Does the Gay lobby have a monopoly on discrimination?

Snickers Man

floggg wrote: »

If it was a dreadful speech, why was it played around the world and translated into numerous languages?

Why was she invited to countries around the world to speak after the speech was heard?

You may not have liked it, and that's fine. But it has been critically acclaimed around the world so lets not pretend it's dreadful.

You mean, a bit like One Direction then? I can't fathom the reason behind their popularity either. I suspect a lot of it has to do with adolescent crushes (both gay and straight) but such crushes don't automatically confer musical merit on their objects of lust.

Still, what you choose to listen to in the privacy of your own headphones is nobody's business.

floggg wrote: »

Homophobia does take various forms, much like all types of discrimination.

Much like racism isn't confined to lunching black people, but can include employment discrimination, negative stereotyping, access to services, racial abuse and harassment etc.

Believe me, honophbia takes numerous forms and impacts in innumerable ways.

All bad things. And there are few who would try to justify any of them. Certainly I wouldn't. But Panti couldn't leave well enough alone. There had to be that little bit extra, which may have been intended to strengthen the point but which strayed into stupidity.

Two samples from the Noble Call speech to illustrate:

1) the bit about the lads hurling abuse (and more) at him/her from the car.

Nobody (or almost nobody) would deny that such behaviour is boorish, bullying, intimidatory and almost certainly, without any reference to special laws for gays, illegal. But why would Panti then go on to say that what feels oppressive is wondering "What gave the gay away?"

That was a stupid and unnecessary point to make. It implies that if you have the perception to spot somebody as likely to be gay you are guilty of "oppressive" behaviour. That's rubbish. It's an attack on gaydar, a social intuition which in its absence would leave a lot of gay people a lot lonelier than they need to be, rather than an attack on the unacceptable behaviour that ensued in that particular instance.

2)

This passage here

Have you ever gone into your favourite neighbourhood café with a paper you buy every day and you open up a 500 word article written by a nice middle class woman, the kind of woman who probably gives to charity?

And she is arguing over 500 words so reasonably about whether .... you should be given fewer rights than everybody else and then when the woman at the next table gets up and excuses herself to squeeze past you with a smile and you smile back and you think to yourself: "Does she think that about me too?" And that feels oppressive.

This is garbage. Let me put that innuendo into another context and see what you think.


'Have you ever been at your computer, hurrying to make a deadline and the phone rings and a helpful friendly Indian-sounding person comes on the line and tells you there's something wrong with your computer and they can help you fix it and you know damned well this friendly earnest person is in fact operating a scam which, if you co-operate, could end up costing you a lot of trouble and/or money and so you politely decline their offer and hang up.

But the next time you go out and see an Asian face you wonder to yourself "Is this nice industrious, charming, fastidiously polite person going to try and rip me off too?" And that feels oppressive.'

Yeah but for whom? Who's being unfairly stigmatized here?

floggg wrote: »

And Panti was clear that being homophobic does not make one evil. So it was very clear that she wasn't equating the lesser forms of homophobia to gay bashers.

Well this is central to the point. If she wants to differentiate between degrees of behaviour then she has to find better language to describe those different levels.

Picking the word that is best understood to describe the very worst behaviour and then applying it retrospectively to much lesser behaviour is defamatory. You can't do that sort of thing. Especially not if you're a public spokesperson for a cause.

floggg wrote: »

Oh and people aren't called homophobes "for raising questions about the legal minefield" of adoption by same sex couples (what legal minefield - apart from some drafting changes to adoption legislation, no substantive issues arise).

It's because there they have no reason for opposing it other than the fact that it's gay couples.

Seriously, there aren't. Check any of the recent US judgments on gay marriage cases. The judges, even republicans, are openly ridiculing the arguments put forward to oppose same sex marriage and same sex parenting.

Excuse me. Adoption IS a legal, moral and sociological minefield, even without involving the issue of gay parents at all. Haven't you seen Philomena? Or the controversy surrounding the so-called "mass grave in a septic tank" in Tipperary? Or indeed the recent landmark case about surrogacy heard in Irish courts recently to determine who has the right to be called the mother: the egg donor or the womb donor?

We are a long way from consensus on even the broader aspects of this issue.

It's an issue that deserves calm and reasoned debate and not some histrionic old stage queen squealing how oppressive it is that the debate is taking place at all.

Martin Luther King, she sure ain't.