Having read more stories of near-misses by flying debris, homes and businesses lost, millions of dollars of damage, and storm-related disruption of lives than I was able to process properly, I began skimming through other stories in the news...
...and found something to be really annoyed about.
Assuming the effects of Sandy haven't forced some to remain closed, over 30,000 schools across the U.S. are scheduled to participate in "Mix It Up at Lunch Day" today (Tuesday). Sponsored by the Southern Poverty Law Center[1], this program has been running for over a decade and is slowly growing. It encourages -- one might say forces, in some cases -- students to spend their lunch period sitting and hopefully socializing with other students they would normally not socialize with in an effort to break down barriers, promote understanding, reduce bullying, minimize the negative effects of school cliques, create new friendships for students, and generally do some real (and needed) good in the world.
So of course there's a group of idiots opposing it.
It seems that a bunch of bigots based in Tupelo, MS calling themselves the American Family Association have wrapped themselves in the American flag, hoisted the cross of [their perverted version of] Christianity on high, and declared the event "a nationwide push to promote the homosexual lifestyle in public schools."
Say WHAT?
Despite homosexuality barely rating a footnote as one of many hate-related issues the program is trying to address, the myopic AFA leadership -- led by the (in)famous Rev. Donald Wildmon, frequent foe of programs promoting understanding and provision of basic human rights equally to all humans -- warned their membership of the "threat" and the AFA's "Director of Issue Analysis" (how's that for a self-aggrandizing job title?) actually equated the SPLC's anti-bullying program with poisoned Halloween candy in an on-air CNN interview.[2] AFA supporters subsequently barraged the SPLC with over 1000 angry emails and many schools with phone calls protesting the event and demanding it be stopped.
There is, luckily, a silver lining to this distinctly bigoted & distasteful cloud. Although a few schools asked the SPLC to remove their names from their website to avoid further attacks from the AFA (it is unclear as to how many have actually withdrawn from the program as opposed to simply not publicizing their participation), once news of the AFA's hateful stupidity began making the rounds of various mass media and the Internet several hundred new schools signed up for the program.
Nonetheless, this remains a prime example of both the serious chasms separating (some thankfully small, albeit loud) factions of society from intelligent civilization and the power that hate and bigotry continue to hold & wield in American society.
This is the 21st century, folks. We may not have flying cars, weather control, moon bases, and all that cool stuff, but one would have thought that by now we would be free of the kind of hateful, bigoted idiocy personified by the American Family Association.[3]
But we aren't.
And that's damned annoying.
[1] You can see the kind of work being done by the SPLC on their website -- I encourage you to click on the "Get Involved" link near the bottom of the home page.
[2] I find it somewhat ironic that part of the leadership of an extreme fundamentalist Christian group is using Halloween as an example of something good that can be perverted...
[3] I've visited the AFA website, and believe I am being exceptionally polite by just calling them hateful, bigoted idiots. Drop them a line to let them know what you feel about them, won't you...?
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