Quotes of the Day: Fading Christofascist Power and Privilege

I often remark on the growing meme that one hears among Christofascists that they are facing growing persecution, intolerance and hostility - things that they have subjected others to for years, if not centuries or millennium.  Recently, I reflected on Ross Douthat's op-ed in the New York Times that continued this meme and, to my mind demonstrated the ultimate selfishness of the Christofascists and their never ending quest for power and control over others.   In a post today, Andrew Sullivan highlighted comments from readers on this issue that summed up the real basis for the Christofascists' unhappiness and feigned persecution.  Here are excerpts:

I find I have little sympathy for the protestations of Douthat, Dreher, etc., and here’s why: what they’re protesting is their fading ability to dictate to others how to live their lives. They have not actually lost any rights, but rather lost a position of privilege and authority from which they have called the tunes to which others have been forced to dance. What they’re upset about isn’t the loss of power over their own lives; it’s about the loss of power over others’ lives. To which I say, “Boo-freaking-hoo.”

Here's another:

I’m sure it’s painful to discover that your world view is actually just one among many, rather than Reality Itself, and I can sympathize with the pain since I was once a child and had to endure many such painful realizations as I grew up and learned that I was not actually the central character in the universal drama.  . . . .   But I’m finding my resources of compassion seriously over-taxed by Douthat’s et al. reaction to the coming of the age of marriage- equality because it is rooted in the moral and intellectual complacency of privilege.  Douthat, especially, is expending all his intellectual energy on rationalizing his prejudices rather than attempting to examine them. Even so, nobody is forcing him, or anybody, to change his attitudes or behavior – conservative Christians remain free to profess and practice their beliefs.  Indeed, this really isn’t about them at all.  And there’s the rub.  Suddenly they and their views are not the American Unum, but merely part of the Pluribus.  Their outrage (or, in Dreher’s case, apprehension and sadness) is really a reaction to a loss of prestige, a loss of a sense of centrality, a loss of the sense that this is their country and they are the normal ones . . . 

And for the Christofascists, despite Christ's Gospel message, it is ALL about them.  They support the discrimination against others and for the most part support Republican agendas thare the antithesis of the Gospel message.  An final reader then zeros in on what I have argued for a long time as to why a special level of animus has been reserved for gays in the Christianist circles:

The larger issue at stake is the truth claims of Christianity, at least in the view of its most stringent interpreters. If the Bible can’t be trusted to be right about whether or not gay people are horrible monsters on par with murderers, swindlers, and slave dealers, what can we trust it for? . . . I’ve often wondered whether, as gays and gay marriage become more mainstream and, well, banal, many Christians won’t find themselves wondering why the apocalypse hasn’t come after all and what that says about Scriptural authority in a lot of other areas. That’s what’s not sitting well with a lot of Christian culture warriors right now.

The absolute worse thing one can demand of a Christofascist is that they think for themselves and make their own reasoned moral judgments rather than merely parrot what they have been taught.  Suddenly, if their convenient little check list that proves that they are "saved" cannot be relied upon, their entire simple minded world collapse.  And this scares the Hell out of them.  Hence why they lash out so violently at those who threaten their house of cards world view. 

New York Times: Ban "Ex-Gay" Therapy

"Ex-gay" therapy exists and is promoted by the Christofascists for two primary reasons in my view.  The first and foremost is that the normalcy of homosexuality demolishes their house of cards faith system which ignorantly (and very selectively) clings to Bible passages the authorship of which tracks back to ignorant Bronze Age nomads and herders - people who were utterly ignorant in terms of scientific and/or biological knowledge.  The Christofascists like to quote a Bible passage that instructs one not to build one's house on sand, and yet that is precisely what they themselves have done by basing their belief system on a book that requires ignorance and a disregard for objective reality in the face of modern knowledge.  That homosexuality is part of God's or nature's plan and normal utterly shakes the Christofascist fragile faith construct to the core. 

The second reason for the Christofascists' support of "ex-gay" therapy is that it has proven to be an effective tool to dupe the gullible into believing that sexual orientation is a "choice" and that, therefore, gays do not deserve any legal protections.  It is time that "ex-gay" therapy be thrown on the trash heap of history.  California and New Jersey have begun the process.  The process now needs to go nationwide.  Here are highlights from the New York Times supporting a ban on "ex-gay" therapy:

A discredited therapy that purports to convert homosexuals to heterosexuals was repudiated again late last month. This time, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit unanimously upheld a California law preventing licensed therapists from counseling minors to change their sexual orientation from gay to straight.

So-called “conversion therapy” or “reparative therapy” began at a time when professionals in medicine and psychology considered homosexuality an illness that was amenable to treatment. That ended in 1973, when homosexuality was removed from the psychiatry profession’s diagnostic manual of mental disorders. Soon all major mental health associations followed suit. A small number of therapists, however, continue to practice and advocate conversion therapy today. 

The California law, which was signed by Gov. Jerry Brown in September 2012, says those practicing conversion therapy on a patient under 18 would be engaging in “unprofessional conduct” subject to discipline by state licensing authorities.

The three judges, appointed by Presidents Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, concluded that the law did not violate the free-speech rights of therapists and minor patients or the fundamental rights of parents, because it did nothing to prevent licensed therapists from discussing the pros and cons of conversion therapy with their patients. The law regulates conduct, not speech, the panel reasoned, and lies well within the power of the state to prohibit practices it considers harmful to minors. 

Conversion therapy has had other setbacks in recent months. Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey signed a bill on Aug. 19 banning conversion therapy for minors, making New Jersey the second state to do so.

In June, a Christian group that was a leading proponent of conversion therapy disbanded after 37 years, and issued an apology to gays and lesbians for the harm it had caused.  The old idea that homosexuality is an illness that can be “cured” may at last be headed for the trash heap.

Far Right Catholic Extremist Commits Suicide in Notre Dame Cathedral to Protest Gay Marriage

Believe me, I do not want to sound mean spirited or judgmental, but I am increasingly coming to equate fundamental religious belief with some form of mental illness.    How else to explain the uncontrollable hysteria that the prospect of gay civil marriage creates in Christofascists.  Their fragile, artificial house of cards world simply cannot survive anything that suggests that their beliefs might not be true.  And anything - and anyone - that threatens their artificial world view construct will be met with hate and violence.  In Paris today, we saw this insanity/hysteria in full display when a far right Catholic committed suicide at an altar in Notre Dame Cathedral in reaction to the passage of same sex marriage into law in France.  Think about it.  Civil law gay marriage does NOTHING to heterosexual marriages.  It forces nothing onto religious denominations that oppose gay marriage.  It takes no rights away from heterosexuals.  It only means that Christofascist religious beliefs on marriage can no longer be forced on all of society.  And that alone was enough to cause Dominique Venner (pictured above) to blow his brains out standing at an altar in Notre Dame Cathedral.  Here are highlights from The Independent:

A far-right French historian shot himself in the head beside the altar of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris today apparently in protest against the legalisation of gay marriage in France.

Dominique Venner, 78, a former member of the nationalist terrorist movement, OAS, placed a pistol in his mouth and shot himself dead in front of scores of tourists inside the most visited building in France.

Mr Venner, a presenter on a Catholic-traditionalust radio station and controversial historian and essayist,  posted an essay on his website earlier in the day calling for "new, spectacular and symbolic actions to shake us out of our sleep, to jolt anaesthetised minds and to reawaken memory of our origins".

His long essay was a tirade against gay marriage but also a warning that the "population of France and Europe" was going to be "replaced" and brought under "Islamist control" and "sharia law".

Mr Venner placed a sealed letter on the altar of the cathedral before shooting himself. His choice of the altar - associated  with religious marriage ceremonies -appeared to be a symbolic gesture of protest against the law permitting civil gay marriages in France which took effect last weekend.

The "marriage for all" law has provoked a powerful movement of middle class, conservative, religious and right-wing protest in the last four months. Another large demonstration is planned in Paris on Sunday.

Mr Venner, a prolific author of books and tracts on extreme nationalist themes, has been one of many vociferous critics of the law. Some of his work as a historian has been well-received, incuding a 1981 book on the Red Army which won a prize from the Académie Française. Much of his work has been steeped in the racist ideology of the far-right, apologising for the pro-Hitler regime in Vichy in the Second World war and warning of conspiracies to destroy European civilisation and to swamp the white race.

Note how similar Venner's paranoia was to that which we hear from American Christofascists and Tea Party members.  Are we seeing mental illness on display on a broad scale?