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Further adventures in abusing the notion of respect

Further adventures in abusing the notion of respect published on 1 Comment on Further adventures in abusing the notion of respect

Previously I wrote about how it’s incorrect to say that you respect women if that respect is contingent on their dressing and behaving according to your notions of modesty.

It’s also incorrect to say that you respect people while maintaining that for them to have children is “child abuse”:

Francis is still a conservative choice, but has taught the ‘importance of respecting gay individuals’. However he strongly opposed same-sex marriage legislation introduced in 2010 by the Argentine government, calling it a ‘destructive attack on God’s plan’. In a letter to the monasteries of Buenos Aires, he wrote: ‘Let’s not be naive, we’re not talking about a simple political battle; it is a destructive pretension against the plan of God. ‘We are not talking about a mere bill, but rather a machination of the Father of Lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God.’ In the past, he has also called the adoption of gay couples child abuse, saying it was discrimination against children.

You know what’s really child abuse? Child abuse. The kind which has been covered up and gone unnoticed and unpunished, time and time again, within the Catholic church. I wonder how many children of gay parents would like to slap the leader of 1.2 billion Catholics for asserting that the existence of their family unit is equivalent to an actual crime committed against countless children by people under the auspices of his institution over so many years.

Father of Lies, indeed.

Forward Thinking: What Would You Tell Teenagers About Sex?

Forward Thinking: What Would You Tell Teenagers About Sex? published on 1 Comment on Forward Thinking: What Would You Tell Teenagers About Sex?

Libby Anne and Dan Finke at Patheos have started a project called Forward Thinking, which is a series of questions they put to bloggers to encourage them to think productively. The replies to these questions are then rounded up and a new prompt posted. This will be my first crack at it. 

Congratulations, teenager! You are the recipient of a rapidly and perhaps scarily developing sexuality. By “sexuality,” I am of course referring to the parts of you which are growing and in some cases becoming hairier at a rate which is almost certainly not to your satisfaction in one way or another, but also to the feelings you have about those parts and what you’d like to do with them, either by yourself or with friends. I’m referring to the changes in the way you carry yourself, the way you dress to either show off or hide (or frequently both) your body, and the way your relationships with pretty much everyone you know are changing in mutual recognition of all this. It’s a lot to take in, I know– “fraught” would not be too strong a word for it. But you’ll get through this.

I want to talk a little bit about how to do so, while being a good person– what you could call sexual ethics. There are two aspects of that which I’m going to cover:

  • Taking care of yourself
  • Taking care of others

Yep, that’s it. That’s what sexual ethics is. You might think it’s a no-brainer, but it isn’t to a lot of people…and I’m going to try and explain that too.

First, let’s talk about taking care of yourself.

You need to do this both mentally and physically, and oftentimes they will amount to the same thing.

For example, masturbation. It’s something you should do– you know, if you want to. It feels good, it’s sanity-preserving, and most importantly for teenagers, it give you an opportunity to get to know your body better and achieve some sexual satisfaction without engaging in intercourse with another person. It is not wrong and never in your life will it become wrong. It can only be inappropriate, such as if you don’t take proper care to preserve your privacy while masturbating, or count as poor behavior toward your sexual partners later on if you decide that masturbating is more important than interacting with them. But generally speaking, masturbation is simply treating yourself to an orgasm without having sex. If you’re a virgin, you remain one after masturbating– but you have become more educated about what pleases you sexually, which means that when/if you do eventually have sex with someone else, you will be better equipped to know how they can please you. That’s taking care of yourself.

When you’re ready to actually have sex with someone– or rather if you are, since some people never want to have sex with someone, and live out their lives quite happily that way– taking care of yourself means making some demands of that person. No, not literally (unless you and your partner(s) are into that sort of thing). But there are certain things you’ll need to insist on, for your own well-being. The first and foremost being contraception. Contraception is not magical— it is a real thing that really prevents you from creating a pregnancy and, in certain forms, prevents you from catching or transmitting a sexually transmitted disease, when you use it correctly. The pregnancy thing is something you will be concerned about for most of your life– certainly now– and the disease thing is something you’ll be concerned about forever. So don’t let the embarrassment of talking about sex prevent you from taking care of yourself– this stuff is important. Using contraception doesn’t make you paranoid, judgmental, slutty, or a killjoy– it makes you smart. Don’t have sex with people who are not smart, or who don’t respect your desire to be. They are the judgmental killjoys, not you.

The other demand you need to be willing to make of your partners is that they listen to you, and don’t do things you’re not comfortable with. Because guess what? Sex is a relationship, and relationships have to be conducted according to the terms of the people involved in them. What you want matters, and you have veto power– always. You don’t get to force your partners to do things, but you can refuse to do things. Get comfortable with this power, so that you can use it without hesitation if the need comes up. Agreeing to hold hands with someone (yeah, I’m going back to the basics) doesn’t mean you agree to kiss them. Agreeing to kiss someone doesn’t mean you agree to have them touch your body. Agreeing to have them touch your body doesn’t mean agreeing to have your clothes taken off. And so on down the line. You can agree to these things, sure, but it’s not assumed. You always have the right to stop. Always. That’s you taking care of yourself.

Now let’s talk about taking care of others.

The best way you can take care of others is by remembering that it’s not all about you. Sex is not about getting what you want and forget everybody else. Other people and their sexual desires matter just as much as yours– they are not simply targets and obstacles in the way of targets. So forget about treating people like crap if they won’t sleep with you, or talking crap about other people because of who they sleep with or want to sleep with. Sexual competition– people wanting to sleep with the same people that other people do– exists. It’s a thing, and it’s nobody’s fault. If you get mad at some other girl for attracting the guy you like, you’re saying he doesn’t have the right to make his own choices. But he does, doesn’t he? Just like you do. So maybe you’re upset, and that’s fine– it’s upsetting to not get what you want. But you can’t require that the people you like have to like you back. That’s not fair to them, and just because you want something to be true doesn’t make it true. So take a deep breath, listen to some good music, and move on. That upsetness you’re feeling is called jealousy, and it’s understandable and natural but it can make people do some terrible things if they can’t deal with it. Don’t be one of those people.

Following in the line if “it’s not all about you,” you can take care of others by respecting their decisions. They’re allowed to like what and who they want to like. They’re allowed to sleep with who they want to sleep with, provided that person is agreeable, of course, and– here’s the most important thing– nobody is obligated to sleep with you. Ever. There is nothing you can do or say that makes a person owe you sex, and nothing they can do or say. There’s this term called “enthusiastic consent,” and what it means is that a potential sex partner should be just as into the idea of having sex with you as you are about having sex with them. If they’re not, something is wrong and you should stop. Does it suck to stop when you don’t want to? Yes, but it’s better than being the kind of person who tries to have sex with someone who doesn’t want it, or isn’t even conscious enough to express clearly (in words or in actions) that he or she wants it. Consent is agreeing to do something. If someone isn’t clearly agreeing or isn’t capable of agreeing and you go ahead anyway, that’s sexual assault or rape. Now you know. Do not forget.

You may have noticed that in all of this talk about how to be ethical sexually, I’ve said nothing about the wrong people to have sex with, or the wrong kind of sex to have with them. With one very important exception that I’ve stressed in different ways: the type of people to have sex with are those who are capable of consenting to have sex with you, and have done so. The kind of sex to have with them is the enthusiastically consenting kind. Beyond that, I haven’t said “Having sex with this sort of person is bad,” “Having sex with this many people is bad,” “Having sex at this point in your life is bad” (assuming, of course, that you’re a consenting adult yourself) or “Having this kind of sex is bad.”

And I’m not going to.

Because those statements do not fall within the bounds of taking care of yourself and taking care of others. Those statements, for that matter, often amount to the very opposite of taking care of yourself and others. They’re used to harm people who aren’t harming anyone themselves, and that is (you guessed it) bad.

To illustrate this, I’ll tell you a little about what was going on when I was a teenager and going through my own internal struggles about sex and sexuality. I went to high school in the mid-90’s. During that time the movies I saw included Philadelphia, Reality Bites, Threesome, and Jeffrey. You may not have seen all or even any of these movies, but here’s something they all have in common– they all feature at least one gay character. In every case it’s a man, and in two cases there’s a gay male character with AIDS. Because the mid-80’s was when the AIDS scare hit if you were paying attention, and the mid-90’s was when it hit if you weren’t. And I wasn’t– not until high school, anyway, when sex and sexuality really started mattering to me.

The third season of The Real World, back when reality shows were still something of a novelty, included a gay housemate called Pedro Zamora who was living with AIDS. As entertainment editor of the school newspaper I wrote about this, as well as another article on the experience of coming out as a gay high school student (which got me branded as a dyke by anonymous sources). I knew several gay fellow students, some out and some closeted, and dated one of them (you’re awesome, Jeremy). We founded a gay-straight alliance club at our school. I volunteered for the Red Cross as part of the National Honor Society program and my job was to go to local middle schools and give presentations on sexually transmitted diseases and how to avoid them. We attended seminars on AIDS and met people living with it– gay men. A theater geek, I spent my summers working at Music Theater of Wichita, where the majority of my friends were gay men (and one lesbian). I got to know what they were like and what their relationships were like. And what they were like is: normal.

I’m telling you all of this because these are people who, it was being declared all over the place then and still sometimes is today, have been punished by God with a horrible disease for having the wrong kind of sex, with the wrong people.

Fuck that.

If God or the universe punished people for having the wrong kind of sex, with the wrong kind of people, do you know who would have AIDS? Rapists. Child molesters. And nobody else.

Actually that’s not true since AIDS doesn’t just affect the person who has it but also anyone that person has sexual intercourse with, which could include any future victims of a rapist or child molester. But you get my point– if God or the universe care what kind of sex you have, and with which kind of people, they clearly do not express it in any clear and unambiguous way in terms of physical afflictions. So don’t look to natural consequences to tell you what is moral or immoral sexually. Good people also experience STDs, unplanned pregnancies, and other sexual misfortunes. Those fall under the category of precautions you should take to take care of yourself; not judgments from above for doing something wrong.

Single question pop quiz:

Which of the following stops an STD transmission or the creation of an unplanned pregnancy?
a) being married
b) being straight
c) being a guy
c) having sex with only one person, or a small number of people
e) a condom

If you answered “e,” then you have grasped the relevant point of this section (and you’re also correct). Let me explain the answers a bit more:

  • Being married. A marriage is a contractual agreement between two people– usually opposite sex, but sometimes not– who have decided that they want to be together for the foreseeable future, usually with at least the pretense of being monogamous. However oftentimes they are not completely monogamous, and sometimes they’re even deliberately not monogamous. The vast majority of Americans will have sex before getting married, which statistically speaking includes you. Some of you, of course, will not ever get married. That being the case, marriage– while a wonderful thing for many people– cannot be counted upon as a reliable way to avoid diseases and unplanned pregnancies. Especially unplanned pregnancies. 
  • Being straight. AIDS became known as a “gay disease” because it’s more easily transmissible via anal sex, and anal sex– it was and still is often assumed– is how the gays do it. But here’s a little secret for you: straight people have anal sex too, and plenty of gay people don’t! Yes, lesbians, but a lot of gay men aren’t into it either. Lesbians, for that matter, have the lowest rates of STD transmission of any sexually active group. And when it comes to avoiding unplanned pregnancies, gay sex is unquestionably a better method. 
  • Being a guy. I don’t actually think that anyone believes being a guy is, in itself, a way to avoid STDs or unplanned pregnancies. But there’s no shortage of people who act like neither one is or should be a concern for guys, because after all they’re not the one who gets pregnant. And if someone is going to be suspected of being infected with STDs based on their sexual behavior, it will invariably be a girl. More on this in the next point.
  • Having sex with only one person, or a small number of people. Promiscuity is far and away the factor most people assume to be the cause of STD transmission or unplanned pregnancy, but strangely the already strong assumption of this becomes even stronger when we’re talking about a girl. It’s as if we manage to forget that transmission of an STD requires two people, two straight people if we’re talking about an unplanned pregnancy. The next time you hear someone characterize prostitutes or promiscuous women as disease-ridden, think about this. Who did they get these presumed diseases from? In any case, the real determining factor is not the number of partners, but whether contraception is used and used correctly. A person who has sex with multiple partners but does so safely is taking care of him/herself better than someone who has sex with one person without contraception. (If you’re interested in learning more about STD transmission in prostitutes– more accurately, the lack thereof– who use contraception, check out Alexa Albert’s excellent book Brothel: Mustang Ranch and Its Women). 
  • A condom. At this point, I think this is self-explanatory.

A condom has tremendous advantages. They’re (comparatively) inexpensive and can prevent both STDs and  pregnancy, and don’t require a prescription. However, condoms can break. They’re expensive given that you need to open and use a new one each time you have sex, and some people manage to use them incorrectly. So my recommendation would be: use backup. If you’re a girl, there are several options– the pill is most popular, but you might investigate Norplant, NuvaRing, and IUDs as well. See a gynecologist. Make this your priority if you’re even thinking you might have sex sometime soon. And when you talk to him/her, don’t be afraid or embarrassed– his/her job is to make sure you’re healthy, to help you take care of yourself. There should be no judgment involved, and if there is, find another doctor.

There are important things this post hasn’t covered: Alternative sexuality. Abortion. Slut-shaming generally. How to talk to your parents about all of this, and what they expect (and why). But hopefully I’ve gotten across the main point I was trying to address, which is that the morality of sexuality is not really about what people often pretend it’s about. Ultimately, what matters is the consequences of the decisions you make for yourself, and for others. In all of the judging, there’s a stunning lack of taking care going on out there. And that’s not only also important; it’s most important.

So please….take care.

I must have missed that part of PCU…

I must have missed that part of PCU… published on 1 Comment on I must have missed that part of PCU…

Yesterday in my hometown, a man received seventeen life sentences for the repeated rape of two minor girls, some of which occurred while they were as young as 11 and 12 years old, respectively. Complicit in these rapes was the girls’ mother– actually no, she was far more than complicit. She arranged for it to happen, and on at least five occasions actually sat and watched this man, who is now 49 years old, have sex with her two daughters. She received a life sentence with no chance for parole for 25 years.

Something else I heard yesterday? That this man, and that woman, are just like people who support gay marriage. Yep:

There is a movement on to normalize pedophilia, and I guarantee you your reaction to that is probably much the same as your reaction when you first heard about gay marriage. What has happened to gay marriage? It’s become normal — and in fact, with certain people in certain demographics it’s the most important issue in terms of who they vote for. So don’t pooh-pooh. There’s a movement to normalize pedophilia. Don’t pooh-pooh it. The people behind it are serious, and you know the left as well as I do. They glom onto something and they don’t let go. […] What is their objective? They want us to all think that pedophilia is just another sexual orientation. You know who’s gonna fall right in line is college kids, just like they have on gay marriage, just like they do on all other revolutionary social issues. Their own definition of the cutting edge, civil rights, freedom, understanding, tolerance. So I’m just warning you here. You think it can’t happen. “Impossible! Don’t be nutso and wacko on us, Rush.”

Pedophilia– all of the college kids are gonna be doing it!

At Dispatches, Ed points out that in this insane rant, Rush Limbaugh doesn’t clearly articulate who “they” are– presumably “the left” in general (to be defined here as anyone whose politics do not align with Rush Limbaugh), those bleeding hearts who are ready to take up “revolutionary social causes” whatever those might be, because they’re just into…normalizing stuff. Stuff that Limbaugh doesn’t like, which usually has something to do with women’s and minority rights and sexual practices he personally doesn’t want to engage in. And hey, pedophilia falls into that latter category for him, certainly, so why not for liberals? Because after all, liberals stand for the interests of people Rush is not and the ability to do things Rush doesn’t want to do, and they are therefore the enemy!

No, right wingers are not narcissistic. Not remotely.

But yes, there’s a movement to normalize pedophilia– it’s called NAMBLA; it has been around for a very long time; and despite its self-description as a “civil rights” group, their efforts have mysteriously not resonated with left-leaning people generally, possibly because– going out on a limb here– having sex with underage boys isn’t something they consider to be a civil right.

Because of the consent thing, and all.

Given the slew of jaw-dropping comments made by conservative politicians in the news lately regarding rape, however, my confidence in right wing comprehension of what consent means, let alone their regard for it, is on seriously shaky ground. In case you’re having trouble keeping track (and I know; it’s like trying to keep track of who’s been caught with a rent boy most recently), here’s a handy infographic:

Credit: The Frisky

Now, it’s not at all news to see a right winger, especially someone like Rush Limbaugh, compare homosexuality to pedophilia. It’s beyond common– Rick Santorum has practically built his reputation on it, Rick Warren has done it and then issued “notpologies” for it…heck, in the (continuing) wake of child molestation scandals in the Catholic Church and Jerry Sandusky’s locker room, homosexuality and pedophilia have been directly equated: If you’re a homosexual, you’re probably a pedophile, or at least there’s nothing stopping you (and please don’t mention that the vast majority of child molestation and rape cases are like the one which begins this post– straight adult man and female child).

But…do they realize what they’re saying?

Do they realize that they’re saying that they, personally, don’t grasp the importance of consent? Especially the female kind?

I don’t think they do.

Marching, not racing

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Item #3, “Make you like us,” conspicuously absent.

So the Supreme Court has some consideration of gay marriage coming up, in two different forms. First there are a number of cases involving the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) which may be added to the docket, which specifically would entail addressing whether the act violates equal protection guarantees under the 5th Amendment’s due process clause when applied to same-sex couples legally married under the laws of their own state. Then there’s Hollingsworth v. Perry which address Prop 8, the California ballot measure which denies legal marriage to same sex couples in that state. The issue there is whether such a provision on the part of an individual state counts as a violation of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment guarantee to equal protection under the law.

(Both of these case make me fervently wish that there was a Supreme Court channel. C-SPAN, make it happen. All SCOTUS, all the time. I’d watch it. I’d totally settle for a livestream, if it’s a good one. Just saying.)

Given the current makeup of the court, there’s little reason to be optimistic. They might declare DOMA unconstitutional, but they might not. And it’s very unlikely that they will declare that state measures banning gay marriage are a violation of equal protection across the board.

Some recent advances in civil rights which can be attributed to SCOTUS:

  • Desegregation: With Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, the court decided against racial segregation in schools. 
  • Interracial marriage: With Loving v. Virginia in 1967, the court declared that laws against miscegenation are unconstitutional. 
  • Abortion: In Roe v. Wade in 1973, the court ruled that there is a right to personal privacy which renders unconstitutional laws prohibiting abortion.
  • Homosexuality: With Lawrence v. Texas in 2003, the court ruled against state laws banning sodomy. 

And of course, along the way the court has had several misses– it has frequently ruled against civil liberties before it has ruled for them (see Plessy v. Ferguson, Pace v. Alabama, and Bowers v. Harwick). It will not be a surprise if it does so again in these cases. When it moves toward freedom, the court moves slowly. And it does not always move toward freedom.

Still, it’s disturbing to see a position like the following:

Here is a movie plot you have never seen and never will see: a disadvantaged athlete struggles against the odds, makes it to the Olympics by sheer force of grit and talent, and is ahead in the race for gold—when, with the finish line in sight, the referee calls off the competition, hands the hero a medal, and everybody goes home. Gay Americans are in sight of winning marriage not merely as a gift of five referees but in public competition against the all the arguments and money our opponents can throw at us. A Supreme Court intervention now would deprive us of that victory. Our right to marry would never enjoy the deep legitimacy that only a popular mandate can bring.I tell my gay friends: imagine if the Supreme Court had ordered gay marriage this past June, at the end of its 2011-2012 term. November’s game-changing electoral victories would never have happened. Gay marriage advocates would be forever stereotyped as political losers who won by running to mommy. Our opponents would mock and denigrate our marriages as court-created, legalistic fictions. The country would never have shown how much it has changed. If we have come that far in five years, imagine where we might be in five more. Imagine, then, the opportunities to extend and consolidate support that we will lose if the Supreme Court steps in now. Strange but true: a favorable Supreme Court intervention next year would make us weaker, not stronger.

This piece, by Jonathan Rauch at The New Republic, makes me wonder how Rauch’s gay friends haven’t strangled him.

So does desegregation not have “deep legitimacy”? Interracial marriage? Reproductive freedom? Because these rights were acknowledged by the Supreme Court, does that mean they’re less legitimate, and amount to being handed a prize by a referee before you’ve actually earned it?

Because we know, after all, that rights are earned by minorities. It should be a matter of popular opinion, because getting everyone to like you should be the foundation of “legitimate” personhood.

What?

This is an argument that could only be made by someone who doesn’t believe that marriage equality is a civil right. It is, for that matter, an argument I’ve heard many times over by opponents of marriage equality, because they think it is somehow up to gays and lesbians to convince the rest of us that they’re charming enough to be allowed to marry the person they love, just like anyone else. The way a minority “wins” is to win the affection of the majority, and eventually by popular appeal the majority will grant them the status of equals.

And yes, that would be great. Except you know what? The unwillingness of majorities to recognize the equality of minorities is called bigotry, and minorities shouldn’t have to cure bigots of their bigotry to get that acceptance in order for that to be the basis of their legal recognition as equals. In the Olympic race analogy, that would be like the runner having to stop along the way to make sure that a majority of the fans lining the track with their arms outstretched are willing to give him/her a high five, before the referee is willing to acknowledge that he/she made it over the finish line. For the race is not to the swift, but to the likable…

No. Gay rights are legitimate because they are civil rights, and civil rights should not be up to a popular vote. It would be nice if there was popular acknowledgement of the legitimacy of gay rights, but a) it’s not a requirement, and b) there is ample evidence that such acknowledgement can follow a SCOTUS decision rather than needing to precipitate it or render it unnecessary. In that regard, SCOTUS is more like a teacher who steps in and prevents all of the straight kids from bullying the gay kid. Sure, it would be great if the kids would just stop bullying the gay kid on their own, but…let’s not hold our breath that they will. They can go through catharsis and character development on their own time– it’s not the responsibility of the gay kid to make them.

Procotting

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I can’t seem to find a word that denotes a deliberate decision to patronize a business in response to a boycott by others, so I’m going to say I’m procotting Home Depot. Here’s why:

The American Family Association has announced yet another boycott, or perhaps a continuation of an already existing one, and the target this time is Home Depot because it set up a booth to promote itself at a gay pride event in Atlanta.

 The Anti-Fags American Family Association complained that

One of the main purposes of “gay” pride events is to push for the legalization of marriage between men who have unnatural sex acts with other men. Rather than remaining neutral on the issue, Home Depot has taken the side of grown men who parade in public places dressed as drag queens and “fairies.”…AFA is promoting a boycott of Home Depot until it agrees to remain neutral in the homosexual culture war.

Because apparently, being neutral means treating gays like non-humans. I’m not sure if the AFA has noticed, but  homosexuals have home repair and improvement needs just like all other humans. Desiring romantic and intimate relationships with other people of the same gender does not, seemingly, absolve one of the need or compunction to paint the living room. Heck, it might actually further it.

    I would recommend….

    I would recommend…. published on No Comments on I would recommend….

    …buying stand-up comedian Tig Notaro’s set off fellow comedian Louis CK’s web site.

    But before you listen to it, I would really recommend listening to listening to the Professor Blastoff podcast. In general, but especially since episode 63. Here’s the iTunes link.

    Hat tip to Kara, who pointed me in the right direction after I discovered Notaro in this. 

    The only football player I care about

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    He’s also nearly the only football player I could name, but only nearly. Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe writes again in response to another banal, thoughtless anti-gay marriage diatribe, and his essay is just superb. The diatribe in this case was written by his former team member Ravens center Matt Birk, who trots out the traditional but mysterious (because never fully elaborated or explained) argument that gay marriage is bad for children. Kluwe responded with a very thorough refutation which, as is so often the case with refutations, required considerably more time and thought than the original piece to which it responded. One can spew a load of nonsense in an incredibly brief time, but it takes a great deal more work to unpack why it’s nonsense. And Kluwe did so. My favorite part:

    The only impact same-sex marriage will have on your children is if one of them turns out to be gay and cannot get married. What will you do (and I ask this honestly) if one or more of your kids ends up being gay? Will you love them any less? What will your actions speak to them, 15 years from now, when they ask you why they can’t enjoy the same relationship that you and your wife have now? And if your response is “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it”, well, for a lot of people that bridge is here right now. They’re trying to cross it, but the way is barred, and I will do my best to tear those barricades down any way I can because I believe that we are infringing on the free will of other human beings by denying them their basic right to live free of oppression. I love my daughters for their minds and their personalities, not for who they love as adults. That’s none of my damn business, and I will support them in life no matter who they want to marry.

    Now you may ask, why exactly are we leaving the discussion of gay rights up to pro football players who write passionate editorials? And I will say, honestly– I have no idea. It seems to be mainly celebrity worship, and they probably differ very little from the general populace in terms of opinions on gay marriage and degree of actual knowledge about gay marriage. But Kluwe, who is exceptional in more ways than his eloquence and intelligence (he’s also a self-confessed nerd, and his twitter handle is Chriswarcraft), is certainly the one we should want to listen to first. Use that bully pulpit for all you’ve got!

    Memo to Tony Perkins

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    You do not get to operate a hate group without being called a hate group. Sorry.

    Yes, when your group says that homosexuals are “destructive to society” and should be “exported from the U.S.,” it’s a hate group. When it says that we should return to having criminal sanctions for homosexuals, it’s a hate group. When it assigns general responsibility for pedophilia to homosexuality, it’s a hate group.

    I’m sorry that it hurts your feelings that the Southern Poverty Law Center accurately describes your group, the Family Research Council, as promoting an anti-gay ideology. But complaining about that makes you look exactly like a KKK grand dragon complaining about being accused of racism. It would be laughable if it wasn’t so cruelly ironic in this particular instance. Because you see, what you’re doing is claiming that in labeling the FRC a hate group, the SPLC is somehow responsible for the shooting of the building manager at that group’s headquarters. And yet I don’t see you taking the slightest hint of responsibility for every instance of gay bashing that occurs– the murder, torture, and imprisonment of men, women, and children for simply being perceived as homosexual.

    It actually says a lot about your twisted mentality if you think that describing the FRC as a hate goup– even if it wasn’t true– legitimizes shooting someone associated with it. If it did, we would see members of the SPLC out attacking members of the FRC, wouldn’t we? Instead of writing online and in newsletters about how the FRC relies on pseudoscience to legitimize its claims that homosexuality is a threat to society and characterize homosexuals as immoral in order to hamper their efforts to gain equality, members of and sympathizers with the SPLC would just be waging a literal war on you! But they’re not. And no, this one guy does not count.

    People who aren’t doing anything wrong– people who are actually doing important, necessary, brave things– are occasionally shot. George Tiller was one of those people. Members of your group are not, and pointing this out does not amount to justifying shooting them. See, I understand a general reluctance to say that people who speak out against something are giving “license” to people who take it upon themselves to go out and physically attack practitioners of that thing. I get it– we don’t want to equate condemnation, even strenuous condemnation, with violence. But here’s the funny thing– you are expressing no such reluctance! You are claiming that condemnation amounts to license to harm– I took that word directly from you– and yet you don’t hold yourself and your own group responsible for attacks against any homosexual! You know, the people who have actually campaigned for such people to be attacked!

    How can this be? Are you an idiot as well as a bigot?

    Of course not. You’re a bigot who is also a transparent hypocrite. This has always been the case– your name is right up there with Brian Fischer in terms of people I don’t even bother to read about anymore when I come across a headline. It’s always a story about something said in which the hate and the hypocrisy compete for dominance. But now you’re in the spotlight because someone unfortunate enough to work for you received the focused rage of an unstable person against your odious organization, and some people might be in danger of taking you seriously. Which is why I’m writing this post.

    I’ve always liked that (apparently disputed) Gandhi quote, “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” But it’s a problematic thing to say, because you can count on anyone who is being ignored, laughed at, or fought using it to understand that eventually they will win. This is the slogan of authentic victims of oppression, but also of oppressors with a martyr complex because they do not realize they’re oppressors. When you’re lying about a group of people in order to make them seem dangerous or immoral when in fact they’re nothing of the sort, and advocating that their behavior (which you’re lying about) should be criminalized– guess what? That’s a good way of knowing which group you fall into! You can’t be ignored, because you have power. You can be laughed at, but only because it beats crying or screaming. You can be fought, but this lone shooter is the only one trying to do so with force– and I bet you’re over the moon about that.

    I wonder how Leo Johnson feels to know that you’re capitalizing on his attack in order to claim glorious underdog status, probably regretting only the fact that he wasn’t killed. I have not the slightest doubt that you would welcome more such attacks, in order to double down on the irony of a group which promotes violence against gays instituted by government shrieking about violence perpetuated against them by vigilantes. It must leave a perversely sweet taste in your mouth to preach hate against a group for nine years and then denounce them and their supporters when someone on your side is attacked. Poor, poor, persecuted bigots. The world is so unfair. When George Rekers got caught with a male prostitute, that was a tragedy (because he got caught). But this– this is an opportunity! An opportunity to do what you do best– paint yourself as the real victim in a battle against those evil people who think there’s nothing wrong with being gay. That’s getting harder and harder as the obviousness of this position becomes ever more prevalent, but for now, at least a bone has been thrown– a juicy, beefy bone of martyr complex opportunity, and you’ve leaped on it with jowls a’drooling.

    Enjoy, I suppose. At least allow Johnson a sliver or too– he earned it– and cherish it while it lasts. You’re a dying breed, but not because someone’s going to come and shoot you. Because hateful crazies like you don’t come into power very often, and once they lose that power society is reluctant to give it back again.

    ETA: The Southern Poverty Law Center published a statement on Perkins’ remarks. Excerpt:

    Perkins and his allies, seeing an opportunity to score points, are using the attack on their offices to pose a false equivalency between the SPLC’s criticisms of the FRC and the FRC’s criticisms of LGBT people. The FRC routinely pushes out demonizing claims that gay people are child molesters and worse — claims that are provably false. It should stop the demonization and affirm the dignity of all people.

    Priorities

    Priorities published on No Comments on Priorities

    A couple of months ago I wrote about different categories I fit in, ideologically and politically. I was tempted to expand on it earlier this month when PZ Myers wrote a post asking people what kind of atheist they are– scientific, philosophical, political, or humanist. I understood what he was getting at, but my first impulse was to ask “Why is the ‘atheism’ part the constant? The most important thing?” Because when it comes to politics and ideology I am, first and foremost, a free-speechist.

    If you’re not a free-speechist, whatever else you believe and whatever priorities you give those beliefs, you’re not on my side. That seems harsh, maybe, but I’ll explain why that is, and what a free-speechist is.

    A free-speechist is a person who believes that a free market of ideas is absolutely critical to the maintenance of an educated and moral society, and as such the only real justifications for government censorship of speech are those related to safety and property rights– e.g. you can’t shout ‘fire’ falsely in a crowded theater, and you can’t make money off of someone else’s creative work by representing it as your own. I value private forums which cherish a relative freedom of expression also, but a) as private forums they don’t have an obligation to allow anyone at all to speak, let alone everyone, and b) an “anything goes” atmosphere is not conducive to ideas being exchanged freely and productively, so some amount of moderation in order to eliminate abusive content and commenters is arguably not just permissible but necessary. So if you’re one of those people who whines that any sort of moderation whatsoever on an internet chat site, blog, or forum is wrong because it violates commenters’ freedom of speech, you’re not only wrong (since the First Amendment does not apply to private fora, and couldn’t since that would violate the owner’s right to freedom of association) but probably a troll.

    Briefly put, trying to defeat an idea by either silencing the person voicing it or causing damage to their person or property is the coward’s way out. It’s an act of aggression against a person because you dislike the content of their ideas; it does not refute the ideas.

    And no, a boycott isn’t a form of that. A boycott is an individual refusal to contribute to someone’s livelihood because doing so amounts to contributing indirectly to something you wouldn’t support directly. Similarly to a private forum, not being allowed to boycott would mean abdicating your own freedom of speech by being made to support ideas you don’t agree with whether you like it or not.

    This might seem like a rather long-winded way to get to the point that I’m livid about hearing that yet another government official has seen fit to wield unique power to prevent someone from doing business because he objects to the content of that person’s ideas:

    District of Columbia Mayor Vincent Gray says he won’t support an expanded presence for Chick-fil-A in the district because the president of the fast-food chain is opposed to gay marriage. Gray, a Democrat, referred to the company’s product as “hate chicken” in a tweet on Friday. His statement referenced his “long-standing strong support for LGBT rights and marriage equality” and followed similar statements by mayors in Boston, Chicago and San Francisco that the company was not welcome.

    You know what’s depressing? It’s depressing that Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum, of all people, are pursuing the correct course of action with regard to freedom of expression by encouraging people who agree with their opposition to gay marriage to vote with their wallets and support Chick-fil-A. Of course, neither of them is actually in office and therefore in a position to use legal power to promote or inhibit a view by damaging the business of the person espousing it, so let’s not give them too much credit. Let’s not give them any credit, for that matter, except to note that what they’re doing does not violate anyone’s freedom of speech whereas blocking someone’s business simply because you don’t like the views they support absolutely does.

    And I say this as a passionate advocate of LGBT equality since 1993. There is a right way and a wrong way to fight for these things. Silencing and intimidation are the wrong way.

    That’s why I’m a free-speechist.

    Equal opportunity flirt-slaying

    Equal opportunity flirt-slaying published on 1 Comment on Equal opportunity flirt-slaying

    I received an email this morning from Change.org:

    “Yeah, I killed him, but he did worse to me.” In 1997, a man in Queensland, Australia killed a gay man who he claimed flirted with him by bashing his head into a wall and stabbing him to death. Today, “gay panic” is still a legal defense for murder in Queensland that can result in lesser charges. In fact, just two years ago, a man was brutally killed in a Queensland churchyard, and his killer used the “gay panic” defense in court. He was subsequently acquitted of murder. Father Paul Kelly is a priest in the parish where that man was killed, and he started a petition on Change.org demanding that Queensland abolish the gay panic defense. It looked like Father Kelly’s petition was headed for victory, but now there’s a new Premier in Queensland, Campbell Newman, and he won’t say whether he will abolish the gay panic loophole. Father Kelly thinks it’s crucial to build quick international pressure on Premier Newman, particularly from important Australian allies like the US. A recent study named Queensland as Australia’s most homophobic state — 73% of gay and lesbian Queenslanders are subjected to verbal abuse or physical violence for their sexuality. Father Kelly believes that if the gay panic defense stands, Queensland’s gay community will be forced to live in terror knowing that the law is on their tormentors’ side.

    Upon clicking through to the petition, I saw that an update had been made:

    Queensland’s new Attorney-General has just said in media they won’t end the “gay panic” defence — instead saying any change is “unnecessary”.

    Yes, apparently he did say that, but that’s not the most bizarre thing. Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie said that it’s “not a priority” to change the defense, and also that it’s not appropriate to call it a gay panic defense because both sexes can use it:

    I think we have to get this misconception out of everyone’s mind that this [is a] “gay panic” defence. It’s a Criminal Code defence open to any Queenslander regardless of sex.

    So, two straight men have used the fact that they felt “provoked” by a non-violent sexual advance– i.e., they were hit on– by another man as justification for murdering that man, and did so successfully, but it shouldn’t be considered a gay panic defense because apparently (for example) women can also use this defense if they murder a woman who hits on them, or…a man who hits on them.

    Wow. Can you imagine if every woman who felt threatened– or even “provoked”– by being hit on by a man reacted with violence? To the point of murder? And was acquitted of that? In America, I would guess that every woman has been or will be sexually harassed at least once in her life, and about 1 in 5 have been raped. I hope I don’t need to clarify that if 100% of women had been raped it wouldn’t justify killing a man simply for hitting on them, but if we’re talking concern about personal safety then surely women have a need for it. More concern, at least, than a man needs to have about another man who has expressed a sexual interest in him deciding to translate that into a sexual attack.

    And yet how often do women react to sexual advances with violence? Rarely, regardless of who they’re coming from. Will the crudest of these advances be met with a slap? Occasionally (and no, I do not advocate this). But if violence enters the picture it’s far more likely to come from the woman’s jealous significant other, provoked not by concern for his own physical welfare or that of the wife/girlfriend, but by a sense of propriety. I say this not to step into some kind of gender war, but to point out that women are hit on all of the time without violence ever resulting, even though they arguably have at least some justification for being defensive. So what’s the excuse of the homophobe?

    Oh yeah– he’s grossed out. He’s offended, both by the thought of the type of sex act he imagines will result from being receptive to the advances of this other man, and by the assumption on the part of the other man that he might be receptive to these advances. At being thought a “fag.” Horrible. Horrible enough to justify bashing that man’s repeatedly head against the wall and then stabbing him to death.

    In Australia this is known as the “homosexual advance defense.” It was entrenched in Australian law by a high court decision in 1997 and used successfully as recently as 2009.

    But it’s okay, because hey– it’s not just a defense against homosexuals. We all can use it!

    Imagine a world in which everyone did.