A month ago, I mentioned something a police commander once told me: "Lucky for us that most criminals are stupid".
There is a corollary to that among transphobes, homophobes and haters of all other stripes: We're lucky that, most of the time, their prejudices are based on a complete lack of reason or empirical evidence.
And in the case of one member of the species, I don't know how in the world he got a law degree. He fancies himself a constitutional lawyer and uses that platform to spew his bilge.
I'm talking about Matt Barber, founder and editor-in-chief of BarbWire.com. He's called self-styled Christians to join him in hatefests disguised with fasting, prayers and other trappings of fealty to the God he claims to believe in.
Now he's claiming that same-sex marriage is "rooted in fraud and child rape".
First, the "child rape" part. I thought almost nobody who hasn't been living under a rock for the past thirty years still believes that all gays are paedophiles, or that having been molested or raped as a child will make someone gay. Now, I know that my own experience, all by itself, doesn't prove anything, but I must mention that as a child, I was molested by a man who probably never even thought about having sex with an adult, or even post-pubescent, male. I know of plenty of men who were sexually molested or abused by men but didn't "turn out" gay or even bisexual. In my case, I had my gender identity long before the man I've mentioned ever laid a hand on me.
So how does Barber make the connection between between same-sex marriage and child rape? Well, that's where the "fraud" part comes in. You see, Barber claims that Alfred Kinsey instigated the "sexual revolution"--which, he says is responsible for the "artificial construct" of gay marriage. Barber claims that Kinsey was "promiscuous homosexual and sadomasochist" whose research has been "discredited". By whom? Well, by no less than Dr. Judith Reisman, who claims, among other things, that Planned Parenthood funds itself through sex trafficking and that the "homosexual movement" in Germany gave rise to Nazism and the Holocaust.
But, oh, it gets better. I'm not an expert on Kinsey or, for that matter, gay marriage. Still, I don't think it's a stretch to say that I've read most of the arguments for and against gay marriage. Perhaps, at my age, my memory isn't what it used to be, but I feel confident that I haven't seen or heard a single argument in favor of same-sex marriage, anywhere, that makes reference to Kinsey's work.
And Barber claims that the arguments for gay marriage are constructed on a house of cards!
To top everything off, he ends his diatribe with this little gem: "At this point, prayer alone may save marriage and keep, at bay, the wrath of a just and Holy God."
I'm not going to argue with or against his or anyone else's right to believe in such a God, or any other kind. I simply don't understand how he, as a self-proclaimed Constitutional lawyer, can forget that the First Amendment guarantees the principle of the separation of church and state. How can he advocate for or against a law on the grounds that it's God's will, or some such thing?
Fortunately for us, only those who have suspended their facilities for logic and reason--or never had such facilities in the first place--will place any credence in his arguments. Still, that's not going to stop them from fighting viciously. So, while they won't win, ultimately--they can't--they'll do whatever they can to forestall the inevitable.
There is a corollary to that among transphobes, homophobes and haters of all other stripes: We're lucky that, most of the time, their prejudices are based on a complete lack of reason or empirical evidence.
And in the case of one member of the species, I don't know how in the world he got a law degree. He fancies himself a constitutional lawyer and uses that platform to spew his bilge.
I'm talking about Matt Barber, founder and editor-in-chief of BarbWire.com. He's called self-styled Christians to join him in hatefests disguised with fasting, prayers and other trappings of fealty to the God he claims to believe in.
Now he's claiming that same-sex marriage is "rooted in fraud and child rape".
First, the "child rape" part. I thought almost nobody who hasn't been living under a rock for the past thirty years still believes that all gays are paedophiles, or that having been molested or raped as a child will make someone gay. Now, I know that my own experience, all by itself, doesn't prove anything, but I must mention that as a child, I was molested by a man who probably never even thought about having sex with an adult, or even post-pubescent, male. I know of plenty of men who were sexually molested or abused by men but didn't "turn out" gay or even bisexual. In my case, I had my gender identity long before the man I've mentioned ever laid a hand on me.
So how does Barber make the connection between between same-sex marriage and child rape? Well, that's where the "fraud" part comes in. You see, Barber claims that Alfred Kinsey instigated the "sexual revolution"--which, he says is responsible for the "artificial construct" of gay marriage. Barber claims that Kinsey was "promiscuous homosexual and sadomasochist" whose research has been "discredited". By whom? Well, by no less than Dr. Judith Reisman, who claims, among other things, that Planned Parenthood funds itself through sex trafficking and that the "homosexual movement" in Germany gave rise to Nazism and the Holocaust.
But, oh, it gets better. I'm not an expert on Kinsey or, for that matter, gay marriage. Still, I don't think it's a stretch to say that I've read most of the arguments for and against gay marriage. Perhaps, at my age, my memory isn't what it used to be, but I feel confident that I haven't seen or heard a single argument in favor of same-sex marriage, anywhere, that makes reference to Kinsey's work.
And Barber claims that the arguments for gay marriage are constructed on a house of cards!
To top everything off, he ends his diatribe with this little gem: "At this point, prayer alone may save marriage and keep, at bay, the wrath of a just and Holy God."
I'm not going to argue with or against his or anyone else's right to believe in such a God, or any other kind. I simply don't understand how he, as a self-proclaimed Constitutional lawyer, can forget that the First Amendment guarantees the principle of the separation of church and state. How can he advocate for or against a law on the grounds that it's God's will, or some such thing?
Fortunately for us, only those who have suspended their facilities for logic and reason--or never had such facilities in the first place--will place any credence in his arguments. Still, that's not going to stop them from fighting viciously. So, while they won't win, ultimately--they can't--they'll do whatever they can to forestall the inevitable.
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