“This is a baby. This is a blessing from God. It is not a political statement. It is not a prop to be used in a debate, on either side of a political issue. It is my child.”
Then he begins.
Nice try, Mary.
Yes, it’s a baby, not a prop. My kid isn’t a prop either, but that never stopped right-wingers from attacking me and my boyfriend over our decision to become parents. The fitness of same-sex couples to parent is very much part of the political debate thanks to the GOP and the Christian bigots that make up its lunatic “base.” You’re a Republican, Mary, you worked on both of your father’s campaigns, and you kept your mouth clamped shut while Karl Rove and George Bush ran around the country attacking gay people, gay parents, and our children in 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006. It’s a little late to declare the private choices of gays and lesbians unfit for public debate, Mary.
Oh, and that's nothing. You really need to read the rest of the column. Let's just say it's not quite quotable for a family blog like our own. :-)
What I really wondered, after reading about the long, hard road in front Ted Haggard was this: Are they paying him? Haggard has a wife and a family—six hungry mouths to, uh, feed. If he spends all his time having the gay beat out of him, how is Haggard going to support his wife and kids? How will he keep a roof over their heads?
Which makes me wonder…
Is Ted Haggard drawing some sort of salary while he’s on his big ex-gay adventure? And if he is, how are we supposed to view it as something other than hush money? Haggard embarrassed the hell out of his evangelical buddies; Dobson seems beside himself with less-than-Christian rage. What really annoys them about Haggard’s fall from grace is how neatly it gives the lie to their whole ex-gay argument. Again, if Jesus didn’t make Haggard straight, and if it’s going to take five years for the top evangelical ministers in the country to pray the gay out of him—again—what “hope” is there for the rest of us? Why should we bother?
So.
Being a cynic and a fag that believes that male homosexuality is innate and fixed, I can’t help but wonder if Big Gay Ted is being bought off.
The guy is a creep. Dan Savage was the one to discover this. The interview Haggard gave yesterday, the one with his poor wife watching where he talking about buying crystal meth and only getting a massage from the gay hooker, his poor kids were sitting in the back seat the entire time. And before anyone criticizes the reporter, the journalist asked Haggard if he wanted to step out of the car for a second to do the interview and he said no. He chose to do it in front of his kids.
Dan's column is in big free weeklies across the country. Hopefully Ford will resolve this soon, before the damage is too deep to undo. As only Dan can write it:
Straight Rights Update: After alleged secret meetings with the right-wing American Family Association (AFA), Ford Motor Company agreed to pull its advertising from gay publications and cease sponsoring gay events in order to avoid a threatened boycott. What does this have to do with straight rights? The AFA fucks intimidating Ford on the gay issue are the same fucks intimidating retailers like Target into denying women access to morning-after pills. They're the same assholes trying to stop the feds from approving a vaccine for two strains of HPV. (The HPV vaccine—already tested and 100 percent effective—could save thousands of women's lives every year.) When the AFA successfully attacks gay rights, it only emboldens its attacks on straight rights. So gay or straight, the AFA is your enemy.
What can you do? Call Ford dealers in your area and let them know that you won't be buying a Ford after this. (A list of Ford dealers broken down by state can be found on Americablog: americablog.blogspot.com.) And while you've got 'em on the phone, ask them what Ford is so afraid of. The AFA's boycott of Disney was called off after nine years because it wasn't working. When the AFA threatened Kraft, the execs at Kraft told the haters from the AFA to go fuck themselves. But what did Ford do when the AFA threatened them? The "Built Ford Tough" boys collapsed into a puddle. "Ford Puff" needs to hear from people who won't buy cars from companies that cave in to right-wing hatemongers. And when your local Ford dealer tells you that he didn't make this decision, tell him he had better yell at Ford HQ and get this decision reversed. Microsoft caved to right-wing Christian bullies and then reversed itself. Ford can too.
I'd marry Dan Savage if he were single, and it were legal, and if he and I had ever actually met.
Dan is the editor of the Stranger, the Seattle alternative weekly that broke the Microsoft caving to the religious right story, and Dan is also the guy who writes Savage Love in pretty much every alternative free paper in America, including DC's own City Paper.
Anyway, Dan has a take on the Ford affair that's been missed. Namely, the extremist gay-hating American Family Association and its ilk arent just gunning for gay America, they're gunning for straight America too:
So what can you do? Gay or straight, you should at least pick up the phone and let local Ford dealers know that you won't even consider buying a Ford after this. Why should straight people care? Because the same AFA fucks that have successfully intimidated Ford on the gay issue are also attacking straight rights—they’re the same assholes who have successfully intimidated retailers like Target into denying women access to morning-after pills. They’re the same assholes trying to convince the Feds not to release a vaccine for two strains of HPV , the virus that can cause cervical cancer in women. The HPV vaccine—already tested and 100% effective!—could save thousands of women’s lives every year. The AFA is fighting it.
Here’s a list of Ford dealers (use the link to find your local dealer). Call them, tell them you’re pissed — and remind them that the AFA’s boycott of Disney didn’t go anywhere. Tell them that when the AFA threatened Kraft, Kraft told the AFA to go fuck themselves. But Ford? The “Built Ford Tough” boys collapsed into a puddle when the AFA assholes threatened them with a boycott. So let Ford know what you don’t buy cars from companies that caves to right-wing hate mongers. And when the local dealers tell you that they didn’t make this decision, tell them that’s too bad. Tell them to scream and yell to Ford HQ and get this decision reversed, or you will never, ever consider buying a Ford.
And corporations can reverse themselves. Microsoft caved to right-wing Christian bullies, and then reversed itself. Tell ‘em Ford can too. Tell ‘em Ford better.
Dan writes even more about the threat the religious extremists pose to straight America here (scroll down to the end of the column, where it says "Straight Rights Update").
Excellent question, from Dan Savage of "Savage Love" fame. At first blush, I think Dan's right. I'd been talking with friends for a while about what amendment we could offer, to the federal Constitution, but also to state constitutions, that would sound all warm and fuzzy on their face, and totally undercut the fundamentalist bigots at the same time. This is a good one.
Here we are, decades after Griswold, and social conservatives and liberals are constantly arguing about whether or not the right to privacy, which is a popular right (naturally enough), and one to which most Americans believe they're entitled, is actually a right to which Americans are entitled, constitutionally-speaking. Liberals love it because the RTP underpins our constitutional right to have access to birth control, abortion services, gay sex, porn. Social conservatives hate it for that very reason....
I find myself wondering why we don’t just put it in there? If the Republicans can propose a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, can’t the Dems propose a “Right to Privacy” amendment? Since the RTP is popular (unlike the anti-gay marriage amendment), the Dems should put it out there and let the Republicans run around the country explainging why they're against a right to privacy—not a winning position. Then, once it passes, we’ll be spared the debate over whether or not the RTP is in there every time a conservative is nominated to the Supreme Court.
The Right to Privacy Amendment—c’mon, Harry Reid, Barbara Boxer, Ted Kennedy, Patty Murray, Barak Obama! Propose it!
We interrupt this blog for a Heterosexual Rights update from Dan Savage's "Savage Love" column:
Straight rights update: There were two disturbing developments in the battle over straight rights last week. First: Target. We know the store fills its ads with dancing, multiculti hipsters giving off a tolerant, urbanist vibe and runs hipster-heavy ad campaigns positioning Target as a slightly more expensive, more progressive alternative to Wal-Mart. Well, as John Aravosis revealed on Americablog.org last week, Target's politics are as red as their bull's-eye logo.
The chain allows its pharmacists to refuse to dispense birth control and emergency contraception to female customers if the pharmacist objects on religious grounds. What's worse, the company claims that any of its employees has a right to discriminate against any of its customers provided the discrimination is motivated by an employee's religious beliefs. Read all about it at www.americablog.org and www.plannedparenthood.org.
Second, more troubling news from Tucson, Ariz., where a 20-year-old rape victim called dozens of pharmacies in town before she found one that stocked emergency contraception (EC). "When she finally did find a pharmacy with it, she said she was told the pharmacist on duty would not dispense it because of religious and moral objections," reported the Arizona Daily Star. Emergency contraception, the story continued, "prevents pregnancy by stopping ovulation, fertilization, or implantation of a fertilized egg. The sooner the emergency contraception is taken after intercourse, the more effective it is."
Don't just sit there, heteros. Defend your rights! Don't shop at Target, and write 'em and tell them why you're going elsewhere. (Go to Target.com and click on "contact us," then "Target Corporation.") As for Fry's Pharmacy in Tucson, the shop that wouldn't dispense EC to a freakin' rape victim, the fundamentalist pharmacist claims its her "right" not to do her fucking job.
Well, you have a right to free speech. Call Fry's at 520.323.2695 and ask them why the fuck a pharmacy that won't dispense EC keeps the drug in stock. Do they do it just to torment rape victims? ("Oh yeah, we've got EC-but you can't have any. Don't you know that Jesus wants you to bear your rapist's child?") Rise up, straight people, and demand your rights.
You may remember Dan Savage as the editor of the Seattle alternative weekly, The Stranger - the paper that broke the Microsoft going anti-gay story. Dan is also a regular sex advice columnist, published on The Onion and in lots of alternative weeklies around the country. His latest column is a must-read, and not very work-safe, if you worry about such things.
I'm probably the 6,715th person to alert you, but "santorum" was voted the "most outrageous" word of 2004 by the American Dialect Society (www.americandialect.org). One of the judges wrote this on Slate.com: "The Most Outrageous category is tricky; we never agree whether it's the word itself that's outrageous (typically for having some vulgar element, as in 2003's winner, cliterati, for 'prominent feminists') or the concept (as with 2002's neuticles, 'false testicles for neutered pets'). This year the strongest contender was santorum, defined (and heavily promoted) by sex writer Dan Savage--in a campaign to besmirch the name of right-wing Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum--as 'the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex.' We dismissed one potential problem--that newspapers wouldn't print the term if it won--on the grounds that we shouldn't censor ourselves. And indeed, in the afternoon's voting, santorum did win, but many newspapers simply skipped this category in their coverage."
Congratulations on your success!
Wasting Time At Work
Thank you for the sweet note, WTAW, but Christian humility prevents me from taking credit for coming up with the new definition of santorum. My column was merely the platform from which santorum spewed forth. If congratulations are in order, let us congratulate the Savage Love reader who suggested I honor Sen. Rick Santorum by attaching a new definition to his name and the Savage Love reader who actually came up with the now-infamous "frothy mix" definition when I asked my readers for suggestions. And, of course, congratulations are in order for Sen. Rick Santorum. But for Rick's idiotic anti-sex statements, the frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex would remain nameless to this day. Anyone interested in sending Senator Santorum a message of congratulations or thanks can e-mail him via his website--http://santorum.senate.gov--but e-mail, on an occasion like this, seems a little too informal, don't you agree? So I would like to encourage my readers to send cards and letters of congratulation and thanks to Sen. Rick Santorum, 511 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. Rick is thinking of running for president in 2008 and I think we should all encourage him to do so, if only to get our hands on collectible "Santorum!" campaign T-shirts.
May I just add that every time they mention Santorum on TV or the radio, let's file an FCC indecency complaint!
Q. If they ever put language in the U.S. Constitution forcing gay guys to marry women, who would get to be the lucky Mrs. Savage? -- JUST CURIOUS
A. Wonkette, of course, as she's the only woman I know who likes to talk about ass-fucking as much as I do (wonkette.com). If Wonkette won't have me, then I'd pop the question to Mary Cheney, Vice President Dick Cheney's lesbo daughter. Mary worked for the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2000, doing outreach to gay and lesbian voters - effective outreach, apparently, as almost 25 percent of gay and lesbian voters went for Bush. (You dumb fucks!) Mary's working for her dad again this year, despite the fact that her dad and her dad's boss want to write anti-gay bigotry into the U.S. Constitution. As Mary's husband, I would do all I could to make her absolutely miserable. I wouldn't beat her (I reserve that for people I like), but I would pee on the toilet seat every morning, fart under the covers every night, and remind her at every opportunity that she's the most despised American lesbian since Mamie Eisenhower.
