I've said before that one reason I'm finding it hard to write this blog is that I feel like I'm repeating myself. But then, so is Dan Savage: he said the same thing to another antigay bigot a few years ago, and I can't add much to what I wrote about him at the time. Since then, however, he's shown his moral superiority to bigots by calling some high school students "pansy-assed" because they walked out on one of his personal appearances, using a homophobic epithet to try to shame them; and by saying that he sometimes thinks about "fucking the shit out" of the antigay bigot Rick Santorum, again using the homophobic trope that fucking another man degrades him. As I wrote of Savage's remarks about Santorum, Savage is indulging in homophobic abuse that no one should be allowed to get away with, using sex as a metaphor for debasement and humiliation. He's tapping into the same reservoir of male violence that drives queerbashers and rapists. And, of course, he's also revealing his own hangups about being gay himself. So why listen to Ben Carson when you can get your daily dose of antigay bigotry from Dan Savage?
Carson backed down and apologized, but also "criticized CNN for airing the comments he'd made in an interview and said he won't be addressing gay rights issues for the duration of his presidential campaign." Hahahahah, I'm sure he won't. If he's going to be a presidential candidate, he'd better get used to the comments he makes during interviews (!) being aired and otherwise published. I doubt his candidacy will get very far, though, since like other Republican hopefuls he's prone to making stupid gaffes that will entertain his hardcore supporters but put off everybody else.
On the other hand, Carson said something true: that "up until this point there have been no definitive studies that people are born into a specific sexuality." Maybe his medical training has paid off after all! But if he really cared about factual accuracy, he wouldn't make any statements at all about the etiology of sexual orientation, and he certainly wouldn't have said what he said about the effects of prison on sexual orientation. Nor would he claim, as he continues to do, that homosexuality is a choice. But he seems to be driven to make a fool of himself, so even in the apology he posted on Facebook he said that "we are always born male and female", which as a scientist he should know is oversimple, and that he thinks "marriage is a religious institution"; if he really believed that, he'd reject civil marriage, the interference of the State in a religious institution.
It's interesting how far Carson (like other religious bigots) has surrendered to the Politically Correct Gay Agenda. Does he want homosexuals to be executed, as Scripture commands? Does he want to reinstate sodomy laws, or Don't Ask Don't Tell? Does he want same-sex couples to be outside of all legal recognition and protection? No, he does not:
I support human rights and Constitutional protections for gay people, and I have done so for many years. I support civil unions for gay couples, and I have done so for many years. I support the right of individual states to sanction gay marriage, and I support the right of individual states to deny gay marriage in their respective jurisdictions.That's not a Bible-believing Christian talking, not one who stands firm against the moral erosion of American society. That's a flaming liberal. Even when he says that marriage should be restricted to one man and one woman, he's agreeing with the liberals that polygamy -- a Biblical and traditional value, mind you -- is wrong. Someone really should ask him, though: since he thinks marriage should be defined and sanctioned by states rather than the Federal government, does he think that Loving v. Virginia, which overturned state laws against "interracial" marriage, should be overturned? And if he really believes that permitting legal same-sex marriage is an illegitimate redefinition of marriage, why is he willing to let states do it?
"I am not a politician," Carson concluded. As a presidential hopeful, he is a politician. But he won't be one for long, the way he's going.
Ah there, you see? I've said all this before, though sometimes about different people.
