What does the stuff lying around us reflect back? Let’s have a little experiment. This is a fun book meme that a friend of a friend on Facebook brought to my attention:
I’ll begin…
Supposedly, one of the benefits of living in a small town is that one gets to be nearer natural areas, woods, forests, streams and open skies; not in Shepherdsville. Here, in this photo for example, we must put up with skies obstructed by monstrous tentacled telephone poles. It’s ironic that the poorest of people living in the poorest parts of the wealthiest country on earth can’t seem to appreciate the beautiful free yet priceless vistas all around. Also, too often when I drive around, I see gorgeous natural beauty that has been neglected, overlooked or just outright spoiled. What a shame.
winning maquette for Harvey Milk City Hall Memorial Sculpture Competition
© 2007 by Daub Firmin Hendrickson Sculpture Group
HARVEY MILK: A TRUE HERO
29
Nov 08
Is There Value in Appeasing Anti-gay Bigots?
There are many reasons for bigotry, for supremacist belittling views of gay people. There were many reasons for supporting slavery, Jim Crow. Those reasons were and still are fundamentally based upon aggressive ignorance and dogmatic fear.
And, you see, I’m not interested in appeasing that.
I want to look that ignorance and fear directly in the face and say, “No. I am not inferior because I’m gay. No. I am not less than you. No. I am not sick. No. I am not unworthy. I am a fully human law abiding contributing citizen who happens to be gay.”
This article points out some interesting context to the bigotry. But let’s face it. Whatever the context, the grievance, the fear, the misinformation – supremacist ideology is supremacist ideology.
If black women are more bigoted toward gay people because they’re ignorant about sexuality and prejudiced against gay people because of the anti-gay denigrating rhetoric they hear repeatedly in their fundamentalist churches, well so what!
My experience with people who’ve been entrapped by the Christian fundamentalist cult, whether black or white, is that they’re a lost cause when it comes to reason and fairness. To them, gay people will always be devlish child molestors in need of repair. Why would they ever overlook their belief that I am a child molestor? Absurd.
Thus, it’s a wasted effort to reach out to these people if it means appeasing and stroking and tip-toeing around their bigotries as if they were sacrosanct. No. I’m not interested in hateful homophobic hypocrites. I might have an interest in marginalizing them but I certainly don’t have an interest in respecting them.
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