Box Turtle Bulletin

How anti-gays view the world (it ain’t smart and it ain’t pretty)

We generally ignore the rantings that the anti-gay activists write to each other to bolster their resolve to fight on in their lost cause. No one outside of their fellow-thinkers read them and the head-bobbing dolls will never see our challenges to their predetermined beliefs.

But today I think it’s worth exploring both how this crowd perceives the world and how very far from reality they really are. Our example is an article by Peter Heck in which he delivers his response to Don Lemon’s coming out.

Let me start by saying that it can be tempting to believe that folks like Heck are just making a buck off of the ignorance and malice of their audience. And while that might be some part of it, don’t doubt for a second that he really believes what he says. This is his crowd, his social circle, his political allies, this is where he lives his life.

Heck’s worldview is an uncomplicated one. Everyone is easily fitted within a compartment, and there are only two. There are good moral born-again Bible believers, and the evil vile rest of humanity. And everything fits nicely along with everyone. Good is good and done by good people, bad is bad and done by bad people, and there’s no need for any of that liberal, gray-area, situational ethics type of thinking.

Let’s begin.

CNN host Don Lemon recently became the latest in a string of high profile individuals to “come out of the closet” and inform everyone who would listen that he enjoys practicing homosexuality.

Doubtlessly, you too missed the interview in which Lemon talked about how he enjoys practicing homosexuality. Because, of course, it didn’t happen. Lemon didn’t talk about enjoying anything or practicing anything. He simply spoke about the reality that he is a person who is attracted to persons of the same sex and is neither ashamed of that nor seeking to change it. In a word, he’s gay.

But in the world of anti-gays, there is no such thing as a gay person; and in the world of extremist anti-gays, there is no such thing as a same-sex attractions. Anti-gays can only process homosexuality in terms of behavior so everything is presented as though that is what Lemon discussed.

First, why do the very people that constantly tell us that what a person does in their bedroom is no one else’s business, simultaneously find it necessary to inform everyone of what they do in their bedroom? If this is a private matter, Don, then let’s keep it private. Perhaps I’m the only one who feels this way, but frankly, I don’t care to know what kind of sex the evening news anchor is into.

It’s hard to find a response to this, it’s so wrong on so many levels. Unlike Heck, I didn’t hear Lemon’s announcement and suddenly know what kind of sex he is into. I don’t know what goes on in his bedroom, if anything.

But in Heck’s world, just as there are only two “kinds” of people, there are only two “kinds” of sex: that which meets the requirements of his sexual code, and that which does not. And any mention of one’s orientation is an announcement that you have abandoned sanctioned sex and are delighting in practicing debauchery.

But the real purpose of Heck’s rant – and what seems to be a growing trend in anti-gay rants – is to whine and moan about how mistreated are those who seek the legal and societal harm of gay people. Why if “a Bible-believing, born-again follower of Jesus Christ whose faith teaches him that homosexuality is morally improper” simply call a gay person an oddball decadent sexual anarchist, then they are labeled a “hater”!! How intolerant!!

And Heck sees plenty to blame. It’s the fault of gay “proponents of sexual anarchy”, the “uber-leftist Joy Behar” (a Christophobe), Charles Barkley (“whose most famous contribution to his profession was spitting on opposing fans in the crowd”), and “vile and perverted” Lady Gaga. They are the one’s who are calling him names.

And the funny thing is that Peter Heck really doesn’t think that he’s a “hater”.

Yes, everything he writes would give that impression. Words of contempt flow from his keyboard. He dismisses those with whom he disagrees in the meanest possible way. And yet he doesn’t see himself in terms of “hate”. Real love, you see, is that which reminds the sinner of his depravity and warns of eternal punishment. So really anything, anything whatsoever at all, is “loving” provided that it is done by those he considers good.

I believe that a good many people who oppose our equality can be reached, including many in Heck’s target demographic. Yes, they have preconceptions, but they are not completely closed off to facts. They have prejudices, but can over time be persuaded to rethink their views.

But people like Peter Heck are beyond our reach. Their “reality” is impervious to facts, to logic, to reason. They know what they know and nothing is going to dissuade them. Good people already agree with them and the views of those on the evil vile side of humanity are, by definition, wrong.