Of the national gay organizations whose releases and statements I read most regularly, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF) has perhaps the most over-the-top rhetoric and offer the most frequent distortions of conservative ideas and the policies of conservative leaders. Whenever there seems to be problem in the gay world, its Executive Director releases a statement blaming President Bush and/or social conservaties. Earlier this month when some creep violently attacked the patrons in a Massachusetts gay bar, Foreman was quick to blame the religious right for teaching such behavior.
From the moment the president tapped Judge Samuel A. Alito, Jr. to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, Foreman and his staff have accused the president of having sinister motives in making the pick and Alito himself for his radical record. Foreman claimed the president was dividing the country by naming this jurist and capitulating “to the howling from the extreme, evangelical right.” Later, he called Alito’s record “completely antithetical to the constitutional principles and values on which our rights and equal protection guarantees rest.” When the nomination of this good man to the U.S. Supreme Court was confirmed, Foreman lamented: “The confirmation of Justice Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court seat of Sandra Day O’Connor is a devastating blow to individual rights, civil liberties and equal justice under law in America.” (Emphasis added.)
While she did acknowlege some of the positive aspects of Alito’s Senate testimony regaring gay issues, Eleanor Acheson, NGLTF’s Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs, still considered his appointment to the Supreme court as presenting “a mortal threat to the constitutional protections we have.” Not only is such rhetoric over-the-top, but it also, like much of what NGLTF has said about Judge Alito, distorts that good man’s record.
This is just one example of how NGLTF attacks — and misrepresents — someone on the right of the political spectrum. Given this background, I was amused to read about Foreman’s keynote address this weekend to Salt Lake City’s Winterfest 2006, “a conference sponsored by the local gay-lesbian-bisexual-transgender (GLBT) community.” From the Beehive State, the Deseret News reports:
It’s time, [Foreman] said, to stop ignoring “the lies of our opponents, their distortions, their disgusting tactics, and the vile things they say about us. . . . You hear them, you see them, you feel their poison seeping into the public discourse and into young and old minds alike.”
He took exception to what he called the “gay exception” — the notion that “it is OK to say things about GLBT people in legislatures, in newspapers, on TV that no one, no one could get away with saying about another minority.”
It’s time, Matt, that you look in the mirror and consider your own organization’s tactics, NGLTF’s distortions and the nasty things you and your staff say about Republicans and conservatives. Your own rhetoric shows that you (and many, many others on the left) have carved out (what you might call) a “conservative exception” so you can say things about conservatives, particularly social conservatives, that no one could “get away with” saying about people with more liberal political views, particularly in newspapers and on TV.
Foreman called Utah Republican State Representative Rep. LaVar Christensen “a damn hypocrite” for sponosoring a bill to bar counties from offering domestic partnership benefits despite having said he would not do so. That makes two of you.
If you’re going to lash out at conservatives and accuse the president of capitulating to howling extremists while a member of your staff calls a respected jurist’s appointment to the Supreme Court a “mortal threat” to constitutional protections, perhaps you shouldn’t accuse others of spreading poison “into the public discourse.” Because NGLTF has long been trying to get away (as you might put it) with mean-spirited and dishonest anti-Republican and anti-conservative rhetoric. Look in the mirror, Matt. You’re the last person who should be accusing others of distortions and disgusting tactics.
Just like that old pot and that old kettle.
-Dan (AKA GayPatriotWest): GayPatriotWest@aol.com
Yet another post from BDB that nails it to the wall and leaves it quivering 🙂
Someone please tell Mr. Foreman & Co. that I, for one, DO NOT need his protection!!!
They wanna be perpetual victims, fine, but leave me the hell out of it!
Eric on his own…
I won’t go so far to say that prominent activists on the religious right encourage violence toward gays but I will say I don’t think they do much to discourage it.
When that pitiful James Dobson, for just one example, is on television or radios talking about gays he always says “homosexuals” and always pronounces “homosexuals” with such disgust one might think he’s talking about vermin that ought to be stomped under our boots. And he constantly argues that these horrible “homosexuals” are a threat to families and out way of life.
Someone who’s mentally unstable doesn’t need to hear much of that crap before concluding that gays are legitimate targets for violence.
And yet, Jack, we have yet to see proof that Robida heard ANY of it.
Meanwhile, we have lots and LOTS of evidence that he was listening to homophobic music, among other things, the bulk of which directly mocks Christianity and glorifies violence against gays. Plus, he himself claimed to be an atheist; they tend not to do a lot of listening to preachers.
So instead of focusing on the thirty-ton elephant with pink ears doing the mashed potato in front of the TV cameras and studio lights, Foreman and the rest of the “gay left” are running around screaming, “It’s the FLEA! There might be a flea here! THAT’S what caused it!”
That makes two things obvious — first, that these groups hate Christianity to the point of irrationality, and second, that their accusations have little to no basis in reality, nothing to do with homophobic violence, but EVERYTHING to do with advancing their hate agenda.
And there, friends, we have yet another example of liberals not even considering, much less supporting, the concept of responsibility. I don’t care if he was beaten as a kid seven days a week, made to memorize songs whose only lyrics were I HATE FAGS over and over again, or forced to eat brussels sprouts. He chose to commit murder. He, and he alone, is responsible for the murders.
#3 – Jack,
Please give us a specific example of a popular Christian who teaches explicitly that gays should be killed or stomped on.
Phelps, who by the way has more ties to Democrats than anyone, doesn’t count. Also, I’m afraid your personal interpretation of Dobson’s accent does not count (as objective evidence).
I’m asking because, with a little research, I could give you many examples of the exact opposite: popular Christians teaching explicitly that gays MUST be loved and respected, even if one disagrees with them or their behavior.
Finally, Jack, kindly describe the role of religious belief in any recent or famous gay-killers / gay-killings. The real-life examples I can come up with are all either (a) Moslem, or (b) functionally atheist.
The reason I ended the post with the line about the pot and the kettle is that, in that old adage, both utensils are black. I agree that some of the rhetoric of social conservatives (on gay issues) is over-the-top and “poisonous,” just like NGLTF’s rhetoric on conservatives and Republicans, even those, like Judge Alito, who are far from the narrow-minded extremists who lambaste gays as the NGLTF (& its media allies) savage those on our side of the political aisle.
#4
That makes two things obvious — first, that these groups hate Christianity to the point of irrationality, and second, that their accusations have little to no basis in reality, nothing to do with homophobic violence, but EVERYTHING to do with advancing their hate agenda.
Naturally. They’re liberals. That’s all they’re good at.