As the state of Illinois considers legalizing same-sex marriage (the Senate passed it the other day, making its ultimate passage very likely), the anti-gay Illinois Family Institute is pulling out all the stops to, err, stop it. And of course, it’s all about saving the children. From what? From the horrible knowledge that gay people exist.
Elementary schools will not be able to keep picture books that portray homosexuality positively out of their libraries and classrooms. Those who still harbor the stereotype of librarians as conservative stuffed shirts will be surprised to learn that librarians and university programs in library science are, like teacher education programs, notoriously liberal…
Public schools will be hiring teachers who are in legal “homosexual marriages.” These teachers will put photos of their homosexual spouses on their desks and talk about their homosexual spouses to their students. Such images and ideas coming from teachers whom children love and admire will powerfully shape the feelings and beliefs of young boys and girls, particularly when such images and ideas are reinforced countless times in other cultural contexts. Such images and ideas will undermine what is being taught at home.
Some will argue that schools are already hiring teachers in homosexual relationships, so the legalization of same-sex marriage won’t change anything. They are only partly correct. Although schools are, unfortunately, already hiring teachers in homosexual relationships, once the government recognizes homosexual unions as marriages, administrators and school boards—particularly in elementary schools—will have the social stigma that makes them reluctant to hire teachers in homosexual unions knocked out from under them. And this, of course, is the chief motivation for homosexuals to pursue same-sex marriage when they already have all the benefits and privileges of marriage through Illinois’ civil union law.
It’s “unfortunate” that schools are already hiring gay teachers. Because for these bigots, it isn’t just gay marriage they freak out about, it’s the inability to discriminate against gay people in every way possible. And children must be protected against the mere knowledge that gay people exist.
38 comments
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mvemjsun
February 19, 2013 at 9:17 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
When will these idiots pick up a Biology textbook and learn that homosexuality is innate not learned. Or realize that if they do not like discriminated against then discriminating against others makes them assholes.
theschwa
February 19, 2013 at 9:19 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Yes, I remember in grade school, my teacher could not get thru a single math lesson without talking about her husband, and of course going into the details of their sexual activities. It WILL be awful when teh gays start doing this too!!!
steve oberski
February 19, 2013 at 9:24 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Replace “homosexuality” with “mixed race” and set the wayback machine to the 1950s.
Scr... Archivist
February 19, 2013 at 9:29 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The I”F”A says all this like it’s a bad thing.
I found this phrase odd: “once the government recognizes homosexual unions as marriages”. Are they referring to civil unions here? If so, they are demonstrating their bigotry once again.
Also, in Illinois, would people with civil unions be automatically reclassified as married? Or would they have to actually get a new license and have a (new) marriage ceremony?
timgueguen
February 19, 2013 at 9:39 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Does anyone think this lot approve of civil union laws? Nah, me neither.
jnorris
February 19, 2013 at 9:50 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
And to add to the persecution the Christians have to endure, The Gayz aren’t required to where the pink triangles. However do the Christians really know who to hate? Bless their little hearts.
Giliell, professional cynic
February 19, 2013 at 9:52 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
They say that as if it were a bad thing…
nigelTheBold, also Avo
February 19, 2013 at 9:53 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
So, it’s liberal to think of people as, well, people.
I’m starting to think “liberal” means, “Not scared of your own shadow.”
Gregory in Seattle
February 19, 2013 at 9:55 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@Scr… Archivist – In Washington, where we’ve had domestic partnerships for some years, same sex couple can now either explicitly get married, which would replace their DP, or simply wait until June 30, 2014 when most remaining DPs automatically get reclassified under state law as marriage. (The law was written to provide legal recognition and protections to elderly couples who could not get married without endangering pensions, social security and the like. In this form, DPs will remain valid in Washington and DPs where at least one partner is 62 years of age or older will not be converted to marriage.)
Illinois may chose a different path, but this one seems reasonable.
Gregory in Seattle
February 19, 2013 at 9:58 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@nigelTheBold #8 –
From JFK’s accepting the Liberal Party of New York’s nomination, September 14, 1960.
democommie
February 19, 2013 at 10:02 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Illinois may chose a different path, but this one seems reasonable.”
I see a split coming between UpstatechicaGAYland and DownstateKKKayroMurKKKA. They will split the state and rename the norther part, “Illium” and the southern part “Noise”.
* Spelled Cairo but pronounced the way I typed it
Jim
February 19, 2013 at 10:03 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“When will these idiots pick up a Biology textbook and learn that homosexuality is innate not learned.”
In the past ten years, I’ve gone from believing that homosexuality is innate and abominable, to thinking that homosexuality is innate and not abominable, to thinking that is doesn’t matter whether homosexuality is innate or learned, it’s still not abominable.
I prefer blondes. It’s not something I chose, it’s just how I am. I’ve had three girlfriends, the third of which is now my wife, and all were blonde. Does it matter whether this preferences is innate or learned? Why would it matter if I preferred boys instead?
Marcus Ranum
February 19, 2013 at 10:04 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
it’s all about saving the children
I don’t like children.
John Pieret
February 19, 2013 at 10:20 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Stigma” n. pl. stig·ma·ta: Bodily marks, sores, or sensations of pain corresponding in location to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus, usually occurring during states of religious ecstasy or hysteria.
Apparently the IFI is playing the part of Caiaphas.
fifthdentist
February 19, 2013 at 10:22 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Marcus, have you ever had them cooked correctly?
That makes all the difference.
Didaktylos
February 19, 2013 at 10:33 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@#15 – Are you saying you can actually eat a whole one? All by yourself? At one sitting? I don’t believe you. ;)
unbound
February 19, 2013 at 10:42 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Isn’t it amazing how fear and hatred almost sound reasonable when you word it just the right way? Too bad groups like the Illinois Family Institute are unable to figure out that they are the ones filled with fear and hatred on this subject…
eric
February 19, 2013 at 10:51 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
If I were IFI’s opponents, I’d be quoting that to high heaven. I’d be putting some of that on billboards. Its such sheer bigotry that I would guess most moderates and people who just haven’t thought much about the issue would recoil from the IFI’s position.
Scr... Archivist
February 19, 2013 at 11:25 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@ Gregory in Seattle
Thanks for that interesting detail from Washington state. I had not considered the retirement savings and related factors.
It seems that with time the domestic partnership category will fade away in that state, and marriage will just be marriage. The same may be said on a society-wide level, especially as The Children! grow up seeing same-sex relationships as normal.
Synfandel
February 19, 2013 at 11:32 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Curious… I read that quote waiting to encounter the bigoted slur against gays and lesbians, but there was none. With the lone exception of the word “unfortunately” in the third paragraph, the whole quote is laudable. If you didn’t know that it came from an anti-gay organization, it would read like a cheer for legalizing gay marriage.
M, Supreme Anarch of the Queer Illuminati
February 19, 2013 at 11:44 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Why would this be even remotely surprising? We’re talking about a whole field devoted to organizing and maintaining vast amounts of information to make knowledge as widely and freely (in both senses!) accessible as possible. Not exactly a conservative-values-based enterprise…
Gregory in Seattle
February 19, 2013 at 11:51 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@M #21 – Well, reality does have a strong liberal bias, after all.
Modusoperandi
February 19, 2013 at 12:10 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
M, Supreme Anarch of the Queer Illuminati “Why would this be even remotely surprising? We’re talking about a whole field devoted to organizing and maintaining vast amounts of information to make knowledge as widely and freely (in both senses!) accessible as possible. Not exactly a conservative-values-based enterprise…”
And the ‘Religion’ section is full of books about things, and I can’t stress this enough, other than Protestantism!
Wes
February 19, 2013 at 12:26 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Good! When what’s taught at home is complete dog shit, then I applaud anything that undermines it.
cjcolucci
February 19, 2013 at 12:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
These teachers will put photos of their homosexual spouses on their desks and talk about their homosexual spouses to their students.
The teachers I had never put pictures of their spouses, or anyone else, or any other personal items, on “their” desks, in a room with 30 unwashed louts, if they wanted to keep them.
And if any of those unwashed louts asked about a teacher’s spouse, they’d be told in no uncertain terms that it was none of their damned (well, maybe they wouldn’t say “damned”) business.
dugglebogey
February 19, 2013 at 12:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Why are these people so terrified that their children won’t be taught to hate in schools?
Shouldn’t they be learning how to hate at home? It’s their parents to teach them that, not schools!
garnetstar
February 19, 2013 at 1:08 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Et tu, librarians?
cottonnero
February 19, 2013 at 1:22 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I’m trying to think of how many of my teachers’ spouses I was aware of, and every case that I can think of is one where Miss So-and-So came back the following year as Mrs. Somethingelse (actually, since it was West Michigan, Mrs. VanderSomethingelse), or where the spouse was also a teacher at the same school.
hunter
February 19, 2013 at 4:29 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
My dad was in the school administration when I was in grade school, and I still didn’t know anything about my teachers’ spouses.
shay
February 19, 2013 at 5:40 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“I see a split coming between UpstatechicaGAYland and DownstateKKKayroMurKKKA. They will split the state and rename the norther part, “Illium” and the southern part “Noise”.”
Not to pick nits, but downstate is not the solid block of 50′s values one might assume. Bloomington/Normal (right smack dab in the middle of Illinois) has made the top ten places for gays to live for over a decade now.
Our churches have even been picketed by Fred Phelps!
dingojack
February 19, 2013 at 5:58 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Shay – so Normal gays are considered *ahem* normal?
:) Dingo
lanir
February 19, 2013 at 6:03 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Did anyone else pick up the vibe there from the IFI article that they were basically screaming at the top of their lungs “LET’S NOT TALK ABOUT SEX!” while no one else had even remotely gotten near that topic?
democommie
February 19, 2013 at 6:08 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@ Shay:
No slight intended against Bloomington. I’m in Oswego, NY. Oswego is sorta blue in a county that is quite red. If not for the SUNY campus here, I suspect that blacks and out gays would be rara avis. Most of our county lege has said they will not support the new NY assault weapons ban/law. It will get interesting.
dingojack
February 19, 2013 at 6:15 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
M, Supreme Anarch of the Queer Illuminati – A librarian’s job is to connect patrons with the information they want to know. It’s not their job to censor or restrict that connection.
Modus – see the section 200 to 299.999 in your local library today! :)
Dingo
shay
February 19, 2013 at 8:14 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Dingo — *everything* is normal in Normal.
(I hate telling people where I work).
shay
February 19, 2013 at 8:16 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@Hunter — the spousal unit’s been teaching for 12 years now. We’ve been married for 29. I have yet to see my photo on his desk.
(of course, he has yet to see mine on his, so we’re even).
shay
February 19, 2013 at 8:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Ah heck. His photo on my desk, I meant. This is what I get for not using the preview function.
Nomad
February 19, 2013 at 11:37 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I’d like to express my gratitude to the Illinois Family Institute for letting me enjoy this moment even more. To see this group of crusty bigots openly declaring that they don’t want marriage equality because then they’ll have difficulty teaching their children to hate gay people is icing on the gay marriage cake.
It really encapsulates the progress that’s been made in just the last few years, even. This is basically an admission that they’ve lost the war in the culture at large, and that now the culture is starting to threaten even their ability to turn their own children into bitter little balls of anger.