HATE THE SIN, NOT THE SINNER
Bigotry From Cradle to Grave

From AlterNet:

The Texas Observer, a liberal newspaper, conducted interviews with several fundamentalists as part of an effort to understand the support in the state for the recent anti-gay marriage ban.

Mary Ann Markarian of Sugar Land, who described herself as an ordained minister for M.A.P. Ministries, Inc., explained that she would encourage people to vote for the constitutional amendment. "But not," she said, "because I dislike homosexuals. I know a lot of homosexual people who are wonderful people, who are very kind and gracious, who are my friends. "But sin is sin. We're not animals," Markarian said. "The proof is in the pudding."

Here comes Cameron: "Ninety-two percent of all gay males engage in rimming, the process of licking the rim of the anus and ingesting various amounts of fecal matter. Forty-seven percent of all males engage in fisting, the act of placing their fist in their partner's rectum for sexual pleasure." Markarian went on in the interview about other practices, and then turned to mortality rates, which again clearly mimic Cameron's discredited research. "The median age of a homosexual dying with AIDS is 39 years old; that's wrong, not natural. The median age of all other homosexual men dying from other causes is forty-two," she said. "The median age of death for lesbians is 45 years old--of lesbians.... Think about it and then tell me that God doesn't have some problem with this whole thing."

All of this nonsense, of course, is purportedly about protecting the family. And all of the organizations and leaders mentioned heretofore also resist reproductive freedom; opposition to legal and accessible abortion formed the core of much of their organizing, fundraising and lobbying throughout the 1980s and early 1990s.

Click here for the rest.

I am continually amazed by how the fundamentalists obsess about homosexuality. At first glance, it makes no sense: homosexuality, according to the Bible, is one sin among many; traditional fundamentalist dogma asserts that no one sin is worse than any other--they're all bad in God's eyes. So why all the attention to homosexuality instead of say, murder or theft or exploiting the poor? The answer, as suggested above, is the more generalized concern with sexual morality. Or, I should say, their sexual morality. Again, the same principle applies, that sexual sin is no better or worse than any other sin, but since human beings are fairly obsessed with sex generally, it is no surprise that fundamentalists are too.

I think it's safe to say, because there is no Scriptural basis for holding up one sin as worse than any other, that fundamentalists are simply jealous of the free-wheeling sexuality of gay folk. Well, gay men, who tend to be more promiscuous, to be precise, but you just know these right-wing Christians have also got to be intrigued by some of that hot lesbian action, too. Anyway, my point is that, even though I agree that the Bible is pretty clear about homosexuality being a sin, fundamentalists' anti-gay attitudes have little to do with the Bible, which is ultimately, in this case, simply a justification to bitch and moan about the sex they aren't having.

This doesn't even get into the fact that, to fundamentalists, following the law doesn't get anyone into heaven--one must be "saved" first, that is, become a Christian. It makes no sense to insist that people who aren't believers should do what the Bible says. Maybe they've got a good point with gay Christians, but, otherwise, it's really none of their damned business, and the Bible essentially says so: go save 'em first, and then you can castigate them.

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