Apr 03
2007
JoeBrummer| Category: Ex-Gay Issues, Hate Speech, Peter LaBarbera, Stephen Bennett |
A coalition of anti-gay advocates led by Stephen Bennett, have banded together to urge parents to pull their kids from school on April 18th as a protest of the protest, a “Day of Silence“. I have been pondering this protest of the protest and think it is great! Good for them and good for the protest.
Here are the reasons why:
To start with the only kids left in the schools will be kids who are silent. I suspect, the numbers of kids who will stay home won’t be that big since the youth of today are far more accepting of gays, according to national surveys. The show of solidarity will be a very supportive thing for gay youth to see. The show of silence from more kids will send a stronger message to school officials of the problem at hand. (Read the latest reports on kids being bullied for their perceived sexual orientation, also read what mental health advocates say about the damage that does to youth)
Gay youth will see who their friends are and so will everyone else. Much like the Children’s March of 1963, the world will be watching this one. For one of the first times, many will see who supports violence and discrimination against gays and lesbians and who doesn’t. The community will see the number that support the violence, discrimination the gay youth face is smaller than those who are opposed to the violence. The Day of Silence is a protest for those who can no longer speak since their voices have been silenced by violence. Without the kids who will not participate the percent of kids who will participate will be greater. Rather than 20% of the kids present taking part in the protest 80% will be. This sends a clear message to administrators that lots of kids support the day of silence since the only kids they see will be silent ones.
The best way to be silent, is to not be there at all. So even though the intention is to not participate in the Day of Silence, these kids pulled from school are participating. The absence is their silence whether they know it or not. I guess I should send Stephen Bennett a thank you note for making the Day of Silence more successful by taking the problems out of it, the bullies.
Day of silence is about kids being bullied by other kids who misunderstand, have been mis-educated by their parents and have misguided by their churches. If you are curious who is bullying the gay youth, it will be the absent youth on April 18th. Remember that hate is not born into people. Hate is taught to children by their parents. This action will help identify those kids who are being taught to hate by their parents. At least teachers will finally know who to watch out for!
Again I reminded myself that all tyranny falls. Even Stephen Bennett, one day I feel assured people will look back at him and say what they do about George Wallace or Senator Theodore Bilbo now.
Mar 26
2007
JoeBrummer| Category: Cross-Posted, Ex-Gay Issues, Hate Speech, Lies, Stephen Bennett, Uncategorized |
Cross posted from “Replace the Lies With Truth“
I often see anti-gay advocates make tragedies even more tragic when they turn them into hate speech against gays. Ex-gay minister, Stephen Bennett is very good at this. In his latest blog post, he carefully, and skillfully chooses words that try to link homosexuality to child molestation. What is tragic for all of us is the misinformation puts more kids at risk. What is tragic is that this type of distortion perpetuates the myth that gay men are more often child molesters than straight men. It is nothing more than taking a sad and tragic event and making it even more tragic by using it as hate speech.
Stephen Bennett writes on his site:
“Read the story and weep. Weep for the young, innocent little boy whose life was taken in the most heinous of ways, because of two demented and evil homosexuals, a father and son, and a perverted wife and mother. The two homosexual men took turns brutally molesting and sodomizing the child before choking the little boy to death.”
The distortion us subtle, but it is there. Stephen is turning the focus of this tragic story to something that doesn’t even exist in the story. There is no evidence these men were homosexual, in fact the evidence points to them being heterosexual. This older man did not identify as a homosexual man. He was married to the women in this story. It is also not clear from this story if the younger man identified as homosexual. Stephen is calling them “homosexual” men because it fits with his distortion that gay men molest at a higher rate. The distortion gets worse when we realize that when a man molests a little girl, Stephen does not refer to them as heterosexual molesters. Men who are attracted to children are just that, attracted to children. Studies show that those who are attracted to children tend not to care as much about the gender of the child but the availability of the child. It all comes down to the language.
Dr. Gregory Herek explains:
“Another problem related to terminology arises because sexual abuse of male children by adult men2 is often referred to as “homosexual molestation.” The adjective “homosexual” (or “heterosexual” when a man abuses a female child) refers to the victim’s gender in relation to that of the perpetrator. Unfortunately, people sometimes mistakenly interpret it as referring to the perpetrator’s sexual orientation.”
Stephen Bennett continues this distortion by changing the wording in the Fox News Story. Again, the changes are subtle but just enough for the reader to make a false link to homosexuality and child molestation.
The original wording of the story said:
The indictment charges all three family members with murder and child molestation in the slaying of Christopher, whose body was found March 15 inside a trash bag dumped by a roadside.
Stephen changed the wording to read:
The indictment charges all three family members with murder and homosexual child molestation in the slaying of Christopher, whose body was found March 15 inside a trash bag dumped by a roadside.
(more…)
