Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Janet Folger distorts yet again: It's getting to be a habit for her

And I thought Harry Jackson was bad.

Unlike Jackson, who is content with exploiting his racial heritage to attack hate crimes legislation, Janet Folger and her group, Faith2Action, has a more sophisticated method attacking the legislation.

Folger takes current events and manipulates them to make it seem that people are being criminalized for merely speaking out against homosexuality. This manipulation involves omitting certain key facts.

Case in point, her new screed that attacks gays and lesbians because a few of us had ugly things to say to commemorate Jerry Falwell's passing. I do not condone what was said, but there is also no excuse for Folger's following deception:

Those kind of hateful statements are perfectly acceptable, free from any repercussions of any kind. They get their own forum at the ACLU. However, if two 16-year-old Crystal Lake girls say an unkind word about homosexuals and pass out a few flyers to their classmates, they are in "violation of an Illinois state hate crime statute." They face felony charges and are locked up in juvenile detention while bail is denied.

But here is the true story:

Two female 16-year-old Crystal Lake South High School students face hate-crime charges after allegedly plastering their high school’s halls and distributing anti-gay fliers directed towards a fellow student in the school’s parking lot.

The actions against their former male friend landed the two girls in juvenile court on May 15, after being arrested by Crystal Lake police on May 11. Both, unnamed due to their ages, also face charges of obstruction of justice and disorderly conduct, and one teen faces an additional charge of resisting a police officer.

McHenry County State’s Attorney Lou Bianchi told Windy City Times that despite arguments being made by many locals about the right to free speech, what the two girls did is clearly a hate crime.

“They had the intent to alarm and disturb another, and they were successful in that,” Bianchi said. “In alarming and disturbing, they also committed a hate crime. Their words ... were directed against a specific individual of a certain sexual orientation.”

Now there have been some disagreement whether or not what these two young ladies allegedly did constitutes a hate crime. Some gay blogs have taken opposing views of the situation.

I am of the opinion that if these two young ladies passed out the flyers in hopes of causing harm to the young man on the perceived notion that he was gay, then it can constitute a hate crime.

But one thing we can all agree on is the fact that Janet Folger distorted the situation.

Apparently in her world, who care about facts when your eyes are on the kingdom of Jesus.