Sex columnist Dan Savage weighs in on Ted Haggard, and while I generally don’t copy-and-paste wholesale from other pieces of writing, I don’t know how many of my readers are also Savage Love readers so I’ll risk it:

If you believe that Jesus Christ can change the sexual orientation of a believer, why on earth did he refuse to cure Haggard? He founded a church that has 14,000 members! Thousands were brought to Christ by Haggard’s preaching. Mixed in with Ted’s meth-fueled gay sex romps and hypocritical gay bashings were, without a doubt, thousands of good works.

Did Jesus help Haggard out? No. Haggard struggled with temptation all his life. He tried to battle off his “dark” desires, but nothing proved effective. There was no cure for Haggard, no miracle. No matter how long he struggled, no matter how much faith he had, Haggard’s sexual orientation remained unchanged. Nothing helped. Not prayer, not Jesus H. Christ on his cross.

Nothing.

If giving his heart to Jesus couldn’t cure Haggard, what hope is there for the likes of me? If Jesus can’t be bothered to work a miracle for the most powerful evangelical minister in the country, what “hope” is there for the average dyke?

None.

The ex-gay thing is over. It’s dead. It was bullshit from the start, and it’s bullshit now. And I will personally track down and bitch-slap the next fundie douche who sends me an e-mail explaining how Jesus can cure me. And I will personally track down and shit in the mouth of the next cable-news anchor who entertains—even for an instant—the notion of a miracle cure for homosexuality.

I know this is basically the line of thought that I and a few folks who appear on the sidebar links there have had lately — both when it comes to homosexuality and pretty much any other area of life where God supposedly has ultimate power. Of course, here it’s presented with Dan Savage’s usual, shall we say, zest.

Personally, I do feel a little sorry for Haggard. But not too sorry, because in the end he was a victim of his own regime. When you build the weapons you’d better be prepared to die by them.

Ah, Friday. The day of unabashed meme-blogging and, what else? CJD (Crazy Jim Dobson) Wingnuttery!

Pandagon has the story, but it can be best summed up with this line from the Focus on the Family site:

We know dogs aren’t born mooing. But what about people? Are they “born gay?”

You know it’s bad when they don’t even bother to create the pretense of making sense anymore. Dogs… mooing… gay… science…

I’m really trying, here.

Friday Random Ten
“I Everwith,” Blunderspublik
“Warm,” Kinnie Starr
“Fox Confessor Brings the Flood,” Neko Case
“Strugglin’,” K’naan
“The Grass is Blue,” Dolly Parton
“Enjoy,” Bjork
“Back it Up,” Peaches
“AFK,” Pinback
“Yesterday Is Here,” Cat Power
“Life Effect,” Stars

Eddie(F) at Edge of Faith has a great post up about Bush’s proposed amendment to ban gay marriage.

For some reason, I’ve tried to avoid talking about things overtly political, even though this is ostensibly a religion blog and religion and politics are attached at the hip so often, especially in that country to the south of me — you know, the one founded by people who fled another country where the marriage of religion and politics had turned deathly oppressive.

I guess we all turn into our parents eventually, which is why the United States of America has, two centuries later, followed suit.

Laws passed on what one of the many deities seemingly would want is not only insane, but exactly what the forefathers were against when they crafted the constitution to protect all minorities.

Handing out $5 Starbucks gift certificates to gay people to show the “kindness of Jesus with no strings attached” is an affront to them, especially when many of the same people giving out these cards are the ones supporting Bush to pass this amendment. If you want do to something Christlike for gay people, then lobby your congressperson to oppose this amendment. I don’t see Jesus walking around influencing Rome to establish his kingdom which he said is not from this world to begin with.

Of course, for American Dominionists, the “kingdom” will be brought about by the sweat, tears and force of good Christians.

It’s been said many times and many ways, but I’ll say it again: if Dominionist Christians are so concerned with legislating marriage according to Biblical principles, why aren’t they trying to outlaw divorce?

Then there’s also the fact that this amendment is clearly pre-election pandering to so-called middle America. I agree with Peter David: if I were a conservative American, I’d be insulted.

technorati tags: america, george bush, homosexuality, religion, dominionism

Sometimes when you’re in the majority and attempt to curtail the minority’s rights to the things you enjoy, the minority gets all uppity about it. The minority might refuse to be ashamed of their “deviance” and declare that they are proud to be who they are.

As a card-carrying member of the majority, what do you do?

This.
Often in feminist circles when women are discussing how oppressive the patriarchy is, a man will show up to declare that he too is oppressed! And maybe he is. But not for being male.

This isn’t the same thing, of course, but it’s just as obnoxious.

Visit their about page for more info on the heterosexual agenda. Basically, these folks are ferverent in their defense of heteronormativity. Girls must behave as girls, and therefore must be taught how to behave girlishly by women. Boys must behave as boys, and therefore must be taught how to behave boyishly by men.

Lesser_gods on the Dark Christianity LJ community said:

I would like to see someone pointing out to them that, by their logic, it would still be okay for lesbian couples to raise girls, and gay male couples to raise boys.

But as usafpa says, they’d have an answer for that, too:

Oh no. that means they would teach teh boy to wash dishes and make beds. That will never do. The lesbians might make the little girl change the oil in the car.

Part of the conservative Christian fight against the queer community has to do with the verses in the Bible that ostensibly condemn a man lying with a man and so forth, but the other part has to do with gender and the belief that God intends for us to adhere to a strictly binary, firmly defined set of gender expression. My favourite and yours, Crazy Jim Dobson is big on this. That’s why Focus on the Family has two magazines for teenagers, one for girls which talks about preparing yourself for your future husband and one for boys which talks about how masturbating is bad for you. Not to mention the books about raising boys to be boys so they don’t turn out gay.

On a lighter note, I found it very amusing that the image on the frontpage they’ve got this image — two women, side by side, with one wearing a rainbow vest.

One other point of hilarity and/or terror: check out the similarity between one of their t-shirt designs and a Nazi logo.

technorati tags: homosexuality, religion, christianity, heteronormativity, focus on the family, gender