Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
This is an unbelievable story. Just when you start to think that maybe there is sanity in the world, you see a story like this.
For J.R. and Robin knight, owning a bed and breakfast is everything they've always wanted. "We came here in search of our dreams, my wife always wanted a bed and breakfast and I always wanted a restaurant," says California native J.R. Knight.But recently their dream has turned into a nightmare, all because of a flag they're flying outside. "It's a rainbow flag - to some people it means friendship to some people it means gay pride," says Knight. But for knight, it was just a souvenir from his 12-year-old son...
Knight says his son gave him the flag after a trip to Dorothy's house, a museum about the Wizard of Oz. The flag reminded the boy of "somewhere over the rainbow."
But the good folks of Meade, Kansas saw that rainbow flag and lost their freakin minds. Get a load of this:
Knight says the local Meade newspaper is trying to put him out of business and was frustrated when it ran an article about the flag and did not even bother to contact him regarding why he put it up. In fact, most people we spoke to in Meade said they didn't even know what the flag meant until the article ran. But once word got around, the reaction was harsh.Knight says the radio station has called him threatening to remove the restaurant's commercials if he does not remove the flag. A local pastor stopped by said it was equivalent to hanging women's panties on a flag pole. When Knight jokingly said he might consider that - the preacher said he would have him arrested.
His business has suffered - down to only a few local customers. The folks in Meade who've boycotted say it's too offensive for them to eat there.
Local resident, Keith Klassen says the flag is a slap in the face to the conservative community of Meade. "To me it's just like running up a Nazi flag in a Jewish neighborhood. I can't walk into that establishment with that flag flying because to me that's saying that I support what the flag stands for and I don't," says Klassen.
Yes, Mr. Klassen, a rainbow flag is just like flying a Nazi flag in a Jewish neighborhood, you fucking idiot. If there was any justice in this world, this kind of stupidity and bigotry would be accompanied by migraine headaches, pus-oozing sores all over your body, and a burning rectal itch that never heals.
Update: I didn't realize that PZ had already covered this, but he has even more information. It turns out that the son that gave them the flag is dead and the flag is a reminder that he still exists "over the rainbow" to his parents. And some idiot, maybe Klassen or some halfwit who shares a brain with him, cut the flag down. PZ reprints an eloquent email from the parents refusing to back down in the face of such idiotic harrassment. He also includes their contact information, which I will reprint here and urge my readers, if they are ever in Kansas, to give these folks some business so they are not forced out by this town full of vile cretins.
JR & Robin Knight
Lakeway Hotel - Bed and Breakfast Inn
115 N. Fowler, Meade, Kansas 67864
PO BOX 1029, Meade, Kansas 67864-1029
Toll-Free: 877-276-2700 - Phone: 620-873-2700
lakewayhotel.com - innkeeper@lakewayhotel.com
Comments
The part that makes me the angriest is the knee jerk reaction that the town had. The flag doesn't even mean what they thought it did... it was a reminder of the man's son. Essentially the town is behaving like 2 year olds because a father had a sentimental family flag outside.
What happened to loving your family and your neighbor. Can you find a greater example of hypocritical bullshit anywhere?
Man I wish I had the money to just go out there and stay at that B&B just to give support.
Posted by: Robert | August 2, 2006 1:27 PM
First place I read about this story, there was a commenter who mentioned it was actually a lot more like flying a Jewish flag in a Nazi neighborhood, a remark whose accuracy made Klassen's quote all the more infuriating.
PZ blogged about this again yesterday, apparently someone in the town decided to tear the flag down, and the owners wrote a letter of thanks to supporters:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/08/news_from_the_lakeway_hotel.php
Posted by: nicole | August 2, 2006 1:36 PM
If I were the B&B I'd be suing the newspaper for defamation since it led to them losing customers. It's also very bad journalism for someone to write a story without getting both sides of it first. I'm guessing the author never heard of integrity?
Posted by: llDayo | August 2, 2006 1:49 PM
I find it hard to believe that places as hickish as this do exist. I'm English and I've read my fair share of novels about inbred American towns, but I'd always thought it was a bit of an unfair stereotype. I actually find it unbelievable that someone would have the gall to equate putting up a rainbow flag outside their premises with putting up a Nazi flag in a Jewish neighbourhood.
Do these people have even an inkling of sensibility and proportionality?
Posted by: John B | August 2, 2006 2:23 PM
John B, to answer your question, having grown up near one of them, no. What they do have is personal convictions that are very strong and just as unthought about. Anything that goes against those must be torn down immediately as an affront to all that is good and right. And I grew up in north Georgia. There are parts of the south of my own state I'm terrified to go near. They can smell the science on you, I think.
Posted by: Caduceus | August 2, 2006 2:40 PM
Christians: thugs with Bibles.
Posted by: Martin | August 2, 2006 2:43 PM
Martin-
I certainly don't think that's a fair characterizations of Christians as a whole. Some subset of the group, to be sure, but only a subset. There are also a great many Christians who are every bit as appalled by this behavior as you and I.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | August 2, 2006 3:08 PM
John B., I can attest as well that not only is this behavior typical for some areas, it's almost expected. I spent all of my adolescence in a north Texas town called Lewisville, and I regularly lived out whole Bill Hicks comedy routines every time I dared to try reading while I was eating lunch. (The telling point was crashing a high school class reunion, when I joked about how we didn't have to worry about singing the school football team's fight song because "Dueling Banjos" has no lyrics. Most of my classmates thought I was serious, and even more had to have the punchline explained when I told them about how the first Lewisville Erotic Film Festival consisted of 37 back-to-back showings of Deliverance.) I also work in a call center, and I adore calls from Kansas customers in the way I adore calls from West Virginia and Ohio customers: if someone developed a surefire cure for fetal alcohol syndrome and put some real laws on the books banning brother-sister marriages, Kansas could be liveable in our lifetimes.
Posted by: Paul Riddell | August 2, 2006 3:18 PM
Okay, I'm from Kansas. We're not all mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging mental deficients. I've stayed in a number of B&Bs (a very civilized way to travel), and I'm trying to find a way to travel to Meade just to stay there and show my support.
Yes, it's sad, but at least there was some good news from Kansas today too.
Posted by: pablo | August 2, 2006 3:24 PM
I certainly don't think that's a fair characterizations of Christians as a whole. Some subset of the group, to be sure, but only a subset. There are also a great many Christians who are every bit as appalled by this behavior as you and I.
I wish they would speak up louder and more often.
Posted by: Will | August 2, 2006 4:02 PM
"Wikiality" bites ---
Not to play devil's advocate or anything, but I just happened to run
across the Wikipedia entry for my home town of Saugatuck MI, and it includes
this paragraph:
"Tourism
"Saugatuck is a gay-friendly town. Many merchants display rainbow flags or
decals, and most lodging establishments are comfortable with gay couples.
There is an all-male n ude beach at one of the coves along Lake Michigan.
[citation needed]"
Yes, you don't have to tell me how stupid the fuss over this is. But what it does indicate is that potential gay customers may really be looking for the rainbows, despite all the "decoys" around, such as at the Knights. (BTW the gay beach was supposedly around back in the '50s -- way ahead of its time, my home town).
Posted by: David See | August 2, 2006 4:34 PM
Its places like Meade that are trying to put ID in the class room. Its good to know that there are enough people of rational thought (or maybe enough people of irrational thought who can't be bothered to vote) to still have hope for Kansas.
Posted by: Robert | August 2, 2006 4:34 PM
I wish they would speak up louder and more often.
I am a Christian who finds that kind of behaviour loathsome and disgusting. And while I don't preface everything I say with my faith, I make no bones about it - I am a christian and anyone who googles me after reading soemthing I say is led to my blogger profile and my blogs which make that abundantly clear. I know many Christians who find this kind of behaviour reprehensible - the problem is that the only ones that get much press are the evil, biggoted types who hate what this country is truly founded on.
Posted by: Treban | August 2, 2006 6:10 PM
If I'm not mistaken, Ed, the son is alive. they just had to send him to CA to live with grandparents because of all the good kristian joy being spread around. This story reminds me of the good kristian people of Indian River, DE. There is a deep rot in the heartland, and a lot of surly hate.
Posted by: SharonB | August 2, 2006 6:15 PM
Just read the open letter they wrote. Wiping away the tears. . .
Posted by: Treban | August 2, 2006 6:15 PM
I certainly don't think that's a fair characterizations of Christians as a whole. Some subset of the group, to be sure, but only a subset. There are also a great many Christians who are every bit as appalled by this behavior as you and I.
I wish they would speak up louder and more often.
Well, it's the same here as elsewhere. Faced with the closed-minded stubbornness of some people, it can be frustrating and futile to try to talk some sense into them.
Example: even though it's been corrected many times, people persist in tarring all Christians as intolerant, ignorant fascists, etc.
You see, Will, people have spoken up, loudly and often. But no one seems to be hearing them -- on any side of any issue -- because it would go against some favorite stereotypes, and would undermine any opportunity for being smugly outraged.
Posted by: corky | August 2, 2006 6:17 PM
I think the argument that the Christians who oppose this sort of thing aren't speaking up is outdated, at the least. Now more than ever, they are speaking up, from Jim Wallis to Mainstream Baptist to the 10,000 clergy who signed a letter opposing ID to the Texas Faith Network. They don't get near the attention from the media, primarily because they don't have such enormous power in one of the major political parties. But they exist and they are speaking out, and we have a good many of them that post here (Ruidh, Treban, Henry Neufeld, Wes Elsberry and many others). So rather than deride them for not speaking out, let's welcome them with open arms.
I've said for a long time that we've drawn the lines in all the wrong places. The lines shouldn't be between atheists and Christians, or Christians and Jews, or Jews and Muslims, etc. The lines should be between the decent, reasonable people in all of those groups and the irrational, authoritarian people in all of those groups.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | August 2, 2006 7:08 PM
All faithful followers of Jesus Christ -- no matter where they sit on the political spectrum -- find the behavior in this story reprehensible.
Posted by: zwilson | August 2, 2006 8:16 PM
I've said for a long time that we've drawn the lines in all the wrong places. The lines shouldn't be between atheists and Christians, or Christians and Jews, or Jews and Muslims, etc. The lines should be between the decent, reasonable people in all of those groups and the irrational, authoritarian people in all of those groups.
Amen to that.
Posted by: corky | August 2, 2006 9:20 PM
It is highly unlikely a single line can any religion into (decent, reasonable) and (irrational, authoritarian) groups. The definitions of those properties are also suspect -- what exactly is mean by reasonable, for example?
Posted by: Caledonian | August 2, 2006 9:24 PM
The simple truth is reasonable people are reasonable whether they are atheist, deist, Christian, Muslim, and on and on.
But I somewhat agree with Caledonian how reasonable are any religions? How reasonable is someone really who accepts the supernatural tenets as unquestionable truth?
The real statement should be 'lines between decent, caring people and authoritarian people of all groups.'
Posted by: GH | August 2, 2006 10:06 PM
Ed,
Planning on getting married? COngrats. When is the big day?
Still time to back out ya know:-) Just kidding all the best.
Posted by: GH | August 2, 2006 11:12 PM
I'll write more tomorrow, but I called them to pass on good wishes and they were very insistent that many of their neighbors had been good and supportive -- even though they were Kansans and, probably Christians. The problem was with the bigots, but they weren't the whole town, or even, by inference, the majority.
Posted by: Prup aka Jim Benton | August 3, 2006 2:20 AM
how reasonable are any religions? How reasonable is someone really who accepts the supernatural tenets as unquestionable truth?
In this context, "reasonable" means being open-minded and allowing the other guy the freedom to make up his own mind.
Being open-minded doesn't necessarily entail being skeptical or agnostic about everything where absolute proof is unavailable.
Nor does belief entail dogmatism.
Finally, not all religious faith is blind faith. Many people have found reasons to believe which, while they might not be convincing enough for you, are convincing enough for them. I think an open-minded, non-authoritarian attitude should respect their right to make those decisions on that basis.
Posted by: corky | August 3, 2006 3:23 AM
I think the argument that moderate Christians aren't being heard because the media doesn't give them attention is outdated, at the least.
Posted by: Will | August 3, 2006 8:12 AM
Outdated? Maybe. Doesn't make it less true. Moderation doesn't increase ratings the way extremism does. It's a simple, if sad, fact of modern journalism.
Posted by: Joshua | August 3, 2006 11:16 AM
This is BS. There is no evidence for anything supernatural at all. You may have reasons that make you 'feel' comfortable but at the core it's all blind.
And I for one see nothing wrong with that if it makes people feel better. But it is still blind faith.
Posted by: Uber | August 3, 2006 4:31 PM
Uber, as a Christian, I wish I could say that our faith "makes you 'feel' comfortable." There are many times when I would feel more comfortable having the faith of a scientific naturalist: no God watching me, no God to hold me accountable for my conduct, no objective standards of truth or morality, only that which I conceive myself, etc.
Posted by: zwilson | August 4, 2006 8:06 AM