'Tard of the Week - Family Research Council

Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Disclaimer: I know many, many Christian Americans who are fine people and do not indulge in institutionalized bigotry. The following screed does not imply that every Christian American is a bigoted asstard. But it does imply the FRC (and its members) are. If the shoe fits, and all that.

There's a bill winding its way through Congress. It hasn't received a great deal of publicity - not surprising, in light of the historical health care reform bill, that this piece of legislation is taking a back seat. It's called the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), and provides employment discrimination protection for LGBT workers. Specifically, the legislation would make it illegal “to fire, refuse to hire, or fail to promote employees simply based on sexual orientation." Small business, religious organizations and the military would be exempt from these new regulations.

President Obama supports this bill, and is pushing the Democratic Congress to pass it.

Enter the "Family Research Council," a self-described "Christian organization promoting the traditional family unit and the Judeo-Christian value system upon which it is built." Feel free to translate their mission to be spreading Judeo-Christian justified bigotry and blurring the line between church and state, because their website doesn't seem to be about anything else. Don't believe me? Check out the letter they sent out to their supporters surrounding the ENDA legislation. In it, they claim that extending the same non-discrimination rights already enjoyed by other minorities isn't really about protecting the LGBT community at all. Oh, no - in fact, it's about DISCRIMINATING AGAINST CHRISTIANS IN THE WORK PLACE. That's right - the far left and their HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA (which is intent on contaminating your sons and daughters and converting them to teh Gay) is now actively attempting to SQUASH YOUR CHRISTIAN FAITH. SQUASH IT LIKE THE OPPRESSED, PERSECUTED BUG THAT IT IS.

Ahem.  Sorry about that. The crazy - it's contagious.

This letter contains so many flavors of crazy and outright untruths, I don't even know where to begin.

Let's start with the many, many references to "cross dressers" in the letter. Their fear and loathing appears to be restricted to men dressing as women, but it apparently never occurs to them that cross-dressing often has nothing to do with sexual preference, and in fact many cross-dressing men are heterosexuals. But that confuses the issue with pesky facts.

The letter also goes on to say that religious organizations would be "forced to hire" teh gayz (and those grotty cross-dressers!), thus exposing their fellow bigots congregants to THE EVIL. Since churches and such are specifically exempt from the law, I'm not sure how FRC arrives at this conclusion. More of those pesky facts. 

They seem to be primarily concerned about the possibility of a "slippery slope." That if ENDA passes, gay marriage and other human atrocities can't be far behind. My own response to such an event would of course be "yippee!" but I guess I understand why such a prospect would scare the crap out of people such as them. 

The thing that really burns my ass about these asstards and their letter is the incredible way in which they try to make their VAST MAJORITY the PERSECUTED MINORITY. For many, many years, Christian Americans had vast amounts of unearned privilege, and basically did whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted. No one dared speak for the rights of those with a different world view, and the institutionalized bigotry of the so-called "traditional Christians" was allowed to stand without challenge as "mainstream culture," or even worse, "white culture" (::gag::). Now the President and prominent members of Congress are issuing a challenge to their bigotry, and these fucknuts have the absolute gall to pretend THEY'RE the ones that are being PERSECUTED?  Really? Sorry, FRC - you're not persecuted, and your attempt to force your so-called "traditional Christian bigotry values" down the throats of your co-workers in the guise of "religious freedom" simply does not wash. Religion is a private matter, and simply has no role in the secular workplace. No one is attempting to force you to engage in homosexual activity, no one is forcing you to change your religious belief. But they are attempting to force you to stop discriminating against others on the basis of your religious belief. It's no different from the government forcing members of the KKK to stop discriminating against people of color (which was also justified using religious belief, if memory serves), and your attempts to make it seem different on the basis of the 1st Amendment is at least disingenuous, and at most a blatant lie to protect your bigotry from the law.

Killing someone's unearned privilege in the interest of providing equal protection under the law* to other groups is not persecution. Failing to hire someone or promote them to a position for which they're otherwise qualified because you find out they're gay is. You justify your bigotry with your religious belief, and you wonder why liberals consider you uncivilized savages?

YOUR UNEARNED PRIVILEGE IS NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE CONSTITUTION, YOU FUCKING 'TARD. The age of the religious right is over. Either move on, or move to a crazy-gated religious compound. Either way works for me.


*That would be the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, you fucking ignoramuses.

H/T to The Amateur Scientist

16 comments:

nzforme said...

This is James Dobson's group.

(You know, I could say more, but that about sums it up.)

Janiece said...

That explains quite a lot, actually.

::erp::

Phiala said...

Cross-dressing? Yeah, those damn women in trousers are destroying modern society. And they're probably even wearing clothing of mixed fibers. Bound for hell, every last one of them.

[Note, please that I, a woman, am indeed wearing trousers. And sensible shoes. And have not worn a skirt to work since sometime in the summer of 2008, maybe. And am out to destroy modern society. Or at least secure equal rights for everyone.]

Janiece said...

Phiala, clearly you're bound for hell, with your mixed fiber clothing and destruction of traditional values.

I'll bet you wear lipstick, too. Harlot.

Carol Elaine said...

Why, I'm wearing trousers RIGHT NOW! And a BLAZER. Only the very slight ruffle on my blouse's sleeves/neckline and my high heeled shoes are keeping me from destroying the sanctity of my workplace.

*gasp!*

Steve Buchheit said...

Why, I'm also wear trousers today. Wait a sec. Nope, okay, I guess I'm supposed to do that.

Dobson, the last I saw him he was debating the PETA people for their latest ad (which, frankly, if there hadn't been a controversy I probably would have never seen it, and advertising is part of my job) and calling them "animal haters and abusers."

Uh, yeah.

Well, at least it keeps him off of the "OMG There's a War on Xmas"/"Year Without a Santa Clause" bent he's been on for the past few years.

Janiece said...

Wait. The workplace is sacred? Really?

I HAVE A SACRED BASEMENT!

vince said...

Speaking as a Christian, I just don't get why teh gays are more frightening than shotgun-toting, mind-controlling, bunny-sacrificing zombies to these people.

WendyB_09 said...

Today I was working in trousers...with mixed fibers. And a blazer and a turtleneck sweater. And now come to find out my brand spanking shiney new cubicle is sacred! All in one day!! Sweet!!

Haven't worn a skirt to work for over 15 years. I did tech support at the time and crawling into/under/around things was part of the job. Went slacks only after a stellar view of a co-worker's fushia panties as she went ass-up under her own desk to plug in a new device.

Had to splain why I nearly slammed her door before our boss came around the corner. Poor guy would have lost his religion! (although I suspect he would have found it as amusing as we did!)

Janiece said...

Vince, speaking as a human, I don't get it either.

But have I told you lately how thankful I am that I have you (and other) sensible, loving Christians in my life? You guys help me keep my perspective when I see shit like this, which is a good, good thing.

Carol Elaine said...

Vince and Janiece, shotgun-toting, mind-controlling, bunny-sacrificing zombies can only kill off your body, which, frankly, has a limited self-life anyway. But your soul is forever! It is IMMORTAL! It must never, ever be tainted by Teh Gayz, or you will BURN THROUGHOUT ALL OF ETERNITY!!!!!!

I mean, really! I thought y'all would've gotten it by now.

Jim Wright said...

come to find out my brand spanking shiney new cubicle is sacred

Trousers and spanking, Wendy? Yep, express elevator to hell for you, you trollop.

___________________________

Here's the thing,

Option 1) This is a Christian Nation,

Option 2) Christians are a persecuted minority (According to people like Dobson, the most persecuted minority in America).

Which one is it? Because it can't be both. So pick one, Christians, and admit that the other position is complete bullshit.

Option 3) is, of course, "I'll take both and ignore the hypocrisy" standard religious dodge option.

Option 4) is None of the Above.


Frankly, I'm a big fan of 4), but if I was Dobson, I'd go with option 2), because then he'd be eligible for protection under the non-discrimination laws and all that political correctness stuff he's always on about...

Just sayin'

Thordr said...

So if I wear my kilt I'm going straight to hell... ok, stale beer and condoms for everyone.

Eric said...

I started to point out that the FRC letter is wrong about what ENDA says about churches, but "wrong" implies a foolish or relatively honest mistake; the FRC letter just lies about the bill's contents, which contain an explicit exemption for homophobic churches.

::sigh::

It makes me wonder why I even try to play fair. I mean, I know why, it's because it's the right thing to do. But I am just so damn sick of going and fact-checking a certain breed of conservative at this point. I mean, the FRC letter isn't merely mistaken, it's very clearly dishonest in the way it's worded and structured. It's phrased to suggest one thing, but then veers away abruptly so that it doesn't have to be specific; it leads with the false claim, buries the church bigot exemption in the middle, then closes with heavy-handed and non-specific claims that the church bigot exemption doesn't matter. And of course what some people will read, remember, repeat and act upon is the initial fraudulent claim.

Here, by the way, is ENDA if you want to read it yourself. It's fairly short for this kind of thing:

ENDA page at GovTrack

ENDA summary

ENDA text

Janiece said...

Eric, I hear you. As Jim notes, the hypocrisy is just so blatant it's hard to remain fair-minded about the issues they raise. Even if there were some sort of valid point in their frothing (which I don't think there is), I don't really give a good goddamn, because their lies and obfuscation piss me off so damn much.

Steve Buchheit said...

Eric, oh yeah, I've been debating the whole "fairness" issue lately. While once I get the scent on someone spewing darkness on my favorite blogs I tend to want to run them to the ground, I'm generally a live and let live kind of guy. But lately I've been wanting to say, "Okay, we'll accept your tactics and since you believe there is a (war on, persecution, denigration, etc), I'm willing to bring it."

I struggle with this thought like I used to struggle with the "You swore and oath to protect it, just what are you doing today for that, buck-o?" argument for the past seven years.