Box Turtle Bulletin

John Gibson Update

John Gibson continued to heap more insults on yesterday’s radio broadcast. But today, his tune has changed considerably for the better. “I’m sorry that some took my comments as anti-gay and insensitive. … Once again, to anyone offended by my comments, I’m sorry. But I’m also sorry that Heath Ledger is no longer alive and with us.”

We gave John Gibson the LaBarbera Award this morning for his comments mocking actor Heath Ledger’s untimely death. But now, even with this half-hearted non-apology “apology,” it looks like John Gibson has demonstrated himself to be a much bigger man than Peter LaBarbera, in whose honor the award was christened. I don’t think I’ve ever seen LaBarbera actually apologize — not even half-heartedly — for  much of anything.

Update, 1/26: Now that it’s a nice Saturday morning, I’ve had time to re-read this post and agree with the commenters. This isn’t much of an apology. I’ve updated the post accordingly as shown in italics.

LaBarbera Award: John Gibson

Whenever misfortune befalls anyone in the gay community, there is a small band of anti-gay extremists we can count on to exploit that news to make cheap political points. When tragic news comes around, we know we will be hearing from these demagogues in very short order. It’s not a matter of if, but when. They’ve shown themselves to be pretty reliable that way. No “Oh gee, we’re sorry” or “How can I help?” but a parade of press releases and media appearances saying “A-ha!” while friends and families grieve.

As Timothy Kincaid observed in a recent comment, it’s hard to imagine a better definition of evil than finding joy in other people’s suffering. And on seeing the behavior of some people over the years, it’s hard to believe that deep in their hearts that they did’t experience a moment of abject glee upon hearing the news.

If there is a smidgen of a silver lining, it’s that most of these demagogues remain on the fringe and their yawps are often nothing more than pathetic attempts to draw attention to themselves. But not yesterday. Yesterday, we heard a major media figure, John Gibson, whose programs appear on radio and television coast-to-coast, find glee in the death of a young actor and devoted father.

On Tuesday, Fox News host John Gibson opened his radio show with funeral music, followed by callous jokes about the death of actor Heath Ledger, who played the role of Ennis Del Mar in the landmark 2005 movie Brokeback Mountain. Gibson played an audio clip of Ledger’s famous line from a pivotal scene, “I wish I knew how to quit you,” and replied, “Well, we found out how to quit you.” He laughed then played another clip of Ledger saying “We’re dead,” followed by his own mocking “We’re dead,” followed by Ledger’s clip again. (Think Progress has the audio.)

What fun he must have had making fun of dead gays — no, not dead gays, but dead straight actors who portray gay characters. You see, the level of discourse in this country has plummeted so badly that you don’t even have to be gay to be targeted. The sad fact is that LGBT’s can be treated this way and too often the outrage doesn’t go much beyond the LGBT community. But today, you don’t even have to be gay to be singled out for abuse.

We all should be outraged when someone mocks another person’s suffering, no matter who’s suffering. But if our greater society cannot find a way to be outraged over the abuse heaped upon the grieving family, friends and the young daughter of a straight man, then we’re far worse off than anybody has wanted to admit publicly so far.

You can register your outrage at Fox News. Let’s hope they listen.

Update: John Gibson continued to heap more insults on yesterday’s radio broadcast. But today, his tune has changed considerably for the better. “I’m sorry that some took my comments as anti-gay and insensitive. … Once again, to anyone offended by my comments, I’m sorry. But I’m also sorry that Heath Ledger is no longer alive and with us.”

LaBarbera Award: Mike Huckabee

We reported earlier on former Arkansas governor and GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee’s 1992 remarks on AIDS, in which he called for the “isolation” (thus avoiding the “q” word) of “AIDS carriers” — presumably all 253,448 people with AIDS known to exist in 1992. When asked about those remarks last week, Huckabee refused to back down. That storm barely had time to blow over before other outrageous anti-gay comments began to emerge. Some of these comments border on the harmlessly ill-informed, like this one from the New York Times:

The governor regards 1968 as the dawning of ”the age of the birth-control pill, free love, gay sex, the drug culture and reckless disregard for standards.” The Rolling Stones album ”Their Satanic Majesties Request” provided the soundtrack for that annus terribilis. But Mike Huckabee wanted me to know that he believes in the separation of church and stage.

But others, like his AIDS comment earlier, have a ring of menace to them. David Corn at Mother Jones found this gem in Huckabee’s 1998 book, Kids Who Kill:

In lamenting the “cultural conflicts” besetting the country, he wrote, “Abortion, environmentalism, AIDS, pornography, drug abuse, and homosexual activism have fragmented and polarized our communities.”

Why was he lumping environmentalism with activities he considered sinful? He did not explain further. A few pages later, Huckabee complained, “It is now difficult to keep track of the vast array of publicly endorsed and institutionally supported aberrations—from homosexuality and pedophilia to sadomasochism and necrophilia.”

Institutionally supported pedophilia and sadomasochism? Institutionally suppored necrophilia? What “institional support” could he possibly be talking about?

Huckabee said his views on AIDS haven’t changed much since 1992. What about his lumping homosexuality with pedephilia and necrophilia? Joe Carter, Huckabee’s director of research, tried to clarify Huckabee’s remarks:

“He’s not equating homosexuality with necrophilia,” Carter told us. “He’s saying there’s a range of aberrant behavior. He considers homosexuality aberrant, but that’s at one end of the spectrum. Necrophilia is at the other end.”

So homosexuality is in the same class as necrophilia, but we’re just not as bad. As with his AIDS comment, Huckabee stands by this one too. And for that, Gov. Mike Huckabee is today’s LaBarbera Award winner.

The LaBarbera Award: Tony Perkins

Good Lord, what should we make of this? I received an FRC Action E-mail from Tony Perkins, as I often do. There’s an article praising Mike Huckabee, there’s another one chastising Congress, and then at the bottom, Perkins says this:

An Assault On Faith
It is hard not to draw a line between the hostility that is being fomented in our culture from some in the secular media toward Christians and evangelicals in particular and the acts of violence that took place in Colorado yesterday. But I will say no more for now other than that our friends at New Life Church and YWAM are in our thoughts and prayers.

It looks like Perkins has been chomping at the bit to pin the blame for the Colorado shootings on somebody he doesn’t like. When it comes to culture wars, nobody is safe, and no tragedy is off-limits for exploitation. Here he chose the old familiar bogeyman, “the secular media.” We’re lucky I guess. It could have just as easily been anyone else.

I’m not sure how Perkins found it so easy to “draw a line” between the secular media and Matthew Murray, the Christian-raised guy who actually did the shooting. Unlike the FRC, we won’t imagine any lines where none exist. (Update: The most direct line so far may be mental illness.) And we call on the Family “Research” Council to live up to its name and do a little research before releasing statements that are so patently moronic. Why, they’re beginning to sound like someone else we know…

Here is a screenshot of the E-mail. Click on it to see the full-size version.

See also:
Colorado Gunman Scared Co-Workers, Heard Voices
The LaBarbera Award: Tony Perkins
Prayers and Condolences for Arvada and Colorado Springs
Four Shot At New Life Church
Two Christian Missionaries Killed, Two Injured Near Denver

Why We Have A LaBarbera Award

Peter LaBarbera invited the world to attend a news conference at the National Press Club today to premiere his documentary on the Folsom Street fair. Fewer than ten people showed up, and most of them appeared to know LaBarbera or Concerned Woman Matt Barber. There were maybe two journalists, one of whom was the Washington Blade’s Rebecca Armendariz. Amazingly, Rebecca lived to tell about it. This part was my favorite:

And Peter REALLY hates the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, who were a prevalent force at Folsom Street. …LaBarbera, though, said that even though the Sisters do charity work, “We wouldn’t tolerate a Nazi charity fund.” NEWSFLASH: The Nazis killed millions of people. This gay rights organization raises money for AIDS research, breast cancer and the arts, among countless other charities. When he made that comparison, my mouth dropped.

You see, statements like that are why we have a LaBarbera Award. There are many imitators and pretenders, but Peter’s the real deal.

LaBarbera Award: PFOX’s Gabriel Espinosa

It’s been a long time since I gave one of these out. I almost thought I’d have to retire it. What was I thinking?

Another PFOX member is the latest proud recipient of the LaBarbera Award. This time, it goes to Gabriel Espinosa, who is PFOX President Reginna Grigg’s right hand woman and PFOX webmaster.

The Montgomery County (Maryland) Council is considering a new gender identity nondiscrimination bill, which has generated a lot of heated debate. JimK at TeachTheFacts.org has published a couple of letters from the far-right fringe in opposition to the proposed measure. The sticking point is over men’s and women’s restrooms — who should be allowed to go into which one. Gabriel joined in with her cahrming little note, reportedly done up in about a 40-point font. Please exuse the French:

Bill 23-07

Allowing men who think they’re women into women’s bathrooms and locker rooms?

ARE YOU PEOPLE OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MINDS?

Hopefully, it will be one of your daughters who gets raped first!

Sincerely Yours,
Gabriel Espinosa
President
Furryllama Media Productions

Congratulations to PFOX’s Gabriel Espinosa, today’s LaBarbera Award winner!

The LaBarbera Award: PFOX’s Regina Griggs

Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays (PFOX) Executive Director Regina Griggs has long co-opted the status of a persecuted minority by describing a strange parallel universe where homosexuality is perfectly accepted and it’s the ex-gays who experience “discrimination.” Her organization works aggressively against gays and lesbian families at all levels, but if anyone expresses any opposition to her efforts they are labeled as engaging in “discrimination against the ex-gay community.” She’s even positioned “ex-gay” as another kind of orientation. To support this line of argument, Griggs has a long history of blowing criticisms out of proportion to prop up the idea that the so-called “ex-gay community” is a persecuted minority under constant siege.

In her most recent example, Griggs claimed that members of her PFOX organization were “attacked” at the Arlington, Va County Fair:

As happens every year, gay activists disrupted our booth activities. They screamed obscenities, threw our materials from the exhibit table to the ground, insisted we recognize their same-sex “spouses,” demanded that PFOX leave, and hit a PFOX volunteer because he is ex-gay.
…
One gay man went so far as to hit our ex-gay volunteer because he refused to recant his ex-gay testimony. We summoned a police officer, who ejected the gay man off of the fairgrounds. Our ex-gay volunteer decided not to press assault charges against the gay man because he wanted to turn the other check as Jesus had done.

This is not the first year that PFOX has had to summon the police for protection from gay activists.

This story was picked up all around the anti-gay circuit, including Focus on the Family’s Citizenlink webzine and Family News In Focus radio program. But it appears that this incident didn’t really happen. Ex-Gay Watch’s David Roberts did some digging and has the story:

Since PFOX stated that the police were “summoned” and that they “ejected the gay man off the fairgrounds” we decided to check with the Arlington County Police Department…

We contacted the Arlington PD and ended up speaking with John Lisle of the Media Relations/Legislative Affairs Office. He had no initial knowledge of such an incident. After checking briefly, he again said that no one was aware of such an incident. So we sent a copy of the PFOX statement to him at which time he agreed to check more thoroughly. After over two days of research, there was nothing he could add to his statement; no report exists and no one recalls such an incident.

David Roberts also learned that Arlington County Fair officials hadn’t heard of any problems either. In a follow-up story, he reported:

Yesterday, we spoke with Jackie Abrams, Vice Chair of the Arlington County Fair. According to Abrams, no physical altercation occurred, police were never called and no one was ejected from the fairgrounds – she was emphatic and certain. “I was in radio contact with the other board members during the Fair, and definitely would have known if the police had been summoned. It did not happen [her emphasis],” said Abrams. She added that her calls to PFOX, and specifically to PFOX president Regina Griggs, had gone unanswered.

David Roberts also spoke with two eyewitnesses who worked at nearby booths. Each reported an incident of a heated discussion, but neither of them saw anything physical — no shoving, no hitting, no police or fair officials escorting anyone off the property.

In other words, there is no shred of evidence that anything happened the way Griggs describe it. In fact, all evidence suggests that this is just another one of her many attention-grabbing stunts.

This isn’t the first time Griggs has claimed victimhood status for ex-gays. It’s been a long-running theme of hers, and she’s been very diligent in coopting the experience and the language of the gay rights movement. One of her best examples can be found in this letter she sent to the APA last March:

The ex-gay movement is a civil rights movement to ensure the inclusion of former homosexuals in all realms of society and to support the ex-gay community’s equal access to schools on the same level as gays currently enjoy. Ex-gays and their supporters should not have to be closeted for fear of other’s negative reactions or disapproval. They do not think something is wrong with them because they decided to fulfill their heterosexual potential. Nor do they believe others should condemn them for the personal decision they have made for their lives. Because of the abuse heaped upon them by society, former homosexuals experience discrimination at every level.

The PFOX website’s “About” page has more examples where the “ex-gay community” experiences “abuse heaped upon them by society.” And in the most amazing turn of logic, they go so far as to claim that anti-discrimination and hate crime laws which identify sexual orientation as a factor for protection somehow “legitimize intolerance against former homosexuals” — a notion that is both ludicrous and blatantly false. The fact is, these laws protect everyone regardless of sexual orientation — including non-gays of all stripes, ex-gays among them.

But it’s the last point which makes Grigg’s hysterical notions of “discrimination at every level” so particularly outrageous. Terrance Heath recently began a huge undertaking with the LGBT Hate Crimes Project, and if Grigg’s really wanted to understand the face of intolerance, she should look at a few of these examples:

• Michelle Abdill and Rhonda Ellis of Medford, Oregon were shot execution style on December 4, 1995 by Robert Acremant, who wrote a letter to his hometown newspaper saying that it was easier to kill them knowing they were lesbians.

• Gary Matson and Winfield Mowder of Redding, California were murdered on July 1, 1999 by white supremacist brothers Benjamin Matthew Williams and James Tyler Williams, who confessed to killing the couple because they were gay.

• Author Warren, a developmentally disabled gay man from Grant Town, West Virginia, was murdered on July 3, 2000 by two teenagers. After kicking and beating him, they drove him to the edge of town ran over him four times to disguise his death as a hit-and-run.

• Guin “Richie” Phillips disappeared on June 17, 2003. His body was found on June 25, 2003, stuffed in a suitcase in Rough River Lake. During Joshua Cottrell’s trial, Cottrell’s aunt and cousin testified that he planned to kill Phillips because he was gay.

• Michael Sandy died on October 13, 2006 after being hit by a car while trying to escape four attackers. His attackers later said they targeted Sandy because they were seeking gays to attack and rob.

Griggs might do well to consider that a little bit of perspective is in order. There were 1,171 hate crime incidents in 2005 based on sexual orientation. Twenty-three of those crimes were anti-heterosexual. It’s quite possible that a few ex-gays might be caught up in that mix. If so, those crimes are every bit as deplorable as the other 1,148. But to try to compare the “ex-gay community’s” experience with the very real discrimination and harassment that gays and lesbians experience across the country is beyond offensive.

If the “ex-gay community” has experienced abuse and discrimination “at every level,” where are the ex-gays who were kicked out of the military for being ex-gay? Where are the ex-gays who have been fired from their jobs because they were ex-gay? Where is their answer to Daniel Fetty?

The “ex-gay community” should consider themselves blessed that they have no such answer.

But Regina Griggs isn’t interested in counting blessings. Instead, she’d rather count something else. Notice how she ends her rant about the Arlington County Fair:

… Almost every day we are on the front lines suffering harassment and injustices merely because we demand our equal rights.

The public eats up our information because they have never been exposed to factual truth about same-sex attractions. Teens especially are eager for our educational literature. But our brochures and flyers cost money to print. We also have to pay for exhibit fees and travel. If you would like to help with costs, please make a tax deductible donation to …

Nice. Milking a non-event using hysterical hyperbole to raise money. The LaBarbera Award was created to highlight “the most outrageous, offensive, malevolent, crazy, or excessive statement or claim.” Regina Griggs more than earned the award just on her latest drama-queen antics alone. Capping them with a fundraising appeal is just the rhetorical equivalent of running up the score. Congratulations, Regina. You’ll be a hard act to follow.

PFOX is an Exodus member ministry.