You really have to wonder about the leaders of the so-called �Christian�* Right and their political sycophants. They continue to use the same hackneyed rhetoric, propagate the same bogus stereotypes, and repeat the same outright lies. Perhaps they�re just, as Frank Rich suggested in his New York Times OpEd, �brain dead.�

Whenever a court rules in favor of constitutionally guaranteed civil equality, they trot out the �activist judge� mantra. The �Christian� Right loves to call itself �pro-family,� while working diligently to shatter �traditional families� when one of the kids announces s/he is gay . . . even if it�s their own family: example one, example two. And they�re absolutely tireless in their efforts to stigmatize and hurt gay families -- both parents and children -- in any and every way possible. Is that �pro-family�?

Recently they�ve altered their rhetoric. Now they�re also claiming to be �pro-marriage.� No they�re not. They want to prevent monogamous, loving couples who believe in the institution of marriage from marrying. They�re anti-marriage.

As for using lies to propagate bogus stereotypes, Miss California�s church is exemplary. According to Rock Church�s website:

Today�s society tries to teach us that morals are all relative that there are no absolute moral laws but this is not only wrong but a very dangerous way of thinking. For not only does God�s Word tell us what is right and what is wrong . . .

Consequences of a Homosexual Lifestyle

God�s Word tells us differently and He provides us of the evidence that homosexuality is not natural or normal. There are physiological repercussions from homosexual behavior; male homosexuals are 430 times more likely to contract HIV than a heterosexual, while heterosexuals have a 1-in-750,000 chance of contracting the virus responsible for HIV, a male homosexual has a 1-in-165 chance of getting HIV. A 20 year old gay male has a 30% chance of either dying or contracting AIDS before the age of 30. They are also 23 times more likely to get other sexually transmitted diseases than a heterosexual.

There are also moral repercussions stemming from homosexual behavior as evidenced by the fact that one third of all sexual crimes against children are committed by homosexuals even though they are representative of only one percent of the population. Pedophilia has even been called central to the gay lifestyle. . . .

Emotionally people suffer from homosexuality. Gays are five times more likely to commit suicide than a straight person. They are suffering depression because of God�s judgment and their alienation from Him. So God not only tells us what is right and wrong but that by continually doing what is wrong there will be consequences and this is all evident to us so we have no excuse in suppressing the truth.

�God�s Word tells us what is right and what is wrong.� Really? What about all those passages in Leviticus and Deuteronomy about stoning people who wear clothing made of two different threads or who work on the Sabbath. And then there are those other fun parts of �God�s word� that sanction selling one�s daughter into slavery, killing disobedient children, and stoning to death non-virgin brides.

If �God�s word� changes with the New Testament, how come Jesus never said anything about homosexuality or gay people? He did, of course, champion the marginalized and disenfranchised, which is exactly the status in which the �Christian� Right wants to entomb gay people.

As for those unsupported, undocumented (and patently ridiculous) �facts� and statistics in Rock Church�s �Consequences of a Homosexual Lifestyle� tirade, they reek of discredited �psychologist� Paul Cameron.

In his article �The Fabulist: Anti-gay researcher Paul Cameron�s falsehoods are well known. The incredible thing is the people who still cite them,� David Holthouse noted that �religious right action groups including Focus on the Family, the American Family Association, the Family Research Council and the Traditional Values Coalition promote Cameron�s statistics on their Web sites.� Cameron�s unscientific, unethical �research� is constantly being exposed, yet these �Christian� organizations keep citing it as gospel truth. Can you spell �intentional deception�?

The man the �Christian� Right seems to hold in such high regard has long had a �final solution� to the �gay problem�: �At the 1985 Conservative Political Action Conference, [Paul] Cameron announced to the attendees, �Unless we get medically lucky, in three or four years, one of the options discussed will be the extermination of homosexuals.� According to an interview with former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, Cameron was recommending the extermination option as early as 1983.� [Mark E. Pietrzyk, News-Telegraph, March 10, 1995]

In some places such recommendations are taken seriously . . . with horrific results:

Iraqi Gays Face Gruesome Torture/ Murder Technique
By: DOUG IRELAND
04/30/2009

As the murder campaign targeting Iraqi gays intensifies, a leading Arabic television network last week revealed the use of a horrifying new form of lethal torture against Iraqi gay men - anti-gay Shiite death squads are sealing their anuses with a powerful glue, then inducing diarrhea, which leads to a painful and agonizing death. The use of this stomach-turning new torture was first reported by the Al Arabiya network, which is headquartered in the United Arab Emirates and was alerted to the story by a leading Iraqi feminist and human rights activist.

Rock Church claimed �Gays are five times more likely to commit suicide than a straight person. They are suffering depression because of God�s judgment and their alienation from Him.� Gays do have a higher incidence of alcoholism, drug abuse, and suicide -- especially among vulnerable gay teens -- but it�s not because of �God�s judgment.� It�s due largely to the demeaning, hateful rhetoric used by people like Paul Cameron, James Dobson (Focus on the Family), Louis Sheldon (Traditional Values Coalition), Don Wildmon (American Family Association), Tony Perkins (Family Research Council) and the rest of the leaders of the �Christian� Right, including Miss California�s Rock Church.

Do you think that if you were constantly denigrated, harassed and made fun of, constantly on guard against violent attacks, called �a freak of nature,� �evil,� �an abomination to God� and �a threat to the state and society� by religious and political leaders, denied employment or housing, forced by a discriminatory society to live life �in the closet,� saw signs that read �God Hates Gays� and �Fags Die, God Laughs,� and had people calling for your murder that you too might develop some �problems�?

Dr. Gary Cohan�s March 12, 2004 article on Advocate.com made the clinical point: �After 20 years of practicing medicine in the gay community, I can report that many diseases and most self-destructive behaviors are tied to low self-esteem. Alienation from families, shame, social isolation, hate-fueled violence, and being called �faggot� does so much damage to the young psyche that many of my adult patients now struggle with the tragic aftermath: depression, substance use, and sexual compulsivity to fill the emotional void.�

Glenda M. Russell, senior research associate and acting executive director at the Institute for Gay and Lesbian Strategic Studies in Amherst, Massachusetts, also noted the same implications in her recent article �The Dangers of a Same-Sex Marriage Referendum for Community and Individual Well-Being: A Summary of Research Findings�: �When a particular group is the subject of political debate, group members often exhibit a variety of negative outcomes including anxiety, depression, alienation, fear, and anger. In the case of the debate over same-sex marriage, these consequences will be most strongly experienced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people; by children in LGBT families; and by LGBT people�s extended family members and friends. As the referendum polarizes people, LGBT citizens become fearful and their children often encounter ridicule at school.�

As for �Miss California� and her new found fame with anti-equality (and anti-marriage) groups such as National Organization for Marriage:

Miss Universe to anti-gay group: Stop using Carrie Prejean pageant footage

TMZ reports that Miss Universe Organization has sent a cease-and-desist letter to the National Organization for Marriage. Seems the Miss Universe organizers are not too thrilled with NOM using footage from the Miss USA 2009 pageant in an anti-gay marriage commercial.

And then came this:

Miss California officials bypass no-show title holder
12:01 PM | May 11, 2009

Carrie Prejean, the controversial Miss California, was neither fired nor embraced today by local pageant officials. Instead, frustrated officials said at a news conference in Beverly Hills that they would simply circumvent her and appoint first runner-up Tami Farrell as �our official Beauty of California ambassador.� . . .

Pageant officials said they would be willing to work with Carrie Prejean, but every time they reach out to her, they are confronted by an army of her handlers and haven�t been able to talk with her.

�Up to now, it�s been very difficult to get in touch with her,� said Shanna Moakler, executive director of the California pageant.

Perhaps Ms. Moakler should have tried contacting Prejean via NOM, which has another new spokesman and board member:

Orson Scott Card, author of the popular sci-fi novel �Ender�s Game,� has joined the board of the National Organization for Marriage. . . .

We think that Card, who turned into a reactionary crank somewhere along the way, will be a good fit for NOM. . . .

Last July in the Mormon Times he appeared to advocate overthrowing the government if [California�s] Prop 8 failed:

�How long before married people answer the dictators thus: Regardless of law, marriage has only one definition, and any government that attempts to change it is my mortal enemy. I will act to destroy that government and bring it down, so it can be replaced with a government that will respect and support marriage, and help me raise my children in a society where they will expect to marry in their turn. [ . . . ] American government cannot fight against marriage and hope to endure. If the Constitution is defined in such a way as to destroy the privileged position of marriage, it is that insane Constitution, not marriage, that will die.�

Twisted logic, twisted people, same old stale song.

To be continued . . .