You might be aware that a group of LGB/T activists held a demonstration today near the headquarters of the American Family Association in Tupelo. I didn't get a chance to attend, although there are some bits I did find interesting to hear about, most notably that neither the Daily Journal or WTVA could spare the manpower to offer any coverage.This despite the fact that there was apparently a phony bomb threat called in which forced Tupelo police to sweep the theater where they were meeting. Naturally AFA didn't acknowledge the protest in any way, you can't really expect that. But AFA president Tim Wildmon did write about the coming event in his bi-weekly column for the Journal on Sunday and voiced his objection to the charge that AFA is a "hate group."
Now, I'll admit that as a life-long conservative, it bothers me some to be taking my lead from the Southern Poverty Law Center on that label. I won't chase that rabbit but I like to think I can call something what it is without resorting to sources that my conservative friends will dismiss out of hand without giving them due consideration. More importantly, having spent my entire life within the folks of Conservative Evangelical religion, I think I have a pretty firm understanding of the worldview and motivations of AFA and those who support them and ally with them - and those motivations are NOT, in point of fact, hatred (except for Bryan Fisher - I find it hard to believe there's any Christian love behind HIS words).
I fully understand the theology that provokes their position, and how, within the context of that worldview, cautioning people against homosexuality is the moral equivalent of intervening in the life of a drug addict or an alcoholic. Nevertheless, I likewise understand how an LGB/T person could not possibly help but HEAR their rhetoric as hateful, given some of the over-the-top rhetoric.Very few anti-gay thought-leaders come across as "we love you and we only want to help you overcome" rather than "the vile disgusting gays are coming to get us!" Certainly the result of such rhetoric is an increase in hatred among those already prone to bigotry and not tempered with Christian compassion (yes, my non-christian friends, there are a ton of compassionate and loving Christians out there - AFA does not speak for even most, let alone all).
So it's natural that pro-equality folks would point the finger and say "Haters!" and Wildmon would put on his best innocent face and say "Who me?" and both be sincerely convinced they were in the right. As is my wont, I could not resist an extensive point-by-point reply to Wildmon's column, with the intention of providing as much counterpoint to his comments as possible for the uninitiated or open-minded reader. You may read the entire set of replies at the link above, the content is just too huge to repost here.
I'll warn you though, that there will be things that my friends on both sides of the aisle will disagree with. First of all, there's not complete agreement even within the LGB/T community about how we describe our condition. I, for one, am at peace with the understanding that being transsexual is a birth defect - because I understand that when we use that term for an autistic child (for instance) we are not calling the child "defective" and nor am I calling myself defective - it's simply the common expression. But I know that some within the community strongly resist that acknowledgment.
I know that my believing friends tend to default back to the Bible and filter everything else through what they have been taught that the Scriptures say - without acknowledging the possibility they have been taught incompletely or incorrectly. I would say to these friends that God does not call you to lay aside your reason and logic when you consider the Scriptures and something that seems to be irreconcilable might indicate a place you have been misinformed.
Likewise, I know many of my friends on the left are not Christians, or even religious, at all. and such people will read the discussion and say out loud "But there is no God anyway!!!" To those friends I reply thus: if you start a conversation with a Christian in an attempt to change their mind by discrediting their entire faith system, you will fail. Pure and simple. if you try to defend gay rights by spouting off about someone's "bronze age superstitions" by the time you get that phrase out you have invited them to ignore everything else you say. There are many things which are "common knowledge" believes among Evangelical Christians which I question, or disbelieve to be sure but I do believe in the Gospel of Christ. Nevertheless, even if I didn't, I'm wise enough to understand that when I am discussing this thing with an Evangelical, I MUST present it to them within the context of what THEY believe.
The reality is that even within the teachings of Evangelical Christianity, it is possible to demonstrate that opposition to equality for LGB/T people is unchristian when considered rationally. I choose to approach the discussion from that angle. One of the things we miss while asking for our liberty is that in the same way we don't want fools like Bryan Fisher calling us Nazis or terrorists or vermin or whatever, we gain NOTHING if we return anger for anger, insult for insult and childishness for childishness. that's what they expect us to do, hope that we will do so as to confirm their twisted stereotypes (likewise, as an aside, I always mourn the flamboyancy seen in Pride parades by those who insist on re-enforcing the worst stereotypes).
We must be better than that. Smarter than that. Let the goofy things they say stand in contrast to respectful, intelligent discussion. That's what I attempted to do at the Journal site, and what I hope all of us do.
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