Recently, several impossible events have happened here in Oklahoma City:
1-- 5.6 magnitude earthquake
2-- Abbie rides motorcycles
3-- OKC add sexual orientation to nondiscrimination policy
END TIMES! END TIMES!!!!!
Just last week, it was entirely legal for, say, an OKC fire department, not to hire someone because they thought the applicant was gay.
It would not have been be legal for them to not hire someone just because they are female.
It would not have been be legal for them to not hire someone just because they were Hispanic.
It would not have been be legal for them to not hire someone just because they were Catholic.
But if the person doing the hiring even *thought* an applicant was gay, and didnt hire them for that reason (or fired them, or whatever), that would have been totally fine.
And thats still totally fine on a state and federal level.
But its no longer fine in Oklahoma City-- The OKC city council added sexual orientation to the citys nondiscrimination policy.
While this is wonderful news, this post would not be complete without copy/pasting some of the comments from the 'dissenting' politicians and citizens for us all to laugh at.
Great example? Skip Kelly:
Councilmen Skip Kelly and Larry McAtee voted against the measure saying they see no discrimination against gays in city offices and that federal and state law don't provide explicit protection to gay people.
Im sure you all can appreciate the obvious irony of an African American denying other minorities nondiscrimination protections. Im sure lots of white folks didnt see no discrimination against blacks 100 years ago, either, Skippy. Discrimination and prejudice make lovely blinders, so you dont have to see how you are treating a fellow human.
But what you non-Oklahomans might not know is that Skippy here has a fancy for getting plastered and weaving his car through traffic at 90 mph. So just so we are clear, here, I totally believe Skippy. I dont think he cares at all about this topic. I dont think Skippy gives a rats ass about any human. Why would he care about discrimination of homosexuals in the work place when he doesnt even care about potentially killing a car full of Girl Scouts, an infinitely worse crime?
His BFF and fellow dissenter Larry McAtee had this to say about Skippys DUI:
"I hold Skip Kelly as a friend," McAtee said. "As his friend, I intend to stand by him and be of whatever assistance I can be as he works through this. I'm hurt that it happened to him, and I'm hurt for his family."
Uuuuuuuuum... nothing happened *to* Skippy. Skippy actively made the choice to 1) get drunk, 2) drive his car, and 3) drive at reckless speeds. No one held a gun to his head and forced him to do that. SKIPPY did that, completely and utterly of his own volition.
Know who *I* feel sorry for? The poor sap who saw a maniac driver, thought they were going to literally watch someone get killed (maybe themselves), and could do nothing about it but call 911 and watch in horror. How helpless must that person have felt? How scared? But no, McAtee, you feel sorry for your poor, poor BFF who fucked up and got caught, and is lucky as HELL he didnt kill anyone. Poor, poor Skippy, amirite?
Skippy and McAtee are obviously freaks with twisted morals, and yet here they are in a position to withhold legal protections from people who do nothing wrong, but who are accused of being freaks with twisted morals. Ugh.
But this isnt even the best part. No, the most deliciously idiotic tid-bit come out of the debate over whether it should be okay to fire a cop cause you think shes gay (but not because shes a woman!) is this one, from a complete psycho 'pastor' Tom Vineyard. Quote:
Pastor Tom Vineyard of Windsor Hills Baptist Church cited a New York judge in saying more than half of murders in large cities are committed by gay people.
More:
Many homosexuals openly admit that they are pedophiles because they cannot actually reproduce. They resort to recruiting children. ... Folks, you're making a decision that will bring down God's judgment on your city if you vote in favor of this.
Yeah, no, homosexuals obviously dont need any discrimination protection here in Oklahoma City.
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I was unaware that 'gay' sounded a lot like 'priest'. You know what is true? When sex between members of the same gender was illegal, gays did account for substantial amount of sex crimes.
See how that works? You can make criminals out of thin air by just enacting some stupid legislation. Sitting in the driver's seat while driving is now a crime. BAM. Look at all those criminals!
"Pastor Tom Vineyard of Windsor Hills Baptist Church cited a New York judge in saying more than half of murders in large cities are committed by gay people."
He is citing the Murtagh report to Wagner or some crap from "Cast the First Stone" if not both.
There was a giant pile of false attributions when the southern baptists came up with that tract about how gays in the military were going to cause the apocalypse.
It has caused some problems for Yonkers City Council Member John M. Murtagh who is a pro gay marriage conservative.
Tom Vineyard is from Edmond BTW....none of his freakin' business.
You're being too hard on Skip. He could have killed a family or two when driving drunk, sure, but how many families died in the earthquakes and floods caused by the unholy, God-angering actions of teh gayz?
Nono, it makes perfect sense, you see "it" in this case was "the ghost of getting someone drunk and forcing them to drive recklessly, endangering the lives of everyone around them."
Obviously it makes sense to pity Skip in this case, as he was the unfortunate target of such a vicious, random haunting that was totally not his fault or anything why do you keep going ON AND ON about that?
"2-- Abbie rides motorcycles"
This deserves a blog post of its own.
But...but I thought that 90% of murders in large cities are committed by young brown gang members who smoke the pot and play the violent video games, and are also illegal immigrants who snuck across the border to vote for Obama. Are they gay too? Something does not add up!
Why would gays in the military be a problem if they have this incredible aptitude for murdering people? I mean, we've basically got a huge population of extremely well-dressed Jem'hadar just going to waste, when we could be unleashing them on the Muslim hordes....
So if Skip Kelly's house is on fire, is he going to quiz every fire fighter who responds to the scene "Are you gay?"
Anton @6. You would think homophobes would want gays to serve in the military. Why pass on such a great opportunity to get them killed in combat? They could form an all-gay regiment and send them into the most hostile combat environments in Afghanistan and then conveniently let them be cutoff without supplies and reinforcements.
Now what kind of outrage will develop when Oklahoma City follows the path of towns like Houston and Portland and elects a mayor who is gay? It could happen.
Regarding the complete pastor, I'm still genuinely surprised every time I see someone blatantly lie like that, even after seeing it over and over. I can sorta kinda understand people who believe things even when it should be obvious to them that they're wrong. Human minds are weird places, it's easy to take a wrong turn. I can't understand the lying though. It's utterly alien.
As for the news itself, good. The world takes another small step towards becoming a decent place. And one might hope that it happening on a relatively low level is a sign of a general shift in attitudes which will work its way up.
Homosexual = someone who prefers to do something a certain way.
African-American = someone who IS a certain way.
One of these things is not like the other. Again, this is SCIENCEblogs. ERV's opinions on politics and society are shown, once again, to be of very low value.
Rhology, do you choose to be straight? How much consideration have you put into your own sexual orientation? Is it a daily decision?
I used to be oriented away from enjoying coffee. Now I'm oriented toward coffee. My orientation and preferences changed, and it was a complex process because human psychology is complex.
However, every time I drink a cup of coffee, I choose to drink it.
Similarly, every time someone engages in a consensual sexual act, one has chosen to do so (by definition).
Such is not true of BEING African-American. That's why the analogy fails.
Rho, you're a bigoted Christian dumbfuck. That is why YOU fail.
Rhology, while your response might be an answer to some question, it isn't one to the question which was put to you: when did you choose to be oriented towards heterosexuality? And how often do you choose to remain that way?
Yes, every time one chooses to engage in sex one has made a decision. Thank you for pointing that out, and the first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club. Choosing to have a sip of coffee is a choice; liking coffee or not liking it isn't something one decides upon before sipping it.
I choose when to have sex; I do not choose whom I find attractive.
I choose to watch movies; I have no choice as to whether I will like a movie I've decided to see. In fact, more often than not I don't enjoy them, thus I rarely choose to watch them.
Homosexual = someone who prefers to do something a certain way.
African-American = someone who IS a certain way.
Not quite. Some people are bigoted towards gays and African-Americans because they attribute characteristics towards them that are not necessarily true. People who are bigoted towards blacks don't hate blacks because of their skin color but because of what they perceive to be characteristics of people who have that skin color (e.g. they're lazy, irresponsibile, prone to violence, theft etc.)
Likewise people who are bigoted towards gays (as opposed to someone who objects to homosexual conduct on religious grounds but feels no ill will towards gay people) attribute blanket negative characteristics towards gays based on fear and ignorance.
Just because gay fireman Adam likes to exchange blow jobs with his friend Pete on his days off from work, it has no bearing on whether or not Adam is a good firefighter who will willingly put his life on the line to rescue your wife and child if your home caught fire in the middle of the night.