CShine

I'm guessing that after they pull this off they'll set their sights on banning MTV. I always love watching people try to tear up the Constitution.


http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/...in691106.shtml

guy44

Yeah, that college production is probably The Laramie Project. My college put it on a couple of years ago, and it was pretty good. I guess there is probably some level of irony in that the only clearcut bad guys in the play were people exactly like State Representative Gerald Allen.

I want to try something, bear with me.

"I don't look at it as censorship," says Senator McCarthy. "I look at it as protecting the hearts and souls and minds of our children."

Yup. Still fits after all these years.

BTW, off the top of my head I figure that includes works by Leonardo da Vinci, Oscar Wilde, and Gertrude Stein. Where will Alabamans get their daily dose of Aida?

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ObieX

I don't understand why more people don't just pull the bigot card. Follow the guy around and introduce him to everyone he walks past on the street as "that bigot". Every speech hold up a sign that clearly states his name and that he is a bigot, or make use of a bullhorn. Same for people who use "Faggot" commonly as a derogatory term, or gay. Just greet it with a "hey look, its a bigot." loud enough for all to hear. Same goes for nigger or cracker etc. If he runs for reelection, place signs around with his face and the word bigot under it in big bold letters, instead of your choice for the office.

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We Must Dissent.

energus

I just wonder how many movies, screenplays, musicals and other forms of entertainment are going to feel the backlash of this one. A lot of unemployed people if you ask me.

Silly bugger, glad I don't live near there. I would have a heart attack.

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Somnia, terrores magicos, miracula, sagas,
Nocturnus lemures, portentaque.
Horace

Seanland

O shit, they should look into eliminating ancient history, cause I mean, Europeans/Egyptian history had gay people, that should definately be eliminated......

Charlatan

I just love this line:
"I don't look at it as censorship," says State Representative Gerald Allen. "I look at it as protecting the hearts and souls and minds of our children."

I know he believe he is doing this as a good thing. That he believes Homosexuals are evil. But I just can't believe people can truly hold these beliefs in this day and age.

I have to it is a minority (even if it isn't).

I wonder if he sees, or would recognize if he was shown, the parallels between his action here and the kinds of actions taken by religious theocracies around the world. I wonder if he would appeciate the irony of his position vis a vis an organization like the Taliban or the Mullahs in Iran?

__________________
"My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars."
- Old Man Luedecke

tecoyah

Get them bonfires a 'Blazin'

This is unfortunate....if not unexpected.

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samcol

It reminds me of my school that had a Christmas production with a gay Jesus. I mean why would someone want to do this for any reason other than to create a huge stir in the community.

Even though I don't enjoy gay themed art productions, their free speech should be upheld.

maleficent

Who the heck died and made Gerald Allen the morality police to decide what people could and could not read.

Once he gets rid of the homosexual works of literature, where's he go next? I'm sure every great author in history has something that's bound to offend Allen in some way.

I think he needs to be sent a copy of Farhrenheit 451...

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connyosis

Well, banning MTV might actually be a good thing :-)
I'm sure the chinese government doesn't see their blocking of webpages critical of them as censorship either, just a way of protecting its citizens fragile little minds.

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If atheism is a religion, then not collecting stamps is a hobby.

Ilow

[QUOTE=samcol]It reminds me of my school that had a Christmas production with a gay Jesus. I mean why would someone want to do this for any reason other than to create a huge stir in the community.
QUOTE]
come on...single guy, never married, always hanging around a dozen dudes and drinking wine... (just kidding)

In other news, please tune your ovens to 451 and await the signal.

Seriously, this guy is a moron regardless of his political affiliation (although I can't imagine too many Democrats behaving in this way regarding this issue) but this really appears to be a red state issue. Although some blue states voted down a gay marriage issue, I cannot imagine a blue state politician saying these things. If this is true, as I believe, then the divide continues.

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--Sam Harris

StanT

You say that like it's a bad thing.


This is a representative on a state level. His constituancy is likely very small, perhaps a single county or so. He's just getting some free publicity on an issue that the people that elect him may care about. It is unlikely to ever get voted on. It is highly unlikely to ever get approved. It's just a political publicity stunt.

cellophanedeity

I can't believe this man! I can't believe that after all of this time that there are still public officials who are audacious enough to blatently hate a group of people so publicly.

There is no justification for this. I'm sure even Jesus or God or whichever deity he's calling upon wouldn't approve.

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who am I to refuse the universe?
-Leonard Cohen, Beautiful Losers

lindseylatch

I LOVED the Laramie Project when our school produced it. It wasn't about supporting gay people, it was basically about how the violent hate act affected the community, although it DID support gay people. However, it also showed the perspectives of people in the community who didn't support gay people, but also didn't support the crime. I think it was a good lesson that you can condemn an act even it was commited in the name of something you believe it.
I think it would be a CRIME to censor gay media. It's just hiding under a rock and not accepting that this is an issue in our society. And you really can't hide from something so universal in this society. There's tv shows about gay relationships, it's on the news (esp. surrouding last November). If they really want there kids to condemn gay marriage, then they need to spin the media, not bury it. Like the real good politicians and news programs do.

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liquidlight

I was listening to some commentary about this on the radio this morning, I'd really like to ask the senator if he means to remove Shakespeare from the schools ciriculum as well. I mean just look at that heathen Macbeth.

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Halfway to hell and picking up speed.

lindseylatch

Macbeth is gay?
it would be much easier to scan for my posts with an avatar. *sigh* just a few more days.

__________________
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
"If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him."
"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."
-Voltaire

lurkette

By all means, let us protect the hearts and souls and minds of our children from such dangerous concepts as tolerance and compassion. Seeing a play that paints tying a guy to a fence and beating him to death as a bad thing will surely lead to the downfall of our society.



I could cry. I could just cry. I see things like this and I wonder how we as a species will ever survive without killing each other. I wonder when the day is coming that I'll be locked up for lusting after women. Or move to the Netherlands. What makes people think "I don't think like X so nobody else should, either" is viable social policy?

Hell in a handbasket, I tell you. I'll just be muttering to myself over in the corner.

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"If ten million people believe a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing."

- Anatole France

lurkette

Charlatan, I suspect the only thing people like this see wrong with the Taliban is that they're worshiping the wrong god.

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"If ten million people believe a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing."

- Anatole France

samcol

Well, being gay can't biologically contribute to survival of the species.

guthmund

^^^^Why not? Their parts work just as well. Just because they prefer using their gentalia elsewhere doesn't mean it doesn't work, no?

(I know you're joking. That's why I responded with whimsey rather than vitriol. You were joking...right?)

*bumped for truth

That. Is a fantastic idea! Have little leaflets with detailed examples of their bigotry to show the masses. It's about time we stop worshiping the idea of equal time and start calling bullshit for what it really is.

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lurkette

pththtbhht!!!

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"If ten million people believe a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing."

- Anatole France

Coppertop

Actually Christians and Muslims are not worshipping a different god. They both worship the god of Abraham. This of course just makes it all the more pathetic.

Gilda

Yeah, we can't have students reading, oh, say Lincoln by Gore Vidal for their history classes, now can we. And of course, this would mean no Julius Caesar in English class, (those heathen Romans and their acceptance of casual homosexual acts between men). Oh, and Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice with their crossdressing women, that's just horrible. And we might as well just ban ballet and Broadway musicals altogether.

Elphaba

Is it required that I light a fire to my Truman Capote collection? Naw, Mark Twain would go first, and has in the public schools from what I have read.

Public school libraries have been under censorship attack for as long as I can remember. It appears that one parent can cast out "Catcher in the Rye" or "Huckleberry Finn" for an offensive word. I have no solution to this problem, but I agree with Stan that this is a politically motivated stunt.

EULA

The funny thing about the matthew shepard things is that everyone but the police were saying it was a hate crime. The attackers were coming off of a 3-day meth bender and one of the attackers was bisexual and had a sexual encounter with shepherd some time before the attack. They walked into the situation wanting the contents of his wallet.

Kadath

I don't think anything is funny about the death of Matthew Shepard. I also object to the idea that the crime is somehow less horrifying if it was motivated by money instead of hate.

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lurkette

I'm not intimately familiar with the details of the case, but if they just wanted the contents of his wallet, there was no cause to beat him, burn him, and leave him tied to a fence to die. Further, one of the defendants tried to mount a "gay panic" defense, arguing that he had had traumatic homosexual experiences earlier in his life, and that Shepard came on to him, triggering his rage and panic. Sounds a bit like a "hate crime" to me. Shepard was murdered because he was gay and had tangled with the wrong homophobes.

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"If ten million people believe a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing."

- Anatole France

alansmithee

But isn't that the whole point of hate crime designations? That if a crime is motivated by something other than hate it's a lesser offense? Or is it just horrifying because the victim was gay?

roachboy

1. alansmithee: what possible reason motivates you to question whether the murder of matthew shepard was or was not a hate crime? what do you hope to demonstrate by pursuing this line of argument?

2.
i thought this thread was about the latest manifestation of reactionary cultural policy emanating from the evangelical-dominated extreme right.

as is usual for this kind of thing these days, censorship proposals--wholly ridiculous proposals at that--are squeezed out into the public sphere wrapped in the steaming brown bonbon of "protecting our children"---- from what i guess could be understood as the floating spores that cause homosexuality in the tiny world of the extreme right.

on the other hand, maybe there is a sense in which gerald allen recognizes the linkage between ignorance and his views and so is really defending his views by trying to limit access to a huge range of literature. information is poison, apparently.

the funny thing underneath this is that in order to implement the proposal, a list would be required--which means that criteria for defining homosexuality would have to be elaborated--all of which would be very 1942. i wonder which model they will use: the nazi lists of jews? no no...naming fascist antecedents creates more trouble than it is worth. it follows, then, that fascist proposals cannot be fascist if the person floating them does not mention fascism. q.e.d.
so maybe the vatican's index of banned books--but wait....the vatican is full of catholics--and we know from reading various apocalyptic tracts from evangelicals that there is a strain of "thought" which understands the catholic church as the Beast outlined in the extended fever dream that ends the new testament.

so i expect that they will pretend that nothing like this has happened before, because gerald allen means well....the last defense of the true asswipe.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Strange Famous

Clearly this is never going to be allowed to become law. It's just an extremist trying to court cheap publicity I would imagine...I can only also assume that he will not seek re-election the next time his post comes up for vote?

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"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

jonjon42

I think we should explain to this guy some of the more interesting sub-texts of "The Importance of Being Earnest" (hint: deconstruct the world bunbury)

and anything by Shakespear is out of the question

I can see the if passed the libraries would be rather empty

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Strange Famous

oh, jeez... I just re-read... no books WRITTEN by homosexual authors???

well yeah, no more Shakespeare or Wordsworth...

people like this give the Philistines a bd name

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

DukeNukem4ever

[QUOTE=CShine]I'm guessing that after they pull this off they'll set their sights on banning MTV. I always love watching people try to tear up the Constitution.

I doubt if you have anything worry about... The chances of this "Bill" getting passed is about the same as a monkey flying out of my arse within the next 5 minutes...


"Don't take life so seriously... Enjoy it while you can."

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kramus

I honestly think that a lot of people are not taking seriously enough the rabid and growing power/influence of the bible belt faction. It is increasingly a polarizing factor in American politics. The liberal blip on the cultural radar that was the 60's and 70's may colourize and give more texture to the ongoing debate of just what direction ethicly and morally we envision ourselves as taking. However the fundamentalist reactionaries are a powerful group and their money, influence and cohesive ideology is apparent in details such as GWBush being the current hand on the helm. Seriously folks, pay attention to this shit and be aware that this is scary and very very real.

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Strange Famous

I dont know if this belongs in this thread or not... but has anyone ever read a nook called "The handmaid's tale" by Margaret Atwood?

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

kramus

As I said, scary stuff man. Also "A Creed for the Third Millenium" by Colleen Mccullough I believe it is also carries some of this resonance.

__________________
And now to disengage the clutch of the forebrain ...
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eeef2

I agree. The majority of ppl choose to stay in the dark because they too damn lazy.