Focus on the Family Clarifies Position: We’re Total Bigots

The Plum Line recently reported that Focus on the Family would not oppose a gay/lesbian Supreme Court nominee:

“We agree with Senator [Jeff] Sessions,” Bruce Hausknecht, a spokesperson for Focus on the Family, which was founded by top religious right figure James Dobson, told me a few minutes ago. “The issue is not their sexual orientation. It’s whether they are a good judge or not.”

Their sexual orientation “should never come up,” he continued. “It’s not even pertinent to the equation.”

Wow. That’s almost… reasonable.

That can’t be right, right?

Of course not. Focus on the Family’s Tom Minnery responded to the article with a correction:

“To be honest, this is one of those conversations we’d like to ‘do over.’ We can assure you that we recognize that homosexual behavior is a sin and does not reflect God’s created intent and desire for humanity. Further, we at Focus do affirm that character and moral rectitude should be key considerations in appointing members of the judiciary, especially in the case of the highest court in the land. Sexual behavior -– be it heterosexual or homosexual -– certainly lies at the heart of personal morality.”

To paraphrase:

You know how one of our guys told you we wouldn’t discriminate?

*laughter*

That was a mistake. We’re total bigots. Gay people have no business being in a position of power.

We’ve gone through the sexual behaviors of all the previous Supreme Court nominees and we approve of everything they do in the bedroom. (*wink wink*, Harriet Miers.)

These are the same people who then tell you they “love gay people.” (They love them so much, they go out of their way to make sure LGBT people never have equal rights or protections.)

What’s laughable is that the headlines I’m seeing about this story from Christian Right groups aren’t even subtle about this. Take this one, for example:

Focus on the Family Clarifies Position, Opposes Homosexual Judicial Nominees

They’re priding themselves on the fact that they’re opposing a gay person getting this job before they even know anything else about the person! As if being gay is the end-all, be-all characteristic about a person…

It’s pathetic and it’s telling.

I don’t know how any Christians could keep silent about their opposition to groups like this. They need to speak out against this sort of bigotry, or else they’re part of the problem.

"For many years I assumed it was Jane Fonda."

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Hazor

“Sexual behavior -– be it heterosexual or homosexual -– certainly lies at the heart of personal morality.”

It’s always about sex. Why so obsessed? Why such a big deal? Seriously.
WesStrikesBack

I’d be cautious too while we still have the memory of Ted Haggart snorting meth off a gigolo’s back and slarving dode on Focus on the Family’s dime.
Sarah

Christians are terribly obsessed with sex. They just can’t stop thinking about what people are doing in the bedroom. Good grief!
fritzy

“Sexual behavior -– be it heterosexual or homosexual -– certainly lies at the heart of personal morality.”

I thought atheists were the ones that were supposedly hedonistic, yet I have yet to hear any atheist group talk about sex as much as fundamentalist xtian organizations.

When will someone in the mainstream media finally force these half-wits to explain how morality has anything to do with what consenting adults choose to do on their own time and in their own space. Without playing the “god card” of course.

What’s truly laughable is that we’re expected to accept that there’s nothing immoral about making de facto judgements about a person or group of people based soley on their consensual sexual practices.

Cheers, Focus on the Family–once again standing steadfastly on the wrong side of history.
muggle

Keep talking. Keep uncoiling enough rope to hang yourselves.
Jen

Gay, straight, whatever- the real issue is please, please no more Roman Catholics. That said, I fear the only possible way we’d get a gay person one on the Court is if he (naturally) was a white, straight- acting, conservative who hates gay marriage who lost use of his penis in a tragic accident. In my dream Supreme Court, the judges reflect better the demographics of the country, and at some point they are mandated to retire since we live hella longer than we did in the 1700s.
Richard Wade

I don’t know how any Christians could keep silent about their opposition to groups like this. They need to speak out against this sort of bigotry, or else they’re part of the problem.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for that.

I have as much contempt for the cowardice of those Christians who know that the bigotry of their fellow Christians is wrong, but who do nothing to oppose it, as I have for the bigots themselves. Oh, but what should I expect? It’s a religion started by shepherds, and they call themselves a “flock.” Sheep aren’t well known for being brave.
mark

does bruce hausknecht still have a job? lol.
Nameless Cynic

You know, it’s interesting. Harriet Miers is 64, has never been married, and has no children.

I wonder which way she stands on gay rights…
Lenoxus

I love how difficult it can be for bigots to maintain the courage of their convictions. If homophobic Christians were consistent in their rhetoric, they would do either of two things:

• Say “We don’t love homosexuals, we more or less despise them, because they are, in our opinion, committing a grave evil”.

or

• “We love rapists and serial murderers, and are willing to forgive them.”

The reason Christians can play this “forgiveness” schtick is precisely because, when it comes to homosexuality, there is nothing to forgive, and at this point in its history, the culture knows it.

There is huge power in “forgiving” someone for moral wrongs you just made up, especially ones to which people are biologically prone.

“Gerald has chosen to write with his left hand. We forgive him for this, and love him as much as anyone else.”

COMPARE:

“Gerald has chosen to bomb a school. We forgive him for this, and love him as much as anyone else.”
hoverfrog

We can assure you that we recognize that homosexual behavior is a sin

What precisely is “homosexual behaviour” and what precisely is “sin”?

I know plenty of people, some of them (about 10% apparently) are homosexual. I cannot tell who is gay or straight unless they tell me (I think I’ve got a broken gaydar) so how is homosexual behaviour any different from heterosexual behaviour? I mean it isn’t even about which orifice they stick their cocks in.

As for sin I mean isn’t every supposed to have sinned: Romans 3:23. Actually we know what sin is: 1 John 5:17 explains that “All unrighteousness is sin” and we know that unrighteousness is failure to adhere to moral principles. Furthermore we can assess a moral principle in simple terms by seeing the relative weal or woe of a given action. So being gay entails no action and is therefore morally neutral. Having a homosexual relationship is to love another and express that love. I don’t know about anyone else but I find that to be morally positive. Therefore NOT a sin.

Not that homosexuality needs to be justified. That’s why these bigots have to justify their own stance but it just makes them look worse.
anti_supernaturalist

FoF — Focus on the Fanny.

True believers’ knee jerk horror and disgust are produced by religious conditioning which grinds into the neurons another Big-Lie, the inherent “filth” of sexual organs, sexual attraction, and sexual behavior. (What would the porn industry do without it?)

What-is-forbidden becomes unbearably attractive given the high psychological cost of repressing a beneficial and wholesome drive. Just thank Saul of Tarsus:

…[B]ut I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. Rom 7:23 NIV

After all no one knows the voluptuous pain of rigorism better than sexual involutes. They are constantly tormented by sin in their “members” — each true believer a do-it-to-yourself Marquis de Sade.

the anti_supernaturalist