Mission America’s Linda Harvey spoke with Peter LaBarbera of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality about how she and other anti-gay activists are running out of places to shop because so many major businesses have announced their support for LGBT rights. Harvey criticized the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index, which she called “a huge fascist scheme to reward homosexual, this immoral behavior, and I can’t imagine how many hundreds of thousands of stories there are out there that we never hear about of people in the workplace whose views are silenced and feel like they work in a concentration camp.”…. “Well yes, that’s what political correctness does,” LaBarbera said. “It forces people to be victimized at work.”
I’ve always wondered about those who are so thoroughly obsessed with homosexuality that they’d make a career out of hating both the idea of it and those who happen not to live, love, and believe as they do. It’s difficult not to wonder what they’re so afraid of…and why they’re so terrified of the thought that two people may live and love differently because they ARE different.
If you believe that we hate in others what we most fear in ourselves, a reasonable person might begin to ponder the possibility that the haters just be terrified of what they see, but can’t bear to acknowledge, in themselves. Could it be that homophobes like Linda Harvey and Peter LaBarbera at some level recognize what lies deep within themselves? Could it be that they’re terrified of their true selves…and the sexuality that might accompany it?
Of course, I can’t with any degree of authority speculate about the sexuality of others, nor do I care to…but those who traffic in bigotry and homophobia could benefit from a good, long look in the mirror. They might want to examine why they’re so virulently homophobic, and why they spend so much time hating homosexuals and obsessing about their private sexual behavior.
In a recent radio commentary, Harvey similarly vented her outrage that she can’t find anywhere to go Christmas shopping because “the big retailers” are “doing everything the homosexual movement wants them to do.”
I suppose if you live in Harvey’s head and believe that tolerance and acceptance are to be equated with “doing everything the homosexual movement wants them to do,” the world might seem a very adversarial and unfriendly place. The problem with Harvey’s misdirected calumny, though, is that hatred and exclusion are bad for business. Whether or not Harvey, LaBarbera, and their fellow homophobes care to admit it, LGBT money is every bit as much legal tender as that spent by good, God-fearing heterosexual Christians. Businesses endeavor to maximize profits, a goal that’s difficult to attain if they’re prone to excluding people from the “privilege” of being customers because of an arbitrary and capricious belief.
I’m not denying Harvey and LaBarbera their right to believe as they see fit. They’re free to believe that Jesus rode to Jerusalem on a dinosaur if they choose…but their self-ascribed moral superiority doesn’t provide them license to determine who’s fit to be full partners in American life. They don’t get to condemn those who live and love differently for “violating God’s laws” when they’re wearing clothes of mixed fiber and eating shellfish.
My Sunday School days may be well behind me, but I do remember enough to know that Jesus Christ was all about love, tolerance, acceptance, and inclusion. He never preached against homosexuality…but he did preach against hypocrites who would hate and discriminate in His name.
If these good Christians are having difficulty finding places to do their Christmas shopping, might I suggest gift certificates from Chick-Fil-A or Hobby Lobby? After all, hatred in the name of Jesus is the gift that keeps on giving, no?
