I don’t know why I expected, that would happen here.

Linda Harvey has and does endorse this vile act! I linked up to her “denouncement” and found as she writes:

“…it is deplorable this incident is already being used by the homosexual community to blame this act on those holding a traditional moral viewpoint. Israelis, just as anyone else on earth, should still have the right to oppose homosexuality for religious or other reasons without being called accessories to murder.”

Allow me ask an obvious question: besides anti-gay propaganda that brings out hate filled people to the polls of Prop 8, how else would one interpret having the “right to oppose” homosexuality?

The answer is violence. Far as I’m concered, Ms. Harvey didn’t condemn anything—just the LBGT community, once again. And yes, she IS an accessory to murder!

…a huge proportion even of those who invoke the authority of an “infallible” Bible in their condemnation of gays would be startled into re-thinking their attitudes.—William

Call it P.C. hate mongering, and outrage in the absence of it would not be confined to the class of individuals who consider the Bible the inerrant word of God. A mainstream awareness of the true nature of anti-gay activism would ultimately be the undoing of Linda Harvey, Mission America, and the whole of the RRW attack on civil rights.

That awareness cannot come too soon.

If Linda Harvey were consistent she ought to praise and applaud such attacks on gay people. Fundamentalists insist that the prohibitions of homosexual behaviour in the Mosaic Law are binding on modern Christians. (They justify such ad hoc selection from the Mosaic Law by inventing a fraudulent distinction between “moral”, “ceremonial” and “national” laws, ignoring the clear and repeated reminders throughout the Book of Leviticus that ALL the laws are commands of God and that ALL are to be observed.) And Leviticus 20:13 could not be clearer:

“If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.”

Fundamentalists insist that the story of Sodom in Genesis is historical and that Sodom was destroyed, not for violent inhospitality or for attempted homosexual mass rape, but for homosexual practices per se. So surely anyone who murders gays is to be commended for following God’s example. As Queen Mary of England said in justification of the burning of Protestants, “As the souls of heretics are hereafter to be eternally burning in hell, there can be nothing more proper than for me to imitate the divine vengeance by burning them on earth.”

Furthermore, fundamentalists also insist that Romans 1:26-32 is about homosexual behaviour tout court and that we are still constrained today by St Paul’s very limited understanding of homosexuality. So what does St Paul say?

“Who knowing the judgment of God, that they who commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.”

Why doesn’t Linda Harvey just come out with it honestly and say, “Look, IF that gunman was deliberately targeting gays then he did a damn good job. The only thing that he can perhaps be criticized for is acting ultra vires; but he wouldn’t have had to do that if the Israelis had followed the word of God and instituted the death penalty for homosexual behaviour”? Because I suspect that she knows perfectly well – although she probably hasn’t reasoned it out in such explicit terms – that if she did, a huge proportion even of those who invoke the authority of an “infallible” Bible in their condemnation of gays would be startled into re-thinking their attitudes.

What makes her think we were wrong, or misunderstood HER!?
What makes her think that we don’t know what she really means or is determined to say?

These young people were meeting in peace and fellowship. They were friends, they were doing no harm, nor plotting to.
They represented love and support, not clandestine activity they shouldn’t have been engaged in.
We know EXACTLY what she’s saying.

She just doesn’t like how ugly it is when WE hold up the mirror.

And no Linda Harvey, being gay is NOT a choice. The whole of the scientific community thinks your opinions on the matter to be nonsense. Instead of wallowing in self pity and whining about persecution – as she is doing on her latest blog, on her ludicrous website, it’s high time she realized that she must expect ridicule for her beliefs, since she is not qualified to comment.

What I think sickens me most about her statement is that she’s making a preemptive strike, saying that the gunman’s motive doesn’t matter. She might as well come right out and say “they deserved what they got” because that’s what she’s implying.

It is kids who are told things like this whose teenage years are being stolen from them, as I realise that mine were. At a time when their straight peers are learning to come to terms with their natural sexuality and, hopefully, to express it responsibly, gay teenagers are being morally bullied to repress theirs and to engage in a futile and harmful attempt to get rid of it.

As life slowly slips away, I find myself ever less tolerant of pernicious statements like Linda Harvey’s.