Contact
Subscribe


Bigotry's Deep Pocket

Nov 7, 2008
By .
Politics & Current Events

The "Yes on Proposition 8" Campaign was heavily financed by forces within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, more frequently known as the Mormons. (More precisely, Mormon leaders urged followers to donate to the campaign — including from out of state — and Mormons did, reportedly to the tune of $20 million. In the wake of the passage of Prop 8, there have been bitter protests outside the Mormon temple in Westwood. And an independent group supporting the No on 8 campaign released a very hard-hitting advertisement on the subject that infuriated Mormons:

A commercial opposing Proposition 8 also drew criticism. In it, two actors portraying Mormon missionaries forced their way into the well-kept home of a married lesbian couple.

"Hi, we're here from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," one says.

"We're here to take away your rights," says his partner.

The missionaries then rip the wedding rings from the women's fingers and ransack their house until they find the women's marriage license, which they destroy.

"Hey, we have rights," one of the women says.

"Not if we can help it," answers the missionary.

That's rough, and the Mormons and No on 8 supporters call it bigotry. I think it's fair comment. If a church urges it members to support a particular political position financially, then attributing that position to the church is entirely appropriate.

Kip at a Stitch in Haste has a understandably angry piece about LDS involvement in Prop 8 that is well worth reading. I wouldn't use and don't condone some of Kip's language about religion, but share his view that the LDS leadership now calling for healing is outrageous and contemptible. The LDS church has cast the die; it has chosen to use its power with its supporters to generate vast financial support for a measure calculated to prevent people who love each other from getting married. The dark dreams of McCain/Feingold aside, its supporters have that right. But now the church and its supporters are marked. History, and the people of California, will remember and judge them accordingly.

If you want to be loved, don't be hate's piggy bank.

Edit: Via John Scalzi, a fun and constructive way to make your voice heard.

Edited again: For a dissenting view, see the Volokh Conspiracy.

Last 5 posts by Ken

13 Comments
Tags , ,

12 Comments

  1. Ezra  •  Nov 7, 2008 @11:01 am

    Noted Bay Area mormon Steve Young went out of his way to put a No on 8 sign up at his house (although, come to think of it, he might just have been covering his tail…)

  2. gbasden  •  Nov 7, 2008 @11:24 am

    Man, it's good to see you back. I forget how much I enjoy reading your work until it disappears for awhile.

  3. Eduardo  •  Nov 7, 2008 @2:42 pm

    The Boy Scouts have been anti-queer thanks to the LDS for quite a while now.
    AND they get public money to do so.

  4. Al  •  Nov 7, 2008 @7:53 pm

    I think this anger is a little misplaced. Prop 8 wouldn't have passed if 70% of black voters didn't vote for it. Given the history of marriage in this country over just the past sixty years, that's the one community that one would think would be more sympathetic or at least more reluctant to suppress another minority's rights.

  5. Patrick  •  Nov 7, 2008 @7:58 pm

    Black people are slow, dumb brutes, easily manipulated by fiendish white people of sinister alien faiths. You can't blame them, for they know not what they do.

  6. Malachite  •  Nov 8, 2008 @11:42 am

    Actually, white people are slow, dumb brutes, easily manipulated by fiendish white people of sinister alien faiths, as evidenced by the number of yes on 8 signs in my white neighbor's suburban yards. And yes, I do think they were manipulated by large amounts of money that were well spent on advertisements full of lies.

    My evidence for that – the number of white neighbors and family members I've talked to who told me how Teh Gays were going to be able to sue churches to make them perform gay marriages, how kindergarteners were going to be taught homosexuality, etc. They assured me that they don't HATE the gays, of course, they're just trying to protect their children, churches, etc from lawsuits and so forth.

    When I pointed out that the Catholic church has never been forced to marry divorced people, they were surprised. When I asked them why they thought kindergartners would be taught homosexuality when they aren't taught heterosexuality, they were stumped. When I pointed out that the lawsuits the "Yes" campaign described happened in states that did NOT have legal gay marriage, and so had nothing to do with legalization of gay marriage, they were dumbfounded.

    And when I asked them why they would believe the things they were telling me, they explained how they'd seen an ad, been mailed a flier, etc.

    So yes, I do think it's completely reasonable for pissed off, forcibly dis-married people to protest against the group that was significantly responsible for financing an incredibly dishonest propaganda campaign.

    -a white, straight, married mother of a kindergartner, who believes that discrimination and prejudice are NOT good family values

  7. David  •  Nov 8, 2008 @6:27 pm

    There is lots of mis-information regarding the funding for Prop. 8. Both sides raised roughly equal amounts (approx. $35 million each) with either side having around $10 Million in out of state funding. Check out the stats at the LA Times website, and search for the big donations anywhere in the country. The founders of the former WordPerfect were the only "big" donors from Utah: Alan Ashton giving $1 million for the YES side and Bruce Bastion giving 1 million plus for the NO camp.

  8. David  •  Nov 9, 2008 @1:26 pm

    How strange that the WordPress software doesn't prevent username collisions.

  9. Chris  •  Nov 10, 2008 @6:48 pm

    It would be a royal pain if it prevented collisions with commenters. There's no authentication mechanism in place, so you have no way to prove you're you, and it would be relatively easy to hit a blog with comments from the 500 most common names and all the usernames in the forum. Presto – commenting killed. If you require your commenters to register and login you can stop collisions, but not really otherwise.

  10. Hershel Goldberg  •  Nov 15, 2008 @8:42 pm

    the Mormon (Moron?) Church is a cult full of real fruitcakes and the only baptism for them is to drown themselves in a toilet bowl.
    Anyone who would use the excuse of their religion to deny any minorities of their civil and equal rights is nothing but a t—t to be flushed down a toilet. We ought to pass a law that Mormans should not be able to marry because they are mentally unfit to know what they are doing. The only thing they will understand is for every true American is to picket their ungodly churches through out American every Sunday year around saying "Marriage is between civilized people regardless of sex."

  11. Ken  •  Nov 16, 2008 @1:27 pm

    Hershel, being a dick about religion is not the answer. Outrage that a particular church or group orchestrated a morally repugnant campaign is legitimate and understandable. Expanding that into a bigot-trope filled attack on the entire religion, or members thereof, is contemptible. Don't be a dick.

  12. Grandy  •  Nov 18, 2008 @6:20 am

    God I love the smell of 'sploded sarcasmines in the morning.

1 Trackback