San Francisco 49ers record anti-gay-bullying spot

[rpannier]

The San Francisco 49ers have become the first NFL team to record a video condemning anti-gay violence and bullying.

San Francisco defenders Donte Whitner, Ahmad Brooks, Isaac Sopoaga and Ricky Jean Francois appear in the spot as part of the "It Gets Better" campaign, which began in 2010 in response to a string of suicides by students bullied over their sexual orientation, The Sacramento Bee reported.

The franchise was encouraged to take part in the campaign by one of its fans, Sean Chapin, who collected 16,000-plus signatures on Change.org asking the 49ers to join the effort. This comes on the heels of the San Francisco Giants becoming the first team in baseball to record an "It Gets Better" video.

link:
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap1000000055038/article/san-francisco-49ers-record-antigaybullying-spot?module=HP11_content_stream

kudos to many of the comments, they're very supportive of the campaign -- at least when I read them. In a few hours or days who knows

on edit: Link also here. I recommend the NFL website as the NFL keeps track of which videos get watched
http://www.itgetsbetter.org/video/entry/9461/

[Enthusiast]

1. The nation is trying to get beyond

bigotry. Most of the nation, with the exception of the Tea Party Republicans.

[rpannier]

2. Best Part of the Video (IMO)

They seem to really believe what they're saying. They don't appear like they're just reading some lines. The NFL has gotten behind this, I've seen where the Packers, Seahawks, Jets and Patriots will likely be the next teams to run spots

[No Elephants]

3. I'm unsure.

Amendments to state constitutions that ban equal marriage have been on the ballot in over half the states and they carry whenever they are on the ballot, as opposed to a state legislature. The bigots have never lost..

Republicans have never abandoned the "Southern strategy," so I imagine they believe that appealing to racism is still working for them. And they developed that in the late sixties and seventies, days upon which I have seen so many Democratic posters look back with nostalgia.

It's funny, just before logging into DU, I was thinking that we have always had racists and bigots and hard-hearted people, but, now, they seem to be proud in public of being that way. I was thinking of the crowd cheering birther allusions--never mind that a presidential nominee made an overt appeal to racism.

Then, there was yelling out approval during the Republican debates at the prospect that an ill person without health insurance should just be allowed to die, untreated.

I don't know that these are all Tea Partiers--or, for that matter, that all Tea Partiers are bigots.

Anyway, I've been looking at reruns of the Ed Sullivan show that PBS has been airing, with the show's carefully dressed, relatively well behaved audience (well, the adults, anyway--who behaved differently from the teens cheering the Beatles).

I cannot imagine those people cheering racism or cold bloodedness in public, where a camera might catch them.

So, I guess I read your post while in the opposite mindset. But my mind is not made up. I am only doing the message board equivalent of musing out loud.

Maybe tomorrow, I will share your view and reject the one I've expressed in this post.

[Enthusiast]

4. You are right, of course, that there will always be bigotry.

In the Southern States they cling to it like it's a dear cherished reminder of an idealized imaginary past. But, as a whole, the nation is making great strides in the area of teh dreaded gay.

I think Tea Partiers are just what they look like. Ignorant, gullible bigots. They are the ones that cherish the old times there that are not forgotten. Just as Confederate soldiers died to preserve the plantation lifestyle that was against their best interests, the Tea Partier of today fights against an imaginary foe that would drag them kicking and screaming into a new progressive age free of bigotry and hatred.

Tea Party ignorance is an effective tool of the Koch Brothers, as such this ignorance is encouraged and carefully cultivated.

[No Elephants]

5. Agree totally.

Also, you cannot legislate social equality, only legal equality. But the latter informs the former.

For example, lynching was on the wane before the divil rights act, but totally disappeared almot immediately afterward. And, thing is, there had been a right to sue for violation of federal rights since the late 1800s but the "separate but equal" decision had prevented those lawsuits until the 1950s Brown v. Board of Ed. decision. I am not sure about lawsuits during the years between Brown v. Board of Ed. and the civil rights act, though.

In any event, even though laws may not eliminate bigotry, I do believe they can help preseve bigotry. As long as government keeps saying that something about gay people is "less than," our laws foster bigotry, even though they outlaw hate crimes. Indeed, Obama's pronouncement on gay marriage alone, even without the force of law. changed many attitudes about it. So, equal rights under law is essential.