Wednesday, October 19, 2005

God Hates Newton & Fags

This is a follow up to a post I did a few days ago about the "Rev." Fred Phelps coming to Newton to protest the play "The Laramie Project". Well, it seems the story was picked up by the Newton Tab. (Hat tip to Chuckieo) It discusses the various people who are involved with the production and their thoughts, however, toward the end of the piece there are comments from...who else, Article 8's own Brian Camenker (take a deep breath):

Brian Camenker of Newton, president of Article 8 Alliance - an organization formed to remove state justices who support gay marriages - said that Phelps' proposed visit shouldn't come as a surprise.

"The play is about Phelps, so for him to want to protest it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone," said Camenker.

Camenker said he doesn't agree with Phelps' "whacked-out Calvinist" agenda, but understands the anger toward "The Laramie Project."

"It is a vile play - it is basically gay-propaganda full of a bunch of lies," said Camenker. "Why can't they do the 'Sound of Music?' Why do they have to do this kind of stuff that is so divisive?"

Divisive!? Did he say divisive? They're being divisive because they are putting on a play? It's not like they're burning the Massachusetts Constitution or advocating removal of Supreme Court Justices because that's not divisive, oh no. Also, so the play about a boy who was tortured and killed because he was gay is vile. Thanks Brian for clearing that one up.

He also said it was "gay propaganda full of a bunch of lies." Brian, what part of "The Laramie Project" is a lie? The part where they strung Matthew Shepard up on a fence and left him to die? The part where Fred Phelps and his clan protested Matthew's funeral? The play was written from interviews with the towns people of Laramie.

Brian, the play isn't divisive your statement is.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey, I saw Brian on the ABC News this evening. He also thinks it's "lunacy" for kids to talk about their families in school. Nice guy. Rational, too. . .

Anonymous said...

Will you people ever stop with the lies? 20/20 did a story a while back debunking all the spin on Matthew Shepard. His killers were high on methamphetamines and were trying to rob him for more drug money. Also, it turns out one of his killers had had bisexual encounters.

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=277685&page=1

What truly is sad is that neither Matthew, nor his killers, ever got any help for their problems before it came to his death.

Anonymous said...

Actually, that's the killer's claims, well after the fact. The Chief of Police (now former) says:

"I really don't think he was in a methamphetamine-induced rage when this happened. I don't buy it at all," O'Malley said. "I feel comfortable in my own heart that they did what they did to Matt because they [had] hatred toward him for being gay," he said.

Anonymous said...

That's the spin from the anti-gay people. They don't want to believe that Matthew was targeted because he was gay. Out of all the news programs and papers out there, ABCnews was the only one with such coverage. Yes, the above poster is right too, the killers (who are so believable) claim after they were found guilty that it was because of drugs. You can always trust a killer.

Anonymous said...

Doesn't the Sound of Music end with the main charecters fleeing from Nazi persecution? That's much more family oriented I guess. I'll take a homo over Nazi's anyday. Besides, the play is almost million years old. Like Article 8's thinking? hmmmmm.

Anonymous said...

I'm sure a Nazi would think the Sound of Music is vile and full of lies and propaganda too.

Anonymous said...

Speaking of Newton - Greer Tan Swiston is running for Alderman at large there.

You may remember her as one of Romney's hand-picked State Legislature candidates.

I used to work with her and she's from the "no special rights" school of pseudo-libertarian homophobes.

Anonymous said...

Since, as mentioned in your mission statement above, you welcome 'opposing viewpoints', please allow me to offer a few in response to the message regarding Greer Tan Swiston.

First, she was not 'hand-picked' by Romney. Last year she was honored to have been encouraged by many members of our Newton community to replace what they saw as a weakness in our representation at the state level, and this year to have been encouraged to try to bring some sanity to our local government in Newton.

Second, I can only assume that the anonymous author was lying when stating that he or she 'used to work with her.' I don't know what's meant by the 'no special rights' comment, but anyone who has spent more than 30 seconds with Greer (let alone worked with her!) knows that she has immense respect for the difficulties faced by gays/lesbians in everyday life. So calling her a homophobe is a clear indication that the author has in fact never met her.

I understand that it's not popular to be a Republican around these parts these days. But I find it unthinkable that people so opposed to prejudice and hatred should turn around and behave exactly that way towards someone else. Get to know Greer. For real. Then tell us what you think... who knows, you may even surprise yourself.

Anonymous said...

To add on those comments I remember sitting in a meeting with Greer when she informed the Governor that she supported marraige for gays and lesbians and that he accepted this and was happy to hear that she was standing up and fighting for what she thought. As a republican activist who also supports the right of gays and lesbians to marraige this made me work even harder for her election. There are good and bad on both sides of the political aisle and until gay rights activists learn to support the good guys, regardless of their party affiliation, you will always be fighting an uphill battle.