The FRC shooting

By now you know that a disturbed man shot a guard at the Family Research Council in Washington DC. (Thankfully, the guard will be fine). News suggests that the shooter was opposed to the FRC's anti-gay policies.

Brian Brown of the National Organization (against) Marriage (Equality) immediately complained that this is because FRC is called a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center because FRC opposes marriage equality. in fact, he suggested that the obviously shooter was carrying out a political agenda.

No, Brian. It is you with the political agenda. The FRC is called a hate group because it tells lies and demonizes LGBT people.

The FRC often makes false claims about the LGBT community based on discredited research and junk science. The intention is to denigrate LGBT people in its battles against same-sex marriage, hate crimes laws, anti-bullying programs and the repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

Thanks to the GLAD Accountability Project, you can see exactly what people like FRC spokesmen Tony Perkins and Peter Sprigg say about LGBT people.In fact, Sprigg thinks that gay behavior should be criminalized. And you can read more quotes from the FRC at the SPLC site.

Aside: you can also read posts here at my other blog (one, two, three) about the language of violence employed by so-called "Christians" against LGBT people.  And don't get me started on their claim that gay people are anti-Christian.  The right doesn't own the term "Christian" and there are plenty of gay Christians out there.

Meanwhile what about the shooter? He is no more representative of the gay community than the man who shot up the Sikh temple is representative of the Christian community, or the man who killed people at the Batman movie is representative of Neuroscience PhD students.

Although some conservative groups accuse the pro-gay blogosphere of "celebrating" this, the response was not that at all. In fact, 41 pro-gay groups immediately released a statement condemning the violence and sending their prayers and best wishes to the FRC and the victim for healing.

Funny, the conservatives ignore that, instead preferring to demonize the gay community further.

What is the conservative response to disturbed acts of anti-gay violence? In fact, 2011 saw a record high rate of murders motivated by anti gay bias. And what did this conservative pseudo-"Christian" groups have to say about that? what did they say about Bible-verse shouting street preacher  at Grand Rapids GayDay, who threatened to rape a woman attending?

::Crickets::

As Zack Ford writes at ThinkProgress,

Violence is not the answer to solving any conflict and nothing justifies the actions taken Wednesday by Floyd Corkins. But any attempt to use the shooting to justify reinforcing the inequality LGBT people experience everyday is intolerance at its most basic.

Update:  Excellent commentary from Pam's House Blend :

The fact is that the political discourse in this country is at rock bottom — dehumanizing people so that it is easier for those who are filled with rage to act out violently. We see it with the numerous rage-filled hate crimes against LGBTs all the time, race-based preposterous acts claiming to be religious freedom, and comments from public figures like Joe the Plumber’s recent guidance on immigration reform to “Put A Damn Fence On The Border Going To Mexico And Start Shooting.”