Evangelist and conservative Christian activist Dr Michael L Brown is a little disappointed but mostly deliriously excited that the publishing world was “afraid to touch” his latest book.
The back cover of his self-published tome, A Queer Thing Happened to America: And What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been, lists blurbs by “a conservative pundit,” “a conservative publisher,” “a bestselling conservative author,” “the head of a New York City publicity firm,” “a publishing insider” and “a top literary agent” — all predicting what a flop Brown’s book would be.
To Brown, this is evidence that a gay agenda controls the media, making conservative publishers scared to publish this supposedly damning exposé of how homosexuals are destroying America, its faith and its families. Only to Brown, apparently, are blurbs like this a good thing:
FROM A BESTSELLING CONSERVATIVE AUTHOR:
“Honestly, there is no NY publisher … who will touch this manuscript.”
FROM THE HEAD OF A NEW YORK CITY PUBLICITY FIRM:
“Unfortunately [he] spoke with his team and he doesn’t have anyone willing to take on Dr. Brown’s book.”
FROM A TOP LITERARY AGENT WHO FARMED THE MANUSCRIPT OUT TO A NUMBER OF MAJOR PUBLISHERS:
“I’d be better off burning the money in my fireplace. … The economics of publishing a book like this are bleak.”
So it was that Brown was forced to publish the book himself, under his own press, EqualTime Books. The self-proclaimed “Voice of Revolution” put his publicity machine into overdrive to market the volume to an audience of fearful fundamentalists.
As I began to read this book — I’m now three chapters in — a few facts became very obvious. One is that a major aspect of Brown’s defence of his views is that he is open-minded, tolerant and loving, while gay activists are anything but.
Michael L Brown Doesn’t Get ‘Hate’
It’s clear that in Brown’s view, love and respect are about manners. It seems, in fact, Brown thinks he can make just about any claims as long as he’s sincere and polite, and refrains from using bad language:
I engaged people with “nice civil discourse” [the words of a sarcastic critic] — so what I actually said was polite and respectful — but I was in reality a “virulent bigot” going forth “in jihad.”
And what, again, was my crime? Daring to air publicly my differences with gay activists — with respect and without name-calling, anger, or rancor — and daring to come to the conclusion that the Scriptures taught against homosexual practice.
At a news conference … I explicitly stated to the media that no hate speech would be permitted at the [Booth Playhouse] lectures. … But to repeat: We were determined to state our differences with grace and respect.
The moment I took issue with gay activism in any shape, size, or form, regardless of the graciousness of my speech, I was deemed guilty of “incendiary hate speech” and “anti-GLBT hate rhetoric.”
He speaks elsewhere of “compassion” and “unconditional love,” and is apparently bemused that in the face of such words anyone can still “push the Hate button.” Here’s the problem: They’re words, Dr Brown. Saying you are loving and tolerant doesn’t make it so. A hateful statement does not become loving because you’re “polite,” and you express it “respectfully” and with “grace.” Hate remains hate no matter what way you phrase it. If you deny the rights of LGBT persons and call for discrimination, and if you bolster your words with myths and misrepresentations (and I’ll be addressing some of those in later parts of this review), then yes, it is hate.
I had that hate for a long time as a closeted gay man and a fundamentalist Christian. A few years before I was able to come to terms with my own sexuality, I first had to come to terms with the fact I had believed and advocated harmful, homophobic views of gay men and women. I had to admit that, without realizing it, I harboured hate. “I’m sorry, but I’m dismissing you from your job because I can’t reconcile your sexuality with my Christian faith” isn’t, ultimately, much less hateful than “You’re fired, faggot.” Couch it in all the Christian niceness you can muster, but it’s still hate, conscious or not.
It’s teh Internetz!
A major — and, frankly, risible — aspect of Brown’s argument is his reliance on internet commenters to prove that gays are graceless and intolerant while he is polite and compassionate. A significant part of of A Queer Thing is taken up with quotes from anonymous bloggers, commenters and YouTube users. In the preface to chapter two, Brown quotes the following comment, aimed at a 12-year-old boy who opposed same-sex marriage on biblical grounds:
You, just like everyone who is against gay marriage, is a mentally retarded bigot. No exceptions. Now go to hell.
The author? Wizzyboy520. Yes, an anonymous YouTuber. And the chapter is peppered with quotes from such people, often replete with very colourful language, of course. Brown seems unaware that you can’t post so much as a picture of a fluffy kitten to a site like YouTube without getting a barrage of offensive comments from anonymous users. Using the same tactics, I could construct a convincing diatribe to prove the anti-cute-pets lobby is full of hate. (I could also very easily find anonymous quotes from conservative evangelical Christians who agree with Brown and have just as impressive a command of the customary internet haterz vocabulary.)
Thank God for Fred Phelps
The first plank in Brown’s defence, however, is Westboro Baptist Church pastor Fred Phelps, the notorious Kansas preacher known for the slogan “God hates fags.” As long as he can point to Phelps as an example of “real” hate, Brown can always make his own statements look moderate:
But first, let’s take a look at some real, hardcore, unabashed hate speech by none other than Rev. Fred Phelps, considered by many to be one of the foremost practitioners of hate speech in our day. Consider this representative sampling of his shocking, venomous words … This is hate speech, plain and simple, and without apology.
From here, Brown takes issue with Charlotte, NC-based activist and columnist Matt Comer, who described him as “Fred Phelps without the colorful signs.” To defend himself against this charge, Brown repeats an “apology” his Coalition of Conscience made to the Charlotte LGBT community:
We recognize that we have sometimes failed to reach out to you with grace and compassion, that we have often been insensitive to your struggles, that we have driven some of you away rather than drawn you in, that we have added to your sense of rejection. For these failings of ours, we ask you to forgive us. By God’s grace, we intend to be models of His love.
Brown is not sorry that he thinks firing us from our jobs because of who we love and share our lives with is a fine thing. He’s not apologizing for telling America that we’re a vicious and deceptive lobby secretly intent on destroying families. He’s not repenting for condemning us to everlasting punishment on account of our relationships and families. He still wants to push us back in the closet and take away the basic human rights we’ve fought long for. He’s apologizing because Christians haven’t always been polite expressing these things.
There’s always someone more extreme, more hateful to point to. Phelps is a convenient prop, since evangelical leaders like Brown are always going to use words like “love,” “grace” and “compassion” where Phelps uses “hate.” But for those whose lives are affected by it, the difference is merely rhetorical.
In the next part of this review, I’ll examine the first chapter of A Queer Thing, “The Stealth Agenda,” and asking, Is there a gay agenda?
Meanwhile, we’ve been here before with Brown. See my previous articles: The Fighting Words of Michael Brown and Pedophilia, Hedonism & Impending Confusion: Revisiting the Anti-Gay Rhetoric of Michael Brown.
great review! I look forward to the next part.
The blurbs he chose to publish on the back of the book demonstrate a concrete Orwellian delusion that Brown lives in. It reminds me of how, when people (including conservatives) make fun of things Sarah Palin says, she only couches herself in the language of martyrdom and uses it to rile her defensive fanbase. (and I don’t care how conservative you are and how much you like her personally – she’s said some dumb things, plain and simple.)
Leviticus 18:22, according to most GLBT people, is clearly hate language. “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination.” Romans 1:26-27 is equally hate language. “For this reason, God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.”
Yes, God is hated. Jesus is hated, Christians are hated. Jesus warned that we would be hated (see John 15:18-25). The Bible is hated. Why? Because the truth is too much for people to bear. And yes, adulterers, fornicators, liars, thieves, pornographers and self sex people are in the same sin bunch.
And because I used to be involved in the last two sins, although I am forgiven by the Lord based on Psalm 103:12, I am a hypocrite (no sarcasm). It still doesn’t change John 3:16. Jesus didn’t die and shed His sinless blood so that we could continue in sin (see Romans 6:1). He died so that we could be freed of all sin.
To be free from all sin is a very hated statement because people want to continue in sin and have God at the same time. Or continue in sin and completely disregard God and His Word. Yes. No matter how it is said, tactfully, pleasant, nice, sweet, or sugar coated, God’s Word, Jesus, and Christians will forever be hated. We will never escape this hatred according to Jesus.
No matter what. So we might as well get used to it. Maintain the moral standard and get used to the hatred. This writing is not intended or unintended sarcasm. This is the truth as plain and simple. People that do not want freedom will hate anyone that desire to help people get free. One of the best friends in the world is the firefighter that rescues a person from the flames. That’s what Jesus was to me and will be to anyone that want to be rescued from the flames of sin and death.
@Fred Rochester , why stop at Leviticus 18:22? Why not continue to Leviticus 20:13, where homosexuals are to be put to death? “Clearly hate language,” yes, though I’d go a bit further than “according to most GLBT people.” I’d say, “according to most modern, civilized people.”
“self sex people”???? Are you talking about masturbation?
Excellent point, Dave, when you say “It’s clear that in Brown’s view, love and respect are about manners.”
He thinks that because he uses a knife and fork, it’s no longer cannibalism.
@Fred Rochester
On top of using Biblical quotes which have been proven to not condemn homosexuals, you justify being a hateful, lying hypocrite because the Bible says you’re forgiven for it.
Well guess what? That doesn’t mean that you have the right to do so KNOWINGLY all the time, and treat people like crap because of your own selfish convictions.
And you know damn well that you’re a hateful person, because you said those things.
So we should just “accept” mistreatment because yours, and every other bigots’ outdated interpretations of Biblical text that has been mistranslated, says that we’re on the same level as adulterers, fornicators, liars, and pornographers?
Gays are exactly the same as everyone else, save for their attraction to the same sex.
What is there to be ashamed of?
yes, masturbation. Other than that, the facts in Dr. Brown’s is a compelling book. The facts speaks for itself. What church must now do is come clean and repent of all its sin and be the moral witness that it needs to be. We need to be salt and light like Jesus said we are to be. We can’t tell the world about sin when we are in sin ourselves. This is the hypocrisy that opened the door. Until then, we are no different than another brothel or back room club.
The sad part about this is that when you get to know God through His Son, Jesus, you will see that God knows what’s best for man. What is referred to as hate language in the Bible is God’s commands. And yes, in the OT, God sanction the death penalty to make a point. Remember, as long as He is God, He can make the rules. In the NT, Romans chapter one, the Lord imposed consequential judgment to continue to make His point that sin must be judged. Remember, He created man and He makes the rules. They may seem unfair. Even hateful. But He is still God at the end of the day. Men call it hate because they do not understand that God is God. But He never said that we can’t be changed. God loved us so much that He gave Jesus to pay for the penalty of sin to set us free. True intimacy is found in God through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
@Dave Rattigan
@Fred Rochester
Fred Rochester sounds like someone you better keep an eye on if you happen to be onboard the same airliner with him.
@Fred Rochester
Fred, can you tell us what convinced you that Leviticus was not inspired and written by men, but came from the mind of a God? I guess its ridiculous rules concerning fabrics, shrimp, and lack of clear condemnation of slavery kind of swayed me in the direction of believing its inspired and written by men.
@Fred Rochester
Fred, your theology is a bit extreme even for an evangelical. Different sects have different interpretations, yet all claim to be right. The Holiness Codes in Leviticus are not an effective attack on homosexuality, you would be better trying to use something from the NT, though many don’t see a case there either.
Good review so far, Dave. Brown has always struck me as duplicitous, but he is not stupid so he must be aware of the hate hidden in his rhetoric. It appears that all the baiting he did with gay bloggers and activists a couple of years ago was designed at least partly to provide him with fodder for this book. I remember that he used to (may still for all I know) take the most emotional of negative responses lobbed back at him through blogs or Youtube and post them on the front page of his website. In a manner similar to what you report in this book, he would contrast these with his own charges against GLBTs which he thought saintly since he used polite language to express them.
@Paul
My prayer is that you would come to Jesus real soon. My prayer is that you would understand the difference between the lie and hatred, and the truth of God and His unconditional love for all men, in Jesus name. That you would understand the Father’s desire to set you free from the hurt, pains, frustrations, and confusion that abides in your hearts and mind. That there is victory over sin of every kind. I pray that you understand that I have no hatred for you just kindness and love. That regardless of the right you have to express what you shared directly to me without apology, I have a right to express my position without apology. Even if your comments were meant to discourage me, they won’t. As an African American, I am used to bigotry and racism even from my own people. I pray to the Father that you will not have hatred for me. I am a man. I am a Black man, but more importantly, I am a man of God that loves you and desire to see you set free in Jesus. And lastly, I forgive you, because that’s what Jesus said for me to do unconditionally.
The book of Leviticus was given to Moses by God, so it was inspired. It was given directly to Moses to give to the people of Israel so they could live righteously before God. One of the things that the Lord said to me was, “The Bible was here before you, and if Jesus tarries, the Bible will be here after we are gone”. What convinced me was that after I got saved, I started studying the Word and at first, it was real confusing. Until I started asking questions. Why do I need to be saved? What is sin? Why can’t I sin and be saved at the same time. When I saw in the Bible that God hates sin, and that sin is inconsistent with His character, I needed to find a way to stop sinning against God. Finally, I saw that Jesus did everything for me to set me free. All I had to do was trust in God’s word by faith. Not blind faith, assured faith. The Bible gives us this assurance just like when you cash a check or sit on a chair. God assures us everyday. How. His Word. I simply believe and take His Word at face value. @Ralph
I did use Romans 1:26. The OT reference is a “first mention principle” of biblical hermeneutics. Once a presence is established first, we see that God established the standard of righteousness. Malachi 3:6 says, I am the Lord, I change not.” When Jesus died for our sins, it wasn’t for the purpose of giving man a free pass to continue in sin. See Romans chapter 6 and verse 1. Paul also mentioned where there is no law there can be no sin. The law established what sin is. Jesus fulfilled the righteous requirement of the law by living a sinless life and died for our sins so that we could be set free. The law in Leviticus is now summed up in one law, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death, Romans 8:2. @David Roberts
Fred, let’s get REAL.
Okay?
This is the 21st century. We have much in our lives that the writers of the Bible and OTHER religious based texts don’t have. For the most part, we’re a global community that’s not as illiterate as the people those of thousands of years ago wanted to impress with tales of miracles, with parables, directives and admonitions that ordered a MUCH tinier place than we have now.
As a woman, I could protest how religious abuse all over the world maintains women in inferior status, violates and subjugates them. As a woman, I can doubt the Bible or any other book written by men, that handily blames women for the world’s troubles, and condemns those artificially forced to deny their gender variations.
I am a child of great changes in our nation. I’m a black person. The Civil Rights Movement, Women’s Liberation, was anchored somewhere along with our advances in space and medicine.
We have flight, we explore, we search for the meaning of ourselves outside of ourselves and beyond our terra firma lives.
And yet and still, as you use a device that would be magic to the nomadic tribes of ancient Israel and Egypt, it seems that people ONLY get Biblically literate and into the enforcement of it’s directives exclusive for gay people.
Because we all know, if you tried that on heterosexuals, they’d slap you back.
You’re busted on just how selectively that Bible means anything to you and we KNOW it. We can read for ourselves thank you.
And ANY Christian, ANY…..that comes along waving their Bible and ignores that GOLDEN and most ethical of moral principles to treat another as you’d be treated, then you’re NOT a Christian.
You only say you are and throw Scripture around as if it’s a credentialed degree in specialness and superiority.
But it will ALWAYS be how you ACT, that will matter.
Morals, boy, are about how you treat another human being. Period. And the results of what you do TO them, not just the words you speak AT them.
Gays and lesbians, even children, suffer in the name of forcing that’s never existed in nature, nor requires such hostile and distrustful responses to homosexual people.
There is NO human being with superiority over another. Self determination is in the DNA in every one of us.
And a politician recently said something profound. Essentially he said, how many gay people do their have to be and for how long before you believe that God wants them here?
Or words to that affect.
Straight people have had their say about gay people for centuries AND SCREWED UP!
The world isn’t a better place because of how much repression and violation you exact on gay people. Discrimination and isolation of gay people doesn’t improve ANYONE’S life, and you’re too arrogant and spoiled rotten to think that you and the writers of that book you hold so dear were spinning information the way people like Brown can spin it now.
You are the more spoiled of God’s children, and don’t even appreciate it.
You’re not the only brother in the family, and I’m sure it pains our Creator to see one part of his children, tear apart the others.
Which are women, and those who vary in gender attraction and expression. Anti gay sentiment has ALWAYS been an extension of misogyny.
You live in a world of countless diversity, variance and expanding life. And you DARE to assume, heterosexuality is the ONLY normal? The ONLY sexual orientation that renders someone whole, and important in the world?
That’s stupid on it’s face.
Men have denied women their place in this world.
Whites assumed that they were superior to the order of the world and Jews are STILL suspect in so many places and gay people, who have and always been a part of any culture or human history, are treated as if they are strangers to be human sacrifice.
Yet, you distrust the legacies of justice and equality in our culture, but embrace a religion that’s got a bloody, and destructive history of it’s own?
Ask the Muslims during the Crusades.
Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Australia and the Caribbean Islands.
Ask the women of the Magdalene Laundries, or the Native american children of the Christian Institutes of American Indian Affairs (one of whom was my maternal grandmother).
I work in law enforcement, and have witness every human depravity and people like you and Brown preoccupy yourselves with gay lives as if they are the worst presence and influence on what’s bad anywhere.
Gay people can make you a profit.
The scourge of gang members and domestic violence and child abandonment and abuse, not so much.
Christians like Brown are full of it.
And so are you.
Well done, Christine.
..until Christians decided He’d change into a God-man to be a human sacrifice, a grave sin in Judaism.
Well, that’s more John’s Gospel, the “Canon among the Canon” according to Protestants. John put in all the hysterical “I’m am the word, I know all, I’m the same thing as God,” etc. etc. Funny that the youngest gospel, the one written farthest from Jesus of Nazareth’s (supposed) existence, is the one taken the most to heart by evangelicals.
In any case, not all of the people here are Christians anyway. I’m not. So the point Fred is trying to make is moot – he’d best work on converting others before he gets into all the murky gay stuff.
Dave, thanks for taking the time to review the book at length. I’ll check back for updates in the coming weeks. For the record, though, my time spent here a few years ago interacting with comments was not for the purpose of baiting. (I don’t relate to the concept or tactic.) Rather, it was educational in terms of the nature of the interaction, which then contributed to some of my thinking.
With regard to the hate speech chapter, it would have been nice if you had quoted the conclusion and final appeal, namely, that there’s obviously lots of hate speech on BOTH sides, so how about we STOP pushing the hate button and do our best to listen to each other? This is how the chapter ends:
“….there’s obviously lots of hate speech on BOTH sides…”
Apparently Dr. Brown, YOU don’t know the difference between an action and a REACTION. Gay people are reacting to the unfair hostility around them that harms their lives. And YOUR side is never interested in listening to anything gay people know, feel or experience.
Case in point: that you wrote such a book in the first place. You’re one of many straight people who TELL gay people what they are.
That’s like a man lecturing a woman on the experience of monthly cramps and childbirth. Or a white person who has never and could never experience what real racism and chronic suspicion of them feels like, telling a black person raised under Jim Crow that he doesn’t know what prejudice is.
You and your ilk and what you think you know, won’t SHUT UP and let gay people have the floor. You keep insisting that YOU know the truth, and gay people can’t be trusted with giving the rest of us the benefit of their experience and really learning who they are.
Seriously, when I want to learn about Jews, being Jewish and the history of Jews, I’d never go to a non Jewish anti Semite to learn.
You’re the equivalent of that non Jewish anti Semite when it comes to what you say about gay people.
In other words, you’re spreading information that’s harmful, untruthful and to serve the purpose of continuing discrimination and misunderstanding.
You’ve done enough and it’s no good at all.
Does it not occur to you that perhaps there are straight folks like me, who are extremely tired of your side NEVER shutting up and letting gay folks speak for themselves?
It’s WAY past time they had THEIR turn. So have the grace to be quiet for a while and LEARN from THEM.
Thank you!
Regan:
In other words, this.
@Emily K
Did you notice that’s actually the infamous George Rekers wielding the stick in that picture you just posted?
Regan, I have spent more than six years listening carefully to the LGBT side, face to face, hearing their stories, reading their books and articles, listening to their talks, and I quote their side throughout the book, simply begging strongly to differ with many of their positions. In contrast, there’s not a day that goes by where there is not some statement or article or news item or political issue being pushed forward aggressively by the LGBT side. That side is hardly being silenced.
What you are saying, though, is that there is no other side to the story, no other perspective that can be shared unless it agrees with your perspective, and that despite the fact that there are hundreds of gay-slanted books and articles and TV shows and lectures that are being made available day and night, for me to respectfully differ with the positions and goals of the LGBT side or to have religious and spiritual differences with practicing homosexuals is forbidden.
So, I am not allowed to differ with any LGBT theology, ideology, practice, political or social goals in writing and in speech? If I do, it can only be discrimination and bigotry? I just want to be sure I’m hearing what you’re saying.
Those uppity gays. Always true to form, Dr. Brown.
No, that’s what you want to respond to, not what she is saying. You can have all the opinions you want, but don’t be surprised when others understand your statements for what they are. You do not debate to enlighten, you use debate as a tactic to debase gays and lesbians. Manners or no, it’s still insulting and wrong.
For those who may not have experienced Dr. Brown before, his “discussions” run on and on without accomplishing any exchange of ideas. Each response is aimed at those positions which appear on his own talking points, and so the thread ends up full of Dr. Brown’s comments but those of others are not addressed. It’s all a means to an end, with any truth that might come out purely accidental.
And if anyone gets frustrated or angry over the whole mess, he will be happy to put your exasperated comments up on his website as an example of what the mean gays are saying about him. Apparently, he might even use it in his next self-published book.
Regan makes a good point, and the cartoon Emily references makes it even more concisely. I’m sure the guy hitting the other over the head is being very polite about it, too.
David Roberts, I asked Regan an honest question, wanting an honest response. You can interpret or represent me however you like. This is your site. But my question stands. And of course, I understand how I will be viewed here.
Great post, Regan.
Dr. Brown,
I think what gay and pro-gay straights are seeing, regardless of how many LGBT people you talk with, is that you have constructed an invisible wall between you and them. Hence you have what might be called an “agenda” based on saving redeeming coercing forcing people that in your view are discordant with nature, which they are not. You have yet to grasp this part of natural humanity because you have a self imposed mental block refusing to sit in it’s shoes, imagining what it is like being the gay piece which humanity includes. Take the plunge.
Until this measure is taken, you will continue to see through the dark glasses of lack. Lack of compassion, lack of information and in a spiritual religious term, lack of forgiveness, mainly for yourself for using only one eye when God gave you two. You views are no more evolved than a skinhead white supremest KKK member inciting blacks. Different form same content.
Your desire to change others is with evil intent, based on bias and misinterpretation which you prey on and admire on pedestal about yourself. It’s a glorification of an over zealous uninformed dictatorial ego. Gay people’s “agenda” is to be accepted as they always should have throughout history. A truly noble cause. It is an enlightening force free from evil, based in knowledge and understanding of humanity, which you lack. Your unchecked “views” have produced an ex-gay movement that has caused a large vulnerable group who suffer from sexual anorexia, a mental/sexual disorder with symptoms of isolation and sexual self hate.
So while you sit with an impenetrable wall between you and LGBT people in general, you and yours will continue to fail over time. Your just one more rail road tie across the tracks, trying desperately without success to block the train to human freedom. All this hell based separatist energy you are putting into trying to change the color of the sun, could be used for much more constructive co-habitive tones for the good of uniting humanity.
Heaven is unity and heaven is a decision we all make with each and every view we take. That of course in this instance, is something only you can decide.
Folks, I really didn’t intend to start a new discussion here, so I’ll be bowing out and catching up on Dave’s review when it comes out. If it seems appropriate, I’ll respond to the review when it’s completed on my own website.
Whatever man.
I think I might be right in suspecting this is the extent to which Dr. Brown listens to gay folks. Not much, or for very long…but he has all the time in the world to write a book, and a whole SIX YEARS of experience of being around the kinds of gay people he prefers to be with.
I tried to answer him, but as you see, he didn’t give me much time to respond.
Figures.
Regan, I welcome your response but don’t want to intrude on the blog here, nor does time permit. But please do respond, and I will read your response carefully, without responding here. I might disagree, I might see a blind spot, or I might think you miss my point. But I will honestly read your words carefully and give them thought. Fair enough?
@Dave Rattigan
It DOES look like him!! is that really supposed to be him??
iDavid<
I really must say that your comment was one of the most profound, bang-on, tell-it-like-it-is things I have ever read.
My vitural hat is off to you, sir.
If someone showed you a C.V. that included the following, what would be your guess as to the person’s field of expertise?
Would your guess be “homosexuality?” Me neither.
Here is the link to the whole thing: https://askdrbrown.org/about-dr-brown/academic-c-v
If you don’t respond here, how will I know you received the message? I’ll write an answer, for Fred’s benefit as well.
The same people who deny that gay people share a similar socio political history of systemic bigotry and discrimination to that of blacks and Jews or women, are working overtime to keep laws in place or create new ones, that isolate gay people for particularly cruel exclusions, even from protections from the Constitution.
The same people who deny that homosexuality has a legitimate biological basis, are quick to equivocate it to negative pathologies not exclusive to gay people. They are also quick to equivocate homosexuality to a bad habit, or addiction or mental illness, disregarding that all these eventually either have discernible health and/or social consequences that render a person incompetent or incapable of self reliance.
Homosexuality doesn’t render a person incompetent or unreliable, which certain doesn’t make discrimination or distrust of them, justified.
But I see again, people working overtime to rationalize the discrimination. Creating lies, slander and libel out of nothing.
Indeed, those things that gay people achieve that heteros are applauded for, the public is encouraged to be suspicious of.
Such as serving in uniform, or adopting children. Such acts of bravery and compassion are met with disdain and suspicion.
It’s not even a naturally occurring instinct to be suspicious and hostile to gay people. Religious communities go out of their way to train people to respond that way. Indeed, do you remember, EVER having to be taught how to respond to witnessing violence, or theft or betrayal by another person?
Avowed Christians, will constantly conflate and confuse moral sins, with religious ones.
Proving only to me, how selective they are in enforcing response to them, and hypocritical in how they live those principles in their own lives.
When it comes to the socio/political context and legacies of equal protections and rights for gay people, the historical record shows that no social good has come from discrimination to justify continuing to libel the entire minority.
When I pointed out before, that BLACK SEXUALITY was used to justify Jim Crow, you contradicted me. When I clearly pointed out the parallels to how preoccupied whites were with black sexuality, while blacks were concerned with integration, the casual violence they were treated to and the unfair libel of their character, you contradicted me.
When I pointed out that color was a means of making segregation easier, just as marital status is used to isolate gay people in a different way, you denied there was anything in common that gays had with blacks.
Don’t you EVER contradict me again. Because I KNOW I’m right and the historical record, will show it, if you cared to look at how gay lives are discussed and compared it to how black lives were discussed during the Jim Crow years.
And another thing that gay people should be proud of, although it’s painful and horrifically frustrating: that regardless of how any of their number are brutalized, or harmed in any way, the general response as been considerably compassionate and NON VIOLENT.
Gay people have gone out of their way to access due process of law, the courts, the political process and reaching out to the public in as civil a way as possible.
Similarly also, to the way blacks responded to achieve the dismantling of Jim Crow.
But do YOU appreciate that?
Do you realize to what degree of humanity gay people have had to deal with the likes of you to have that happen?
No.
Because you dare to complain and point a finger that gay people aren’t civil enough or that there are displays of anger, or prejudice coming from OUR side.
If you’d LISTENED to gay people, as you claim, you’d UNDERSTAND that anger and appreciate that it’s justified, instead of trying to say it isn’t.
And you’d work overtime to assure that gay people were understood, and help us to achieve the VERY noble goal of equality.
Indeed, when has equality or the same rights and freedoms, EVER hurt anyone?
Especially a minority that’s otherwise been denied it for far too long, with casualties no one could afford.
You don’t have any casualties that number what our side has. And THAT is why you’re not to be believed or trusted, because there is not now, nor ever has been…any reason to war on gay people, let alone continue it.
Oh, and in answer to your question:
“So I’m not allowed to differ with LGBT theology, ideology, political and social goals in writing and in speech…”
That is actually a rather ridiculous question.
First of all, the political and social goals of gay people isn’t something that differs from those of decent, law abiding and responsible people. Gay people SHOULD serve their country in uniform as commitment and skills allow. Gay people SHOULD be participating in marriage as their long term commitment to another person exemplifies. Gay children SHOULD be able to and WANT to, engage their school careers and peers, as their interests allow.
Gay people ARE a distinct, and perpetual minority, which the majority shouldn’t be allowed to tyrannize through the political process, as the Constitution stipulates. And gay people ARE participating in ALL the tax burdens, social responsibility that everyone else is, so by that contract as citizens, are required to be treated equally.
You differ, I’m sure, with all KINDS of other people on theology, or ideology…but you wouldn’t want to engage in a political crusade to deny them the aforementioned because they have those differences. And, you’re NOT speaking out AGAINST that, in the way you speak out against gay people as deserving of that discrimination based on the SAME socio/political goals they have you wouldn’t differ from, if they were straight.
Who is STOPPING you from speaking out? No one can.
But you deserve to be called to task on just how hypocritical, contradictory and essentially the LIBEL and SLANDER you’re exacting on gay people.
You don’t speak out but to compromise those goals gay people have you SHOULDN’T and WOULDN’T be speaking out against, were you a truly good Christian, and just one.
As I told Fred, morals are about how you treat another person justly and fairly, not how much you can control them, UNJUSTLY.
And any laws, or goals you support that treat a gay person unjustly and wrongly, makes YOU unjust and wrong. Not moral or fair.
Regan — I have received your response and am reading it now. Thanks so much for taking the time to write. Feel free to interact with me privately if you’d like my response by writing to me through the http://www.askdrbrown.org website, since, again, I don’t want to intrude into the thread here.
Why would you be “intruding” when the thread is about your book and Regan’s question is about things you have written? Unless your purpose is to keep your responses out of public scrutiny.
David, you’re reading too much into my comments. First, I don’t want to get into side discussions that distract from the review of the book (and, in point of fact, I’m being challenged on things here — even if Dave’s review — that I haven’t written in my book). Second, when I do post here (which hasn’t been for a while), it seems like there’s an immediate reaction (and even explanations from you about me), etc., so I don’t want to intrude. But when I try to drop out, you now claim that I’m avoiding scrutiny. So, I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t. Third, I don’t have time to get into lengthy interactions with lots of people now, so I don’t want to start something I can’t finish. However, out of respect for Regan’s post and so as to make clear that your concerns are untrue, I will respond to her post ASAP and then refrain from further interaction for a while.
No, Dr. Brown….
iDavid is who you SHOULD listen to, believe and MOVE ON and say NO MORE about what you are ignorant of.
iDavid and Emily, and my other friends here are the most expert on what we’re talking about. I told you don’t EVER contradict me and the context in which I’m describing how gay people are treated.
You’re OUT OF YOUR LEAGUE here.
We are the ones expert on this situation which obviously will not only effect us, but straight people who are misled by people like you.
Our concerns are not only true, but EXCEPTIONALLY valid, and you in NO WAY can refute it with evidence based information.
There ARE no two sides to this. The side that matters is our side getting HAMMERED by so much distrust in this country, that it’s been extremely difficult to save even the integrity of the Constitution itself. Let alone the careers and school experiences and committed situations gay people are in as we speak.
These are our concerns, not some amorphous perception that you live on. But real and tangible problems created by anti gay sentiment that you keep reinforcing. What you keep talking about isn’t new, nor is it revelatory or doing ANYTHING good towards actually UNDERSTANDING and respecting gay people and their needs and responsibilities.
You’re suiting your OWN needs and their expense. The least you could do is OWN that, instead of couching your interest as if you cared.
I have a hard time keeping something short. So let me say it this way.
Get the hell out of the way! Some of us straight folks REALLY want to hear the gay folks talk, we want to respect and learn…and need NO prompting from YOU and your opinions which have absolutely NOTHING new to say.
Let alone positively, which is MY experience and true of other straight people.
We want to love our friends, and see them treated rightly.
Get. Out. Of. The. Way…
Or do I have to PUSH you?
David Roberts, in light of Regan’s recent posts, I’ll leave it to you two to sort out whether or not I’m intruding in the blog here, but for sure, I won’t engage in more ridiculous back and forth exchanges likes this. Those who want to interact with me can do so privately through my website, and they will have my permission to reprint my unedited comments if they desire. When Dave is finished with his review, if appropriate, I’ll post a response on my website. I wish you God’s grace.
My friends, some people just get on my last nerve.
I’m living my life out here, as you are. My new neighbor is a sweet kid, finding his way in this big, tough city. He’s from a small town in GA. He just told me he’s gay and his family is not accepting. He’s clean cut, clean living, boyish and accomplished, works hard…and his coming out, cost him his family.
Can’t help it when my inner mama bear wants to take a bite out of people like Michael Brown.
He will just take snapshots of the wound and post them on his website.
And I to you, Ben in Oakland.
An opposing viewpoint does not make someone homophobic or heterophobic and it’s unfair to assume Brown is homophobic because of his researched opinion. The truth is the hate is equal on both sides because the finger pointing, labeling never stops. It’s the nuclear bomb of an argument when one side cannot get their way.
Equal Hate
I’m not sure to whom your comment is directed, Jim, but I don’t hate Michael Brown. I do hold him accountable for his baseless fearmongering concerning GLBTs.
What is the innocent, rational opposing viewpoint to civil rights for African Americans? What kind of compromise should be made concerning their rights to live equally in our society given the belief of major religions of the mid-twentieth century that they were “evil defendants of Cain?”
Not every issue has a valid opposing view in our society. That assertion is a canard used to justify arguments of many who really are bigots, racists and homophobes.
“An opposing viewpoint does not make someone homophobic or heterophobic and it’s unfair to assume Brown is homophobic because of his researched opinion. The truth is the hate is equal on both sides because the finger pointing, labeling never stops. It’s the nuclear bomb of an argument when one side cannot get their way.”
Jim, I don’t think you really understand what’s going on here, or else you are being deliberately obtuse. Heterophobia? I can’t think of any gay person I know who hates or fears or disparages or would deny equal protection of the law to heterosexuals for the simple reason that they are heterosexual. I know of no political campaigns that exploit fear, hatred, and ignorance about heterosexuals in an attempt to keep them as second class citizens. I have yet to see anyone pointing out that the 40% divorce rates, the 40% out-of-wedlock birth rates, the 25% adultery rates are good reasons to write 700 page books which seek to point out the danger o faith, family, freedom, children, and marriage that heterosexuality so clearly is.
If Brown said, “Homosexual relationships are against my religious beliefs.” I would really have no problem with that. I think that it is stupid, bigoted, wasteful, a mis-application and a mis-translation of scripture, one that deliberately ignores other far more relevant portions of scripture in favor of one’s own prejudices, ultimately on the wrong side of history, one that has proven harmful to heterosexuals, families, marriage, religion in general, and children, and extremely toxic to people about whom conservative Christians are severely ignorant…
but hey, no problem. you are entitled to your beliefs.
The problem is the statements that come after “Homosexual relationships are against my religious beliefs.” The lies, the fear-mongering, the distortions, the political campaigns, the demonization, the hidden agendas, the hypocrisy, and the utter lack of concern about the damage done to gay people, their families, their children, their careers, their relationships, and their health, all done in the name of “sincere religious belief” and the greater glory of a very small minded and ignorant god…
…a good that for some strange reason resembles a certain class of his followers in no small ways.
What you hear isn’t hate, though I am certain that it is much more comforting to YOU to believe that it is. Blessed are those who suffer persecution for my name’s sake, or something like that. It’s called projection and trying to put lipstick on a pig
What you hear is ANGER, not hate. It’s the same thing that happens when someone tells me they don’t hate me, they just hate my sin. It just allows others to do the hating, while those who love me so much can stand idly by and claim no responsibility for the consequences. It is a win-win for everyone but the victims. Can you say the names of Carl Walker-Hoover or Eric Mohat, and not understand how monstrous is this so-called Love that Brown and all You Good Christians (TM) profess?
I’ll tell you what I hate. I hate that the course of my life, and my happiness, and those of millions of people just like me, can be subject to uninformed, hateful prejudices, whether or you prefer to call them your religious beliefs or just admit them for what they are. I am equally sick to death that gay people are imprisoned, attacked, murdered, executed, tortured, used as political fodder, scapegoated, vilified, condemned, persecuted, jailed, slandered, libeled, and accused of all sort of things that are simply NOT TRUE because someone doesn’t approve, or believes their God does not approve.
And here you do it one more time. You accuse us of the bigotry you know in your heart you are and every anti-gay Christianista is so guilty of.
I would encourage people to actually engage with the book themselves, instead of hanging off short reviews like this.
Why would I want to read 700 pages of anti-gay trash by a man who knows no more of my life and the lives of millions of people just like me than he does of astrophysics or simple human decency?
Honey, I’ve been listening to that message my whole life. It’s not new, it never changes, and is no more authoritative than me speaking ex-cathedra from my belly button about a group of people I do not know, know nothing about, who have done me no harm, yet who must be supressed, if not eliminated, for thre gretaer safety of all humanity?
Actually, I’m a bit cranky this morning, so i ave a little more for Brendan burnett, whom I am fairly certain is the same Baptist Brendan i have encountered elsewhere.
This is from a huffpost article on the israeli government classifying some religions as sects, for political purposes. “No democracy would admit to being intolerant of minority faiths or opposed to religious liberty. The tactic used to discriminate against targeted minority faiths in some countries is to redefine the notion of “religion” to exclude disfavored minority groups by labeling them as so-called “cults” or “sects”. ”
Religionists like brown in our very own democracy do this to gay people ALL OF THE TIME, Change “cults and sects” to “perverts and sinners” and you have our situation exactly. It happens every time there is an election to determine which rights, available to the heterosexual majority with no conditions attached, we may properly be accorded, if any. Every time congress debates another provision to prevent the repeal of don’t-ask-don’t-tell. Every time a state legislature decides that the law just isn’t anti-gay enough.
And evry time Mr. brown opens his mouth or sets pen to paper to discuss a subject he clearly knows nothing about.
Gay people particularly offend (or entice, or torment) you? Easy, tell a lot of lies about them, call them particularly dangerous sinners, and then claim that you are doing it all because you love sinners so very damn much. And you can do that all in the name of saving the children, family, faith, freedom, and marriage from the clutches of those “perverts and sinners”.
You don’t even need to bother with the truth. you can just make up your “facts” as you go along.
This is why we need true freedom of religion, which means freedom from religion as well. Otherwise, you religionists will soon get to feel what it is like when whatever religious sect currently holds sway does so over YOUR civil rights, your ability to live a full life in your own country.
Lest we forget, people who agree with Brown quite frequently call people like me– law abiding, tax paying, contributing members of society– a threat to religion, freedom, children, family, faith, marriage, heterosexuality, barnyard animals, and goddam western civilization.
Civilized people call that the bigotry that it is, more and more all the time. The uneducated, uncivilized hold desperately to their old bigotries. It is easier than compassion¬, logic, or thought.
If they are not so impolite, they will insist that their narrow religious beliefs and absurd biblical translations should determine how my establishment clause government treats me and my family, which rights, if any, should be afforded to me by society, or whether i should be persecuted, and to what extent, or merely shunned.
civilized people call that religious bigotry.
This has never been about marriage, but what it has always been about– how much the very existence of homosexuals attracts, bothers, offends, entices, and torments some heterosexuals, and a number of homosexuals who desperately want to be straight, but ain’t.
This Westboro Baptist Church says they hate the Gay-Community. But, they also hate African Americans, Dr. & Mrs. King, Canada, Sweden, the Fire Department of N.Y., victims of 911, other Christian churches, the pope, Judaism, America, our American troops and the list goes on and on. Many of the groups they despise are specifically named on their hate propaganda, picket signs and their many websites. They not only hate, but wish death on all whom they abhor.
This so-called “church” spreads its hate through picketing in our streets, provoking attacks, with abusive language and flag desecration, attempting to create a confrontation. This is not about protesting, this is about a life of hate. They are in it for the money and the press. They are not a “church.” They go after any thing that can get them in the news. This group will protest anything to get its face on TV or in the news. This group is lost in the darkness of hate, and will put there children in danger to shield themselves.
These people protest at the funerals of our troops. Do we have a real need to protest at any funeral? Is that a real freedom?
The city of Topeka, the state of Kansas and the U.S. at large, its citizens and their churches, schools and events are all held hostage by this “hate group.”-always at the tax payer’s expense.
CB, has a huge point. What is the NEED to harass people at such a painful point in their lives? I take issue with Mike Brown and Fred Rochester pretending or asserting that this is a disagreement and any anger or challenges coming from out side, are proportionate in outcome or influence.
It’s bigotry in and of itself to so diminish not only the impact of anti gay sentiment on gay lives, but that gay people have the socio/political influence to prevent it or harm straight people in the process. Or want to.
Those who are anti gay also insist that gay people are a tiny, insignificant minority, yet are so powerful, noisy and capable of doing great damage if included fully in the rights and protections of this country.
Constant contradictions, and hypocrisy flow from that side. Who also like to remind us constantly too, that it’s majority of states who do not accept any equality measures, and a majority of voters who are poised to take away or block even more.
WBC can be pointed to as the most highly visible extreme.
But the more subtle tactics STILL do as much damage. WBC at least is an entity we can see coming.
Not true for millions more willing to use the anonymity of the ballot booth and other covert means to deny what gay people NEED.
This isn’t about gay people challenging their fellow citizens over something to attack with. But over something of measurable NECESSITY in their lives.
Above all, our society and it’s values DO include self reliance and self determination, and at no time can anyone say that gay people doing it, comes at other’s expense or ability to do the same.
That is at the heart of the matter. And no fellow citizens, nor the laws of this country can stand in the way of gay citizen’s doing just that.