Focus on the Family and its political allies failed this week to convince the Supreme Court that marriage is imminent danger from a relative handful of gay couples who, under Massachusetts state law, cannot export their marriages to states where the marriages would be invalid.
Focus on the Family seems to argue that the court’s absence of hysteria is proof of the need for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriages (and, ideally, civil unions and any other shared benefits enjoyed by heterosexuals). According to the Washington Blade, pastors in Maryland plan a similar challenge to the religious freedom of churches that wish to perform gay marriages.
In Alabama, anti-gay-marriage activist and legislator Gerald Allen is battling to ban the mention of homosexuality in books at public libraries, public high schools, and public colleges. The censorship would include classic works of literature and science books. According to the Washington Blade, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the ACLU will fight the proposed ban.
In Michigan, HRC and the Log Cabin Republicans of Michigan are joining the fight against the state’s revocation of benefits for the partners of state government workers. (Yesterday’s XGW coverage.) The revocation was sought and achieved by anti-gay marriage activists, some of whom had previously said their battle was not against civil unions or benefits.
In Kansas and Missouri, fear is spreading, as gay residents in the heartland see signs emerge of a wave of antigay discrimination and vandalism, according to Reuters.
Media Matters for America notes that Pat Robertson is adding acid to his own antigay rhetoric — declaring that gay people are "self-absorbed hedonists … that want to impose their particular sexuality on the rest of America," and disseminating what MMA considers falsehoods about the U.S. Supreme Court.
Mike, if you keep saying “hysteria,” the lesbians are going to hand you your ass on a lazy Susan. That’s a sexist term. The root is histericus (in Latin) or hysterikos (in Greek), meaning “womb” or “uterus.” The word derives from the ancient notion that mental illness in women originates in the reproductive organs.
I do give you credit, though, for not referring to the U.S. Supreme Court as “the Supremes.” That one really drives me nuts.
Kurt, agreed — and as a founding member of a D.C. profeminist group, I should know better. I welcome suggestions for other words. I’ve been overusing other appropriate words like “paranoia.” Panic?
Panic is good. Phobia. Terror. Heebie-jeebies. White-knuckled, underwear-soiling dread.
I’ve also always been a big fan of “sturm und drang,” but it can be really hard to work into a sentence.
Mike, I saw this a week or so ago at Advocate.com but have seen nothing since. If this is a genuine olive branch I think it is deserving or mention.
I didn’t notice MM say that Robertson was “broadening” his comments. This is the same old rhetoric from Robertson. I also didn’t notice any incidents of anti-gay vandalism reported in that article on MSNBC. All they said was that gays in the Midwest were more afraid than they were in the past. The whole thing is kind of pointless and repetitive — anyone in Kansas or Missouri who expected things to become more pro-gay in their state because of rulings in liberal states must have had their head in the clouds. That this article states as fact that millions of voters showed up at the polls ONLY because of hating gays is very misleading and this whole thing seems like propganda.
I’m surprised you didn’t mention the SC legislature possibly cutting funding to public television because they showed a pro-gay documentary. That’s far more distressing than anything in that crappy Reuters article.
James, MSNBC noted that some gays were pulling rainbow emblems off the front of their homes for fear of backlash, which I interpret to mean vandalism — or violence.
Thanks for pointing out the S.C. legislature — if you have links to news stories, please share. I can’t track the entire nation, or the entire Internet.
Your point about Robertson is well-taken — his particular hatred has always been broader than just the marriage issue.
Here’s an article:
http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/10290265.htm
and an earlier article describing the documentary:
http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/myrtlebeachonline/news/local/10171597.htm
I see your point about people being afraid of vandalism. I guess I just took your words to mean that there had been vandalism, and then the article didn’t mention any vandalism. In places like that I’m amazed anyone would be very open with their sexual orientation anyway. I mean in Kentucky there are still cross-burnings. But I don’t see Reuters writing articles claiming that hatred of blacks is sweeping the nation. The whole article was so simplistic and devoid of new information that I got more irritated than I should have.
To my knowledge, there have been no severe (murder or attempted murder) bashing incidents reported in the St. Louis MO gay press since Aug. (our marriage amendment vote was Aug 2.). And I can’t say that any of the politically minded in MO actually expected to win the amendment – but many hoped the vote would be 60/40, not 70/30. Overland Park, for the coasters, is a suburb of Kansas City, not a holler with a few inbred hillbillies. It produces a sizable amount of Democratic liberal votes.
Well Missouri’s amendment only banned marriage, not civil unions, so that’s probably one reason it passed so big.