Thursday, January 24, 2013

Religious right - 'gays have bad health issues, so let's undermine attempts to discover why'

According to Think Progress, Rep. James Lankford (R-OK) had a very interesting exchange with a constituent about how a workshop which counsels lgbts with substance abuse problems and mental health issues is allegedly pushing the "homosexual agenda:"



CONSTITUENT: I want to know if you’re aware of the Substances and Mental Health Services Administration that has a book called the Provider’s Introduction to Substance Abuse Treatment for Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay and Transgender Individuals.

 LANKFORD: Wow.

CONSTITUENT: They are going around the nation, they just did this here in Oklahoma, December 7th, and having conferences that are educational. [...] About 2 percent of the conference is dealing with substance abuse and mental health issues. 98 percent is doing indoctrination or pushing the homosexual agenda. This is what our president is doing. He has a federal agency doing it. Our state, the Oklahoma Mental Health and Substance Abuse Department, put this conference on and is indoctrinating our citizens who are totally against this. Is there any way you can look into this?

LANKFORD: Oh yes, sure. You know I can absolutely get a chance to take a look at it. We’ll start the process, try to see what we can do to identify it. Some of those things you have the power of humiliation where you can raise it and put in sunlight. They love functioning in the dark. You put some sunlight on it, that does help. But, we’ll see. I’m glad to take that on. 

It has not been confirmed whether or not the woman speaking was Sally Kern - although it does look like her. And those of us who are lgbt know Sally Kern very well. She is the Oklahoma legislator who once said that homosexuality is more dangerous than terrorism, causing a huge uproar and a boon for religious right organizations who anointed her as a victim "unfairly vilified"  for merely expressing an opinion.

I'm pretty sure we are going to be hearing more about this, but regardless of who this constituent was, the fact that she is attacking a program which would help lgbts fight substance abuse and mental health problems is something we should remember, especially in light of the fact that a huge argument used against the gay community by people like the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins is the idea that we are susceptible to substance abuse and mental health issues: 




And there you have an interesting conundrum which very few point out regarding the hypocrisy of the religious right and those who support their efforts to keep us under heel.

On one hand, you have them calling us "dangers to society" because we are supposedly more susceptible to substance abuse and negative mental health issues. And on the other, they object to any program which would help us conquer these negative behaviors, claiming that they are in actuality a plot to "indoctrinate" or push the alleged homosexual agenda.

They seem to be attacking us for negative health issues while undermining attempts to  create solutions to these issues.

And I have a hard time believing that this is not intentional.

1 comment:

Stacey Gray said...

That's what you can do when you control both sides of the issue! You can create the situation, then decry the result, blaming it on the victims targeted in the first place. That really is the demonstration of power isn't it!

If you are really good, you then use the victims' money to propose to the SCOTUS that said group has become too powerful to deserve any outside interference with said alleged discrimination. Ahhhh.... it is good to be king!