President Obama’s position on gay marriage has “evolved.” Combat marines are taking sensitivity training now that “Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell” has been rescinded. The gay agenda has so insinuated itself into popular culture that a third of Americans believes 25 percent of the population is gay or lesbian (the actual figure is 2 or 3 percent). You’d think gays and their supporters in the liberal media would be thrilled at their current progress.
Instead, on May 29th an AlterNet piece titled “Hedges: The Christian Right's Crusade Against Gays Is Far Scarier Than You Think” argued just the opposite. That progress “prevents many of us from seeing that life for gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people is getting worse—much worse,” according author Chris Hedges. And that condition is solely due to the “cruelty and proto-fascism” of the Christian Right.
Hedges sited gay activist and pastor Mel White warning that, “despite gains by gays in wider culture, especially in the entertainment industry…the civil rights of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender people in most states are deteriorating.”
Why? Because the teachings of the Christian Right are working to create a “culture of hate” that is taking over
And, without a hint of irony, Hedges quoted White’s description of the Christian right. “They use fear as their weapon, like all terrorists. They are seeking to deny our religious and civil rights. They threaten to turn our democracy into a fundamentalist theocracy. And if we don’t reverse the trend, there is the very real possibility that in the end we will all be governed according to their perverted version of biblical law.”
Those Christians with their fear mongering.
After noting “the sentencing of Dharun Ravi for the hateful abuse that may have driven his gay roommate at Rutgers Tyler Clementi, to commit suicide,” (the accepted left-wing version of events – the actual incident was no less tragic but far less sinister), Hedges asked White what could cause it. The answer:
It is society. At its heart it is the church. The churches should be convicted, not just
It’s hardly surprising that White would be considered a credible source by the unhinged left-wingers at AlterNet. Ever since resigning from his former position as speech writer for Jerry Falwell and “coming out,” White has constructed a career around his sexuality and hatred for traditional Christian teachings.
In the past his group, Soulforce has made publicity by driving a bus with “Social Justice for Gay, Bisexual and Transgender People” plastered on the side to conservative evangelical colleges, which apparently the Washington Post found newsworthy.
He also made an appearance on CNN after the death of Jerry Falwell. While most would take the opportunity to mourn the loss of someone they worked closely with, White saw it as a platform to further his agenda. “I have buried a lot of young gays” White remarked, “who have been bashed to death by gay people -- by anti-gay people who quote these guys, who quote the Scriptures, to give them a reason, an excuse for killing us. So, I think their rhetoric condemns, it caricatures, it kills us. And I think we have got to deal with that rhetoric.”
Yes, rhetoric that condemns and caricatures is terrible. Just as anyone on the cruel and proto-fascist Christian Right.
