Posted on 05/20/2003 8:14:33 AM PDT by theoverseer
In four Gospels - including the Sermon on the Mount - Jesus neglected to mention the subject of homosexuality. But that hasn’t stopped a handful of self-appointed leaders of the so-called Religious Right from deciding that it is an issue worth the presidency of the United States. In what the Washington Times described as a "stormy session" last week, the Rev. Lou Sheldon, Paul Weyrich, Gary Bauer and eight other "social conservatives" read the riot act to RNC chairman Marc Racicot for meeting with the "Human Rights Campaign," a group promoting legal protections for homosexuals. This indiscretion, they said, "could put Bush’s entire re-election campaign in jeopardy."
According to the Times’ report by Ralph Hallow, the RNC chairman defended himself by saying, "You people don’t want me to meet with other folks, but I meet with anybody and everybody." To this Gary Bauer retorted, "That can’t be true because you surely would not meet with the leaders of the Ku Klux Klan."
Nice analogy Gary. Way to love thy neighbor.
This demand to quarantine a political enemy might have had more credibility if the target – the Campaign for Human Rights -- were busily burning crosses on social conservatives’ lawns. But they aren’t. Moreover, the fact that it is, after all, crosses the Ku Klux Klan burns, might suggest a little more humility on the part of Christians addressing these issues. Just before the launching of the 2000 presidential campaign, George Bush himself was asked about similarly mean-spirited Republican attacks. His response was that politicians like him weren’t elected to pontificate about other people’s morals and that his own faith admonished him to take the beam out of his own eye before obsessing over the mote in someone else’s.
The real issue here is tolerance of differences in a pluralistic society. Tolerance is different from approval, but it is also different from stigmatizing and shunning those with whom we disagree.
I say this as someone who is well aware that Christians are themselves a persecuted community in liberal America, and as one who has stood up for the rights of Christians like Paul Weyrich and Gary Bauer to have their views, even when I have not agreed with some of their agendas. Not long ago, I went out on a public limb to defend Paul Weyrich when he was under attack by the Washington Post and other predictable sources for a remark he had made that was (reasonably) construed as anti-Semitic. I defended Weyrich because I have known him to be a decent man without malice towards Jews and I did not want to see him condemned for a careless remark. I defended him in order to protest the way in which we have become a less tolerant and more mean-spirited culture than we were.
I have this to say to Paul: A delegation to the chairman of the RNC to demand that he have no dialogue with the members of an organization for human rights is itself intolerant, and serves neither your ends nor ours. You told Racicot, "if the perception is out there that the party has accepted the homosexual agenda, the leaders of the pro-family community will be unable to help turn out the pro-family voters. It won’t matter what we say; people will leave in droves."
This is disingenuous, since you are a community leader and share the attitude you describe. In other words, what you are really saying is that if the mere perception is that the Republican Party has accepted the "homosexual agenda," you will tell your followers to defect with the disastrous consequences that may follow. As a fellow conservative, I do not understand how in good conscience you can do this. Are you prepared to have President Howard Dean or President John Kerry preside over our nation’s security? Do you think a liberal in the White House is going to advance the agendas of social conservatives? What can you be thinking?
In the second place, the very term "homosexual agenda," is an expression of intolerance as well. Since when do all homosexuals think alike? In fact, thirty percent of the gay population voted Republican in the last presidential election. This is a greater percentage than blacks, Hispanics or Jews. Were these homosexuals simply deluded into thinking that George Bush shared their agendas? Or do they perhaps have agendas that are as complex, diverse and separable from their sexuality as women, gun owners or Christians, for that matter?
In your confusion on these matters, you have fallen into the trap set for you by your enemies on the left. It is the left that insists its radical agendas are the agendas of blacks and women and gays. Are you ready to make this concession -- that the left speaks for these groups, for minorities and "the oppressed?" Isn’t it the heart of the conservative argument that liberalism (or, as I would call it, leftism) is bad doctrine for all humanity, not just white Christian males?
If the President’s party – or conservatism itself -- is to prevail in the political wars, it must address the concerns of all Americans and seek to win their hearts and minds. It is conservative values that forge our community and create our coalition, and neither you nor anyone else has - or should have - a monopoly in determining what those values are.
And believing something to be propaganda doesn't make it propaganda. The only evidence you have is you don't like the summary. As I previously said, try an internet search on the book and read the same summary and comments from others. You won't find any comments that support your position but you continue to run with your feelings. The other links are very similar in nature but you apparently haven't even tried to read the other links. Perhaps you're afraid to realize a gay agenda does indeed exist, or you don't want to admit it here.
Well then, as I keep saying, try an internet search and see what others say about the book. I'm not afraid of what you'll find, are you?
Misdirection is a form of running away, and changing the subject is just that. As I said to longtermmemmory yesterday:
The real point is we don't have smokers and obese folks talking to our school kids that smoking and being obese is okay and there are no health consequences. Where we do have GLSEN and others telling school kids it's okay to be gay and even discussing fisting.
I've given perfectly valid explanations of why I call these summaries propaganda. You, of course, ignore that fact.
...try an internet search on the book and read the same summary and comments from others. You won't find any comments that support your position but you continue to run with your feelings.
If I cared enough to challenge you on this (but I don't), I think I'd find that you are woefully incorrect. It's patently absurd to think that there is no one else, anywhere, who looks askance at this woman's propagandizing.
That's a valid point for both sides. It's also amazing what some won't do to confirm or deny something in print instead of going off their feelings.
Yes, you've provided explanations but you have nothing to support your explanations. I have.
If I cared enough to challenge you on this (but I don't), I think I'd find that you are woefully incorrect.
Wow, that speaks volumes about your bias. You must be afraid of the results of an internet search.
From tpaine | 05/21/2003 8:10 AM PDT new
You are out of control, and making a obvious fool of yourself. -- Thanks.
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E-mail me privately again and the moderators will have a chat with you in the "back room".
It is you who is out of control and too irrational to see the fool you have made of yourself. Your private e-mail to me is unwanted. Keep your illness to yourself.
Wonder why homos are sooo childish ... could be because they are emotionally immature, like you.
Secondly, why are you berating me about Glsen as if I'd argued in favor of their presence in the schools? You're losing sight of the topic of our conversation. Your on auto-pilot anti-gay mode and slipping into some unrelated soliloquy.
Do you deny the existence of a homosexual agenda? That is the focus of our little disagreement. I have links and links and links to support my position and because I see the importance of this issue I'll carry it on forever.
I don't know what the hell you're looking for. I've given very valid reasons and explanations as to why this woman's summary is not to be taken at face value. Do you want a signed letter from my Congressman supporting my analysis?
Wow, that speaks volumes about your bias. You must be afraid of the results of an internet search.
No, it doesn't and no, I'm not. And you - I'm laughing - are the last person who has grounds for scolding someone about bias.
Something more than: I feel like it's propaganda would do.
No, it doesn't and no, I'm not. And you - I'm laughing - are the last person who has grounds for scolding someone about bias.
I have the facts and a number of links on my side. Any you, you won't even try to support or deny your position by running a simple internet search. Or perhaps you already have and realize I'm right, so now you just want to end our discussion. At least that's how it comes across.
But you can't articulate a damn thing yourself.
Do you deny the existence of a homosexual agenda?
I will state once again what I stated to longtermmemory in post #445
Where I have a problem is when people like you want to point to some extreme misbehavior and extrapolate that because of that misbehavior we need to curtail the rights of everyone who falls into a very broad category similar to those who are misbehaving.This doesn't seem to register with you unless it's the anti-gun lobby who tries to argue that all guns should be banned anytime some looney nut shoots up a school. It's the same misapplied logic.
Um, we adopted two boys, pulled them out of the system and are homeschooling. But not everyone knows what's going on in the schools, thus my involvement here.
I make a point and support it with links. From what I can see, you're just uncomfortable that the links support my position.
Responding to a question doesn't mean you answered it.
Do you deny the existence of a homosexual agenda?It doesn't matter if some gays might disagree with others. Is there an agenda being pushed on society and the schools?
I really don't give a flip about what you find on the internet. There are as many opinions, studies, and theories on the internet as there are people on this earth. I can link you to people who believe the earth is flat, aliens walk among us, and Elvis is sharing an apartment in Atlantic City with Jimmy Hoffa.
I have no respect for someone who can't articulate a single argument in favor of their point of view but only insists that others "do an internet search". Only when you can make a rational, reasoned, well-stated argument of your own will I give a speck of credence to what you say.
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