The Proposition 8 Blacklist

Scott Eckern is the artistic director of the California Musical Theater. Or at least he was. As artistic director, Scott has worked with many in the LGBT community and even has a lesbian sister. Whatever their orientation, Scott showed love and respect to whoever he worked with.

However, Scott also favored Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in California, and to that end he donated $1000 to the campaign. Now this money was Scott’s personal money. He never insisted that his views represented the California Musical Theater, and he never imposed his personal beliefs on anyone before or after the donation.

Once Scott was outed for his support of Proposition 8, though, word spread quickly, and a protest and boycott of the theater ensued, ending only when Scott made the decision to resign [1]. Scott merely had exercised his right to participate in the democratic processes of California, and had never shown any ill will to his LGBT peers, but his personal beliefs cost him his job.

Now LGBT activists have asked to be judged in the workplace by the quality of their work, not their personal beliefs, and they have a very reasonable point here. But if this is true, then why must these activists engage in such shameful, merciless hypocrisy at the expense of an ordinary man like Scott?

Now obviously, the story I just told about the LGBT movement in California is not the typical one you expect to hear. But neither is the vote to pass Proposition 8 the typical vote.

I find it strange that so many people will proclaim the power of the voice of the people whenever the vote goes their way, if say Barack Obama gets elected. But whenever the vote goes the other way, as it did on Proposition 8, it just has to be the result of an oppressive majority.

In a gracious concession speech [2], John McCain, on the other hand, did not mince words. “The American people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly,” he said in response to his loss, and even went on to blame himself, not the mainstream media or Sarah Palin. The response from the opponents to Proposition 8, on the other hand, has hardly been that gracious.

As usual, they complain that the oppressive majority has once again infringed the rights of the majority, but they lost not in Arkansas but in California. And while they insist that their cause parallels that of women and blacks, CNN’s exit polls [3] show that both groups voted in favor of Proposition 8.

It is not as if California is antithetical to rights. On the same ballot, they were so committed to abortion rights [4] (I think the right to life is the real one here, but I digress) that they rejected another proposition which would not restrict abortion but would simply require minors to notify parents of an abortion.

At this point, you would think these activists would figure out that their image problem does not solely result from America being a nation of homophobes who spend every waking moment cursing gays.

Instead, they have resorted to blaming everyone else and protesting churches and Mormon temples. Now while they certainly have a right to protest, at the same time these protests have not exactly shown the type of character that makes people want to repeal Proposition 8. At the protests at Saddleback church, they have called their opponents liars [5] over an ad suggesting that kindergartners would have to learn that homosexual and heterosexual marriage are equal.

However, California does mandate, starting in kindergarten, comprehensive health education, which include marriage as well as its legal and financial aspects. Now California law does not specify any details on how to implement it, but if Proposition 8 failed, then I do not see how teachers could have presented marriage without saying that gay marriage is no different than straight marriage, nor do I see how any LGBT activist would tolerate anything but that.

So basically, while some schools may choose to present marriage at a different grade level, certainly nothing prevents kindergartners from being taught about marriage, both gay and straight. Thus this ad full of lies is apparently true. I could see how protestors could question the underlying motivation of this ad, but to call it lie is more deceitful than the ad itself.

In fact, towards the end of the election cycle, one group opposing Proposition 8 ran an ad that was both despicable and untrue. In this ad, two lesbians answer the door to find two Mormons who later invade their house and rip up their marriage certificate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q28UwAyzUkE
Intolerance in the name of tolerance?

Not only is this an example of intolerance and Mormon-bashing, but the ad, which ironically is supposed to promote tolerance, is also grossly misleading. While Proposition 8 would clearly prevent future gay marriages, the question of what would happen to existing ones is a mystery, although the general feeling is that they cannot be retroactively revoked. If the ad about kindergartners is a lie, then this one is nothing but malicious deceit.

And the situation does not improve too much here at Cornell. Now I do not know how people in the ROTC view Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell on a personal level, but I know they will enforce it because it is the law. As a result of their heinous neutrality, the ROTC often has to deal with calls for their eviction from campus.

At Columbia, the editorial board of The Spectator wrote an editorial constructively criticizing LGBT groups for making Queer Awareness Month a bit too raunchy, emphasizing “sex over awareness.” [6] They did get a couple of facts wrong, but in the big picture these mistakes did not detract from their overall message. The response: yet another protest [7]. I guess perhaps criticism can never be constructive unless it receives a rubber stamp of approval from the LGBT community before being published.

In conclusion, America is a nation of homophobes, Californians being the worst of them. It’s time to take up the fight against these homophobes. We have already crossed one person, Scott Eckern, off the blacklist. Once we deal with the rest of the blacklist, we can then take on The Spectator. And let’s not forget about that homophobe Mike Wacker.

Mike Wacker is an assistant web editor at The Sun. Contact him at mwacker@cornellsun.com [8]. Wack Attack runs alternate Fridays.