Bigots aren't entitled to be bigots.

[mik3cap]

I was listening to NPR yesterday, and was witness to yet another of the endless attempts by homophobic, power hungry, politicizing bigots to take civil rights away from people. This time it was a discussion of the upcoming political tempest in a teapot - since gay marriage worked so great for Republicans in 2004, they're going to take aim at gay adoption in 2006. Despite the fact that there are hundreds of thousands of children currently adopted by gay singles and couples, there are 16 or so states working towards legislation to ban gay adoption; legislation that will no doubt be ready to bring out the "religious whackjob" (as they are called by Tom DeLay's staff) voting contingent in November.

What I really hate most is that any time I hear one of these "debates" no one ever confronts the anti-gay/lesbian speaker for exercising a moral prejudice against people they've never met. They never start with questioning their base assumptions - why are you assuming a negative environment for children cared for by gay/lesbian parents? Why do you implicitly suggest that homosexual is equivalent to over-sexed? And I'm always pissed off when they discuss "gay lifestyle" and "sexual choice" as if sexual preference were something you could just suddenly decide on the spot and change.

How many gay/lesbian people do you actually know? If gays and lesbians aren't entitled to the same rights as everyone else, what is it about them that makes them so different? What's the difference between discriminating against someone based on skin color, religion, or sexual preference? At what point in your life did you "choose" to be straight? Can you choose not to be straight?

These are the questions that bigots need to be confronted with. I really don't think it's that hard to show someone they're being a bigot - it's just that people are rarely confronted with the truth of their bigotry, under the guise of "everyone's entitled to an opinion." I couldn't agree less! The long and short of it is: bigots aren't entitled to be bigots, and misinformed people are not entitled to being misinformed.

Comments

[nhcooncat.livejournal.com]

I hope you're right that fundamentalism is on the wane. I can't help but think it's not, though. The world might have the resources to deal with poverty and lack of education, but are we actually doing it? Overpopulation has continued at such a rate (it took us from the beginning of time until about 1900 to get to 1 billion; at 6.5 billion now, why aren't more of us worried?) that now many poor nations have a huge percentage of their population which is under the age of 18. Overpopulation, lack of education, lack of good jobs, lack of good prospects (particularly for young males) --- all tend to lead towards desperation, which is a breeding ground for fundamentalism.

So either the perceived uptick in religious fundamentalism represents (as you suggest) the last gasp of a burned-out idea (people tend to scream the loudest when they're on the verge of losing entrenched power) --- or it's just an uptick. I hope you're right, Mike, but I have to say I'm not too hopeful that the trends towards religious fundamentalism is going to abate soon. Rather than conflating manic elections (some of which seem to be resulting in theocracies, it seems, but I guess that's OK with this administration) with democracy, we should be promoting the idea that real democracy takes a truly informed electorate. But all that takes education and trying to stay informed at something beyond the Fox News/USA Today level. Instead, we continue as a nation along our current anti-intellectual path (not just anti-intellectual, but proudly so). With Dubya as philosopher king, we haven't much of a chance of mending our ways in the next couple of years.

I never thought we'd have a president who'd make me feel actually nostalgic for Bush the 1st or Reagan, but Dubya's done it for me.

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

Just look at India and China for evidence of increasing wealth and education. Millions of people in Asia are buying cars and things they never could even ten years ago. Those economies are getting richer and richer.

I'm pretty convinced that the problem here in America is that people are sheep - the fundamentalists are a minority who play the margins to win elections, and people just repeat Fox News because it's all they're hearing. The problem is that the Democrats don't know how to herd sheep as well as the Christian Fundies, who've had lots of practice with it.

[nhcooncat.livejournal.com]

Your point about emerging nations is well taken. I would probably be a lot happier about China and India if the fact that their newfound ability to buy cars didn't also mean that, in moving up towards our standard of living, they're also moving up towards our standard of polluting.

The environmental implications are deeply troubling to me. If you ask about global overpopulation and its effects on the environment, most people will answer "Yeah --- those Africans and Asians have too many children". But at least until recently, it's been Westerners who've been the biggest problem, in terms of environmental impact. When it comes to use of resources and level of pollution, a Western couple calling it a day after having had two children is similar to an Indian couple throwing in the towel after 10, or an Ethiopian couple saying "enough" after a few dozen or so. But as you said, clearly, those formulae are changing: positively in terms of living standards, but negatively in terms of environmental impact (at least short-term. Better, cleaner technologies may save our bacon, hopefully!!!).

But if it all comes with the added effect that in additional to (and because of?) higher living standards, religious fundamentalism will hold less power in those parts of the world, that sweetens the pot significantly! I love a silver lining!