Brody's Scribbles... Sad Twisted Mindsets: A Sunday Round-Up

By Brody Levesque (Washington DC) AUG 8 | After the dramatic & landmark decision reached last Wednesday by U. S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker, in the State of California's Perry v. Schwarzenegger Prop 8 Case, the airwaves & worldwide websites have been inundated with both those in favour of his decision and those opposed.

What strikes me the most is how shrill the opposition is and how little sense those folks make in their arguments. It's truly an institutionalised form of bias based on sets of religious beliefs that do not make coherent sense in today's world, cultural, or societal reality.

The thing that stands out above anything else is the total hypocrisy of their stance. How can one argue about so-called Christian love coupled with belief in a political system of equal rights, professing that it is the American way and then turn right around & deprive your fellow citizens of their freedoms simply based on man-made interpretations of man-crafted theology? 

Seriously, I have done my fact checking and due diligence on these arguments countless thousands of times over the 30 odd years I have been a journalist, and not once have I seen a direct attribution from 'God' or 'Son' or the holy ghosty thingy that said; "Thou shall not fornicate with thy fellow gender." Nope, not once. Hey, you'd figure that if same sex sex was that big of a deal it would have made it into God's Top Ten list right? Better still, I'm pretty sure that the 'First Son' would have said something about same sex relationships as well, and of course he didn't although he did lay down the 'Golden Rule,' which I see that the Christianist fundies have a real tendency to ignore.

For what ever reason, rather than reasonably worry about societal & cultural problems that strike at the well-being, health, and welfare of the populace in the United States and elsewhere such as Australia, which is also experiencing a spate of Anti-Gay marriage/Gay adoption family issues, the folk have turned the LGBT communities into the proverbial bogeyman. [Related Link]

Here's some of the arguments from this week starting with my personal favorite, the Reverend Pat Robertson who of course attributes all things Gay to the devil: 

Which is then followed by this gem from Hardball with Chris Matthews on MSNBC:

Now, then, here's the attorney for the plaintiff's in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, Ted Olson, this morning on Fox News attempting to explain the well reasoned 'legal' basis for Judge Walker's decision to an intransigent Chris Wallace:

I have to admit, listening to Ted Olson, who exemplifies the old cliche label of 'The Voice Of Reason,'  gave me a solid basis to understand what it is that scares the oppostion so much, the fear of a significant loss of power & prestige.

Why you ask? It's simple, religious bodies/organisations depend on their believers to support them financially as well as by other means. To succeed, they must have a discernible real opponent to uphold as the bogeyman as opposed to a sketchy unverifiable one such as the devil. Let's face it, when was the last time anyone ran into the physical embodiment the Arch Angel Lucifer?  You can't see, touch, hear, or place him now can you, but its so much easier to have a tangible target right?

Then there's the money, LOTS of money. Every time I walk past the Christian Broadcasting Network's Washington D. C. bureau on M street here in DC, I am amazed at the amount of money that they've spent on it,  its a truly impressive & pricey looking building.... Yup, money.

Sickening to me is the dollars spent fighting their fellow American citizens, oh lest I forget, love the sinner but hate the sin? Oh please, the amount of money these folks have spent demonising their fellow citizens would have gone a long, long, way to eradicating oh say Malaria, for example.

What is even more scary are efforts to eradicate the so-called Gay Lifestyle or behaviour, Here's an example from Wayne Besen's Truth Wins Out website. Listen to the so-called ex-gay guy talk about his experiences:

Finally, from Joe.My.God's Joe Jervis comes this entry:

NY Sen. Ruben Diaz: Same-Sex Marriage Will Bring The End Of The World

In this clip subtitled by Andres Duque at Blabbeando, evil homophobe NY Sen. Ruben Diaz appears on the NYC Spanish-language program Pura Politica to announce that same-sex marriage will bring about the End Times. The host of the show is quite adversarial to Diaz, fortunately, and calls him out rather strongly. Watch this. Last year Diaz appeared on the same program where he infamously proclaimed that as a Pentecostal preacher and a state Senator, "I am the church AND the state." Read Andres Duque's excellent dissection of this latest bit of arrogant assholery:

RELATED: Later in this same clip, Puerto Rican LGBT activist Pedro Julio Serrano rebuts Diaz' insanity. Keep an eye on Serrano, he's a real rising star in the movement.

So, there you go, another week in the so-called cultural wars goes on oh and lest you think the LGBT community is the only bogeyman for the Christiban & the Ultra Right, here's an excellent article from the New York Times over the building of Islamic mosques in communities all over the United States. [Link]