 |
| Derrick Gordon |
When you try to keep track of the progress of gay liberation
in the United States and elsewhere, you need to be ready for anything. Sometimes you inch forward. Sometimes you leap forward. Sometimes you get slapped down.
 |
| Damian Goddard with tie and matching handkerchief |
The best times are when there are unexpected stories of
progress that make you feel good all over.
I felt one of those this morning when chuckling over Anderson Cooper’s twitter slapdown of that Canadian sportscaster, Damian Goddard, for his matching tie and
square handkerchief. It was pure bitch-queen. And deeply satisfying.
 |
| Anderson Cooper |
The feel-good part of the story is what led up to this
tweeter-duel. A young man named Derrick
Gordon added his name to the ever-growing line of sports figures coming out as gay, with the announcement last Wednesday that he too was gay. In Derrick Gordon’s case, he’s the first NCAA
Division basketball player to do so. And
when he did, Anderson Cooper noted the event by tweeting that he found the
whole thing “incredibly
courageous and inspiring.” To which
Goddard responded, "Mr. Cooper, you seem a good man with a warm heart. But you
are dead wrong on #homosexuality.
#prayingforyou."
That’s
when Anderson tweeted back “@heydamo
with that tie and pocket square combo I am praying for you too my friend.”
Now
some of you, I know, are going to say that Anderson Cooper’s tactic of dealing
with this homophobe is petty, and that pettiness will hurt the cause. I would have made that argument – did make
that argument – myself not so long ago.
But
I think the time has come to stop pussy-footing around about the Roman Catholic
hierarchy and their loathsome position that homosexuality is “inherently
disordered.” Time to stop pretending that we can have a civil debate with the bilgewater that spills out of that sinking ship. Time to stop taking them seriously, cry less, and laugh a whole lot more. And time to tell people who want to pray for you to go jump in the lake instead. The arrogance of it all. Pray for your own damn self. Pray the Catholic away. Pray the homophobia away, while you're at it. But don't pretend like you're doing me a favor by asking your God to put aside the laws of nature to make me more like you and your badly dressed peers.
The fact that most
Catholics don’t buy into that crap any more often seems to get lost in the shuffle,
because the official church claims the right to speak for all Catholics. In fact, ex-pope Benedict only recently updated the catechism to say that persons who find themselves drawn to members of their own sex should do what people
with the inclination to rape, murder, plunder and fart in church should do –
suppress the desire.
And
Damian Goddard, no surprise, insists he takes his orders from God and the
Church. And gets a hearing. Nobody in the church denies that Goddard and the magisterium speak with one voice.
Shame on you, young man, says Goddard and any number of Catholic bishops, to young Derrick Gordon. You should have continued to live a lie,
continued to live in fear and shame.
Continued to deny who you are.
Such
a contrast in character. There's folk like Anderson Cooper, who spots courage and calls it. And there are folk like Damian
Goddard who tells us Catholic morality (!) is to be found among the likes of Matt Barber and Peter
LaBarbera. Here's his tweet:
“@1John534: Care about
morality in America? Follow @jmattbarber
@PeterLaBarbera @heydamo @EWErickson @tperkins @StevenErtelt”#brothersinarms source: https://twitter.com/heydamo
And who are Matt Barber and Peter LaBarbera?
Here’s a taste of Matt Barber:
So, America, here's a refresher. Homosexuality 101:
The central, defining feature of homosexuality is same-sex sodomy, a filthy
practice – both from a moral and biological standpoint – that spreads disease,
ruins lives and mocks both God and nature.
In short, these sexually confused and spiritually
lost souls, particularly males caught-up in this lifestyle, can only
"consummate" a counterfeit "gay marriage" through the
squalid, unnatural and feculent abuse of both the reproductive and digestive
systems.
Yuck.
Is it any wonder why these "gay"
jihadists want us to focus on the subjective specter of "gay rights"
and ignore the objective reality of "gay" wrongs?
As for Peter LaBarbera, he is the president of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality,
a group which the Southern Poverty Law Center has labeled a hate group.
So much for the ridiculous.
Time for the sublime.
Have a listen to Derrick Gordon’s tale of coming out. And then to the follow-up interview with his
coach, UMass’s Derek Kellogg.
Always reassuring to note how decency and common sense can
lift you out of the doldrums and restore your faith in your fellows.
I mean seriously.
Imagine a coach announcing that he’s gay (when he’s not) as a way to
prime the pump of the discussion about a kid on his team coming out.
We’ve come a long way.
photo credits:
No comments:
Post a Comment