| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Seldom Seen Smith" |
| Date: |
18 Nov 2004 09:45:08 PM |
| Object: |
Intolerance Is Not a 'Value' |
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52900-2004Nov15?language=printer
Intolerance Is Not a 'Value'
By Timothy M. Gay
Tuesday, November 16, 2004; Page A25
One of my favorite teachers was a wiry little man with thick, horn-rimmed
glasses who taught us fifth grade. It's been 40 years, but I can still see
his crooked grin and hear his voice cracking with excitement.
He made learning fun, constantly getting the class to act out skits to
reinforce one lesson or another. His eyes were keen and his heart was big:
He always made sure that kids from broken homes or the wrong side of the
tracks got starring roles in our productions. He helped implant in me a
lifelong love of history. I was out sick with the flu for a couple of days
that year; he waited until I returned to resume class readings of a Civil
War book that he knew I loved. He was everything a great teacher is
supposed to be: unfailingly kind, considerate and dedicated.
He was, also, we learned much later, gay. But because this was the
mid-1960s in a small town, he didn't dare live as such -- especially since
he doubled as the school's principal. Only in his twilight years did he
follow his heart, moving to a city to live as a gay American.
Imagine for a moment, however, that it wasn't four decades ago but four
days ago that my teacher was reaching out to help a less fortunate kid with
a thorny math problem. And imagine that he'd had the courage in that small
town to "come out" and had taken up residence with his partner. In the new
world order dictated by champions of "moral values," this wonderful, caring
teacher might be branded dangerous. Emboldened by national conservative
leaders, the town's evangelicals -- and there are plenty of them -- could
well have raised a hue and cry to keep this teacher and "his kind" away
from their children. And the town's young people would have been denied the
chance to have their lives shaped by a remarkable educator.
Here's what Republicans of conscience have to understand about the
machinations of Karl Rove and company. Fear isn't some emotion that can be
easily bottled back up after it's been -- viciously -- unleashed. It isn't
a once-every-four-years vehicle that can be wheeled out for a few months,
then stowed back in the garage to be retooled for the next election cycle.
Encouraging fundamentalist preachers to pound their pulpits and inveigh
against gay people has consequences. It puts men and women in communities
across this country at personal and professional risk. There's nothing more
despicable than creating a phony political issue (just how many gay couples
are clamoring for marriage certificates in the state of Ohio, anyhow?) and
preying on people's prejudices.
So now it's up to discerning Republicans to wrestle with this quandary: You
won all right, but at what cost? What happened to the party that once
shared Abraham Lincoln's faith in the "better angels of our nature"? That
fifth-grade teacher taught me to appreciate how -- through Lincoln's
resolve -- our nation overcame a cataclysm of hate to stop the Union from
dissolving. Back then, certain avatars of ignorance were called
Know-Nothings, which, come to think of it, is an apt description of more
than a few right-wingers today.
"Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid," Lincoln
wrote in the years leading up to the Civil War. "As a nation, we began by
declaring that 'all men are created equal.' We now practically read it 'all
men are created equal, except Negroes.' When the Know-Nothings get control,
it will read 'all men are created equal, except Negroes and foreigners and
Catholics.' When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some
country where they make no pretense of loving liberty -- to Russia, for
instance, where despotism can be taken pure and without the base alloy of
hypocrisy."
There are a lot of Republicans troubled by their party's exploitation of
contemporary know-nothingism. You know who you are. And before your party's
degeneracy is complete, you ought to do something about it. Because
camouflaging the fear and loathing of gay people as "moral values" isn't
the base alloy of hypocrisy. It's hypocrisy itself.
---
Stop Elmer Fudd web site: http://www.ElmerFudd.US/
.
|
|
| User: "Hector Plasmic" |
|
| Title: Re: Intolerance Is Not a 'Value' |
19 Nov 2004 12:53:44 PM |
|
|
(Seldom Seen Smith) wrote in message news:<10pqquhkn5tcba4@corp.supernews.com>...
Intolerance Is Not a 'Value'
Well, I've had my year's requirement of irony there, Fred. :-)
.
|
|
|
|
|
Related Articles |
|
|
