Judy Shepard on Kern's Poison
You may remember mention of Sally Kern, the homophobic state representative from Oklahoma who likes to think that gay people are worse than terrorists, and who likes to tell everyone about it. You may also remember that she feels she is being censored because her hateful nonsense is being heard by so many people–a curious idea about censorship, indeed.
Judy Shepard provides some antidote to Kern's poison. Here is an excerpt:
One of the oddest responses of people who agree with her has been that we are trying to restrict her freedom of speech. In reality, the Victory Fund gave her a megaphone. If she’s that proud of her speech, she must be thrilled that more than 1 million people have listened to it.
No, the question isn’t whether she has a right to spew hateful rhetoric. The question is whether she ought to.
My son died nearly ten years ago at the hands of people whose hatred changed many lives that day. It hardened hearts and brought others to their knees. It shook a nation and enraged millions. At that time, I knew there was a window of opportunity that I could use Matthew’s story and my voice in replacing hate with understanding, compassion and acceptance. Through the Matthew Shepard Foundation, we are reaching young people who are at risk of being poisoned by the dark ideas of people like Sally Kern.
I don’t know why Sally Kern is proud of comparing gay people to cancer or terrorism, but count me as someone who’s listening now to people like her. She may be free to say people like my son are a threat to America, but when she does she puts other mothers’ sons in danger. I pray she doesn’t say it anymore.
["Judy Shepard: Sally Kern’s free speech", GayPolitics.com, 24 March 2008; links in original.]
(Seen at Towleroad.)
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To thwart spam, comments by new people are held for moderation; give me a bit of time and your comment will show up.
I welcome comments -- even dissent -- but I will delete without notice irrelevant, rude, psychotic, or incomprehensible comments, particularly those that I deem homophobic, unless they are amusing. The same goes for commercial comments and trackbacks. Sorry, but it's my blog and my decisions are final.
on Wednesday, 26 March 2008 at 03.22
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I wonder if Kern is confusing being censored with being censured. Certainly, if she equates criticism and irate responses with censorship, she's exhibiting even more ignorance.
As Justice Holmes (I think it was) said, freedom of speech means the freedom of others to utter speech we hate. Very well, but that freedom doesn't inoculate against criticism, scorn and derision for the hatefulness of the speech uttered.