Behind flaps, debate flares over teaching kids tolerance of gays

[truthpusher]

http://www.masslive.com/newsflash/mass/index.ssf?/base/news-15/1107375462144420.xml&storylist=massnews

Behind flaps, debate flares over teaching kids tolerance of gays

2/2/2005, 3:15 p.m. ET
By DAVID CRARY
The Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP)

(snip)

The liberal camp argues that even young children should learn that intolerance based on sexual identity is wrong, and that gays are as legitimate a part of the national mosaic as anyone else.

"It's about creating awareness and understanding of people who are different," said Joan Garry of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. "Why shouldn't that be a good thing for America's young people?"

The conservative camp has responded vehemently: By all means, teach children to respect other individuals, but do not cross the line and teach them that homosexuality is acceptable.

"Tolerance itself can be a very dangerous word," said the Rev. Terry Fox, a Southern Baptist pastor in Wichita, Kan. "Tolerance gives the public schools an avenue to literally brainwash our kids that every lifestyle is OK."

complete article:
http://www.masslive.com/newsflash/mass/index.ssf?/base/news-15/1107375462144420.xml&storylist=massnews

[Lautremont]

1. Don't much like that the small-minded prick quoted above

is named Terry Fox. He's a Canadian hero who ran on his stumps.

Now they're trying to lump 'tolerance' in with 'liberal'. We can't let them.

On edit: I mean we can't let them make those out to be bad. Rage has crippled my phraseology.

[rawtribe]

2. Terry Fox has

made Jesus a very dangerous word.... sad

[Smarmie Doofus]

6. I'm not so sure that Jesus hasn't always been a dangerous...

...word. 'Least since Constantine et al. turned him into a pagan god.

[VegasWolf]

3. Ah, so tolerance is a dangerous word, I think fundamental nutcases

believing in sky people are far more dangerous.

[saigon68]

4. They want to make it acceptable to "BEAT UP" the gay man

as in "look Jimmy, there goes a queer faggot."

[marmar]

5. These people are ...

fucking scary, and clearly they feel very empowered right now. There's a full-on cultural war in America.

[Karenina]

7. Make no mistake

The Spongebob flap was NOT about a cartoon character, it was about coloring the words "tolerance" and "diversity" with the brush that slapped its sickening hue over the words "liberal" and "socialism."

[Undercover Owl]

8. homophobes

are proud of their kids when they make fun of people by calling them rude names. It's cool to hate people for being gay.

Homophobes figure the best way to prevent their kids from acting gay is to encourage them to ridicule others who act gay. (Of course it doesn't always work...)

[Lone_Star_Dem]

9. Tolerance=Dangerous

Wow, my dictionary is way off! :eyes:

[peacebird]

10. mine too lonestar

I got lambasted by a cretin for being a vile indecent (sorry forgot all the terms he screamed..) creature. First I was amazed and stunned, then I was merely mortified - to think that people would behave in such a way?

I admit to being puzzled, then I realized it was my "Celebrate Diversity" bumper sticker that got his panties in a wad...

He assumed that to have a rainbow sticker I must be a lesbian, because why would any hetero woman have such a thing.

How very sad. Made me ashamed to be straight.

[Betty]

11. I find religious fundamentalism offensive

but I tolerate others being able to believe in it and espouse it. I am sure it's at least as loathsome a "lifestyle" to me as the so called gay lifestyle is to them.

It's called live and let live, not that these people have any interest in that.

[Merope215]

12. "Lifestyle"?

Has anyone else noticed that they insist on calling homosexuality a lifestyle? I happen to be straight, but it sure didn't seem to me like any of my gay friends woke up one morning and decided to start living "like" gay people. They actually are, in fact, gay people, and they didn't choose that any more than I chose to be straight.

We need to fight this word, "lifestyle." Vegetarianism is a lifestyle, or deciding to live in the city instead of on a farm. Lifestyles are choices, and referring to a sexual identity this way implies that we get to choose our sexuality. Calling homosexuality (or heterosexuality or bisexuality or whatever) a "lifestyle" gives in to the fundies' language framing. Unacceptable. We should start calling it what it is: identity.

These people make me sick.

[Occulus]

15. but you see, it MUST BE a choice, to them,

because the Bible says it's an abomination, and God wouldn't create people who were simply destined to be evil and unclean their whole lives no matter what they did, because God loves all of us....

The day homosexuality is shown to be an inborn, unchangable trait that can't be 'treated' or 'prevented' but simply is is the day the fundies lose the whole war against homosexuals. They know this, which is why they rail about the homosexual 'lifestyle'. It cannot be other than a choice to them.

[arwalden]

13. Faith-Based Bigotry And Hatred... Not Very "Christian" Of Him, Is It?

[Rex]

14. Christ was intolerant of divorce.

He speaks of it all over the place in the Bible. Now, how many of these people who hate tolerance have been married a few times? Whoops, to bad sinner - you're gonna roast in hell! Poor Christ, pissed upon by the people who profess to love him the most. Kinda like log cabin repukicans.

[ninkasi]

16. Ok, so here's my problem...

I keep hearing about the "gay agenda" and the "homosexual lifestyle", and the right wingers and fundies keep warning us against them, and telling us they are trying to convert our children, and all that. So why can't I get a copy of this agenda, so I can see for myself?

I have several gay friends, some who have been friends for over 20 years, and have been with the same partners they had when I met them, and they can't find out, either. Is it, like, a secret, that only certain most holy Southern Baptists and Jerry Falwell and those guys know about?

When my gay friends compare their lives to their hetero friend's lives, they are pretty much the same, you know, go to work, have dinner with family and friends, watch t.v., go on vacation, worry about the sorry state of the world, bicker over whose turn it is to take out the trash, things like that.

I guess tolerance is taboo to the fundies because this so-called gay lifestyle is so cleverly disguised as living pretty much like everybody else except for which sexual identity you happen to be born with, like eye and hair color, that if not for the likes of the Falwells, we would just treat gays and lesbians like we do other human beings. What a dangerous concept. What would the world be like without Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and the rest of them?

Oh...wait a minute...wouldn't that be a better way to live? Well, if intolerance is such a virtue, then I guess it's better to no longer tolerate the fundies; as a matter of fact, I don't.

[Borgnine]

17. Yeah, tolerance is an evil thing.

We would all be much better off if we hated everybody and everything different from us. Let's buy the world a Coke and cram it up their ass.