From Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wayne-besen/the-party-isnt-over-but-i_b_2576665.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices
Wayne Besen
01/30/2013
Responding to the Boy Scouts of America’s plan to ditch their ban on gay Scouts, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said, “A departure from their long-held policies would be devastating to an organization that has prided itself on the development of character in boys.”
The problem that Perkins and other culture warriors are encountering is that each day fewer people believe their hyperbolic and hyperventilating warnings about LGBT people. The terrifying “Gay Agenda” and “Special Rights” rhetoric worked well in the 1980s and 1990s when homosexuals were thought of as a far-off species that only existed in San Francisco’s Gay Pride parades. It was easy to spook the suburban masses by exploiting fear of the unknown.
However, now that gay people are coming out quicker than Perkins can invent new lies — and straight allies are joining our cause faster than new homophobes are minted — the outcome appears to be a foregone conclusion. The only rationale for Perkins and his ilk to continue their losing crusade is to suck every last cent out of their aging, gullible followers’ pockets before they expire.
The Boy Scouts story was featured in today’s New York Times on page A13. However, all one has to do to understand the reason for their policy shift is read the story on page A12, “Sewers, Curfews, and a Ban on Gay Bias.” It is about Vicco, a poor, abandoned Appalachian coal town in Kentucky, which has a gay mayor and a city council that just passed an anti-discrimination ordinance.
Similarly, a bill that would give same-sex couples the majority of the legal rights afforded heterosexual couples cleared a Wyoming House subcommittee by a 7-2 vote and is headed to consideration in the full House. According to the Los Angeles Times, the bill’s sponsor is State Rep. Cathy Connolly of Laramie, the first openly gay representative in Wyoming.
If Perkins’ prejudice isn’t playing in rural Kentucky and Wyoming, it soon won’t be resonating in too many places.
Sensing this trend, Dave Kochel, an Iowa Republican operative who served as senior adviser to Mitt Romney, declared this week on a local television show his support for marriage equality and said, “The culture wars are over, and the Republicans largely lost.”
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