February 27, 2009

Disagreeing with the gay rights lobby=antisocial behavior

By: Sonny Bunch

I was struck by this paragraph over at Slate, in an article discussing whether or not you should be able to sue someone for libel who falsely says you’re gay:

On homosexuality, the views of conservative religious groups are indeed veering on the antisocial. Think about TV and the movies. Ellen DeGeneres came out 10 years ago to an audience of 42 million; when Clay Aiken did so last year, no one blinked. Dozens of shows—Queer Eye, America’s Next Top Model, How I Met Your Mother—have openly gay cast members. Movies like Milk and Brokeback Mountain are mainstream.

Let’s leave aside the question of whether Milk (a movie that grossed less than $30 million and hasn’t received much in the way of distribution outside of the coastal cities) is really “mainstream.” What the author of this piece is arguing is that basically every church/religious person who disagrees with gay marriage is antisocial, akin to the KKK. And no, that’s not a hyperbolic misrepresentation of the piece:

A KKK member can argue that he was defamed by being called black, but if a court thinks that the Klansmen who agree with him hold “anti-social” views, the suit is out.

As someone who supports gay marriage but understands why others don’t, I’d love to see what Rod has to say about this piece; I’d be especially interested to hear what he has to say on how such inflammatory rhetoric cuts against the limited gains by gay rights activists in religious communities.