The Twits Keep on Coming.
Republican homophobes have been crawling out of the woodwork lately. First there was Sally Kern, then Mary Frances Forrester. Now make way for Oregon State Senator Gary George
In his first media interview since coming forward as co-sponsor of the initiative to repeal the recently enacted Oregon Equality Act – an anti-discrimination law for sexual minorities – George railed against gay activists and affirmative action, and warned that if gays continued to be “oppressive toward straights,” they were in danger of “violent backlash.”
The full interview will appear in the March 21 issue of Just Out, but excerpts are included below.
Just Out: Why are you sponsoring this repeal initiative?
State senator Gary George: I’ve had people approach me for special rights for homosexuals and I don’t believe anyone should have special rights. I’ve had members of the gay community come in and ask and I’ll say I’m sorry I don’t give anyone special rights.
That’s just what people like Senator George don’t get. They aren’t special rights, they’re equal rights.
Just Out: What sort of special rights do you feel that the Oregon Equality Act offers?
George: First off, I thought that was a fabrication of definition, in the sense that you gave special rights, it picks out another group, a lifestyle group, and says hmm, you have all these protections. The main thing that bothered us with the whole bill was the fact that here we go again, adding one more class of people that need to have special rights.
Just Out: Can you give an example?
George: If I discriminate in favor of you it automatically requires I discriminate against someone else. I was hoping with your generation we can stop calling each other ‘asian-american,’ or ‘latino-american…’ There’s one talk show host, and he has really severe hard feelings against affirmative action. Because of the race that he is, I believe he’s Italian, he was discriminated against because he’s not black. I have dear dear friends in the legislature who are black but sometimes I really get tired of hearing about their color.
So Senator George outs himself as a racist in addition to a homophobe. He seems to have so many issues withe the labels other people have and apply to themselves, and considers the rights they get/want to be “special”. I wonder why he doesn’t think the same of his labels and rights. I’ll assume he’s Christian, for example, and he’s certainly not going to be giving up his right to protection from discrimination based on his religion. Nor would he give up his right to protection from race based hate crimes (yes, white people are protected too). Nor would he dream of forfeiting his right to prosecute if he were the victim of gender related bias. Yet he wishes to keep others from having the same (read: equal) rights he has.
Just Out: What if an employee is fired because of his/her sexual orientation or gender identity? Isn’t the Oregon Equality Act in place to guard against such discrimination?
George: As an employer, I don’t wanna hear about it. This workplace is for work purposes. My advice to the gay community is SHUT UP, just don’t talk about it. If you walk around talking about what you do in the bedroom, you should be on the pervert channel.
Senator George, when your straight employees come in and talk about the dates they had over the weekend do you tell them to SHUT UP? When they talk about their upcoming weddings do you tell them to SHUT UP? When they start passing around pictures of their children, which are nothing more than evidence of their unprotected sex, do you scream “SHUT UP–I DON’T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT WHAT YOU DO IN THE BEDROOM!!!” ? If not, then you are nothing but a homophobe, Senator George.
Just Out: What is your reaction to the recent murders of out gay youth in Florida and California?
George: Obviously murder is murder, there’s no excuse for that. Here’s what I’m saying, I think we’re seeing a backlash, in other words if you push me too hard don’t be surprised if I react. Gays will tend to react violently if people are oppressive toward them. If gays are oppressive toward straights, then you’ll see a violent backlash. You’re going to have a point where these groups develop and say I’m tired of these special privileges.
Just Out: Are you suggesting that gays, by virtue of being out and open, are inciting these types of violent reactions?
George: You have to recognize for every action there’s a reaction…we’re obviously not gonna tolerate anyone who beats up any other person.
If you do feel like you’ve been discriminated against as a gay, you have hard feelings. I remember when I was heavy and wore glasses as a child and I was picked on. We all know the gay person that nobody notices – I think that is where we need to head. Everybody knows where the line is, so when I see I’m offending someone, I have to back away from that. We have to adjust our behavior so as to not be offensive. If you push anyone too hard, they will react.
Translation: Get back in your closets you homos, and then you won’t get beaten up and killed so much. And anyway getting brutally murdered is really not much worse than getting picked on for wearing glasses.
I honestly feel ill after reading Senator George’s interview (and that was the abridged version). The hateful screeds of Sally Kern and Mary Frances Forrester were far enough off the deep end that most people will see them for what they were–the incredibly bigoted tirades of homophobes. But this man is deadly calm and rational in his hatred, and that is what makes him more frightening and dangerous than the other two. The thought that he could influence minds in his state is quite unnerving.
By the way, should anybody wish to contact the Senator, here is his information:
Address:
Senator Gary George
900 Court St. NE, S-214
Salem, OR 97301Phone:
503-986-1712Email:
sen.garygeorge@state.or.us
