Child Exploitation for Prop 8
Update: Embedding has now been disabled on this video, but it can be viewed here.
I don’t even know how to respond to it. I was reviled, both by the lyrics, the spirit, the bastardization of a child’s tune, and what it taught the children who sang it.
It’s horrible. And they dared to suggest that it was “for the children”. Wow. Not for my children.
Suffer the little children…
Sphere: Related ContentBlackwater, Mormons, and Evangelicals: Prop. 8 Strange Bedfellows
The more I dig down into Proposition 8, the more bizarre the facts are. Like everyone else, I like to follow the money to identify the agendas. Here’s what I know:
Blackwater
From Calitics.com
Andrew Sullivan notes today that one of the biggest financial supporters of the Yes on 8 campaign is Elsa Prince Broekhuizen, who has pumped $450,000 into the campaign. Broekhuizen is the mother of Blackwater founder and owner Erik Prince and Bush Pioneer Betsy DeVos. She’s also quite the patron of the religious right.
At first blush, the two groups don’t have a whole lot in common besides neighboring real estate in the political spectrum. But as Blackwater continues its unwanted presence in San Diego (spawning aspirants to the throne in Hemet), Michigan resident Broekhuizen is just a big fish in the flood of out-of-state money trying to buy their way into a change to California’s constitution.
Blackwater, you remember them. They’re the contractors hired by the Bush Administration to privatize our military. That money is now being recycled into politics by huge donations to campaigns like the Yes on 8 campaign.
To be clear, that’s YOUR taxpayer money, laundered a couple of times.
Mormon Church
From the Salt Lake Tribune
The LDS Church’s campaign to pass Proposition 8 represents its most vigorous and widespread political involvement since the late 1970s, when it helped defeat the Equal Rights Amendment. It even departs from earlier efforts on behalf of traditional marriage, in which members felt more free to decide their level of involvement.
This time, LDS leaders have tapped every resource, including the church’s built-in phone trees, e-mail lists and members’ willingness to volunteer and donate money. Many California members consider it a directive from God and have pressured others to participate. Some leaders and members see it as a test of faith and loyalty.
The Mormons have given $8.4 million to the campaign for Proposition 8. That’s the tithes of Mormons, taken out of the church and funnelled into the political process. 8.4 million dollars.
Prop. 8 is on pace to be the costliest race in the nation, except for the billion-dollar presidential election. The Yes on 8 campaign estimates that up to 40 percent of its donations come from Mormons. Some others estimate that Mormons account for over 70 percent of donations from individuals.
Today, the Courage Campaign delivered a petition to Mormon church President Thomas Monson signed by 16,935 people urging the Mormon church to cease funding the Proposition 8 campaign.
I won’t even address how offensive it is to have tax-exempt religious organizations inject money and resources into politics. Whatever their agenda, they are making an effort with a lot of tax-exempt money to shape the political landscape via out-of-state money and resources.
Evangelicals
Finally, we have the evangelical movement and I would say most specifically, the Baptists. This boggles my mind, because in other, more reasonable days the Baptists wanted nothing to do with any political initiative, fearing (rightly) that injecting themselves into politics would erode the church/state wall. When Rick Warren of Saddleback Church (and author of the Purpose-Driven Life) endorsed the Yes on 8 campaign, he ignored all of the traditionally Baptist beliefs about keeping church and state separate.
Warren, a Baptist, knows better. The cornerstones of the Baptist tradition are adult baptism (as opposed to infant baptism) and the principle of liberty of conscience and the separation of church and state. Baptists inherited these ideas from Roger Williams, the founder of the Baptist tradition in America. And, at least until the conservative takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1979, Baptists have always been watchmen on that wall of separation and fierce guardians of liberty of conscience. Thankfully, Williams’s ideas were incorporated into the United States Constitution, both in the First Amendment, which forbade a religious establishment, and in the recurring principle of respect for the rights of minorities.
In an increasingly bizarre election year we have an incredibly bizarre campaign to discriminate against an entire group in our society, backed by privatized military, and two powerful religious forces who ordinarily have nothing to do with one another.
I’ll end with this: According to the FBI, hate crimes are down. Well, they’re down with one exception: Hate crimes against gays increased 6% in the past year.
Imagine what it’ll be like if Yes on 8 passes. Why? Well, let’s start with the long and ugly campaign where phrases like “don’t let them have this too” and “restore marriage” (implying that GLBT folks are far too low to have such a right, etc) have predominated the debate. Where the Constitution is turned on its head and churches are willing to crawl into bed with the likes of Blackwater.
You don’t think more hate will spring forth? Guess again.
Here are some ways to help:
Because equality is a RIGHT in this country. For ALL. Not the religious or the military only, the righteous and the conservative. It is a right for ALL. Regardless.
Sphere: Related Content8 Minutes on Prop 8: Please watch this!
Lawrence Lessig is very eloquent and logical about why, fundamentally, the concept of Proposition 8 is wrong.
Lessig is one of the most reasonable and reasoned people I know. And he’s straight, married, with two kids. Just watch. Listen. Think.
Then vote No on Proposition 8.
Sphere: Related ContentYes on 8 Group Schools Kids Out of School
[Disclosure: I am a Christian, and I oppose Proposition 8. I support education, tolerance, and inclusion. See Mark 12:31]
The other day, my daughter told me that one of her friends wasn’t in school because she was joining her parents at a Yes on 8 rally. I was amazed. And outraged. As the mom of three kids (one in college, one veteran), I know how important it is for my kids to be in school, learning. For the past week, I have watched the Yes on 8 folks tell the public outright lies about our education system and civil rights, and now I’m seeing them using their kids as attention pawns in the middle of a school day.
I can’t remain silent, and I can’t remain objective. What they are doing is wrong, it’s unChristian, and it’s downright hateful. Over the past week, I’ve heard stories of young children, sometimes not even school age, standing on street corners with their parents, and even their pastors!.
What are their parents telling them? Based on their literature, I can only imagine. “Honey, you need to stand here and hold this sign so you won’t have to learn about ladies loving ladies, men loving men, and the perverted things they do to each other.” Seriously? “The evil liberals want to take away your right to marry a man (or a woman)?” “The gay folks want to end the human race?”
When a parent teaches their child to be afraid of people that are different from them, they plant the seeds of hate. When a parent enlists those same children as pawns in a political cause of exclusion, they teach them that it’s okay to speak that intolerance in public without regard for the feeling of true human beings on the other side of the issue, they teach them to live a life of division and intolerance.
When they teach their children lies, they teach their children to lie.
When they teach their children to be afraid of others who are different, they undermine their own cause. Christianity is a religion of inclusion, not exclusion. It is a religion based upon caring for others, not condemnation. Above all, there is nowhere in biblical foundations for Christians to be involved in an effort to promote discrimination, fear and hate.
Right now, there is no provision in the California state constitution that addresses marriage. When the Yes on 8 folks claim that it forces schools to teach young children about gay marriage, they lie. Second graders are not taught these things in public schools today and nothing will be different on November 5th. Unless it passes. Then some children will be taught that there are groups in our society we should regard as lower than others. That is what the Yes on 8 people are trying to shove down Californians throats, and they’re willing to sacrifice their children’s education to do it. What hypocrisy!
Here’s an irony: By using their children as pawns in the Proposition 8 propaganda campaign, they are teaching their children more about gay marriage than they’d ever learn in public school. Unfortunately, they’re also teaching them to fear, hate and be intolerant of gays. Now for perspective, know that the Mormons are the ones spearheading much of the effort. The same church that spawned people who think it’s okay to waterboard employees as a training exercise. While there are some Mormons who are more tolerant than others, the official position of the church is hard-line and militant with respect to gays and gay marriage.
I ask this question directly to them: Are you willing to accept the responsibility for 14-year old Brandon McInerney’s cold-blooded murder of Lawrence King last year? McInerney’s attitudes came from fear, intolerance, and what he’d learned from his parents. Are you willing to accept your hypocrisy for claiming to be teaching biblical principles while denying outright the acts of love that Christ modeled?
Directly to those undecided about Proposition 8, I ask you this: What credibility should you give to people who pimp their kids for the sake of a cause founded on fear, lies and hate? Are these the children you want looking after you when you can’t work, are disabled, sick or in need? If so, you’d better be sure you fall into the category of those who are acceptable in their eyes, because they have been schooled in the business of judgment and exclusion.
As for me and my house, two of my children are now registered voters and will be voting No on Proposition 8. The third isn’t old enough to vote, but she’s old enough to understand that voting for Proposition 8 is voting for hate, exclusion and intolerance. She is the same age as Larry King. His school was two miles from hers. She cried at the news of his shooting as though she had known him. For the first time in her young life, she felt and understood the price of intolerance: one too high to pay.
This is the message she speaks to those who use their children to promote exclusion:
Leave it alone. Don’t teach your kids to be afraid. Kids have enough to deal with. They don’t need to worry about stuff that is mean.
Photo Credit (Top Right): Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles Times
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