After reading Al Bratton’s exposé of Don Wildmon and his American Family Association (“Welcome to the Dark Side: A Southern Progressive’s Perspective”), I decided to check the AFA site to see what the king of boycotts was up to. There, in a red “Take Action: Capitol Hill Alert,” was one of Wildmon’s latest tirades: “New Bill Would Give One Group Protection Against Discrimination Based Solely On Their Sexual Behavior.”

Since all Wildmon’s AFA boycotts are aimed at companies that treat their gay and lesbian employees equally, there was little doubt that this latest call-to-action was aimed at another employer. Turns out Wildmon is incensed by H.R. 3128 introduced by Henry Waxman (D-CA) on June 29, 2005. The measure is designed “to affirm that Federal employees are protected from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and to repudiate any assertion to the contrary.”

Despite The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, the Waxman bill is necessary because of the overt discrimination against gay and lesbian federal employees – as well as the summary dismissal of over 1000 “whistle blower” cases – by Special Counsel Scott Bloch whose office is supposed to ensure gay and lesbian federal employees are not discriminated against and that whistle-blowers are protected. Bloch’s actions have drawn the attention not only of the media and equal rights groups, but of Congress before whom he offered a flimsy – at best – defense for his actions, which have not changed a bit since then. Hence, the need for H. R. 3128.

As David M. Smith, vice president of policy and strategy at the Human Rights Campaign, noted in a recent OpEd,

In April of 2004, President Bush said he supports protections for gay federal employees. Today, he’s either turning a blind eye as his own appointee in charge of enforcing these protections is refusing to do so or he’s providing backroom approval of the rollback in protection for federal workers.

 

Our message to President Bush is clear: enforce a law that your father’s administration enforced and President Reagan’s administration enforced before that. This bill [H.R. 3128] serves to remind the President of the importance of this non-discrimination legacy.

Aside from the usual twisted ranting about how “equal rights” suddenly become “special rights” when applied to gay and lesbian Americans, one line in Wildmon’s Take Action letter to the faithful caught my eye. He was grousing that adding “sexual orientation” to the Special Counsel protection guidelines “elevated homosexuality to a protected status such as race, color, creed or religion.”

The premise underlying Wildmon’s objection is that homosexuality is nothing more than a “lifestyle choice” and should, therefore, not be a “protected status.” The just-a-lifestyle notion is refuted by every mainstream medical, psychiatric, pediatric and psychological association in America, and for good reason. There is growing evidence that homosexuality has a genetic and/or neurophysiological basis. The only groups advocating the just-a-lifestyle position are those Christian agencies that have a vested interest in the for-profit “ex-gay” therapy programs that all reputable medical and scientific professional associations have called “dangerous” and “harmful.” But notice Wildmon’s list of what should be protected status: “race, color, creed or religion.” The last two are of particular interest.

“Creed” and “religion” are without question purely a matter of choice. One can concoct whatever creed s/he wishes. Similarly, what religion one professes is nothing more than a personal choice. Anyone can choose to be or become a Catholic, a Muslim, a Jew, a Buddhist, a Taoist or be “born-again” as an evangelical Christian. There is absolutely nothing genetic or biological about what religion or religious behavior one chooses. Texas governor Rick Perry helped demonstrate that when he made a media event of signing a document that did not require his signature. The piece of paper he signed – with great fanfare at an evangelical Christian school in Fort Worth – simply stated what was already common knowledge: a referendum on same-sex marriage will be put to Texas voters.

The benediction at the signing event was given by David Stone. Governor Perry introduced him as a “rabbi.” Mr. Stone, although formerly “Jewish,” is not a rabbi. He’s a member of the group known as Jews for Jesus and the leader of the Beth Yeshua congregation in Fort Worth, a Christian church whose mission is to convert Jews to Christianity. The first four items in their Statement of Faith make that evangelically clear:

--We believe the bible is the inspired, the only infallible, authoritative Word of God.

--We believe that God is One, manifested in the Persons of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit as revealed in the Scriptures.

--We believe in the deity of the Lord Yeshua, the Messiah, in His virgin birth, in His sinless life, in His miracles, in His vicarious and atoning death through His shed blood, in His bodily resurrection, in His ascension to the right hand of the Father, and in His personal return in power and glory.

 

--We believe that for salvation of lost and sinful man, regeneration by the Holy Spirit is absolutely essential, which comes through repentance and trust in Messiah Yeshua.

Perry’s statement to the gay and lesbian citizens of Texas was blunt: “Texans made a decision about marriage and if there's a state that has more lenient views than Texas, then maybe that's a better place for them to live.” It’s a model for what Scott Bloch is saying to gay and lesbian federal employees: “I’ve made a decision and if you don’t like it, maybe there’s a better place for you to work.”

Wildmon, Bloch and Perry seem little more than advocates for discrimination. That’s to be expected, given the agenda: to force a political version of “Christianity” and its feigned “morality” onto everyone. Anyone not conforming is suspicious and, therefore, a legitimate target. They can be harassed, discriminated against, dismissed from their job, or told to move their home elsewhere. The ultimate goal would seem to be an evangelical theocracy in which different religious views, different moral and political perspectives would be worse than irrelevant. They’d be “anti-Christian” and, therefore, subversive. How would “treason” be defined in an evangelical Christian theocracy? That’s a rhetorical question, for now.

The ultimate irony, of course, is that the central message of the Gospels is a call for justice, a call to treat one’s neighbor as oneself. Apparently that prime directive was overlooked by Wildmon and the rest of the so-called “spiritual” leaders of the Christian Right and their political agents in the Office of Special Counsel, governors’ mansions, Congress and the White House. Cloaked in religious bigotry or whatever else will get some votes – or financial support for causes or campaigns – their only verity is power.

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

-- John Emerich Edward Dalberg, First Baron Acton, April 5, 1887

 

Unlimited power is apt to corrupt the minds of those who possess it.

-- William Pitt the Elder, January 9, 1770

 

In the United States, though power corrupts, the expectation of power paralyzes.

-- J.W. Galbraith, November 15, 1971

What power is corrupting and its expectation paralyzing in America these days are the ideas of equality and justice, and the Golden Rule of “Do unto other as you would have them do unto you.”

A final thought on that “rhetorical question”…

How would “treason” be defined in a theocracy? Iran’s theocracy provides an answer. At 10 AM on July 19, 2005, an 18 year-old male and another male thought to be 16 or 17 years-old were publicly hanged in Edalat (Justice) Square in downtown Mashad, in northeastern Iran. Both had been lashed 228 times before they were executed. Just as biblical law commands the death penalty for a whole host of transgressors, death is the penalty for homosexual behavior prescribed by Islamic law.

Ali Asgari, a member of the Majlis Legal Affairs Committee, complained that “Instead of paying tribute to the action of the judiciary, the media are mentioning the age of the hanged criminals and creating a commotion that harms the interests of the state” (italics mine).