Posted on 03/01/2006 12:01:59 PM PST by Jim Robinson
Whose children will be allowed to participate in the White House’s annual Easter Egg Roll on April 17? Not the sons and daughters of gay parents, if the Christian right gets its way.
In November, when the Family Pride Coalition, a D.C.-based gay rights advocacy group, invited its members to participate in one of the “great traditions of our country” the religious right sprang into action. The Institute on Religion and Democracy, a religious think tank, accused the Family Pride Coalition of trying to “exploit a children’s event for political purposes.” Even the White House has weighed in.
~~snip~~
The Christian right blogosphere is afire, condemning the presence of gay parents on the White House lawn as “nearly terrorist threats from the homo lobby.” One post suggests that “White House psychologists” should be deployed to help the children of gay parents and implies that they are molested in their homes. Another wishes the gays “good luck,” reminding readers that “the Secret Service carries automatic weapons.”
Such posts are, of course, “those of the individual posters” to http://www.FreeRepublic.com, “and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of … its operators.” The site claims 200,000 registered members, known as “Freepers,” and a daily readership of “tens of thousands.” Free Republic, founded in 1996, has been embraced by right-wing social conservatives as the online water cooler for “patriots” who are “biased toward God, country, family, liberty and freedom.”
Or at least liberty and freedom for some. “These lowlife scum should just be mowed down like terrorists,” writes one good Christian.
(Excerpt) Read more at inthesetimes.com ...
Let us see if you can get a ping list going first. Let us also see how many people join your ping list. Can you please think of a topic first (assuming that you are capable of rational thought)?
Thakns.....FReeper lentulusgracchus mentioned that to me.
BTW, did you see this link: http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/discuss/2514/
Thanks for explaining the ping-thing. I'm not sure how long I'll hang out here, depending on the feedback I get, but I'll ping next time.
Only with qualifying children or circumstances...generally those whose special needs would be cost prohibitive for otherwise viable prospective parents.
The same article was posted at The smirking chimp.com a leftist weblog. You should read the comments over there.
I wonder what Mr Ireland thinks of those vitriolic comments at that site. (warning graphic vulgar language at the site)
I said "bachelors". There are lots of widowers and grass-widowers who are raising children. But for a bachelor to want to adopt de novo, that is a different proposition. Never having sustained a relationship with a woman, he'd be well down the list as a prospective adoptive parent, under the best of circumstances.
No, my statement looks fine to me as written. You changed "bachelors" to "single father".
I usually don't use myself as an example, but I vaguely remembered commenting on that thread. This is what I wrote at the time:
Why on the face of the planet do these people insist on yelling about their sexuality at events intended for CHILDREN?
If they just showed up with their kids like most families, no one would say a thing and it would be no big deal. But they want to make a SEXUAL issue out of it.
Drives me NUTS. And that goes for the Disney fiasco as well.
I think it is disingenuous, bordering on a pathological need to reaffirm one's victim status, to not take the thread as a whole—when clearly the majority do not want your family mowed down. Oh, there are jokes made at your expense...but have you ever watched tv? Or been on a playground? There are cruel remarks all the time about all kinds of people. It's life. We are ALL on the receiving end of those at one point or another. Get a thicker skin and learn to laugh at yourself. (Try being an "evil, idiotic conservative" and "morally uptight Christian" interested in pop culture. Talk about needing a thick skin.)
The bottom line is the majority of us in this country are frustrated by the "storming" aspect, of making events and theme parks designed for children about sexual behavior/arrangements/preferences. Calling us bigots and homophobes if we don't embrace Brokeback Mountain or think that gay marriage isn't a good idea. It's not that most of us don't like you, think that you are subhuman, know you or care about you. Many of us see you as equal human beings. We just DISAGREE that this is a healthy way to organize society. You want to change that? Don't storm, convince. Society may or may not come around.
But you have lost ground recently, mostly because of this kind of tactic. You made things worse for yourselves by insisting that we agree, and if we don't you're going to force it on us at every turn. That is not a great way to build goodwill. I said then, and I'll say it now...if you are comfortable with the way your family is organized, you don't need my approval. If you show up as a regular guest, be it a Disneyland or the Easter Egg White House Roll with your family and don't make a big deal of it...you probably won't even be noticed.
That is the irony of the approach that the gay agenda is taking. While most of us were perfectly happy to live an let live, it is the in your face take no prisoners flagrant display that is causing most of us to push back. The insistence on everyone embracing and celebrating your chosen lifestyle. Heck, that doesn't even happen for straight people who don't have children, or people who live together, or people who do have kids...or...take your pick. Everybody doesn't agree with somebody.
It does not matter what I think about you or your behavior or your family. In the same way, I would never expect everyone to embrace my lifestyle or my conservatism, or my religion. I don't care what you think about it. I am what I am, and I don't need approval from you for me to feel secure or confident about my own choices.
You could have written off that mowing you down post as coming from a loon. Or someone who felt threatened. But, you will never convince a loon by continuing to threaten. You only alienate those who suddenly find themselves disingenuously painted with the broad brush and it makes it worse.
You are not a victim. You are someone who is different than the majority. You are on the road less traveled. That is ALWAYS the tough road, everywhere. It always will be, no matter what road that is. That is true for all of us.
I wish you the best. I wish you not only no harm, but a satisfying and decent life. I respect that fact that your belief system is different than mine. But after I read that initial post, and then your characterization, I sincerely wondered if that was a two way street.
Best wishes.
Hmmm, the "backhand option."
Well, they're going to do propaganda either way. If you go with the soft option, they'll just turn around, shoot a lot of video of their own (or make a stink if you won't let them), and then they'll have the MSM fawning all over them afterward as they do a stand-up press conference right afterward right in front of the W.H. fence, and announce that the White House has officially made "gay-friendly" the politics of the nation and the default option for all social and political occasions.
No, the situation is win-win for them, lose-lose for us. Don't let them toy with you.
I guess I have a more broader definition of 'bachelor' than you do.
Let's all have a look, shall we? Then John Ireland can offer us some commentary about the relative temperance of remarks over at the Democrat-dominated site, versus what appalled him about FR.
Thanks, Harry.
At the risk of agreeing with myself, yes. But I disgree about how to handle it, obviously. My own impulse is to try to keep it away from the kids, and let them have a good time on the White House lawn somewhere away from where the liberals will be doing their stand-ups.
Speaking as a single father I am not a bachelor. I am a widower. Some single fathers are divorced. The big difference is that my daughter is my daughter, my flesh and blood. I'd kill before I'd let harm come to her.
A single man adopting a girl is not a good idea. There is no blood tie there to act as a restraint on his baser instincts. (rationalized thusly "Well she's not really my daughter, after all there's no genetic reason why I can have her" See Woody Allen)
Let 'em roll their stuid eggs.
Cool. He quoted me. I'm famous! Of course he didn't give me proper credit. I feel gyped.
Ah well. Time for a repeat of the second law of homosexuality:
To the mentally healthy (heterosexual), sex is something you do;
To the mentally diseased ('homosexual'), sex is everything you are.
addendum to my previous post. It's astonishing the poor understanding of Christianity those poor souls have. How can anyone live in this country without understanding the merest basics of the faith. Unless of course they are intentionally hiding their understanding so they don't have to face their sin?
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