The words of Karl Marx and the Christian Right

[Jon8503]

By Mel Seesholtz, Ph.D. -- Online Journal Contributing Writer

In 1844 Karl Marx wrote "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people." Those words have much in common with America's "religious" leaders and their politics of oppression.

"Religion," as represented by the leaders of the Christian Right and their supporters, is not the "sigh of the oppressed." It is the Schadenfreude sneer of the oppressor. Every day brings new tirades and efforts by the leaders of the Christian Right to denigrate, demonize and negate gay and lesbian Americans in any way possible. Just type "homosexuality" into the search engines of the Traditional Values Coalition (TVC), Focus on the Family, American Family Association, Family Research Council, or any of the other "Christian" sites and you can see and read, smell and taste the drug-induced oppression and raw hatred.

There's the usual cast of drug dealers. Homophobe extraordinaire Rev. Louis P. Sheldon is busy these days pleading with the faithful to buy his book. The tome's promo proudly proclaims that Sheldon is still hate-mongering using the same old fear tactics and discredited stereotypes and myths: "'The Agenda' describes how homosexual activists plan on recruiting your children into the lifestyle; how they're undermining traditional marriage; and how they will eventually criminalize any public criticism of homosexual conduct." Sheldon and TVC's executive director, Andrea Lafferty, love to depict homosexuals as crazed, inveterate child molesters, but a study by the American Psychological Association reports that "recognized researchers in the field on child abuse . . . almost unanimously concur that homosexual people are actually less likely to approach children sexually."

No doubt James Dobson is preparing a megadose of religious opiates to inject into his veinal video appearance at Tony Perkins' Justice Sunday II, which has as its featured speaker Tom DeLay. And the Christian Right has the nerve to talk about faith-based morality and ethics?

Over at the American Family Association, chairman Don Wildmon is buzzing and boycotting any company that treats (or threatens to treat) its gay and lesbian employees equally: "The chairman of the American Family Association says consumers need to know which companies are actively promoting homosexuality." Some of his more recent targets include Eastman Kodak, Kraft Foods, Ford Motor Company, Citigroup, Pepsico, Merck and Company, Allstate Insurance, and the Coca-Cola Company D&T USA (Deloitte and Touche), Kaiser Permanente, and Visteon Corporation. What these companies are promoting, Rev. Wildmon, is "equality" and "social justice." What are you promoting?

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Theocracy_Alert/080905Seesholtz/080905seesholtz.html

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. social justice is alien to the AFA's way of life.

So these two gays walk into a chapel and get married.

"HORRORS! OH NO! My society is collapsing. I can feel it, I can feel. Frank, stop! Stop, Frank. Stop. I can feel it!"

Unbelievable. The AFA and its fellow organizations prime examples of Karl Marx being right.

[liberalitch]

2. Words from graucho marx on any organized anything....

I would never belong to a club that would have me as a member


he also thought that peter o'toole had a double phallic name