The Elkhart Truth has a strong and well written editorial defending its decision to print a wedding announcement for the son of an Elkhart family and another man who were getting married in Iowa. Bilerico documents some of the ensuing batshittery (Mr. Browning’s term) from right wing groups generally, and Rep. Jackie Walroski specifically.
From the Truth editorial:
We published an announcement Sunday that two men, one a former Elkhart resident, plan to marry this month in Iowa. For more than 48 hours, readers barely uttered a word. We received four e-mails — two against, one for and one that misspelled “disgusting” — two phone calls, and no letters to the editor and roughly 10 comments on eTruth.com.
Readers either didn’t notice the announcement among the other engagements Sunday or they made their peace with it. No big deal. That is, until a pair of family advocacy groups, abetted by a local AM radio station, organized a protest against The Truth.
People wrote and called from throughout Indiana. Many expressed their sincere belief that homosexuality is a sin and that marriage is between a man and a woman. Others quoted straight from the Fred Phelps playbook, excoriating “fags” and “perverts.”
The truth seems to be that there isn’t a large group of people who actually oppose gay marriage strongly enough to do anything about it. Plenty of folks have opinions, but, by and large, if their day-to-day lives aren’t affected, it’s not keeping them up at nights. There is, however, a loud and well-organized subset of the population who will raise holy hell over reporting the news of this marriage. After being dormant for a period of time, the machine kicked into gear. I’m happy the Truth didn’t feel the need to buckle under the barrage.
I’ve mentioned it before, but it seems worth repeating. Growing up, I believed myself to be anti-gay. This was nothing more than ignorant bigotry on my part. I hadn’t met anyone I knew to be gay. (I have come to learn that I knew several gay people, as it turns out.) In college, I finally met someone who was openly gay. He seemed like a good guy, and I realized I had no good reason to treat him any differently than anyone else, so my opinions quickly changed.
Similarly, not too long ago, I was uncomfortable with the notion of same-sex marriage for no particularly good reasons. The more it got discussed, the more I recognized that refusing to legalize same-sex marriage is unjustified discrimination.
Unexamined, opposition to same-sex marriage seems reasonable, but as soon as purported justifications are advanced, they seem to fall pretty quickly. “Because the Bible says so” doesn’t carry a lot of water — we eat a lot of shell fish and no longer require menstruating women to go to the edge of the village, among other things. Following any injunctions against homosexuality while rejecting the injunction against shell fish, for example, requires further explanation. The “we want to promote human reproduction” relied upon by the Indiana Supreme Court when upholding the local variation of the “Defense of Marriage Act,” also seems disingenuous. There is no effort at all to limit marriage to fertile heterosexual couples. Etcetera.
To me, therefore, opposition to same-sex marriage seems like an emotional, largely unreasoned, position. I’d be happy to examine any other rationales that are out there, but the two I mentioned are the ones I see most often. Anyway, good on the Elkhart Truth for its stance on wedding announcements.
Of all the wedding preparations we made, I completely forgot the newspaper announcement when we got married. Oh well. Missed opportunity there.
Well said! Keep up the great blog!
YOU eat shellfish?!? Nooooooooo!
That changes everything. I feel like I don’t even know you anymore.
Oh wait, I suppose I don’t, actually. ;)
Silliness aside, isn’t there somewhere in the Bible where it says to mind your own beeswax? Live and let live? Don’t condemn other sinners?
All I know is that if those Left Behind books were right, all of those people who rail against other peoples’ lifestyles are not going to disappear (like they think they would be) in the Rapture. And that, is my schandenfreude Moment of the Day.
I think most boys grow up with anti gay sentiments. It is somehow cool to bash gays, make funny remarks about not dropping the saop in the shower etc.
I myself have walked this very road. Today I find that I have to a large extent moderated my thoughts and thinking about gays. I believe in live and let live.
Hopefully,Obama will bring us into an era where these emotionalized ‘social issues’ will be looked at on a basis of civil rights,subject to constitutional evaluation and approval.
The worst precedent the social conservatives have set,or tried to set, is that others’ rights can be subject to a general plebescite.
There is something rotten in Denmark when the best way for a party to maintain political control is to include a ballot initiative on gay marriage as a means of winning elections.
Emotional social issues are easily exploited.Responsible leadership is very important to democracy..
added note: I really liked the way Sotomayor answered questions about her philoposphy.She rejected all ideology , as I understood her reasoning,and insisted she could not predict how she would rule until she knew all the aspects of the particular case before her,and then she would rule on only what was before her…sounds very conservative/constructive to me…Importantly,she indicated she looks at constitutional precedent as part of the Constitution,and that’s very important,in my view..otherwise we might as well follow the French model and redraft the Constitution as we progress from one Republic to the next.
We all need to see and hear defined better in public forum what ‘liberal activism’ is and what ‘conservative activism’ is ..
For example: Is bypassing the Constitution to vote on some peoples’ rights ‘activism’? For what purpose and who decides?
IMO, marriage is a private contract. The government should not be involved, not even in heterosexual marriages. I know, I know…it already is involved. I wish it wasn’t.
So what about the polygamists? They’re next you know. I find it interesting when I hear homosexuals who want gay marriage legalized tell me that polygamy is wrong.
I don’t understand why opposition to same-sex marriage necessarily means opposing even reading about one in the newspaper. It the couple submitted an announcement and otherwise complied with the paper’s requirements, why should anyone care? Do people really believe that if the paper merely prints the announcement, that it is promoting same-sex marriage?
And who the heck is Fred Phelps?
I think the notion is that, the more people read about same sex marriage in a mundane context, the more normal it will seem. This will limit the ability of its opponents to demonize it irrationally.
Oh, and Fred Phelps is the wingnuttiest of the wingnuts. “God is killing our soldiers because we’re too nice to the fags” — that sort of thing.
Pila – Google “fred Phelps” or “Westboro Baptist Church” but only if you have a strong stomach. These are the people who shot “God Hates Fags” with their little children next to them. They’ll travel about anywhere to make a name for themselves.
Pila – Google “Fred Phelps” or “Westboro Baptist Church” but only if you have a strong stomach. These are the people who shout “God Hates Fags” with their little children next to them. They’ll travel about anywhere to make a name for themselves.
Fred Phelps has numerous web domain names. His most prominent one is http://www.godhatesfags.com. But he can also be found at http://www.godhatesireland.com, and basically any other permutation of the above you can think of.
I have walked through his gauntlet of inbred followers in 2000. (We were told to remain silent and maintain our dignity. Let them look like the buffoons they are without our help!) I was hoping to have to walk through the gauntlet again next month, but was not elected to be a voting delegate at ELCA churchwide assembly in Minneapolis. Think too many people in the synod knew my liberal views. Pila, you have to watch some of his sign films for purely educational purposes. THIS is the extreme that is out there-well beyond even the wingnuts! Then watch 5 hours of “Bevis and Butthead” to fill your mind back up with educational material;-)
Chicago Tribune and other papers have been doing this for years. It was only a matter of time before a “smaller” paper moved into the 21st century…plus doesn’t Elkhart have bigger….economic problems…to worry about????
Kudos to the Elkhart Truth. Serving in Desert Storm and showering daily with Marines, all of whom knew I’m gay, the dropped soap — and I did once– led to good hearted laughter without any fear of morale loss. Though technically breaking the rules, my CO never worried about my gayness as my Arabic translating seemed more essential to our mission than trivial proclivities unrelated to our mission.