-Caveat Lector-
Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.
-- Euripides
PART IV
The Lavender Revolution
The Lavender Revolution
by WIlliam Norman Grigg
Undermining America's traditional values
During the 18th-century French Culture War, which ended in the French
Revolution and the Napoleonic dictatorship, Christian writer Guillaume
Francois Berthier described the fashion in which cultural debates had been
framed: "The custom has been to call 'philosophers' those who attack
revealed religion, and 'persecutors' those who battle for its defense." In
contemporary America a similar custom presently prevails, in which
leftists -- however violent -- are said to represent the forces of
"tolerance," and traditionalists -- however peaceful -- are portrayed as
agents of "hate" and "violence." This double standard is most visible in the
campaign to normalize homosexuality.
In the late 1980s, media analysts Marshall K. Kirk and Erastes Pill
published a book entitled After the Ball, that outlined a media campaign
designed to win public support for the "gay rights" revolution. Noted the
authors, "The first order of business is the desensitization of the American
public concerning gays and gay rights. To desensitize the public is to help
it view homosexuality with indifference rather than keen emotion .... You
can forget about trying to persuade the masses that homosexuality is a good
thing. But if only you can get them to think that it is just another thing
... then your battle for legal and social rights is virtually won."
According to Kirk and Pill, once the public has been persuaded that moral
indifference is a virtue, homosexuals would be able to use the mass media to
"portray gays as victims, not as aggressive challengers. In any campaign to
win over the public, gays must be cast as victims in need of protection so
that straights will be inclined by reflex to assume the role of protector."
Once the public has been beguiled into believing that "decency" requires
support for "gay rights," public hostility must be focused upon those who
remain committed to traditional morality:
At a later stage of the media campaign for gay rights ... it will be time to
get tough. To be blunt, [traditionalists] must be vilified .... The public
should be shown images of ranting homophobes whose secondary traits and
beliefs disgust middle America. These images might include: the Ku Klux Klan
demanding that gays be burned alive or [tortured]; bigoted southern
ministers drooling with hysterical hatred to a degree that looks both
comical and deranged ....
With a calculated dishonesty that would have won the admiration of Joseph
Goebbels, the homosexual movement and its media allies have followed this
strategy. In contemporary popular culture, any expression of opposition to
homosexuality, no matter how temperate and intellectually sound, is
immediately free-associated with violent bigotry. Having defined the rules
of engagement in America's Culture War, the homosexual "rights" movement is
proceeding with its assault upon what remains of America's sexual morality.
Urvashi Vaid, former executive director of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance
Against Defamation, issued the following directive to the "gay rights"
movement in the December 14, 1993 issue of The Advocate magazine: "The Gay
and Lesbian religious movement has to come out politically and create a
national religious council to promote tolerance, oppose theocracy, and fight
monotheism."
A key figure in the lavender jihad may be the "Reverend" Mel White, who
presides over the Cathedral of Hope Metropolitan Community Church in Dallas
(the Metropolitan Community Church is a homosexual denomination). White made
a reputation for himself as a ghostwriter in the employ of such Evangelical
leaders as Billy Graham and Jerry Falwell. Even as he lent his pen to the
expression of biblical principles, White surrendered himself to the
indulgence of his sexual impulses. He eventually descended into the
homosexual "lifestyle," leaving behind his wife of 25 years.
Just a few years ago, the opinion cartel interpreted the sexual misconduct
of a few television evangelists as a general indictment of the "Religious
Right"; that same cartel, however, chose to interpret Mel White's sexual
apostasy as a triumph of "courage" and "honesty." Talk-show host Larry King
introduced his television audience to White by describing White's experience
as "a story about shattered friendships and changed lives, all because of
one man's decision to tell the truth." A hagiographic profile of White that
appeared in the August 10, 1993 Washington Post bore the mock-ironic
headline, "Mel White Gave Voice to the Christian Right. Then He Committed
the Sin of Admission." The headline of a July 29th Los Angeles Times
puff-piece proclaimed that White lives "In a State of Grace."
Media portrayals of Mel White followed another of Kirk and Pill's
recommendations: "In order to make a Gay victim sympathetic to straights you
have to portray him as Everyman .... The campaign should paint gays as
superior pillars of society." Thus, the Washington Post told its readers,
"At first glance, Mel White looks like an ordinary guy from the suburbs; you
could picture him as the weatherman in Pasadena." The story proceeds to
describe White as an articulate, soft-spoken man of preternatural tolerance
toward his "oppressors." The same template was used to produce dozens of
soft-focus profiles published throughout the country.
But there is militancy beneath White's meek exterior. On the August 13th
edition of CNN's Larry King Live, White stated: "I'm a member of ACT-UP. I
know what we do and what we don't do." White must certainly be aware that
ACT-UP frequently disrupts religious services and conducts campaigns of
harassment, violence, and intimidation. He should also be aware that
ACT-UP/DC, arguably the organization's most influential chapter, was
organized by activists who used Hitler's Mein Kampf as their tactical bible.
Predictably, nobody in the Establishment media saw fit to examine the
implications of White's admitted membership in ACT-UP.
Using the Cathedral of Hope as a base of operations, White intends to
conduct a "personal war" against the Religious Right, which he describes as
"the enemy ... a threat to the warp and woof of American society." Speaking
on the August 13, 1993 edition of Larry King Live, White charged that
Christian conservatives "use gays to make money, and the suffering from
their rhetoric trickles down and causes death -- literally."
The "trickle-down" metaphor was given fuller development by White in this
statement he made to the Washington Post:
We [homosexual activists] have gone underground and we have people in every
one of the Religious Right's organizations. We're on their mailing lists.
We're reading everything they're putting out. We think the words from their
mouths trickle down into violence. And when our evidence reaches a critical
mass, we're going to use the best attorneys in this country to bring a class
action suit in 50 states to have it stopped.
What exactly do White and his allies seek to "stop," and how would they
"have it stopped"? Would they ask the federal government to suppress
"homophobic" speech, or -- in the fashion of White's ACT-UP comrades --
disrupt "homophobic" worship services? Clearly, White's crusade against the
Religious Right should be looked upon as a threat to what remains of
America's religious liberty.
The federal government's involvement in a controversy in Mississippi offers
evidence that White's crusade may win support from the federal government.
In July 1993, Brenda and Wanda Henson purchased 120 acres of land near
Ovett, Mississippi on behalf of a feminist organization called "Sister
Spirit, Inc." The Hensons, a lesbian "couple," paid $60,000 in cash for the
land, which was to be used for the construction of a "lesbian regional
community." By fall, some 20 to 40 activists were living on the property,
and construction was underway on accommodations for nearly 200.
According to a Sister Spirit press re.lease, the group is a tax-deductible
"charitable" organization that is networked with many prominent groups in
the Grievance Industry (such as the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, the
National Organization for Women, and the like). Furthermore, "We receive
Bonner Foundation grants and Federal Emergency Management Assistance grants
to partially fund this project." Accordingly, some unspecified amount of
taxpayer funding was diverted to underwrite what Sister Spirit literature
describes as a "Lesbian Community Project ... created from Lesbian Vision."
Camp Sister Spirit began publishing a newsletter entitled The Grapevine,
which contained the happy invitation, "Please photocopy and share with your
friends." A copy of the camp's October 1993 newsletter found its way into
the possession of an Ovett resident, who promptly reproduced it and shared
it with his friends. In this fashion Ovett's inhabitants were made aware of
a planned "Lesbian Conference" scheduled for December 2nd-5th. In late
November, nearly all of Ovett's 300 residents attended a town meeting to
discuss the camp and its activities.
Most of Ovett's residents were understandably concerned about the intentions
of the camp's organizers and made their views known forcefully -- and
peaceably. Unfortunately, the camp also attracted the uninvited interest of
vandals. Reverend John Allen, a pastor in nearby Richton, told THE NEW
AMERICAN, "There have been some incidents of prank harassment against Camp
Sister Spirit -- vandalism, prank phone calls and the like. None of us has
condoned it; in fact, we have consistently condemned it." Furthermore, notes
Allen, "Several of the people on our side of this issue have received very
nasty phone calls. We didn't make an issue of this because we can't prove
that they [Sister Spirit] are behind them."
Many Ovett residents sensed that their community was being colonized. Paul
Walley, an attorney for the Perry County Board of Supervisors, explained to
THE NEW AMERICAN: "Ovett is a tiny community, and it is 20 miles from the
nearest community that could be regarded as a significant city. Why did they
come here?" Media reports of the controversy began to filter out of
Mississippi, all of them uncritically retailing Sister Spirit's claim to be
a charitable organization devoted to the distribution of material relief to
the poor and homeless. But as Walley points out, "In this county, people
know and care for each other. We don't have any homeless; we don't have any
hungry that aren't provided for. They [Camp Sister Spirit] were after
something else."
On December 7th Peri Radecic, executive director of the National Gay and
Lesbian Task Force, sent a message to Attorney General Janet Reno asking
that the Justice Department monitor the situation in Ovett and send a
representative to attend the next town meeting. Radecic also suggested that
the Justice Department's Community Relations Service (CRS) be authorized to
"mediate" between Camp Sister Spirit and Ovett.
The CRS, a creation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, was intended to
"assist" communities that experience "tension based on race, color, or
national origin"; it has no legislative mandate to deal with questions of
"sexual orientation." Radecic urged that the CRS mandate be expanded by
bureaucratic fiat: "We must convince Reno that CRS needs to mediate the
dispute and alleviate the potential for harm to the Hensons. The CRS must
change its mandate."
CRS Media Affairs Officer Ron Tomalis told THE NEW AMERICAN that "we have
worked with the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force in the past. [Radecic]
called us because of our past contacts .... She is aware that sexual
orientation issues are not under our jurisdiction." (Tomalis did not
describe the nature of the "previous contacts" between the NGLTF and the
CRS.) According to Tomalis, the CRS had referred the Ovett controversy to
the Gulfport, Mississippi office of the FBI and the Civil Rights Division of
the Justice Department. Involvement by the Civil Rights Division in the
Ovett controversy would create a significant precedent.
Radecic described the Ovett impasse as "a violent situation -- the women's
lives are in danger." However, according to Jones County Sheriff Maurice
Hooks, the inhabitants of Camp Sister Spirit are in no immediate peril.
Furthermore, the only threats of violence emanating from Ovett have been
those made by the Hensons. Brenda Henson, who had designated herself the
"Chief SpokesLesbian" for Camp Sister Spirit, told the December 12th
Washington Blade (a homosexual publication) that the camp's inhabitants were
gathering - guns -- "not because we're violent, but because we know they
are." On that same day the Washington Post quoted Henson as saying, "We'll
do whatever we have to do to stay here." In a quote published in the
December 20th issue of Newsweek, Henson declared, "We have guns and we know
how to use them. There are a lot of nervous women out here with trigger
fingers." Wanda Henson stated in a December 19th CNN interview, "I'm a
pacifist, but I believe that if somebody comes for me, then they're gonna
get back what they give me, if I have an opportunity."
It should be noted that none of the media coverage devoted to the Hensons
contained as much as a whisper of disapproval for such statements -- a
curious omission, given that the Camp Sister Spirit controversy occurred at
the height of a media-abetted fear campaign regarding gun-related crime. It
is also useful to remember that for all of their faults, David Koresh and
his followers never issued similar threats against their neighbors.
The most shocking aspect of the Ovett incident has been the involvement of
the federal government, beginning with the approval of a federal grant to
finance the construction of the lesbian colony. The reaction of Janet Reno's
Justice Department to the Ovett situation is also instructive. In February
1993, the Justice Department confronted a lightly-armed, peaceful community
of religious eccentrics in Waco -- with memorably lethal results. Following
the April 19th holocaust in Waco, President Clinton warned, "There is,
unfortunately, a rise in this sort of fanaticism all over the world. And we
may have to confront it again." Leaving aside the question of whether the
Branch Davidians were genuine "fanatics" (which itself begs the question of
whether the federal government's jurisdiction extends to punishing
"fanaticism"), Camp Sister Spirit would appear to represent an example of
armed fanaticism. Yet the federal government saw fit to intervene on behalf
of this particular group of armed fanatics.
While Newsweek sniffled about "the ugliness in Ovett" as an example of
"small-town intolerance against increasing gay visibility," no similar
concern has been displayed over a recent example of cosmopolitan intolerance
against Christian visibility.
On September 19, 1993, a mob of homosexuals surrounded the Hamilton Square
Baptist Church in San Francisco. They had been aroused to action by two
newspaper articles announcing that the service on the Sunday night in
question would feature an address by Reverend Lou Sheldon of the Traditional
Values Coalition. Reverend Sheldon has been an outspoken defender of the
biblical teaching that homosexuality is an abomination before God.
Dr. David Innes, pastor of the Hamilton Square Church, noted in a press
release that before the local press publicized Sheldon's visit, "Only the
church's membership and regular attenders were notified of this service,
through the church's own Sunday bulletin." During the week before the
September 19th meeting, Innes received two phone calls demanding that
Sheldon be disinvited. The church was also visited by two homosexual
activists who told the building's caretaker that Sheldon would not be
allowed to speak on the following Sunday. Fearing for the safety of his
congregation, Dr. Innes formally requested protection from the Northern
Station police division. "You must understand," Dr. Innes was told, "this is
San Francisco." Innes persisted until he received assurances that police
would "monitor" the Sunday evening gathering.
The mob began to assemble around the church at 5:00 p.m. Sunday evening; an
hour later the protest had evolved into a full-scale riot. The protesters
essentially seized control of the church grounds and attempted to prevent
worshippers from entering the chapel. Church property was damaged; obscene
handbills were plastered on the building's walls and windows; worshippers
were assaulted with obscenities and pelted with stones. A group of the
protesters tore down the Christian flag that had been on display in front of
the church and replaced it with the rainbow flag of the "Queer Nation." At
one point, protesters caught sight of children in the church's lobby; they
began to chant, "We want your children. Give us your children."
The September 23rd issue of the Bay Area Reporter, a homosexual newspaper
that helped publicize the protest, described the mob's reaction to Reverend
Sheldon's arrival: "Suddenly the doors to the sanctuary bulged inward as
demonstrators pounded on the doors. Children began to cry as the doors
appeared as if they were coming down and the booming sound of the pounding
reverberated through the gothic ceilinged room."
The few police officers sent by Northern Station were quickly overwhelmed by
the protesters; not a single arrest was made. Dr. Innes does not fault the
local police. "It is impossible for a police officer to arrest a homosexual
activist in San Francisco," Innes told THE NEW AMERICAN. "Any policeman who
arrests a radical homosexual will be immediately brought to the Office of
Citizen Complaints -- he'll lose his job. I don't blame the police; it's a
problem with the [city] Board of Supervisors."
Immediately after the riot, Dr. Innes offered a videotape of the atrocity to
the San Francisco Chronicle and local television stations. "They were not
only indifferent, they were frankly hostile," Innes recalled. "They told me
that they weren't going to run a story about the riot." Like Christians
living under Soviet rule, Dr. Innes and his associates had to rely on
Samizdat -- underground circulation of their information -- to make others
aware of their plight.
Copies of the videotape were made and distributed to Christian broadcasters.
In addition, an audiotape of the riot was played on Christian radio
stations. "The audiotape was even more effective than the videotape," Innes
remarked. "Tens of thousands of Christians have heard the sound of a
homosexual mob trying to break down the doors of a Christian church. It's
been quite a wake-up call for some."
After news of the attack on the Hamilton Square Church breached the media
blockade, outraged Christians began to call San Francisco civic authorities.
At a meeting of the Board of Supervisors in early November, Mayor Frank
Jordan grudgingly promised to protect freedom of religion "on an equal
footing with the freedom of assembly." Jordan demonstrated his dubious
commitment to equity by accusing Christians of attempting "to make San
Francisco a cause célèbre for [an] agenda of intolerance and hate." The
Chronicle offered this helpful clarification: "Jordan was referring to
reports that video footage of the church disturbance have [sic] been used as
an organizing tool for religious right efforts around the country."
By Jordan's reckoning, it was the effort to publicize the anti-Christian
pogrom, not the atrocity itself, that was notorious. Perhaps Jordan could
offer a similarly inventive perspective on Kristallnacht.
Taking its cue from Mayor Jordan, the December 17, 1993 Washington Blade
reported that the mobbing of the Hamilton Square Baptist Church was actually
a "publicity stunt" choreographed by the Reverend Lou Sheldon. According to
Blade writer Sidney Brinkley, the disruption (which inflicted at least
$2,000 in damage upon the church, and featured physical abuse of
worshippers) "was, by San Francisco standards, a relatively minor
demonstration." Furthermore, according to Brinkley,
Sheldon has shown that he knows San Francisco's Gay community a whole lot
better than they know him. He is well aware that any appearance he makes in
San Francisco will provoke a response that's guaranteed to be raucous, at
the very least, and, with that in mind, Sheldon pulled off what openly
Lesbian Supervisor Carole Migden called "a well-orchestrated publicity
stunt" which showed Gays in the worse [sic] possible light.
Brinkley was too busy devising an apology for the anti-Christian attack to
recognize the ludicrous logic of his analysis. If the September 19th rampage
was a "relatively minor" incident of anti-Christian harassment by San
Francisco's homosexual "community," how could it be used to depict
homosexuals in "the worst possible light"? If the assault upon the Hamilton
Square Church is fairly typical of what Bay Area Christians have come to
expect, aren't they entitled to publicize their plight?
Brinkley notes, "In an attempt to justify their actions, as well as sidestep
any possible legal consequences, the activists claimed that they were
disrupting a 'political rally,' not a religious service." This observation
also bristles with frightful implications. Is it to be understood that
homosexuals can disrupt political meetings without fear of legal sanction?
Peggy Sue, a lesbian activist who was part of the mob on September 19th,
told the Washington Blade, "The Hamilton Square Baptist Church did not hold
a religious service that day. They held a hate rally against Gay and Lesbian
people." In San Francisco, all First Amendment guarantees are subject to the
approval of the Lavender Fascists.
Shortly after the protest, Dr. Innes received an anonymous phone message
containing a bomb threat. Pastor Charles McIlhenny, who was in attendance at
Hamilton Square Church on September 19th, can testify that such threats are
not to be lightly dismissed. In 1983, McIlhenny and his family narrowly
escaped death when his First Orthodox Presbyterian Church was fire-bombed.
Although the assailant was never captured, the McIlhenny family suspects
that the murder attempt was made in reprisal for McIlhenny's public
opposition to the homosexual lobby. Since 1977, the McIlhenny family has
received numerous death threats from radical homosexuals. The problems began
when Pastor McIlhenny dismissed a church organist who was an unrepentant
homosexual.
For two decades the McIlhennys have selflessly ministered to the spiritual
and physical needs of their neighbors in San Francisco. Acknowledging that
"all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God," Pastor and Mrs.
McIlhenny have treated homosexuals as flawed human beings who are loved by
God. According to McIlhenny, "The adulterer and the homosexual both need the
same sovereign saving grace of God in Christ to bring them to repentance.
Both can avail themselves of God's mercy and repentance." Many homosexuals
awaiting death in AIDS wards have benefited from McIlhenny's compassion.
McIlhenny's Christian activism has been repaid in the coin of intimidation.
In his book, When the Wicked Seize a City, McIlhenny recalls the persistent
efforts of homosexuals to intimidate and terrorize his family:
If the gay rights activists can't win through the legal system or through
influencing public school policies, they will use their time-honored
techniques of fear, death threats, and physical violence against their
opponents. These techniques are constantly used in San Francisco and
wherever the gay movement wants to seize power.
McIlhenny recalls receiving phone calls "describing our children -- by name,
appearance, where they attended school, when they got out of school, and
what sexually deviant behavior was to be practiced on the children before
killing them." Not surprisingly, McIlhenny has urged parents to understand
the implications of what he calls the "homosexualization" of public
education.
In a column published in The Advocate magazine, lesbian activist Donna
Minkowitz urged her comrades to "take the offensive for a change, whether
the issue is promiscuity or recruiting the previously straight .... Ten
percent is not enough! Recruit, recruit, recruit!" Increasingly, 'the "gay
rights" movement is pursuing recruiting efforts through the public school
system -- in the name of "suicide prevention."
In January 1989, the Department of Health and Human Services published a
four-volume report on the problem of teen suicide in America. That report
contained a brief polemical essay entitled "Gay Male and Lesbian Suicide,"
written by an obscure San Francisco social worker named Paul Gibson. The
article was not an empirical study, yet it has been cited ad nauseam by the
"gay rights" movement and its apologists to prove that "homophobia" is a
murderous social pathology.
Gibson began with the now-universally discredited Kinsey premise that ten
percent of the population is innately homosexual. On the basis of that
fraudulent statistic, Gibson offered this contribution to apocryphal social
science: "Given the higher rates of suicidal feelings and behavior among gay
youth in comparison with other young people this means that 20-30 percent of
all youth suicides may involve gay youth." Gibson cited no studies, adduced
no clinical evidence, and offered no documentary support to fortify this
claim.
Gibson blamed the traditional home and conventional religion for the
problems experienced by suicidal homosexual youth. He described religion as
a "risk factor in gay youth suicide because of the depiction of
homosexuality as a sin and the reliance of families on the church for
understanding homosexuality." Gibson's essay -- which was included in a
taxpayer-funded federal report -- censured "traditional (e.g., Catholic) and
fundamentalist (e.g., Evangelical) faiths [which] still portray
homosexuality as morally wrong or evil."
Gibson's unsupported conclusions are contradicted by Professor Edward Wynne
of the University of Illinois-Chicago, who offered the keynote address at
the 1987 national Youth Suicide Conference. According to Wynne, traditional
religious belief is perhaps the single most effective deterrent to youth
suicide.
But Gibson's interest in the question of youth suicide was purely
opportunistic. It was his conclusion that society is "sick"; rather than
prescribing a remedy for confused teenagers, Gibson prescribed a
totalitarian "cure" for the embattled remnants of conventional society.
According to Gibson, "Laws can help to establish the principle of equality
for lesbians and gay men and define the conduct of others in their
interactions with them" (emphasis added). Gibson recommended that government
be empowered to regulate not only behavior, but also thoughts, perceptions,
and values:
We must promote a positive image of gay males and lesbians to reduce
oppression against them and provide youth with gay role models to pattern
themselves after. Massive education efforts need to take place that would
provide people with accurate information about homosexuality. These efforts
especially need to be directed to those who have responsibility for the care
of the young, including families, clergy, teachers, and helping
professionals.
According to Gibson, "Gay and lesbian youth need access to the same social
supports and recreational activities that other youth have...." This
translates into a mandate for state regimentation of free time. Nor are
private associations -- such as the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts and the Big
Brothers/Big Sisters programs -- exempt from the state-ordained imperative
of attitude revision.
Gibson recommends that churches and synagogues become wholesale outlets for
pro-homosexuality propaganda: "Religions need to reassess homosexuality in a
positive context .... [They] should also take responsibility for providing
their families and membership with positive information about homosexuality
.... Faiths that condemn homosexuality should recognize how they contribute
to the rejection of gay youth by their families and suicide among lesbians
and gay male youth."
Families are given the duty to retail these same politically correct tenets
to their children: "Parents should know that homosexuality is a natural and
healthy form of sexual expression. They do not need to feel bad about
something that is good .... Families need to take responsibility for
presenting homosexuality in a positive context to their children."
In early 1992, Republican Governor William Weld of Massachusetts created a
"Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth." Appointed as head of that
body was David LaFontaine, a homosexual activist and political lobbyist. In
February 1993 the Governor's Commission inaugurated the nation's first
statewide effort to eradicate "homophobia" from public schools.
In announcing the program, Weld declared: "We must free our schools from
violence .... We must free our schools from hate as well. Words of hate can
quickly become weapons of violence." Weld was not reacting to an epidemic of
anti-homosexual violence or harassment. Hattie McKinnis, chairwoman of the
Citywide Parents Council in Boston, told the Boston Globe that the
"harassment of gays is not a problem in Boston schools. But it could become
a problem if you bring it to the attention of the kids and they start
looking around and asking 'Who's gay?'"
In February 1993, the Governor's Commission published a report entitled
Making Schools Safe for Gay and Lesbian Youth: Breaking the Silence in
Schools and in Families. The report was essentially a repackaged version of
Paul Gibson's totalitarian recommendations.
According to the Governor's Commission document:
The Higher Education Coordinating Council should facilitate changes in
teacher-training standards so that all certified teachers and educators will
receive training in issues relevant to the needs and problems faced by gay
and lesbian youth. Such training should be a requirement for teacher
certification and school accreditation .... Schools should be required to
schedule inservice diversity training in order to receive accreditation from
the appropriate professional associations.
Being "sensitized" to homosexuality is also a mandatory requirement for all
public school students: "Learning about gay and lesbian people, including
their experiences and contributions to society, should be integrated into
all subject areas. School systems should urge teachers ... to integrate gay
and lesbian themes and issues into all subject areas," including
"literature, history, the arts, and family life." Classroom re-education
also includes "inclusive human development education, which addresses issues
of sexual orientation...."
The report also demands censorship to remove "biases in existing curriculum,
such as the exclusive use of opposite-sex couples in math or foreign
language exercizes [sic]." School libraries are required to "have a special,
easily recognizable section of books and materials related to gay and
lesbian issues," including "films concerning gay and lesbian people in
general and gay and lesbian youth in particular, which are appropriate for
viewing by the entire student body and by faculty .... School libraries
should periodically display books and materials about gay and lesbian issues
in a highly visible way .... School librarians should develop a reading list
of books in the library on gay and lesbian issues which they can provide to
teachers for inclusion in class reading lists."
Any remaining ambiguity regarding the totalitarian sweep of the plan is
dispelled by a perusal of the document's "Anti-Harassment Policies and
Guidelines," which dictate that "Schools should adopt and publicize policies
which prohibit anti-gay language and harassment on the part of faculty and
students" and that "[c]lear guidelines should be established for dealing
with anti-gay epithets and speech." Teachers and staff are required to
profess a "commitment to addressing and eliminating discriminatory attitudes
directed against gay and lesbian people in general."
The plan also requires that "every high school in the Commonwealth [create]
a support group where gay and straight students can meet each week and
discuss gay and lesbian youth issues." These "Gay/Straight Student
Alliances" may more properly be described as political cells; they are used
to mobilize youngsters on behalf of the Lavender Lobby's agenda.
The "student alliances" were deployed by LaFontaine in the effort to secure
passage of the Massachusetts "Gay and Lesbian Student Rights Bill," a
measure that passed on December 7th. The bill provides that public school
students who identify themselves as homosexuals will be guaranteed equality
"in obtaining the advantages [and] privileges" granted to normal students.
This studiously vague language was written with the express purpose of
inviting litigation. Democratic State Representative Byron Rushing, who
sponsored the bill, told the December 8th New York Times, "They. [homosexual
student activists] will have recourse. They will be able to sue."
One predictable result of the Weld/LaFontaine program has been a noticeable
increase in the willingness of Massachusetts youngsters to experiment with
homosexuality. The November 8th issue of Newsweek reported that in
Massachusetts, "National Coming-Out Day" is "an autumnal rite every bit as
gala as graduation day .... "In the Commonwealth, according to Newsweek,
"multiculturalism has come to embrace muitisexualism." As a result, "more
students seem to be coming out, and they're coming out younger. A climate of
greater tolerance is making it possible for teens to explore more openly
what they've historically sampled in secret."
Nor is this trend confined to Massachusetts. A July 15th Washington Post
story reported that in the Washington, DC area many public school students
were not only discussing "gay rights" issues in school, but "declaring their
own bisexuality or homosexuality, a step some said they were taking to be
trendy or cool." According to one teen interviewed by the Post, some kids
professed homosexuality or bisexuality "to protect themselves from just
being normal."
Although public school systems throughout the country have begun to include
material on "sexual orientation" as part of multicultural education, the
Weld/LaFontaine program is indisputably the most ambitious of its kind. If
Weld's political fortunes continue to flourish, he may have the chance to
impose a similar program upon the entire country. Weld is a member of
"Empower America," an establishment think-tank whose membership includes
such neo-conservative luminaries as Jack Kemp and Bill Bennett. It is
possible that Weld may soon emerge as an early favorite for the 1996 GOP
presidential nomination. It is thus conceivable that family-oriented
conservatives may face the worst of all possible worlds in 1996: A choice
between Democrat Bill Clinton and the man acclaimed by The Advocate as "the
nation's most pro-gay governor."
Teaching "acceptance" of homosexuality as a means of suicide prevention is
murderously irrational. Disease, violence, and early death stalk the
homosexual subculture. The persistence of the AIDS plague among homosexuals
offers proof that use of the human body in a manner forbidden by its
designer voids its warranty.
The December 11th New York Times reported that San Francisco displays
"ominous signs of a second wave of AIDS infection" in spite of that fact
that it is "a city where virtually everybody knows that [homosexual]
intercourse without a condom spreads AIDS." (It should be pointed out that
the "protection" offered by condoms is at best extremely unreliable.)
According to the Times, many in the city's male homosexual population pursue
suicidal sex because they are "unwilling to face a measure of sexual
deprivation and eager for the attention showered on the sick and dying."
According to Dana Van Gorder, who was identified by the Times as an "AIDS
educator," "We need to give guys more meaning, so they'll commit to wanting
to live." The Times left this question untouched: What is it about the "gay"
lifestyle that leaves its practitioners devoid of the will to live?
Many in the homosexual mecca find themselves caught in the tightening coils
of nihilism. Notes the Times, "With homosexual identity and AIDS so tightly
intertwined, particularly in gay enclaves like the Castro [District], some
men said they were attracted to the idea of getting sick because it would
deepen their sense of belonging." Bear in mind that this is the community
from which Paul Gibson issued his prescriptions to "heal" American society
of "homophobia."
Jewish tradition describes Sodom, Gomorrah, and the "cities of the plain" as
dismal, heartless communities in which violence and depravity reigned.
Governed by corrupt, tyrannical civic authorities, the residents of Sodom
and her sister cities surrendered themselves to the unfettered indulgence of
every variety of vice and selfishness. Those who sought to promote Godly
standards of behavior were punished with gleeful severity.
We have not reached Sodom yet -- but we can see its suburbs from here.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Achtenberg Acts Up
by William Norman Grigg
The December 28th edition of the homosexual publication the Advocate
designated Roberta Achtenberg its "Woman of the Year" for 1993. As Assistant
Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity at the Department of
Housing and Urban Development, Achtenberg is the highest-ranking open
homosexual ever to serve in the federal government.
In the Advocate's profile, Achtenberg was quoted as expressing this opinion
regarding the homosexual movement's critics: "There are obviously some
people who demonstrate again and again that they are less than human, but I
don't think about them too much."
Memory does not run to a previous incident in which a prominent federal
official ever publicly referred to anyone as "less than human." It is not
difficult to imagine the torrent of anguished outrage that would ensue had
such remarks been made by a conservative public figure. However, as a
certified practitioner of "tolerance," Achtenberg is free to indulge her
penchant for bigotry.
Achtenberg was confirmed to her present position on May 24, 1993, by a
Senate vote of 58 to 31. According to Achtenberg supporter John Kerry
(D-MA), "The size of the 'anti' vote underscores the enormous gulf we have
in this country in terms of the willingness of Americans to allow other
Americans to be who they are." But Achtenberg's record displays no
willingness to let Americans with traditional values "be who they are."
While serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Achtenberg urged
the local United Way affiliate to deny funding to the Boy Scouts of America.
A 1991 article in the San Francisco Chronicle quoted Achtenberg as posing
this contemptuous rhetorical question: "Do we want children learning the
values of an organization ... that provides character-building exclusively
for straight, God-fearing male children?" As a member of the local United
Way board, Achtenberg joined a unanimous vote to grant her own request,
which resulted in the withdrawal of $l .2 million in donations to the Boy
Scouts. She also introduced a resolution before the Board of Supervisors
calling upon the city to withdraw its $6 million account from the Bank of
America, which had sinned against political correctness by making an $18,000
donation to the Scouts.
Although Achtenberg looks upon the propagation of Christian attitudes as a
public menace, she has been sanguine about the role of promiscuous sex in
transmitting AIDS. During the early 1980s, Achtenberg (who was then an
attorney) battled efforts to close San Francisco's homosexual "bathhouses,"
which had served as incubators for the AIDS plague. According to Achtenberg,
the bathhouses had to be kept open because of their "tremendous symbolic
significance to a sexual minority."
Achtenberg's efforts in San Francisco to evangelize on behalf of
homosexuality -- and punish those who oppose it -- served a vision that she
outlined in a 1985 speech, in which she declared: "We are building our own
tradition of family, for which we demand recognition and respect. We are
entitled to love and respect our partners, to keep the children we have, to
have the children we want, to teach and counsel the children of others."
Although Achtenberg has been relatively quiet since attaining her HUD post,
this may change during the coming year. HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros has
announced plans for a national "Fair Housing Summit" and a campaign to end
"spatial discrimination" in both public and private housing. These
initiatives may offer Achtenberg ample opportunity to continue her crusade
against those whom she regards as "less than human."
© Copyright 1999 American Opinion Publishing Incorporated
http://thenewamerican.com/tna/1994/vo10no02.htm
Bard
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