From gay culture blog QUEERTY:
A Swedish court convicted him under hate crime legislation but the ruling was appealed; Sweden’s Supreme Court has now utterly disgraced itself by overturning the conviction. Is it even imaginable that if a preacher had said the same words against Jews, he would not be punished by a civil, secular society? We fear, actually, that it is imaginable.
Someone over at QUEERTY appears genuinely disgusted the freedom of speech has been unanimously upheld by Sweeden’s Supreme Court. Am I reading this incorrectly? Feel free to read QUEERTY’s original post for yourself and email them. Please let me know if I’m getting upset over nothing because I really enjoy their site normally.
…instead, take action.
Visit Religious Right Watch, then consider becoming involved in Talk To Action.
I still haven’t had time to read the December cover story and related articles thoroughly. Among the items of interest are stories about the Founding Fathers’ intent on religion in government, Christian Reconstruction, the religious right’s growing “orbits of influence,” a conservative-Christian media empire, and a questionable charity.
So I invite reviews and comments by others. Is MJ just spouting liberal anxiety toward conservative religiosity? Exposing religious-right power and corruption? Stereotyping conservative religious beliefs?
(Need free subscriber access to MJ? Visit Religious Right Watch for assistance.)
While I congratulate Swedish pastor Ake Green on his acquittal by his country’s supreme court, I reject the Alliance Defense Fund’s assertion that calling homosexuality a “cancerous tumor on all of society” represents ”the biblical view of homosexual behavior.”
Freedom of speech aside, ADF’s redefinition of Christianity as a religion of venomous hate speech is “radical” – and repulsive. The religious right reaps what it sows: Such utterances, utterly devoid of grace or good will, constitute a disease that infects and debilitates these Christians’ message — and the message of exgay activists who affirm and parrot ADF’s unholy works.
Facts solicited: Do same-sex-attracted persons suffer from discrimination? (Cite current examples and provide links.)
Opinions solicited: Should it be illegal for private individuals or organizations to discriminate? Should it be illegal for government agencies to discriminate?
On his personal blog, Randy Thomas of the Exodus national office cheers Brown University columnist Carman McNary for protesting alleged “drunken orgies” organized by the campus “Queer Alliance.” Thomas says he wants “these folks” — the “gay identified community” — “held accountable” for failing to speak out against sexual irresponsibility.
McNary self-identifies as a proponent of equality and equal rights, and Thomas applauds this supposedly rare instance of accountability in the equal rights movement.
Thomas’ perception that gay people generally do not uphold accountability and responsibility is based not in fact, but in Thomas’ practice of intentional ignorance. AIDS clinics and gay newspaper columnists of the left and right have chastized sexual irresponsibility for decades, and lifelong monogamy is at the core of arguments made in favor of gay marriage. Thomas is aware of these arguments, through his participation (with me and others) in Bridges Across the Divide. He has also been confronted with accountable gays in gay-marriage debates and in sworn testimony at legislative hearings against gay marriage. (Did Thomas, in fact, ever listen to his opponents at these events?)
Beyond his refusal to see responsible, moral behavior among same-sex-attracted individuals and their defenders, Thomas tiptoes around another issue: Exgay accountability. At different times in the past decade, two prominent voices for exgay movement accountability have been Anthony Falzarano — an exgay activist who publicly condemned Exodus’ addiction to the religious right — and Britain’s Courage Trust, which severed ties with Exodus over the U.S. organization’s misrepresentations about “change” and its refusal to minister compassionately to same-sex-attracted individuals who seek moral co-existence between their Christian faith and their sexuality.
If Thomas is truly in favor of accountability, then I invite him to cheer those who hold Exodus accountable, who uphold established clinical knowledge about sexuality, and who oppose political and financial corruption among Christian conservatives.
Addendum: In a followup message, Thomas calls unspecified criticism of his earlier message “scornful.” In his correspondence with me and with ex-exgay letter-writers over the years, Thomas has been a frequent practitioner of rhetorical silence in response to honest questions about his antigay fundamentalist rhetoric, his smears against people whom he labels “liberals,” and his lobbying for discriminatory legislation. Yet Thomas criticizes this same silent treatment when it is regrettably used upon him (allegedly) by unnamed others.
Both Exodus president Alan Chambers and Exodus lobbyist/political organizer Randy Thomas have gotten in the habit, lately, of calling themselves, and fellow conservative Christians, ”godly.”
Latest example: Thomas’ otherwise innocuous promotion of GodlyCreativePeople.com, a site that no doubt has good intentions but immediately flags itself, by name, as overflowing with ungodly self-pride.
Is this choice of language among some Christians mere self-flattery, or an elevation of oneself to the status of demi-god?
Neither liberals nor the ACLU have espoused “compassion” for Islamic terrorists, nor sought to ban Christmas.
But Exodus lobbyist Randy Thomas apparently needed someone to grumble about yesterday. So, on his blog, he reprinted far-right agitprop without checking the facts or identifying any examples of “every liberal mantra” that he claims to oppose. It is Thomas’ usual practice — and that of his religious-right political movement — not to verify whether any specific liberal has ever said what he claims they say. This deliberate (and sinful) ignorance permits Thomas to foster contempt for his neighbors without the pangs of guilt that might result from knowledge and critical thinking about those whom he smears.
For all this Exodus leader’s parroting of epithets such as “jihadist,” it is ironically Thomas who reinforces a holy war: the religious right’s politicization and monetization of Christmas.
These less grievous sins of course include the time Agape editor Jody Brown thought herself too busy to bless a staff writer after they sneezed. [ok I made that up]
But in all seriousness, the religious right usually has the courtesy to pretend as though homosexuality is no different than other sins and shouldn’t be singled out. The Agapepress had a lapse in judgment today after imbibing too much eggnog at the AFA Thanksgiving potluck. Let’s read, shall we?
Few sins in the Bible are described with the same harshness or urgency of language as homosexuality. Genesis 18:20… [bla bla bla, long string of Bible quotes I don't care about] In other words, the consequences of homosexual behavior can be considerably more grievous than some other sins. Homosexuality is unique in that it is especially abhorrent to God and constitutes a significantly perverse and wicked lifestyle that clearly shows that one is far removed from Him.
But really now, by Agape standards that alone is hardly worth mentioning here on XGW. The rest of the article makes use of a literary technique rarely used by the religious right. That technique? Hysteria. Here are some choice sentences used to open paragraphs and lastly the closing line:
Few sins have done more of late to wreak havoc among God’s people as homosexuality…
Moreover, few sins today threaten religious freedom as does homosexuality…
Southern Baptists in the Tar Heel State have become a lighthouse illuminating the way for the great denominational ships of Zion in imminent danger of sinking in the “Graveyard of the Apostates.”
With hysteria like this, I don’t know how they managed to keep Don Wildmon from ripping off his clothes and running down the hall proclaiming the end times.
Stephen Bennett seems to have different numbers than “mister not-so-straight mathematics” Alan Chambers. Perhaps Bennett’s numbers are from 2003 since that was the last time Chambers claimed ex-gays numbered in the “thousands.”
(+22:28) I am one of thousands of men and women who have made that choice and who have made that choice for Jesus Christ. Listen, let me be blunt, you don’t have to be a Christian to come out of homosexuality just as you don’t have to be a Christian to come out of drug addition, or alcoholism, or adultery. But the truth of the matter is, what the point of going from gay to straight and going to Hell? Jesus Christ is the answer. (11.25.05 Real Audio / Windows Media)
Whoa! What’s this little gem from Stephen? The only reason people should seek change is because God compels them? Funny how the very next day’s show is titled “The Medical Truths and Dangers of Homosexuality – Part 1” So yeah, there’s no reason to change other than faith Bennett says…
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