Sometimes it’s nice to know we queers aren’t the only ones who find Lou Sheldon creepy; Tucker Carlson does too.
My editor had just assigned me a story about religious revival in the inner city. The idea was, black churches might be better equipped to help the urban poor than government aid agencies. Someone suggested I talk to the Reverend Lou Sheldon, the head of a group called the Traditional Values Coalition. Apparently he was an expert on the subject. So I called him.
Sheldon came to my office for the interview. We sat across from each other in my cubicle and I threw a series of questions at him. He answered each one impatiently, then stopped me. “You want to know what the single biggest problem facing inner-city black neighborhoods is?” Yes, I nodded, readying my pen and pad. Sheldon paused. “Homosexuality,” he said.
As a general matter, I try to give people like Lou Sheldon the benefit of the doubt. Just because you oppose the practice of homosexuality (and most of the world’s six billion people still do oppose to it) doesn’t mean you’re a bigot. Some people have principled religious objections. I wanted to keep an open mind.
But I couldn’t. Homosexuality was the biggest problem in the inner cities? Bigger than crime? And unemployment? And poverty? And broken families? And AIDS? And for that matter, graffiti? Nope, there was no way around it. What the Reverend Lou had said was bizarre. And creepy too.
If Lou Sheldon had ever bothered to ride along on police patrols, or spend time with large police agencies, he’d know better.
I’ve just completed a four year internship with the Los Angeles Police Dept. forensic photo unit.
I am a lifelong resident of this city and one of the now rare people born and raised in LA.
My father was a probation officer who later specialized in juvenile offenders.
My mother was a social worker. She mostly worked for the foster care system.
Both of my parents have been dead longer than thirty years.
The problems of gangs, runaway unwed parenthood and drug use didn’t have the impact then as now.
Lou Sheldon won’t talk to me.
But I state clearly that it’s not gay boys and girls who form their own or join gangs in large numbers.
It’s not homosexual men and women who have unattended children that join the ranks of welfare, foster or incarcerated children.
It’s not gay men and women who most often abuse, neglect or murder their own children.
Domestic violence between gay couples, makes up a tiny percentage.
Ever fewer with their children involved.
Heterosexuals make up the bigger statistic of sexually abused children.
Especially the ratio of men on females.
It’s in the 90’s percentile and more go unreported.
Male to male, or female to female child sexual abuse is not nearly as significant comparitively.
They make up the 10 to 15% range of cases that finishes out the 100%.
But any stat of adults who abuse children who are not in their own family is bad.
But obviously many more heterosexuals are able to casually make their own children to treat that way.
How do I know all this?
It’s been many years since law enforcement kept comparative stats on gay and lesbian crime, and lined it up to hetero crimes.
As an intern, I was privy to the computer files that interface with other agencie’s records.
The photo unit is next to the Robbery Homicide Division on the same floor of police headquarters.
In the field, my own experience and that of adjacent agencies within LA County has been years long.
West Hollywood, for example, is a concentrated area where mostly gay men and women live.
They were more often VICTIMS of violence by outsiders.
Or of their own excesses, like drug use or financial irresponsibility, which sometimes led to petty theft.
Few incidents the local law enforcement were called out to, involved gay men or women victimizing straight people on any level.
Lou Sheldon is constantly trying to convince those who listen to him, that gay people are a horrible enemy whose ambition is to attack children and straight people’s storied institutitions, rather than simply participate in them.
He’s a liar. And grossly uninformed and doesn’t want to know anything other than that gay people are an intrusive, diseased and dangerous presence.
The reality that heteros (and the unwelcome children they have) are more of a menace to us all be damned.
The sickest disease of all, is the irrational paranoid schizophrenia Lou Sheldon has of gay people.
Unfortunately, that disease can be catching.
Whoops, I meant to say that heterosexuals make up the bigger numbers FOR sexually abusing the young.
Sorry for the grammatical error.
Regan,
I think from your description that I know who your guest is. Please pass along to him that I appreciate his willingness to stand up to his parent and be honest to himself. It must hurt to have a parent trash you in public media and it takes strength not to overreact. I also commend him for not letting himself become a pawn for those who might use him politically. I know this must be a tough time for him (especially around the holidays) and I wish him well.
Regan, I always appreciate your thoughtful and well informed comments. You write with clarity, passion, and authority. Thank you for your voice and your willingness to use it.
Peterson
Regan DuCasse at January 4, 2006 03:27 PM
“If Lou Sheldon had ever bothered to ride along on police patrols, or spend time with large police agencies, he’d know better.”
Regan, you make the mistake of assuming that Lou bases his beliefs on rational observation. He does not.
Crazy Lou’s mind works differently. He starts with his conclusions and works backwards. In his view, homosexuality is the cause of all evil.
He would see AIDS in the inner city and not connect the idea that it is a result of homophobia, silence on the part of black churches, and a lack of focused education to a population at risk. No, he would see it as the result of homosexuals that go out and sin and bring AIDS back to unsuspecting innocent women.
He would see fatherless families and would not see a political policy that for decades rewarded this structure, a criminal justice system that (rightly or wrongly) disproportionatly removed men from availability, generations of racism that eliminated hope, or even a gangsta culture that glamorizes crime and objectification of women. No, he would see a breakdown in family structure brought on by acceptance of homosexuality and other “alternative lifestyles”.
You name it, Crazy Lou’s brain can link it homosexuality. We err when we think that exposing Lou to real life would change his views. Not a chance.
Fortunately, most rational persons are turned off by obsessive insanity (and his obsession is truly not rational). The best thing we can do is just hand Crazy Lou a microphone… and smile. He’ll take care of the rest.
Hence, my last little paragraph, my dear Tim.
Thanks for your input.
Peterson said:
Regan, I always appreciate your thoughtful and well informed comments. You write with clarity, passion, and authority. Thank you for your voice and your willingness to use it.
What he said 😉 Everyone should have someone like you in their lives Regan, to add spice and renew possibilities. Thanks for sharing here.
David
Peterson Toscano at January 4, 2006 04:07 PM
ReasonAble at January 4, 2006 05:05 PM
count me in on the Regan love train
🙂
Rega, Timothy, Dan, and who else? I so gotta make it to LA and meet you all!
um 1st of all not all of those people oppose homosexuality maybe the marriage of homosexual but not homosexuality or homosexual. Very misinformed
james,
It’s difficult to determine just exactly what you are trying to say.
Are you talking about Lou Sheldon (the subject of this thread)? If so, you are mistaken. Lou Sheldon opposes not only homosexuality but also any rights whatsoever for gay people.
Perhaps you are talking about something else? If so, please clarify.
I’ll never forget when Sheldon, after 9/11, went on about how the $$ provided to family members of the victims should not go to “the sex partners” of gay people. That was the full extent of his consideration of our relationships. There was no indication he had any concept that gay people could actually love one another, that partners of gay/lesbian 9/11 victims were at home, stricken with the same grief as the straight spouses of other victims. That about sums Lou up, I think.
IIRC, Sheldon was also famously quoted in Rolling Stone (this is probably 10 years ago now) talking about how gay sex was so much better than straight sex that we had to keep sodomy laws to ensure people didn’t leave their straight spouses for gay sex and end up eliminating the human species through lack of procreation. Not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, if you ask me.
Tucker Carlson’s story reminds me of a similar conversation once. Several years ago when I was in law school, I was part of six-week summer study progam in Krakow, Poland (and had a wonderful and moving time, for what it’s worth). During this program, I sat on a bus next to the wife of a law professor who is a nationally prominent religious conservative. She asked me what I thought of Krakow. I told her that the old city of Krakow was simply wonderful and, among other things, how remarkable it was that I could walk down narrow streets at 2 a.m. and not feel the least bit unsafe even though I didn’t understand Polish – quite unlike Washington, DC. Her response was that the reason why the streets of Washington were so dangerous to walk at night was because the homosexuals had destroyed the moral tone of the city, something which had not yet occured in Krakow. She was quite serious, and I was amazed by it. She might as well have said that she hated hiking the Appalachian Trail because of all the man-eating tigers.
I think the other James may have meant that Tucker Carlson was wrong in saying most people oppose homosexuality. I don’t have much use for Tucker (last year he was extremely snide and mean-spirited about a retirement home being set up for gay senior citizens), but I agree with him about Lou Sheldon.
As for Lou himself, I think last year he even went so far as to compare gay marraige to Pearl Harbor.
Patrick Rothwell at January 4, 2006 07:34 PM
This kind of silliness is not limited to Poland. When we first started going over to our house in Germany (a suburb of Munich) in 1985, someone from the US asked us if Germany still had bread lines. She actually was serious.
Regarding Lou Seldon, he does what he does because it makes money. His TVC operation is nothing more than a family operation. It is currently run by his daughter (or daughter in law). They shake down the rubes for their donations. It really is as simple as that.
Thank you my friends. I do blush sometimes at your compliments and support.
I will say, the love is very mutual. I came here looking to get educated, and I have been. I had hoped that just being honest about myself, and my background and experience would open up the floor.
And it did.
It is I who is grateful TO YOU, for your intelligence, experience and open heart. As you might know, I wasn’t given much of a chance by certain others.
And I admit I lost patience with them.
But in a life or death situation: I don’t believe in (or have a lot of time for) fancy footing around.
I have young folks in my life in crisis and I see that some will be mean all over again when trying to contact them via email, if not their blogs.
My guest and I went to my other home, the Museum of Tolerance yesterday.
It was his first time.
The civil rights display, the hate crimes display at which I could point to friends victimized by hate crimes, the list of groups on the watch list…all very powerful testaments to modern day organized bigotry.
Ignorance and fear…cannot be left to grow. EVER.
The Museum is seeing to that.
Tears.
Few can take the Museum tour without tears. There are displays not recommended for those under twelve.
With your help and support my friends, I will ALWAYS continue to reach out.
I’m glad to be here.
And thank you so very much.
Raj,
The Sheldons are not highly regarded among social conservative activists that I’ve talked to over the years. The Washington Post has long ago exposed their willingness to accept money from and lobby on behalf corporate interests that have little to do with any issue that would be of particular interest to social conservatives. I have long suspected that Phyllis Schlafly does much the same thing in trading her name and clout to lobby and write op-ed pieces on all sorts of non-social conservative issues such as intellectual property. She and the Sheldons, of course, are free to write and lobby on whatever issue floats their boat – and they may even be right from time to time! – but it is hard to imagine their donors caring much about these issues.