UPDATE URGING YOU TO READ HARVEY FIERSTEIN'S BRIEF ARTICLE.
This is a terrific article by Charles Karel Bouley, that I strongly urge you to read in its entirety!
It begins as follows:
If I hear one more pundit say that the choice of Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at the most historic inaugural of a lifetime sends a message of inclusion I will explode. None of them seem to get it, including Barack Obama. The don't have a Klue.
And yes, I'm spelling "Klue" that way on purpose. When I heard of the choice and the subsequent defense of it, my first response was, well, Mr. Obama, many in the country felt a Black shouldn't be in office. They still feel that way. Where are their views? The views that Whites are better than anyone else? Where is David Duke? Truly, where is he? There are more racists in America than gays; that doesn't need a poll, it simply is a fact. And where are their views?
God save us from the "liberals" who can be bought off with a smile and a bit of charm! Those who fancy themselves to be "progressives," and torture logic to justify why President Elect Obama would choose Rick Warren for the honor of giving his Inauguration prayer; even let Obama off the hook for spitting in the face of LGBT people whom he courted during the election process. Save us from those who, in the name of "unity, are quick to forget their stated commitment to equal rights.
See, for example, this article by Melissa Etheridge, that shows how one's charm can easily cause one to ignore the reality of their own oppression and the oppression of others:
He [Warren] struggled with proposition 8 because he didn't want to see marriage redefined as anything other than between a man and a woman. He said he regretted his choice of words in his video message to his congregation about proposition 8 when he mentioned pedophiles and those who commit incest. He said that in no way, is that how he thought about gays. He invited me to his church, I invited him to my home to meet my wife and kids. He told me of his wife's struggle with breast cancer just a year before mine.
I doubt very much if Rick Warren is going to publicly state that he was wrong in espousing his belief that Gay people are not deserving of the same equal rights, including the right to marry, that heterosexuals enjoy.
I seriously doubt that he's going to tell his mega-church congregation and other church groups to which he speaks that Gay people are to be unconditionally welcomed and affirmed in that church, and in all churches.
I very much doubt that he's going to in any way be an ally of those struggling for full and equal rights for LGBT people.
I seriously doubt that he's going to publicly repent of having advocated and supported Prop. 8, and now wishes it had not been passed!
I seriously doubt that he's going to join the plaintiffs in the case before the California State Supreme Court who seek to nullify the vote that removed the already guaranteed Constitutional right of same-sex couples to marry; ask the court to not enable Prop. 8 to be applied retroactively.
As we saw with the nomination and election of Obama, charm goes a long way!
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2 comments:
thanks for the link to my article. You are correct, and don't let the "liberals" get you down. I was on the Bill Press show yesterday and he feels as we do. And he's taking a beating for it, too.
Sometimes being on the right side of history isn't easy. I wish Obama got that already.
Thanks so much, Karel. I hope your excellent article is as widely read as possible, and I'd rather have to deal with Reactionaries than anemic "liberals" who can be bought off with a smile and a nice dinner. Best wishes, Jerry.
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