Religious Right Anger At Obama For ENDA Order Reaches New Extremes

As noted in an earlier post, the "godly folk" are going absolutely berserk in response to Barack Obama's signing of a presidential executive order barring that bans federal government contractors from discrimination based on sexual orientation and/or gender identity.  The volumes of spittle flying from the flapping jaws of the professional Christian class and hate group leaders is off the charts.  All of the reaction stems from the Christofascists' desire to be above the law and free to harm and discriminate against LGBT individuals without restriction.  The New Civil Rights Movement looks at the batshitery that both depicts "godly Christians" as victims of "persecution" and encourages violence against gays.  Here are highlights:

Calling today's signing "a path toward a new thought-policing state where those who hold traditional values about marriage and family are to be marginalized," National Organization For Marriage president Brian Brown claimed the "fact is that non-discrimination rules like the order issued by President Obama can become a weapon used to punish and harass individuals and groups who support marriage as the union of one man and one woman."

The irony of course is that NOM is crusading for laws, like DOMA, that would enable them and their fellow believers to discriminate against LGBT people.

Fox News religion reporter Todd Starnes writes that Obama's new executive orders amount to "the federal government bullying religious groups that hold viewpoints it deems inappropriate." 

Of course, that's false. The religious right wants to have its cake and eat it too. They want the legal right to fire and harass LGBT people for being LGBT, and they want the federal government to use your tax dollars to support that harassment.

Starnes quotes the virulently anti-gay Pastor Robert Jeffress as well.

“The problem with this executive order is that it paves the way for the next one – which could withhold the tax-exempt status or broadcast licenses for religious organizations holding biblical beliefs with which the administration disagrees,” Jeffress told me.
The Obama administration seems hell-bent on forcing Christians to assimilate to the militant LGBT agenda. Resistance is futile.

And, of course, the Family Research Council's Peter Sprigg.

“If religious organizations cannot require that their employees conduct themselves in ways consistent with the teachings of their faith – then, essentially, those organizations are unable to operate in accordance with their faith,” Peter Sprigg, Senior Fellow for Policy Studies at the Family Research Council, told me.

“The mask is coming off of the homosexual movement’s agenda. They really do not believe in religious liberty. They want forced affirmation of homosexual and transgender conduct to trump every other consideration in the workplace – including religious liberty.”

An important reminder here -- at issue is a company's "right" to hire and fire someone for being LGBT. This is what they are fighting for. This is the "deeply-held Christian belief" that the anti-gay religious right is so desperate to retain.

In a separate statement, Sprigg -- who has called for gay people to be deported -- writes that "President Obama has ordered employers to put aside their principles, and practices in the name of political correctness. This level of coercion is nothing less than viewpoint blackmail that bullies into silence every contractor and subcontractor who has moral objections to homosexual behavior.
This order gives activists a license to challenge their employers and, expose those employers to threats of costly legal proceedings and the potential of jeopardizing future contracts." . . . People with deeply held convictions regarding the morality of certain types of sexual behavior should not be bound by the dictates of President Obama's agenda.

As for the credentials of bigots like Sprigg, it is always useful to note that they lack any legitimate credentials  that qualify them for setting social or legal regulations.  Despite the lofty titles they give to themselves, they are little more than far right crackpots who do not deserve to be given the time of day by legitimate journalists.  Her are Sprigg's "qualifications":

Mr. Sprigg is an ordained Baptist minister. Before coming to FRC, he served as pastor of Clifton Park Center Baptist Church in Clifton Park, N.Y. Mr. Sprigg previously served for ten years as a professional actor and unit leader in Covenant Players, an international Christian drama ministry. . . . Mr. Sprigg received the Master of Divinity degree cum laude from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (Mass.).

 Only in Christofascist circles would someone like Sprigg be deemed qualified to pontificate on the cause of sexual orientation, child rearing, and constitutional law.