WELL KNOWN RIGHT WING PUNDIT ADMITS DEFEAT

In an Opinion piece published at the Christian news sight WORLDmag.com, well known conservative pundit Cal Thomas admitted that the battle against gay marriage is all but lost.

Using the classic movie musical The Music Man as a metaphor, Thomas cited lead character Harold Hill's proclamation to worried town folks that trouble had come to River City, Iowa in the form of a pool hall. A pool hall that would corrupt young people unless the local citizens bought the musical instruments he was selling and got their kids into a marching band. He promised that playing music would keep kids from “fritterin’ away their mealtime, suppertime, chore time, too” and going to the track to watch “some stuck-up jockey boy sittin’ on Dan Patch.”

I'm not sure if Thomas was aware of the boatload of ironies swirling around his choice of this American classic as the metaphor for his argument. For one, the movie and its Broadway counterpart were, at least in my generation, considered icons of entertainment within the GLBT community. The story was fun, campy and hilarious. And the would-be swindler finally sees the error of his ways and everyone lives happily everafter.

For a few others, substitute "gay marriage" for "pool hall", "religious doctrine" for "musical instruments", "church" for "marching band" and "praying" for "playing music" and you have the all-to-familiar rantings of the religious right wing fanatics we've all become accustomed to.

However, whether or not Mr. Thomas was or wasn't consciously aware of those ironies (I just found them to be personally entertaining), I do have to give him credit where credit is due. In his piece, after the usual rants about gay marriage leading to polygamy, God only intended man/woman couplings, etc. etc., he did say the following:

To those on the political and religious right who are intent on continuing the battle to preserve “traditional marriage” in a nation that is rapidly discarding its traditions, I would ask this question: What poses a greater threat to our remaining moral underpinnings? Is it two homosexuals living together, or is it the number of heterosexuals who are divorcing and the increasing number of children born to unmarried women, now at nearly 40 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention?

Most of those who are disturbed about same-sex marriage are not as exercised about preserving heterosexual marriage. That’s because it doesn’t raise money and won’t get them on TV. Some preachers would rather demonize gays than oppose heterosexuals who violate their vows by divorcing, often causing harm to their children. That’s because so many in their congregations have been divorced and preaching against divorce might cause some to leave and take their contributions with them.

The battle over same-sex marriage is on the way to being lost. For conservatives who still have faith in the political system to reverse the momentum, you are—to recall Harold Hill—“closing your eyes to a situation you do not wish to acknowledge.”

Clearly, the right wing is finally beginning to see the writing on the wall and they're now looking for other issues to rally their minions around while they still have minions to rally.

Let's make one thing very, very clear here though. Our fight for marriage equality and equal protection under the law is, by no means, over yet. Although we are beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel you can bet that the diehard religious fanatics who are making millions of dollars and thousands of converts from the false emotionalism of gay rights issues are going to continue sending trainloads full of lies barreling through that tunnel in hopes of blocking out that light.

Yes. WE WILL WIN - and soon. But not if we start acting like we already have.

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My thanks to Box Turtle Bulletin for the link to Thomas' piece.