They said this at the time, but

[solarbird]

They said this before - back when it passed - but Proposition 8 (or "h8") backers in California are now officially trying to have all previously and legally-issued marriages between GBLT couples nullified.

Some people seem to be surprised at this. I don't know why. They said this was the intent when the proposition was passed, they've said this was the intent every time they've passed one of these things, and they won't be happy until and unless it happens. After all, as James Dobson so famously said, queers getting hitched will destroy western civilisation. The leadership, further, won't be happy until Lawrence v. Texas (2003) is overturned so they can make queers illegal again. That's an explicit goal, and part of the "judicial tyranny" rhetoric since the decision: it's tyrannical to overturn laws making me illegal, just as their religious freedom is being impinged if they can't enact the mandates of their religion into civil law. They are being oppressed if they can't use the state to oppress me, and everyone like me.

So of course they're going to go after queers at any point they can. It's what they do, and they do it because they really do hate our existence and want to eliminate us from society, commercially, politically, and legally as best as they can, and all the polite words in the world can't erase that vicious reality.

And yet that keeps getting papered over and ignored and silently accepted and dismissed (even when demonstrated with direct quotes and complete context, as I spent years doing), which is why and how you end up with one of these people giving the invocation at Mr. Obama's inauguration. And it's how you get so many people - not on this journal, but many, many other places - supporting that decision.

So don't be surprised. Be disgusted, be angered, be whatever, But for the love of the gods, don't be surprised. Be anything but that.

Comments

[westrider.livejournal.com]

Yeah, this angers and saddens me, but doesn't surprise me by any means.

A possible glimmer of hope, though. (http://www.truthout.org/122008Y)

[darkphoenixrisn.livejournal.com]

It's disappointing to see people who call themselves liberals and progressives defending Obama's choice of Warren. Of course, the vast majority of them seem to be hetero. Privilege is a wonderful thing.

[blues-kun.livejournal.com]

...does someone out there still have his brain on? Hmm.

[silussa.livejournal.com]

Would the destruction of Western Civilization as we know it be a bad thing?

[hugh-mannity.livejournal.com]

(here via Brad Hicks)

Silly question -- and I don't mean to be facetious or anything -- but why do they hate us so virulently? That's the bit that I don't understand. I'm not surprised by any dirty tricks they pull to make our lives more difficult, I just don't understand why.

There's a lot of people I'd be quiet happy to see leave the planet (and in some cases if they had a slow and painful departure it would not sadden me) but I don't hate any of them enough to want to eradicate them, their friends and families and anyone else faintly resembling them. *shakes head* I just don't get it.

[shadesofmauve]

This isn't an answer, but a vaguely remembered theory (I think I heard an author talking about it on a uni radio station). It's that many of these religious groups *need* an enemy, in order to keep cohesive. They don't have enough self-definition, so they create something they can unite against. As "Godless communism" became less of a threat, they ramped up attacks on gays (and most vocally on gay men).

I wouldn't think that's the whole story, but I think defining oneself by one's hatreds is at root of a lot of what's going on. It's a very machiavellian group-management technique (I won't say leadership). Keep 'em foaming at the mouth, and they won't stop to pay attention to the complete crap you're spewing.

[kvogel.livejournal.com]

Because your are different/not conforming/disobeying Ghod, and worse not being ashamed in doing so. More cynically, as at least some of the leadership doesn't actually beleave themselves, they know they can whip up the passions of the faithful to do WHATEVER THEY WANT, including shamelessly hatemongering (along with all the other unchristian stuff they do), and attacking queers is both still acceptable and an effective rallying point.
As for the rank and file fear/hate, as it involves SEX, it hits too close to the up-tight and insecure sex and gender issues of neo-puritanical nit-wits.

[solarbird]

(here via Brad Hicks)
Oh, is that what happened? Now I understand. ^_^

(My hit count took a bit of a jump. I don't have real stats but I have some indicators and it's all "um whut?" so.)

I'm not a psychoanalyst, so I'm not going to get too deep or anything, but I do have some ideas about this. Some I'm pretty sure of; as skellington1 notes, authoritarian structures - of which fundamentalism is an example - need enemies. They need them to use as scapegoats, to scare the "in-group" membership, to externalise internal flaws, and so on. They always do and always have. I have half-assed theories that it's an artifact of troop primate psychology, personally, but that's an extrapolation. Fundamentalism in particular needs a threat from which you must be Saved, capital-S, so that you'll be drawn to the Saviour, also capital-S.

Another thing I'm reasonably confident of comes from a fundamentalist cultural meme that relates to this but deserves a separate calling-out. You'll recognise it from its infection of the Republican party; there is no neutral party. You're either with Jesus, or you're with Satan; you can't be anything else. This comes in part from the Revelations 3:15-16:

15: I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot.

16: So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.

They do recognise the "unsaved," but not as a neutral party; you must pick a side. And GBLT people, by not conforming to their fundamentalist belief set, and not being ashamed of that, have picked a side, the side of the Devil.

Similarly, this religiously-inspired hate for opposition has taken over much of the GOP; you aren't the "loyal opposition," if you aren't in their tribe; you're a "traitor." I saw this taking over the GOP in the 1990s, as the fundamentalist movement really took over inside the party, and, well, you see the situation now.

So that's another reason.

Why were queers in particular picked?

1) Authoritarian movements want weak enemies. The weaker, the better, and the more the power of the weak enemy will be inflated. The weaker said opposition becomes, the more fiercely the authoritarian (and in particular, the fascist) will condemn them.

2) I also think it has to do with the mythological past-image most of them want to recreate. Mostly they want their particular vision of the 1940s and 1950s. Some of that would be older to the non-fundamentalist population, and some of them want to go quite a bit further back, but that's it for the rank and file. And in the 40s and 50s, GBLT people were despised, furtive perverts who were arrested upon discovery, and subjected to all sorts of hellish "treatments" for their "perversion" and "abnormality."

3) It breaks the fundamentalist vision of submissive woman and dominant man. One of the key elements of most fundamentalist movements is submission of women to men; men must control women, and be superiour. There's a real parallel between this and primate troop behaviour, and I really wonder whether this isn't a manifestation of that evolutionary trait.

So I think that's a lot of why. Hopefully this is still short enough for a comment, I don't want to make a post of it. ^_^

[hugh-mannity.livejournal.com]

That makes perfect sense. It's not "us" it's them. They need us to be deviant and unsaved and a thoroughly immoral "enemy" to unite and control their troops.

And yes, the subversion of the patriarchal paradigm that GLBT folks (and especially those nasty dirty trannies!) represent must be stamped out before their wimmin get uppity.

Thanks.

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

I think also that there's a real fear of uncontrolled sexuality, which gay men publicly celebrate. Sex is an incredibly strong force for many people, and I think a lot of these men fear it (sexuality itself, not necessarily gay sex) in themselves.

For a lot of people, it's easier to fight the perceived enemy outside than make peace with the 'enemy' within.

[cafiorello.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes! "Traditional marriage" is a way to control the fire of sexuality and anything that weakens that is bad--the fire might rage out of control and consume us all!

Cathy

[backrubbear.livejournal.com]

Some people seem to be surprised at this. I don't know why.

It's not as if Michigan weren't already an example of how one thing was said and contradictory actions taken.

Perhaps it makes the bigots feel better when they hear the "oh no... we won't go after the established marriages" when they're casting their votes.

[foibos.livejournal.com]

I find it interesting to note that homosexuality is only condemned in a few places in the Old Testament (and most of those condemnations are ambiguous at 'best'). Compared to the frequent and categorical condemnations of, say, the rich and powerful being unfair to poor people, the OT does not support this level of persecution.

As for the New Testament, AFAICR Paul is the only writer to mention homosexuality at all. He himself was probably gay, so maybe he had a case of self-hatred in that regard.