When Partisanship and Homophobia Lead to Paranoid Delusions

Image from Progressive Nation

I know the blog has been more top heavy of late with the gay, and that's of course because the subject has been in the news a lot this summer.  Also in heavy rotation has been the odious conservative web site FreeRepublic.com.  That is because whenever a divisive issue hits the news, there is no better place to find the boiled down, uncensored, unvarnished conservative counterpoint.  They're like Sophia on The Golden Girls, if she were a slightly older Ann Coulter.  They're all id and no filter.

While perusing their reaction to former RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman's big "coming out," I stumbled into a related area.  I'm not going to pick apart the article they were jabbering about--a conservative's argument against same-sex marriage--because while it would be easy, it would also be very time consuming. Maybe later.  Anyway, what inspired this post was a single comment from a FReeper. One so incredibly paranoid, so blindingly stupid, that you would think it was an aberration.  Here it is (emphasis mine):

"The real motive is the complete destruction of the institution of marriage. This then completes the leftists' attack on this institution. The lefties had to get rid of the structure of the American family because it stood in the way of people being dependent on the government. "Gay marriage" is the last nail in the coffin. If marriage can mean ANY type of coupling, then it means nothing at all. And, that is the point." --LibertarianLiz

This is--amazingly enough--a typical FReeper mindset on this subject and many others. It assigns a motive to a group they see as "other," a motive they don't have any more way of knowing than they do about the others themselves.  I'm one half of an actual married gay couple.  I have never had as a motive the "complete destruction of the institution of marriage." I've never met another gay person with that motive. In fact, I've never seen such a motive alleged anywhere outside of a forum like FreeRepublic.

It takes a special kind of paranoia to actually believe that gays are monolithic and diabolical enough to get together and frame issues, present them to the public in a deceitful way, and keep it all secret. Not to mention that this Gay Squadron is only one piece of the "Lefty Legion." The gays are one cog in the greater Lefty machine, playing their part to destroy marriage, and then the WORLD!!! I can't comprehend when and where they think this all happened.  Who led the rally? Are there membership cards?  Am I supposed to get a gift or recognition from "gay central" for playing my part?

It's a lot like conservatives who say that President Obama's end game is to "destroy America." Really? He set out to get the job with that as his goal?  And they say this with an utterly straight face. 

The worst spats I've ever had with friends or family have all stemmed from the assumption of motivation.  "He didn't call me because. . ." or "Well, she said one thing, but what she really meant was. . ."  Assigning motivations to other people without really knowing what their actual motivations are is almost never a good idea.

But in the world of FR, especially when it comes to what they call "The Homosexual Agenda" is that all gay people are lying, and only rigidly anti-gay conservatives really know what's going on.  I'm here to tell them here and now: your assumptions are wrong.  And paranoid. And delusional.  And if you're this wrong about this subject, how much should anybody trust your other opinions?  'Nuff said.

Read more of the delusional "insights" at: Free Republic