave them over to their same-gender lust for one another because of their unrepentant debauchery.
That condemnation falls flat in light of the memories of the millions of us who remember having been same-sex attracted as far back as we can remember, usually at the ages of three, four, five etc. Before the age of reason even. Thus, in order to justify their hatred of us, they must dismiss the reality of a homosexual orientation and insist that the only thing unique about us is our sexual behavior. Lifetime commitments between us become promiscuity with the same person.
Also, Jesus defined divorce and remarriage as unrepentant adultery (and said nothing about homosexuality) but they don’t dare warn them of the supposed eternal hell that awaits them lest they lose their anti-gay $upport.
There are dozens if not hundreds of ways to show that they do not consider the Bible authoritative, it’s really all about supremacy. It’s equality they despise. They’re so drunk on feeling more special than their pet hatreds that they actually think they’re the ones being persecuted, and in a sense they are. Equal treatment for us IS an attack on their self deluded sense of superiority and when supremacy is your religion (religion being what one practices religiously), marriage equality, Muslim equality, atheist equality is an attack on their religion.
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The only thing I can offer is to get a subscription to your local paper and daily scour the letters to the editor for anti-gay content that’s rife for the rebutting. A bit of Googling will show how to answer these clowns back but be professional (don’t come across as angry) about it. Use logic and make sure you know what you’re talking about. It won’t change the minds of the supremacists, but it may sway those on the fence. At the very least, it will let other LGBT citizens know they are not alone and may give other pro-gay activists in the readership talking points they hadn’t thought of.
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“For all of their talk about protecting the 'religious freedom' of folks who believe that homosexuality is a sin, one wonders how does the anti-gay right feel about protecting the 'religious freedom' of those who do NOT think that homosexuality is a sin?”
I often bring that point up in my letters, especially when they say we’re anti-Christian. “How are gay Christians anti-Christian?” I ask. I am well aware that they don’t think the two are compatible but I dismiss it, as it deserves to be. Just like I dismiss the fact that they don’t think people can be born gay, I go merrily along and speak of those who are born with an LGBT orientation.