Captain Obvious: Chris Matthews Discovers Tea Party "Aren't That Far" from White Supremacist Groups

I've had a few issues with Chris Matthews of late, where his always vacillating political needle seemed lodged in libertarian/conservative land. But he still shows flashes of reasonableness, even if the topic is blindingly obvious. In this case, it's noticing the not-so-very-far-apartness of white supremacist groups and "Tea Party" conservatives. Um yeah, we noticed that.

[Excerpt]
MSNBC’s Chris Matthews: Tea Party Republicans ‘aren’t that far’ from white supremacist groups

MSNBC host Chris Matthews slammed Tea Party Republicans on Tuesday, likening them to white supremacist organizations like the one currently linked to House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA).
 

Image from source, Raw Story

“How do you think Louie Gohmert feels toward David Duke?” Matthews askedHuffington Post reporter Sabrina Siddiqui. “How do we know? What do you think of [Ted] Yoho, and that crowd? These guys believe [President Barack Obama] was somehow an illegal immigrant from Africa because they can’t stand the fact that he’s an African-American president. Let’s be honest about it — they’re not that far from the crowd they refuse to associate with. . . .”

Read more at: Raw Story

Captain Obvious: FReepers are Unbelievably Stupid, Part 3,742,897 (The Gay Thing)

[Captain Obvious is a feature of Greenlee Gazette that seeks to point out things that should be absolutely clear and obvious, but also, very obviously, are not. It predates the Hotels.com character, though I didn't invent the concept either.

The Gay Thing is a feature covering news and information about gay rights and gay culture. I've combined them both here for the first time.]


This past week there were huge news items about marriage equality, also known as gay marriage or same-sex marriage. First, the bad news. In Louisiana, a Federal Court judge upheld the state's same-sex marriage ban. It was the first judge at the Federal level to rule against marriage equality since Windsor, after a string of over twenty victories. This, understandably, was somewhat bad news to advocates like me, but also not unexpected. It's always be assumed we'd lose somewhere at the

Federal level, and what more likely a place than the Deep South? But of course, it was not happy news.

The opposition, such as those at the (badly named) National Organization for Marriage was positively giddy at the news. They declared that the tide had turned, and that what had been declared "inevitable" was practically dead in the water. One day later, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals threw a little (a lot really) of water onto their party. In a unanimous and scathing decision, the 7th declared Indiana's and Wisconsin's gay marriage bans unconstitutional. Illinois was unaffected, as they already have marriage equality. Needless to say, the 7th's decision was a bit more weighty than the decision out of Louisiana, particularly since that decision will be appealed to a circuit court itself.

So, people on my side of this issue were smiling again. Sure, we hit a little pot hole, but we corrected course immediately. Whenever I get that little happy-dance feeling, I always have to harsh my own buzz by going to FreeRepublic.com, to see what the bigots and homophobes* over there have to say about the decision. This can be simultaneously frightening, hilarious, head-shakingly sad, baffling and stupefying. FReepers--the denizens of this conservative, online bastion--are as capable of deductive reasoning and critical thought as they are of humor. . .which is to say, not at all. Below, are some choice quotes from the site:

"THIS NOT A CONSTITUIONAL RESPONSE The frrickin' JUDGE should be impeached for violating The Constitution !!!"
EDITOR: Actually, it was the laws he struck down that were unconstitutional. Idiot.

"Madness. Evil, lawless madness."

Ed.: Oh, yes, my 6-year marriage is just sinister and insane (boring, ordinary)!

"It is all about POWER. Their goal is more of the power. A society without fathers is dependent on government. Large centralized government. The destruction of the family unit and the elimination of the societal norm of men being involved in the rearing of their children equals more power for the Democrats as they are the party of big government."

Ed.: I'd love to know when gay people decided to get together to decided this. Must've missed the meeting.

"Homosexuals should be proud: they have officially destroyed the institution of marriage, long understood to be the union of one man and one woman."

Ed.: Allowing gay people to marry doesn't change the definition of marriage any more than allowing women to vote changed the definition of voting. And it certainly didn't "destroy" anything. Idiot.

"They destroyed a social concept that had become a vacuous, empty vestige of the hallowed institution of marriage."

"Don't be so sure that these judges won't allow polygamy, And, while we are at it, safeguard your French poodle lest a passing, ummm, dog lover finds your poodle irresistible and decides to elope."

Ed.: Comparing consenting, loving adults with diddling a dog is both insulting and stupid. Unless there is a canine out there who can both sign a contract and give informed consent. Asshole.

"In what line in the Constitution does it say that men can marry men and women marry women?"

Ed.: It doesn't. But the 14th Amendment promises equal treatment under the law. And the Supreme Court has already declared marriage to be a fundamental right. Repeatedly. Dumbass.

"Why do we even pretend that we live in a democracy anymore?"

Ed.: We don't. We live in a representative republic, where the tyranny of the majority cannot crush the rights of the minority. Basic civics.

"The above news is in opposition to this one: Federal judge upholds La. same-sex marriage ban
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3200079/posts So, one judge rules one way and another judge rules the other. Whose ruling takes precedence?"

Ed.: This is a particularly stupid FReeper. The Louisiana case applies to Louisiana, and can be appealed to its own Circuit Court of Appeals. The 7th's decision applies to the 7th Circuit. Neither takes precedence because they are separate regions. Idiot.

"Whose ruling takes precedence? Whichever one the Democrats like more."

Ed. Wow, even dumber than the person who asked the original question!

"Judge Feldman’s ruling in the Louisiana case is the case that we must look to and what every judge that hears gay marriage cases must look to for precedence."

Ed.: Well of course! The one guy who agrees with your side out of how many? Actually, no, Feldman's ruling applied to Louisiana alone, and will very likely be appealed.

"Wouldn’t the same rationale apply to striking down laws against pedophiles?"
Ed.: Ouch. My eyes hurt from rolling so hard. No, you despicable cretin, pedophiles violate others' rights. They violate consent. They injure other humans. This is not comparable.

As usual, there is much, much more. If you want to find it, simply go to FreeRepublic.com, and go to the heading, "Homosexual Agenda," whose title should tell you immediately what you're in for!



*I don't ordinarily characterize strangers as bigots and homophobes. But hopefully their own words, above, prove my case.

Captain Obvious: GOP Talking Points re: BridgeGate Don't Hold Up

It is obvious that in the few days since Chris Christie's "BridgeGate" scandal went national, the GOP (and the rest of Right Wing World) has been following talking points. Whether they came down from Mt. Limbaugh, were concocted by Reince Priebus, or FOX "News," somebody somewhere decided upon a counter-strategy. And that was to say that Christie gave a big press conference, where he "owned it" (debatable), and took questions. Further, they then say that President Obama has not done the same in regard to his scandals. And then they go down the well-worn list of so-called scandals, Benghazi, IRS and then they have some leeway on further scandals. Some throw in "Fast and Furious," some go NSA, others generically site ObamaCare.

But they're all on that same page as a response to Christie. In tandem with that, they'll compare Christie and Obama both being "unaware" what nefariousness people under them are up to. There are several things wrong with this line of counter-attack, starting with the very large difference between being a President and being a Governor. And it's been irritating me all day, as I've heard and read little driblets here and there, and watched some of the Sunday talk shows. So here, in no particular order, are the issues I find with the response by the GOP and Right Wing World.

If you watch FOX "News", you immediately
know this is Benghaziiiii!!!Image from Washington Post

• The IRS "scandal" has been shown to be mostly hooey, with little-to-no connection to the president.
• The IRS investigated political groups seeking tax exempt non-political status, from both the left and the right. Yes, they selected groups with "tea party" and "freedom" in their names, because these were political groups! They also selected left-leaning groups. Whether it was a straight-up 50/50 dragnet is up in the air, but it was not, strictly speaking, an anti-right-wing probe.
• The real scandal with the IRS is that most of the investigated groups got their tax exempt status, even though they're clearly political groups.
• Obama was expected by the right, to know the inner workings and details of the Cincinnati IRS office, but Christie isn't supposed to know what his closest staff is up to?
• Benghazi was an attack on us, not a conspiracy by us.
• The Republican Congress cut funding for security that may have affected the protection and response to the Benghazi attacks
• The Benghazi attacks was ultimately shown to have a connection to the anti-Muslim video that was originally suspected to have been a motivator.
• What happened in Benghazi--terrible as it was--has precedent in many foreign countries with US dignitaries, under other presidents, notably George W. Bush. Loss of life is an unfortunate fact of life in diplomacy, and while minimizing that loss is always an important goal, Republican interest in Benghazi was absent in prior years.

  

  I'm not nuts about drones either, but it's another
  program started in the Bush Era that the right didn't
  used to question, and it has little to do with
  Governor Christie's issues.

• "Fast and Furious" was a continuation of a Bush-era program that was shut down after the Attorney General became aware of it, at least to my understanding. Conspiracy theories notwithstanding, I'm unsure there has ever been a straight-line to the president for the program.
• The NSA is a powerful shadowy group, and I agree that it's creepy and has too much power. But I think that's been true no matter which party or president has been in charge. And it was the post-9/11, Bush Era policies that pushed NSA even further over the edge.
• The allegation that President Obama hasn't responded to or answered any questions about any of this seems kind of ridiculous too. He's had press conferences, interviews, and White House briefings all the way through his presidency. Not enough? Maybe, but there has not been silence.
• Finally, all of the above (and more) have been pored over by the media, in endless, copious amounts. ObamaCare has been beaten against a rock since it was birthed, and at every step along the way. 

There has been another tactic used by the usual suspects that says this BridgeGate scandal is a lot of hot air over nothing, and they're only touting it to "get Christi," while ignoring the scandals of President Obama and Hillary Clinton. To which I say, are you freaking kidding me? Hillary has had more dirty laundry aired than almost any living political figure in the United States. And Obama has had every little scandal-ette magnified to apocalyptic proportions to fill news cycle after news cycle. The evidence for that fills the pages of just this blog alone, and I'm not terribly prolific. You'd have to be willfully amnesic to state otherwise.

Captain Obvious: Mediaite Has a Little Hyperbole Problem

Some time ago, Jon Stewart lamented the language of blogs and opinion columns, and how one side is always "eviscerating" or "pummeling" their opponents, at least in the headlines. And I'm sure that in my six-plus years of blogging, I've been guilty of it, possibly more times than I'm aware of. But I can tell you, you won't find a front page on this blog, with this many examples!

These headlines are all from one evening's front page at Mediaite, the linchpin of the web empire started by Dan Abrahms. In his Wikipedia entry, he claims that Mediaite is about "appreciating the celebrity of the media." Managing Editor Colby Hall noted that it "plays into the vanity of these individuals" without being "over-snarky or mean and nasty." Maybe. But just look at these headlines (words in red by me), just from the late June 14, 2013 edition.

• Maher Savages ‘Cryptkeeper’ Congressmen: ‘When Did We Become This Weekend At Bernie’s Government?’ 
• Late Night Host Trashes ‘Racist, Child-Killing Coward’ Zimmerman, With Help From Chris Rock 
• Maher Rips Apart Patrick Kennedy’s Anti-Pot Crusade: You Sound Like ‘Nancy Reagan In 1983′ 
• Monica Crowley Slams Dem. Activist: Obama Can’t Face Press Because That ‘Only Works If You’re Not Guilty’ 
• Maddow Blasts Rick Perry’s Bill To Save ‘Merry Christmas’ In Texas: ‘Christmas Is Merrily, Rick Perryily Protected’ 
• Maher Tears Into Panel Over Syria: Obama ‘Looks Like A Pu*sy’ For Obeying Bill Clinton
• Out Of Bounds: MSNBC’s Thomas Roberts Attacks GOP’er’s Teen Kid For ‘Racist Crap’ That ‘Trickles Down’ From Dad 
• Kirsten Powers Brutalizes Elitist Politicians And Media Defaming Snowden In Column 
• Al Gore Tears Into NSA Defenders: ‘We Don’t Do Dial Groups On The Bill Of Rights’

What's left?  "Disembowels?" "Tears a new asshole?" "Rips off the head, and shits down the neck of?" Or maybe they've used those?




You can see if they're still doing it at: Mediaite.com

Captain Obvious: Dictionary.com Doesn't "Get" Atheism

In my previous post, I acknowledged my difficulty with all of the talk of "prayer" and God whenever we have a natural disaster like the tornadoes of the last couple of days. I even got some fairly large readership out of it on Tuesday, for some reason. And a bit of back-and-forth with readers here on the blog, on Twitter and on The Huffington Post. It struck me--since religious people often do not take atheists' word for their lack of belief--that I ought to look up the dictionary definition of "atheism."

I was disappointed, to put it mildly. My understanding of the word is "without religon," or perhaps "without god(s)." The second version is problematic because there are religions that don't have gods, per se. To me, what my atheism means is: I don't have a religion. That's it. I don't have a doctrine, don't have holy books, a place of worship, a congregation, the belief in a higher power, "spirituality," or even a vague notion that there is an entity or entities with magic powers who oversee the universe and/or my sex life. I have no portion of my life devoted to any sort of religion, beyond whatever arguing I do about it in forums like this.

Fig. A - Dictionary.com's first set of definitions.

But, back to the dictionary. Dictionary.com is, of course, the easiest to remember site to go to online to look up the definition of a word, unless you just Google it. Maybe Google would have been the way to go though, because--as you can see in Fig. A--the definition offered up first by Dictionary.com is not good.

First, check out the two ads. Kind of goofy, at least from my perspective. Then, there is the first definition, "1. The doctrine or belief that there is no God." What's wrong with that? Well, there is no doctrine, for one. You can be an atheist without ever having heard of God, gods or even atheism itself, for that matter. And secondly, as I said before, it's a lack of belief in religion as well as any particular god, which covers more than "God." Second definition: "2. Disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings." This one is closer, though it doesn't adequately cover all religions. I'd also substitute "lack of belief," rather than "disbelief," because the latter sounds a bit too active for me, as though it takes effort.

So, I scrolled down to see if somewhere in there was something that I recognized as atheism. Fig. B shows what I found next. The Word Origin and History's "1580s, from Fr. Atheisme (16c.), from Gk. atheos 'without god,'" may reflect how the word came to be, but it still is narrowly focused on apparently the Christian God (though it is not capitalized). Moving down to the World English Dictionary, it gets worse, "Rejection of belief in God or gods." This one is really bad, because "rejection" denotes a strong action, as though one is belligerently casting aside a known truth or something. See, this is something many staunchly religious people believe about atheists, that they are really believers who have rejected God/Jesus. Not true. We simply don't believe. And then, the Cultural Dictionary's "Denial that there is a God." is a mixture of all of the above, focusing on a solitary God, with a strong action of denial.

Fig. B - More not quite right stuff.

So, let me make simple what the dictionary can't seem to do. Atheists merely lack belief in religion in all its forms. That includes God, gods, angels, saints, all doctrines and edicts, spirituality, and anything supernatural. There are "strong" atheists who won't much mind the "rejection/denial" type language, and they'll vehemently state plainly: "THERE IS NO GOD!" There are agnostics and agnostic atheists who simply don't know and/or care if there are gods or true religions. And there are people like me who find all that I've heard on the subject to be preposterous and vanishingly unlikely. Nearly all of us simply lack religion in our lives. It's not there at all. And yet, people will still insist that we have a "religion." It can be frustrating. . .

I'll put a button on this by saying that we're all born atheists. Nobody has religion downloaded into their brains on day one, it has to be learned. And almost everybody is an atheist as it pertains to ALL other religions but their own.

Captain Obvious: There is No Gay Agenda Beyond Equality

I struggled with the title on this one. I knew I wanted it to be Captain Obvious, because this should be obvious. It is inspired by a video I found on Joe.My.God, one of my favorite internet outposts. The video is by Matt Barber, an oddly fixated anti-gay activist. I do not know what drives this man, whether it be a deep-seated sexual identity problem, or maybe he's always mistaken for gay? I don't know, but he thinks about teh gay more than I do, and I'm gay. [Story continues below]


Anyway, this Barber dude's basic premise is that gay people don't merely want marriage equality, and civil rights parity. We want to destroy what marriage means. We want to rend the fabric of society, topple cultural pillars, kick down the picket fences, and dry-hump the Washington Monument. . .or something. But he's wrong. Really, really wrong. The fact that he's (allegedly) straight, and so fixated on gay people ought to be a clue that he might be a little around the bend. But his reasoning is so shaky, so hard to lay out logically that. . .well. . .that Captain Obvious needs to pay him a visit.

Now, if my goal--if all individual gay, married couples (or those aspiring to marriage)--was to tear marriage asunder, tell me something. How did we arrive at this goal? Were there meetings? Is there a leader? Do we pay membership dues, have a secret handshake? 'Cause, I wasn't invited, and yet I'm legally married to my husband, and have been for 4½ years now. So far, we haven't left a trail of destroyed heterosexual marriages in our wake. In fact, if there has been one negative result from the whole affair, it might be that there isn't as much >ahem< action as there used to be. That sounds like marriage to me!

So, Mr. Barber. Get this through your thick, Jesus-drenched, boxing-addled skull: gay people haven't set out to destroy the meaning or institution of marriage. We have no interest in ripping out the foundations of civilization, or any other vague, meaningless symbolic structures. We want equality under the law, and nothing more. Your conspiracy theory is making you look like an idiot. And your obsession is making you look kinda. . .well. . .gay.

Captain Obvious: On Gays and Atheists (Or GAYtheists)

I wasn't sure if this should be under the banner of Captain Obvious, or one of my other loosely structured banners. What the whole post is about, is the extremely odd place I hold in today's America, that of the gay atheist. Or Gay-theist if you will. Which is awkward, because it reads like a theist who is gay. But I'm an atheist who is gay. Which makes me ready to call myself a gatheist, which isn't right either. I therefore coin the phrase, GAYtheist, and hope that people can suss out the meaning, without a literal Latin interpretation, mmmkay? Mmmkay.

My understanding of my personal sexuality (Kinsey-six gay) and my personal religion (none: strong agnostic/atheist) was on a parallel track, and has its. . .I want to say Genesis, but really I think crux is better. . .at about 14 years of age. I knew I was different at a very, very early age. I knew that the term "sissy" was bad, and had the internal realization that it simultaneously applied to me, and that I needed to do all I could to hide that fact. This is at four to five years old, you understand. No frills, no lace, no ruffles, no dollies. And truth be told--other than the Easy Bake Oven and other such gadgets--I was cool with that. I liked trucks and Tinker Toys and Lincoln Logs and Erector Sets.

Jimminy Cricket seems oddly appropriate here.

But, I also wanted a boyfriend in kindergarten. I was strangely intrigued by a kid named Jay, who in kindergarten, got confused about propriety, and came out of the in-classroom restroom with his butt showing. I wanted my one-year younger brother's classmate Rhett to notice me (in second grade!). When playing with my brother and my same-aged friend as a threesome, I was the "housewife." While I didn't identify or want to be a female, I was different. This shit dates back to the beginning.

Complicating matters for me, was the fact that I and my siblings had an interloper in our midst, a family member who inappropriately insinuated their self. One of the things that is problematic about sexual molestation for the survivors is that people lay a whole psychological profile upon them. For future reference, lay off of them. The fact that a person has been molested is not a reflection upon their identity.

What do I mean by that? Only that my siblings are heterosexual. I'm homosexual, no ifs-ands-or-buts. and it has zero, and I mean zero to do with what happened back at the 12-14 age range. In fact, that shit made it tougher to come out, because I knew that once I was public, some people would draw those conclusions. My realization at fourteen that I was gay was a culmination of facts in evidence from my earliest recollections. The unwanted attentions of a relative were a confirmation of that, not the instigator of it.

Anyway, all of this came to light at almost the exact same time that I was sussing out my opinions on religion. We'd been raised nominally Christian, with Easter, Christmas and the rest, but only lightly. There was a little church, Mom read to us from Golden Book-style kid's bibles. But it wasn't drilled into us. The emphasis on God and Jesus was about the same as Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny. When the latter three were revealed to be frauds, God and Jesus were left defenseless. They were never disavowed, but the writing was on the wall.

Due to an afore-mentioned best friend/not-so-secret crush, I was attending confirmation classes in a teenaged Sunday school at a local Lutheran church. The church was warm and welcoming, the fellowship strong and the donuts yummy. But ultimately, I had to back out. I was learning Freshman Earth Science simultaneously, and it quite simply cancelled out the church stuff I was learning. At the age of 15, I was internally a gay atheist. It would be many, many years before I shared that fact with anybody.

So, the point of this post is to point out some obvious facts about The Gay Thing and The Religion Thing as it pertains to atheists. And in no particular order, they are:

- Don't trust Christians to tell you what an atheist is, or believes.
- Don't trust a homophobe to tell you what a gay person is, or believes.
- Gay people do not "recruit." Heterosexual parents make plenty of gay people unassisted. There  is no need to "recruit."
- Molestation doesn't "make" a person gay, though it can complicate the process of discovery. The simple fact is, far too many kids are molested. The outcome is never pretty, but it doesn't cause "conversion."
- Atheists do not belligerently reject a god they believe in. They quite simply don't believe in the first place.
-  Similarly, atheists don't "hate" God or religion. They simply don't believe in it.
- Gays and atheists do not--broadly speaking--have monolitic beliefs. They're individuals. They're like people, that way.
 - There is no unified "gay agenda." In fact, the super-right-wing's idea of a gay agenda is far more developed than any real gay agenda.
- The "gay lifestyle" is a term with its roots in 1970s personal ads in "legitimate" newspapers. they needed a euphemism,  and that is what we've been saddled with.
- "Ex-gay" people were either never gay to begin with, are bisexuals suppressing their "gay" sides, or gay people in denial. Period. I've met too many "ex-ex-gays" to believe otherwise.  

I don't claim to have all the answers. But I can say--as a gay atheist--that I'm not unhappy with my life or my decisions. I believe this is the life you get, and there are no others. I believe there is no "higher authority," or "higher purpose." I think we're on this plane, and we're in this world. We must live life to its fullest, because it's the only life we've got. And we should live life respecting all others' lives and rights and freedoms as we respect our own.

That's pretty simple. It doesn't require God. It doesn't require anything but reason and logic. And this post is terribly inadequate to its task. As a gay atheist I will cop to the fact that I can't speak for all of us, and implore the reader to understand that no one can. No single individual should be allowed to speak for an entire group.

Captain Obvious: Sorting Out Sandusky

This post shouldn't have to be written. But the truth is, posts like it aren't written often enough. On Friday, Jerry Sandusky, the assistant coach at Penn State, was found guilty on 45 of 48 charges for sexually assaulting many, many boys over the years. His guilty verdict was cheered by many on the scene, and my immediate response to the news was, "good."

So, why a Captain Obvious post? Because though 99.999% of sentient humans take this news as a good thing, a goodly portion of those people equate Jerry Sandusky with ordinary gay people. He's not. Sexual orientation is a continuum of sexual attraction from heterosexual to bisexual to homosexual, with shades of grey in-between (and of course, the rare asexual, outside the scale). Pedophilia and pederasty describe a psychiatric disorder wherein a person is sexually aroused by under aged--and unable to consent--children. There are straight pedophiles and pederasts, and there are gay ones. Oddly enough, many child abusers often pick targets that are the opposite sex from their adult relationships. This is the case with Sandusky. Or perhaps not. Many predators just need prey, and Sandusky had access to boys. Who knows what his other predilections might be.

Good luck, short eyes. Image from LA Times.

So, calling Sandusky "gay," or trying to make him representative of all gay people isn't just wrong, it's hideously, unfairly and maliciously wrong. It is also dangerous, and I don't just mean to the gay people you're slandering. If you're got it in your head that it's the gays you've got to watch out for; if you're keeping your kids away from their favorite gay uncle because you can't separate concepts adequately. . .you may be letting your guard down to the actual predators. Married, family men, respected in the community like Sandusky.

Meanwhile, the idiots at FreeRepublic, the tea baggin', Palin-lovin' outpost of the interwebs, can be depended upon to take this wrong-headed thinking to its zenith (or nadir, depending upon your point of view). They run every pederast/pedophile/kiddie porn/you name it fetish under the badly named "homosexual agenda" portion of their stomach-churning site. When my conservative mother assures me that Republicans aren't homophobic, by-and-large, I think of FreeRepublic, and realize that Mom is hopelessly naive. Here are just a few of their comments. The asterisks mask a few words that they actually feel free to type out.

[Excerpts]

"Isn’t men liking men considered normal now? S/"

Editor: Boys, idiot.

"Jerry, Jerry, you're a fairy, A fan of banana and cherry, Go to jail, For a century! A little trick with Dick."
 
Ed.: And that, ladies and gentlemen, is an example of "conservative humor."


"FNS and CNN anchors, both sex perverts, talking about another sex pervert committing anal rape of boys is too much."

Ed.: See what he did there? Anderson Cooper and Shepard Smith are somehow equivalent to Sandusky. Nice. Now, for a doozy:

"Great. Now if they can just quit promoting in schools the idea that “sodomy is good” to the children, so they are less likely to be victims. Sodomites are twisted and have a sick reality, which knows no sexual morality. They misuse their body parts in debasing ways. There is no logic or morality—so age makes no difference. Pederasty and homosexuality has been intrinsically linked since Ancient Greece and the Samurai. It is a learned behavior. Schools intentionally promote Sodomy in Sex Ed (they teach anal sex) and by having “Day of Silence” and putting the word gay with “Pride”. Sodomy is a Vice and children need to learn Good and Evil by the Standard of the Bible—since our Natural Rights come from God, so they do not fall victim to these people who have no sexual boundaries and will use them. The homosexual reality is that debasing acts are “love”, which is the slippery slope to any debasing act-—even that with children—since “self pleasure” is their only criteria for “good”.

Get perverts out of the schools. -—like Kevin Jennings. Better yet, get your children OUT of public schools. They are promoting evil to children—to normalize the debasing and dysfunctional lifestyles which lead to a socialist state."

Ed.: The stupid. It burns! No, jackass, you're wrong about almost everything you've said. But the key chink in your screed is your "slippery slope" comment. You're not even smart enough to know that it is the name of a logical fallacy. One of the main ones.

"Wait a fews years as this nation sinks further into immorality....this behavior will become legal and protected."

Ed.: No. It won't. Rape and molestation are crimes on people against their will. The only time I've seen any otherwise rational person argue against protections against rape, it was Republicans trying to change it to just "forcible" rape, whatever that means.

"Just more proof that homosexual fa**ots have no business in leadership positions."

Ed.: See? Told you there'd be asterisks! Offensive, wrong and redundant. The FReeper trifecta!


"Or be able to adopt!"

Ed.: Okay, moron, Sandusky was a married heterosexual, as far as we know. How exactly would your knee-jerk reaction have stopped him?

And on that note, we have the lone, sane FReeper, who answered that last bit better than me. Credit where it's due:

"The problem with your statement as it pertains to this case was that there was no evidence that Sanusky ever lived an openly “homosexual” or “fa**ot” lifestyle outside of molesting young boys which was done in secret and not openly. Sandusky was never, as I understand ever interested in having sex with other adult men, only in having sex with children who happened to be male. A male pedophile who prefers having sex with female children is none the less still a pedophile and just as sick, twisted and evil.
Barring openly homosexuals from leadership positions would not have prevented someone like Sandusky from doing what he did as he was not an openly homosexual man who had sex with other adult men. He lived as a straight man, a pillar of his community, someone well respected in his community and someone that even his neighbors and close friends, some who are deeply religious, had no idea of his perversions, yet he was someone who secretly preyed on vulnerable children for years." --by MD Expat in PA

There is much, much more. But for once, I'm going to give a FReeper the last word.  Source.

UPDATE: For Dan, my friend at the conservative LasVegasBadger, I do not think that FreeRepublic represents all or most Republicans. But they are a very vocal, and unfortunately these days, heeded force, the core of the tea party. Dan, you keep me on my toes.

Captain Obvious: Atheists Do Not Have a Faith

This is just a quick post, written after too many "faith" and "religion" posts that I've read recently. In America, we are not required to follow any particular--or any at all--religion, or "faith." Unfortunately for we "unfaithful," the faithful cannot comprehend our disbelief. Most religious people, particularly the devout kind, have an extremely difficult time putting their selves in our shoes. To them, unbelievers are belligerent people, denying the truth that they secretly believe to be true. No.

Again, NO. Atheists, atheistic agnostics and other irreligious people simply don't believe in god or gods, deity or deities. It isn't up to us to explain or discover the origin of the universe. We don't claim to know the secrets to all that is. We just simply state that we don't subscribe to the belief systems of the thousands/hundreds of thousands/millions of religions that have dominated the earth. We hold a neutral, non-supernatural "what is, is" philosophy. That is no more a faith than "bald" is a hair color.

Captain Obvious: Another Study Shows Ignorance of FOX "News" Viewers

What's it going to take to get people to turn off that ridiculous channel? Scratch that, it's pointless to try. I spent a long time arguing on Facebook with one of FOX "News"'s target audience members over gay marriage, religion and theocracy. Needless to say, it was like banging my head into a wall. There is an impenetrable bubble these folks live in that will never be breached.

[Excerpt]

Fox News Viewers Know Less Than People Who Don't Watch Any News: Study 

The poll surveyed New Jersey residents about the uprisings in Egypt and the Middle East, and where they get their news sources. The study, which controlled for demographic factors like education and partisanship, found that "people who watch Fox News are 18-points less likely to know that Egyptians overthrew their government" and "6-points less likely to know that Syrians have not yet overthrown their government" compared to those who watch no news. . .

Read more at: Huffington Post

Captain Obvious: Penn State Scandal Has Nothing to do with "The Gays"

When there is a pedophile scandal involving boys, gay people wince, for multiple reasons. Chief among them is the horror imposed on the little boys, against their will. Secondarily--and quite a bit down the concern meter, but still wrenching--is the false equivalence drawn by many (usually, conservatives) between pedophilia and homosexuality.
 
If you have any interest, you can find copious confirmation that some strong conservatives draw a parallel between teh gay and kid diddlers. Just go to FreeRepublic.com, and go to the ridiculously named "Homosexual Agenda" section. You'll find that the hardcore tea bagger crowd draws no distinction.  But there is one.

If you found out that there was a coach who molested a bunch of little girls, you wouldn't immediately jump to the conclusion that there was a heterosexual problem. But when it is a coach and boys? Many minds go there. Even when there is no scandal to use as a touchstone, many conservative minds go there. "Gays can't reproduce, so they recruit," they'll say. Uhhhmmmm, no. Not necessary. Plenty of gays to go around. Most gays were molested, they'll say. But, then they'll also claim that lesbians were molested by men. So, which is it?

Most troubling with the uber-conservative equivalence between pedophilia and homosexuality, is the blindness to force vs. consent. If you dare read the commentary at conservative sites, you'd have to believe that gay people do not see that distinction. When in fact, it is more likely for sexual harassment and abuse claims to be leveled at heterosexuals.


Pedophilia, whether performed by ostensibly straights or gays is a vicious, nasty crime, performed against kids against their will. Pedophilia is not a sexual orientation. It is a sexual pathology. Performing sexual acts against minors (who are unable to legally give consent) or others against their will is always wrong. There is no evidence that pedophilia is any more prevalent amongst heterosexuals or homosexuals. In fact, I think it is--and should be--insulting toward gays or straights to claim that either is more likely to molest a child. I believe that molesters belong in their own category, and I believe they've got what's coming to them.

I'm insulted by the fact that the FreeRepublic site puts all of the Penn State stories under the banner of "Homosexual Agenda." But I'm not surprised. FR is a knee-jerk site, with very little thought, and a whole lot of emotion. From the whole Penn State story, I am of course most upset by the lives that have been damaged. But I'm also really pissed off that a bunch of knuckle-draggers are going to blame this on people like me.