Tennessee Gets The Call: Slouching Towards Africa, The Lou Engle-Honored State Proudly Touts The Right To Bully

Over four year ago, the state of Tennessee made a proclamation raising "prophet" Lou Engle to genuine religious icon status:

On April 9th, 2007 the One Hundred Fifth General Assembly of the State of Tennessee and the House of Representatives passed a resolution recognizing and blessing TheCall and Lou Engle, passed by the Tennessee state legislature.
A resolution is a deeper legislative act than a "proclamation". A resolution carries more weight of authority, and goes through a more complicated legal process before passing.

And now, Tennessee - the state that never got over the Scopes trial* - is emulating Engle's work in Africa by pushing a bill that would definitely make it OK to bully gays in schools - for religious purposes, of course.

Harassment, intimidation, or bullying prevention task forces, programs, and other initiatives formed by school districts, including any curriculum adopted for such purposes, shall not include materials or training that explicitly or implicitly promote a political agenda, make the characteristics of the victim the focus rather than the conduct of the person engaged in harassment, intimidation, or bullying, or teach or suggest that certain beliefs or viewpoints are discriminatory when an act or practice based on such belief or viewpoint is not a discriminatory practice as defined in 4-21-102(4).

Last July, Gov. Bill Haslam signed into law a measure that prohibits local districts from passing and enforcing any anti-discrimination laws stricter than the ones set down by the state of Tennessee (hint: the state doesn't have any real anti-discrimination laws). The state legislature also created a firestorm in prohibiting educators from discussing homosexuality in schools with the infamous "Don't Say Gay" bill (see video below).

Tennessee has been known for years to house anti-gay hate-mongers ala Fred Phelps, people like Glynis Bethel who pepper-sprayed a woman who protested her anti-gay preaching, then pepper-sprayed the police who took her into custody. And the country made note of the gay bashing attacked instigated by one young man's own preacher father. But the latest attempt by the Tennessee legislature to allow anti-gay bullying is considered a step back in time and culture. Or in a lock-step with the likes of Uganda.

Too Close To Home


But while leaders of the anti-gay movement in Uganda were spurred on by the likes of Lou Engle and The Call (his ministry), the efforts of Engle and his followers in the U.S. have garnered attention mainly for their anti-Muslim attacks, side-lining their influence in local governments like the counties of Tennessee on issues of anti-gay discrimination.


So just who is supporting the bill?


FACT (?)

The leading proponent of the bill is the Family Action Council of Tennessee, a social conservative group linked to Focus On The Family and to the virulently anti-gay Family Research Council. And the leader of FACT is former Republican state senator, David Fowler who now admits that he has helped create a firestorm, but seems to be rather proud of it: In an interview, Fowler said, "the purpose is to stop bullying, not create special classes of people who are more important than others."

In the past, the denial of Fowler and FACT concerning anti-gay bullying in the suicide of teen Jacob Rogers demonstrated how uncompromising in its attitude towards teen sexual identity many people in Tennessee are:

The Nashville Scene reported that, according to FACT, Rogers' suicide was a result of "the rotten fruit of the all-about-me individualist culture that comes when we deny the existence of God and his image in us."

But for some people, the way to stop bullying is to yank the kids of FACT's families out of school: "You're going to hell" is a common bullying tactic too often heard by gay teens across the country and it is this particular tactic that FACT wants to preserve.

Because Tennessee has over 35 designated hate groups in the state, it ranks as one of the most serious outposts of hate in the country per capita.**

FACT will definitely make the total 36.

*Rhea county, where the Scopes Trial was held, celebrates Scopes' conviction annually. It is also the county that tried to get the state to pass a resolution allowing it to criminalize homosexuality.
**According to the Southern Poverty Law Center. There are 9 KKK affiliates in the state.

And finally, the rhetoric of Lou Engle:


If we’re struggling with a homosexual, same-sex desire, LET THE BIBLE KILL YOU, rather than make it easier for you, and say well, there must be a better scriptural answer to this …

Mike Huckabee: "Now Queers Will Cause More "Deadbeat Dads!!"

Mike Huckabee just might be losing it:

"When the voters are so overwhelmingly [supportive of DOMA] what does the president believe he knows that citizens in all these other states don't," Huckabee said. Huckabee opposes gay marriage on the grounds that, according to him, it destroys traditional families. "There is a quantified impact of broken families," Huckabee said. "[There is a] $300 billion dad deficit in America every year...that's the amount of money that we spend as taxpayers to pick up the pieces because dads are derelict in their duties."

The connection? Are gay men luring straight men away from their families to the point that we spend $300 billion on single moms? 

Sorry girls, take a good look at that husband of yours!

The Blatant Bigotry At CPAC: The Anger, The Arrogance And A Distinct Lack Of Reasoning

It's over a week since this event happened. It went viral almost immediately. Millions have already seen it. Why am I writing about it? Simply to state this:

THERE  ARE  MORE  WHERE  RYAN SORBA  CAME  FROM

A young Right-wingnut disguised as a budding conservative ala William F. Buckley (who would NOT have approved) aroused anger, shame, boos, disgust and yes, a small amount of applause. No one had expected his arrogant tirade. He was very proud of it. With the first sentence, he proved that Republicans still have not mastered the art of vetting. The event is best told in short points:

• Alexander McCobin of Students for Liberty thanks CPAC for including GOProud as a sponsor...
• McCobin is booed by several members of the audience...
• Including (admittedly): Ryan Sorba, representing ...
• California Young Americans For Freedom ...
• Sorba is introduced next as the young man who appeared on Glenn Beck's show for the wrong reasons and ...
• Was supposed to tell his story...
• The first words out of his mouth...
• "I'd like to condemn CPAC for accepting GOProud"...
• It was met with a chorus of boos...
• To which he said "I love it!"

Forget the booing. It's PC. Yes, for once, booing was politically correct. A bunch of CPAC arch-conservatives would have cheered, but people were recording his sage words, so how should they have reacted? They also heard the boos for McCobin and didn't want to go down that path by cheering Sorba.

And the saga doesn't end with Sorba's words at the podium.

He gave TWO interviews.

One ended in an ugly manner and should be quoted verbatim by gay reporter Alex Knepper of Race 4 2012.

He [Sorba] said at around this point that he needed to go, and put out his hand to say goodbye. I stared at him, refusing to shake his hand, and he said “Well, I don’t really want to shake your hand, you’re intrinsically evil.”

When we reached the area near the escalator downstairs, he turned on his camera. I put out my arms, striking a mocking pose, but realized he kept holding the camera at me.

“Wait, are you recording or taking a picture?” He was recording.

“Ah! OK…Well, I’d like to say, then, that the person behind the camera is a Hitler Youth waiting for a fuhrer to sweep him off his feet into a grand national project so he can sacrifice individuals like stock-fodder to his own biases.”

He turned off the camera and approached me. I told him he should get his girlfriend to give him a blowjob so that he could experience the joys of sodomy. He put two of his fingers an inch from my face and said that he’d want to fight me if a girl wasn’t around. “Ah, the use of force!” I said again.

The full exchange can be read HERE. This was not the first time Sorba's speech caused a stir. Recall that he cited protesting lesbians at Smith College. He was referring to a three-year-old incident at Smith where he was supposed to speak on the "Born Again Hoax". The theme for his speech was supposedly culled from his "forthcoming" book of the same title. Protesters stormed the hall in which he was speaking and he was ushered out ("for his own safety"). He's been living on that story ever since, it seems.  

The irony here lies in the possibility that the "hoax" may be Sorba himself. The only available copy of his "book" is HERE. It is not listed in Amazon.com (which many times even lists out-of-print books). It was copywrighted in 2007. The first chapter and the last three chapters are labeled "tbc" presumably because they are not under copywright yet, but they are important chapters and are missing. But the biggest problems with this 95-page pamphlet/book: no bibliography and no index. Sorba thinks that his brain and his brain alone should be taken as the temple of truth. This man who prides himself on spewing pure Aristotilian rhetoric is himself unreasonable, expecting everyone to take him and his arrogance at face value simply because HE says he's using reason. He makes statements, then immediately storms off because he is cowardly. Bravado, it seems, is not his forte.
 

The second interview he gave that day is below. Again, his bravado does not extend to allowing himself to be photographed for some inexplicable reason. You are allowed to laugh at his statement "I don't hate anybody."  

Remember this message: Ryan Sorba is not alone. He may seem like a one-man hate group masquerading as an intelligent neo-conservative, but he has supporters out there - somewhere.

Drama Queens: New Research 2000 Poll Shows 30% of Republicans To Be Reactionary And Irrational

You've got to hand it to Christofascists and Right Wingnuts - they scream and rant and explode and stomp and faint and cry, well, they're just the greatest emoting animals on the planet! Their rhetoric makes every day Halloween with images of political demons and hellish moral catastrophes. They defend us all (yes, the sinners too!) with buzzwords that sting their enemies, like "God" "Bible" "Hell" "Satan" "Taxes" and "Tinky Winky!" They expand hyperboles, sometimes going on into infinity: "Throughout the history of mankind!" "They'll burn in hell - FOREVER!" "Your children and your children's children and their children's children will never, ever see the end of paying for this disastrous bill!"

They have deep-seated persecution complexes and are the biggest source of conspiracy theories. Meeting Democrats at a party makes them spout doom and gloom: they will never again see the return of Eisenhower's 50's or Reagan's 80's! Things were so much, much better!

Now a new poll conducted by Research 2000 released today shows us that:



39% of Republicans want President Obama to be impeached.

63% think Obama is a socialist.

52% do not believe Obama was born in the United States.

21% think ACORN stole the 2008 election --

AND EVEN SCARIER:

53% think Sarah Palin is more qualified than Obama to be president.

23% want to secede from the United States.

73% think gay people should not be allowed to teach in public schools.

31% want contraception to be outlawed

The poll

The last several weeks were particularly active and agitating weeks for Christofascists: the Prop 8 trial and, well, just about everything else.

The first one may not be classified as a "rant" because it's more like severe contempt, but it gets the party started:

On Haiti:

Right Wing Watch

Mark Krikorian, director of the predictably anti-immigrant Center for Immigration Studies (CIS)

My guess is that Haiti’s so screwed up because it wasn’t colonized long enough.

Then, of course, there was Maggie Gallagher of NOM:

When this trial [Prop 8] began I told you: gay marriage activists were putting 7 million Californians on trial. But this week it got worse: They are clearly putting Christianity itself on trial. Why else have an expert read statements of Catholic and Southern Baptist doctrines into the record?

Bill Donahue, borrowing a trite and erroneous statement from Rick Warren:

Society cannot exist without families; families cannot exist without reproduction; reproduction cannot exist without a sexual union between a man and a woman; and every society in the history of the world has created an institution called marriage to provide for this end.

And Tony Perkins of Family Research Council showed us that when you're feeling frustrated and desperate, it's time to call the other side DESPERATE!

The desperation of the Left
January 22, 2010 | Share with Friends

Dear Daniel,

The Left is preparing a desperate 120-day ASSAULT on your values to appease its CULTURE OF DEATH, ANTI-MARRIAGE political base before the 2010 election campaigns begin.

And Family Research Council (FRC) is preparing to meet that BLITZ head-on.

Perkins' wild pronouncements included: (the good guys)

Reclaiming marriage
Defending innocent human life
Protecting children

(the bad guys)

radical agenda
Silencing faith
Silencing Christian and conservative radio

And ending with:

2010 is a turning-point year for faith, family, and freedom!!!.

And from another part of the globe, we have a drama queen's rant coming from the new archbishop of Belgium, Andre-Joseph Leonard:

"Homosexuality is not the same as normal sex in the same way that anorexia is not a normal appetite."

Drama. Irrational, baseless drama. Unfortunately their drama will create REAL drama.