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Jul. 1st, 2005
The language of hate (on both sides)
Jul. 1st, 2005 02:18 pmOne of the more controversial, if not widely known, features of the current cultural landscape in America, is the ex-gays' movement. I do not want to say too much about it, considering that both sides (as we shall see) are aggressive, prejudiced and thoroughly opinionated; but the least that can be said is that there are organized groups in America claiming to be people who were once practicing homosexuals and who now have, as it were, kicked the habit.
These people's claims infuriate the GLBT movement, because there is an assumption among GLBT activists that they need an ideology, and that their ideology must defend the claim that sexual deviation is something innate and inevitable, as natural as having arms and legs. They insist on a very extreme version of the old "gay gene" notion, to the extent that they sound as though they denied any other possible cause for any possible case. Not only homosexuality, not only transgendering, but even bisexuality, must be - to judge by some of the rhetoric that emanates from their movement - genetically determined.
As might be expected, and although there is no necessary relationship between religion and a desire to change one's sexual identity, activist Christian groups, mostly grass-root Protestants ("ministries"), are the keenest promoters of ex-gays as a "movement". They form organized groups, try to get on panel debates and be recognized by national associations, set up training camps and facilities for homosexuals who might want to be changed; and they do not seem to be short of trade, at least by their own account. (What follows will show why I cannot trust the views of either side.)
A teen-ager called Zach from Tennessee was sent to an ex-homosexuals' camp, I assume by his parents. He kept a blog which gave a very negative account of events, to the point where the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services launched an investigation of the camp as a result of Zach’s online diary. However, the investigation was closed for lack of any evidence to support Zach's claims.
I do not take this as proving anything. On the one hand, it is perfectly possible that the Children's Services people were prejudiced in favour of the camp and made only a perfunctory investigation; or that the camp covered up whatever abuse had taken place, well enough to fool investigators. It is equally possible that Zach, sent to a camp where he may not have wanted to be, perhaps already committed to the GLBT movement, exaggerated or even lied online to blacken the camp's reputation. The fact that he was able to keep an unsupervised online diary and put in apparently horrible detail does not argue in favour of a gulag-like environment, but that is hardly a strong point.
But while I do not believe myself able to assess the reality of what went on, a man called Kevin Naff, editor of The Washington Blade, had no such doubts. He took every word of Zach's as Gospel, and used it as the starting point of a tirade against the very idea that same-sex attractions, whether or not wanted, might be cured. So far, so boilerplate. He wrote nothing that his kind of person has not written a hundred times, not as well as some, and, to judge by one of our fellow LJers, not even as hatefully as some others.
However, Mr.Naff's characteristic seems to be an undisciplined indulgence in his own feelings, which, for some reason, he imagines to be important. He concluded his article with a frank declaration of impotent hatred: the “ex-gay” movement “drives me into fits of rage... Someday, science will discover the biological or genetic root of homosexuality and finally put to rest the absurd notion that sexual orientation is a choice. Until then, we must counter the damaging rhetoric of the ‘ex-gays’ and ensure that young gays like Zach understand that they are perfectly normal as they are. It’s the ‘ex-gays’ that belong in a reparative camp.”
This is a fairly foolish piece of writing, the expression of frustration and impotence. He implicitly admits that there is no scientific evidence ("someday, science will discover that...") for his dogma that there are "genetic roots of homosexuality" and that the "notion that sexual orientation is a choice" is "absurd". He is ranting, like a man up against a brick wall, against "damaging rhetoric", and, like many people who feel themselves to be on the losing side, fantasizes about doing to the enemy what he feels they are doing to his side: "It’s the ‘ex-gays’ that belong in a reparative camp.”
Is this sort of talk to be taken seriously? As an indication of a fairly desperate frame of mind, yes; as anything like a practical program, of course not. Anyone who takes this sort of screed as a serious threat to shut the "ex-gays" up in concentration camps is either ill-intentioned or incapable of understanding human nature. At worst, it counts as a very abstract, very unpractical reflection of a desire to silence the enemy. That is certainly not nice, either in the itch to silence someone, or in treating opponents in a debate as enemies to be squashed; which is not alien to the GLBT movement as I have encountered it. But it has nothing practical about it. If anything, Mr.naff's outburst is a sort of backhanded compliment to the success of the "ex-gay" movement.
(To the success, I say; not to the merits. On this matter I intend to remain strictly neutral. But what Mr.Naff tells us is that he feels that the practical success of the "ex-gay" movement, however limited, threatens people like him.)
So what happens? It happens that a group called the Traditional Values Coalition gets hold of Mr.Naff's screed, turns it upside down, and makes a story out of it. The closing burst of helpless rage is taken to be the point of the whole article, and the Coalition publises on its website, as a serious news story, that ‘Washington Blade’ Editor Wants Ex-Homosexuals Imprisoned.
I have no sympathy for the likes of Kevin Naff, who are copiously represented in HP fandom, and I have suffered at their hands. But anything less Christian, less intelligent, less open-minded, than this patently manipulative approach, is hard to imagine. They take mr.Naff's screed and make a program out of it; they make of it, what it patently is not and never was, a program for action. What kind of Christianity is this, with so little understanding of human nature, so little interest in the human beings that oppose them, not concerned with anything they may say or feel, but only in how his words can be twisted to be used as a political scarecrow?
The Coalition, like other such groups, has a point. We have seen - I posted an account no more than a couple of entries ago - how the law and the courts are being used by people like Mr.Naff (I do not only mean the GLBT movement, but the whole vast arch of leftist prejudice and aggression) for a series of assaults upon freedom of thought and of worship; we know that people of this kind are perfectly ready to use such means to silence us. But this sort of instrumental abuse of others' words is actively self-damaging. Demonizing opponents is not going to help us; understanding them - even if to condemn them - is the only sound road. I have no tenderness, nor even much sympathy, for the likes of Mr.Naff; but to lie about him in order to frighten third parties is not going to give us any advantage. The effect of a lie only lasts until the truth is known; and then the liar, whatever his motives, is discredited in the eyes of others. Anyone who finds out what Mr.Naff really said, and why, is not going to take the Coalition's arguments seriously again; and for that reason alone, even forgetting the moral primacy of truth, this sort of stuff should be left strictly alone. This is the kind of controversy from which both sides come out equally soiled, the Christian one, if possible, even worse.
These people's claims infuriate the GLBT movement, because there is an assumption among GLBT activists that they need an ideology, and that their ideology must defend the claim that sexual deviation is something innate and inevitable, as natural as having arms and legs. They insist on a very extreme version of the old "gay gene" notion, to the extent that they sound as though they denied any other possible cause for any possible case. Not only homosexuality, not only transgendering, but even bisexuality, must be - to judge by some of the rhetoric that emanates from their movement - genetically determined.
As might be expected, and although there is no necessary relationship between religion and a desire to change one's sexual identity, activist Christian groups, mostly grass-root Protestants ("ministries"), are the keenest promoters of ex-gays as a "movement". They form organized groups, try to get on panel debates and be recognized by national associations, set up training camps and facilities for homosexuals who might want to be changed; and they do not seem to be short of trade, at least by their own account. (What follows will show why I cannot trust the views of either side.)
A teen-ager called Zach from Tennessee was sent to an ex-homosexuals' camp, I assume by his parents. He kept a blog which gave a very negative account of events, to the point where the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services launched an investigation of the camp as a result of Zach’s online diary. However, the investigation was closed for lack of any evidence to support Zach's claims.
I do not take this as proving anything. On the one hand, it is perfectly possible that the Children's Services people were prejudiced in favour of the camp and made only a perfunctory investigation; or that the camp covered up whatever abuse had taken place, well enough to fool investigators. It is equally possible that Zach, sent to a camp where he may not have wanted to be, perhaps already committed to the GLBT movement, exaggerated or even lied online to blacken the camp's reputation. The fact that he was able to keep an unsupervised online diary and put in apparently horrible detail does not argue in favour of a gulag-like environment, but that is hardly a strong point.
But while I do not believe myself able to assess the reality of what went on, a man called Kevin Naff, editor of The Washington Blade, had no such doubts. He took every word of Zach's as Gospel, and used it as the starting point of a tirade against the very idea that same-sex attractions, whether or not wanted, might be cured. So far, so boilerplate. He wrote nothing that his kind of person has not written a hundred times, not as well as some, and, to judge by one of our fellow LJers, not even as hatefully as some others.
However, Mr.Naff's characteristic seems to be an undisciplined indulgence in his own feelings, which, for some reason, he imagines to be important. He concluded his article with a frank declaration of impotent hatred: the “ex-gay” movement “drives me into fits of rage... Someday, science will discover the biological or genetic root of homosexuality and finally put to rest the absurd notion that sexual orientation is a choice. Until then, we must counter the damaging rhetoric of the ‘ex-gays’ and ensure that young gays like Zach understand that they are perfectly normal as they are. It’s the ‘ex-gays’ that belong in a reparative camp.”
This is a fairly foolish piece of writing, the expression of frustration and impotence. He implicitly admits that there is no scientific evidence ("someday, science will discover that...") for his dogma that there are "genetic roots of homosexuality" and that the "notion that sexual orientation is a choice" is "absurd". He is ranting, like a man up against a brick wall, against "damaging rhetoric", and, like many people who feel themselves to be on the losing side, fantasizes about doing to the enemy what he feels they are doing to his side: "It’s the ‘ex-gays’ that belong in a reparative camp.”
Is this sort of talk to be taken seriously? As an indication of a fairly desperate frame of mind, yes; as anything like a practical program, of course not. Anyone who takes this sort of screed as a serious threat to shut the "ex-gays" up in concentration camps is either ill-intentioned or incapable of understanding human nature. At worst, it counts as a very abstract, very unpractical reflection of a desire to silence the enemy. That is certainly not nice, either in the itch to silence someone, or in treating opponents in a debate as enemies to be squashed; which is not alien to the GLBT movement as I have encountered it. But it has nothing practical about it. If anything, Mr.naff's outburst is a sort of backhanded compliment to the success of the "ex-gay" movement.
(To the success, I say; not to the merits. On this matter I intend to remain strictly neutral. But what Mr.Naff tells us is that he feels that the practical success of the "ex-gay" movement, however limited, threatens people like him.)
So what happens? It happens that a group called the Traditional Values Coalition gets hold of Mr.Naff's screed, turns it upside down, and makes a story out of it. The closing burst of helpless rage is taken to be the point of the whole article, and the Coalition publises on its website, as a serious news story, that ‘Washington Blade’ Editor Wants Ex-Homosexuals Imprisoned.
I have no sympathy for the likes of Kevin Naff, who are copiously represented in HP fandom, and I have suffered at their hands. But anything less Christian, less intelligent, less open-minded, than this patently manipulative approach, is hard to imagine. They take mr.Naff's screed and make a program out of it; they make of it, what it patently is not and never was, a program for action. What kind of Christianity is this, with so little understanding of human nature, so little interest in the human beings that oppose them, not concerned with anything they may say or feel, but only in how his words can be twisted to be used as a political scarecrow?
The Coalition, like other such groups, has a point. We have seen - I posted an account no more than a couple of entries ago - how the law and the courts are being used by people like Mr.Naff (I do not only mean the GLBT movement, but the whole vast arch of leftist prejudice and aggression) for a series of assaults upon freedom of thought and of worship; we know that people of this kind are perfectly ready to use such means to silence us. But this sort of instrumental abuse of others' words is actively self-damaging. Demonizing opponents is not going to help us; understanding them - even if to condemn them - is the only sound road. I have no tenderness, nor even much sympathy, for the likes of Mr.Naff; but to lie about him in order to frighten third parties is not going to give us any advantage. The effect of a lie only lasts until the truth is known; and then the liar, whatever his motives, is discredited in the eyes of others. Anyone who finds out what Mr.Naff really said, and why, is not going to take the Coalition's arguments seriously again; and for that reason alone, even forgetting the moral primacy of truth, this sort of stuff should be left strictly alone. This is the kind of controversy from which both sides come out equally soiled, the Christian one, if possible, even worse.
Taken from the Brucefans community:
"A last-minute addition to the European tour: Iceland's Keflavik Airport. On his way from Germany back to the U.S. late Tuesday night, after the Berlin show, Springsteen's plane stopped over in Iceland.... and Bruce apparently had one more encore left in him.
According to the Iceland Review, some late-shift workers at the airport were treated to a six-song set: "The employees commented that Springsteen showed no pretense and was very down-to-earth, chatting away with them. His friend asked the airport employees if they would like to listen to a few tunes. Springsteen then played six songs including 'The River.' After the impromptu concert he asked what typical Icelandic food consisted of -- the fans were quick to answer 'Black Death and Shark.'"
As for those five other songs, your guess is as good as ours... "Iceman"? "This Hard Land"? "Open All Night"? A Bjork cover?"
"A last-minute addition to the European tour: Iceland's Keflavik Airport. On his way from Germany back to the U.S. late Tuesday night, after the Berlin show, Springsteen's plane stopped over in Iceland.... and Bruce apparently had one more encore left in him.
According to the Iceland Review, some late-shift workers at the airport were treated to a six-song set: "The employees commented that Springsteen showed no pretense and was very down-to-earth, chatting away with them. His friend asked the airport employees if they would like to listen to a few tunes. Springsteen then played six songs including 'The River.' After the impromptu concert he asked what typical Icelandic food consisted of -- the fans were quick to answer 'Black Death and Shark.'"
As for those five other songs, your guess is as good as ours... "Iceman"? "This Hard Land"? "Open All Night"? A Bjork cover?"