From: cortese@skid.ps.uci.edu (Janis Maria Cortese)
Subject: Re: Women, men, scum, and wicca . . .
Newsgroups: alt.pagan
Organization: University of California, Irvine
Date: 24 Jul 92 19:58:27 GMT

In article <1992Jul23.153140.7179@lmt.mn.org> ciaran@county.lmt.mn.org (Ciaran Benson) writes:
>Jeff Heimberger wonders what the reaction would be if there were a;
>
>
>> "... Hetero Rights Organization that espoused the same
>things for heteros as Gay Rights Organizations do for gays?"
>
>Dear Jeff;
>
>  Please excuse me for taking this single sentence out of the entire post, but
>there's so much in your various posts along this thread that I'd like to respond
>to that I'm afraid my point would be completely lost.  Instead, I'd like to focus
>on just this single thought and maybe work from there.
>
>
>  I've never heard a judge say that someone wouldn't have gotten killed if they
>weren't heterosexual, so they're partially to blame for their own murder.  I'm sure
>that many people here remember the publicized Texas trial not to many years
>ago when this very thing was said about two gay men (to my embarassment,
>I've forgotten the names of the victims, the judge, and the murderer) -- and I'm
>sure many know of local cases where this has occured without publicity.

Everybody's heard of that Dahmer nut, so I think I'm safe in not
providing too much background.  One of the people he murdered was gay,
and when his family went to the cops to report that he was missing, they
got a rather rude awakening.  (I should say that at least one of his
victims was gay; I don't know much about all of them.) 

The guy's sister said that the cop was very helpful, right up to the
minute he found out that her brother was gay.  He then stood up and said
something like, "Well, he's an adult.  We can't police everyone's
private activities," and left.  The guy's body was later found (bits of
it, most likely) in Dahmer's larder.

>  Our country's paradigm appears to hold that some people don't deserve
>equal representation, aren't worth police protection, can't be trusted with civil
>rights.
>
>  When I hear of a "Whites and Straight 'R' Us" organization, I'm immediately
>suspicious that the purpose of the organization is to "prevent the erosion of our
>family values", by which I infer that they want to keep "us" in our places.
>
>  Please allow me to step out of character and into another for a moment ...
>
>  Right now our country is going broke -- is actually trillions of dollars past broke,
>and we can't afford to equally take care of everyone who lives here.  So slowly, but 
>not so slowly that it's imperceptable, our government's been setting us up for
>our own little "desert storm" right here at home.  Some people in our Fine Country
>don't Belong under God's Flag, and Don't Deserve to be getting the Benefits that
>the American Family has Earned.  This Country was founded under Strict Bible
>Principles, and Only through the Elimination of the Liberal Spectrum can we Ever
>hope to see America Great Again.  

EX-cuse me while I go get a book . . .

From Thomas Jefferson:

"Difference of opinion is advantageous in religion.  The several sects
perform the office of censor morum over each other.  Is uniformity
attainable?  Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the
introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined,
imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch toward uniformity.  What
has been the effect of coercion?  To make one half the wordl fools, and
the other half hypocrites.  To support roguery and error all over the
earth . . . Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments.
To make way for these, free inquiry must be indulged."

From Thomas Paine:

"Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the
cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with
which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more cinsistent
that we call it the word of a demon than the word of God.  It is a
history of wickedness, that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind;
and for my part I sincerely detest it, as I detest everything that is
cruel."

Evidently, Geordie and his pals haven't read much about the "founding
fathers," if they think THIS place was founded on biblical values.
 
>The Drug Pushers, the Drug Users, the Welfare
>State and all of the Great Society Hangons, the Unemployed, the Wanton Single
>Mothers and their Crack Babies have Earned their Fate -- God's Hand will soon 
>Reach Down and Wipe this Plague From Us.  AIDS is Just The Start of the
>Cleansing!

My SO read something that Geordie Bush said that in effect said that
atheists weren't real citizens (if someone doubts this, I HOPE he will
post in support).  Guess we'd better just pack up, then!

>  Whew!  Now I need a bath.  Most of that's been drawn from stuff that Bush,
>Quayl, or other's within the patriarchy have said.  Bush himself actually said during
>an election speach that athiests don't deserve to live in America.  

There ya go.  Should have read the post all the way through.

>The Senate actually
>unanimously passed a bill (in '88?) that would have completely denied any Pagan
>religion in America any legal status, including tax exemption and the right of
>clergy (the bill died in a House committee -- because of filing procedures, not because
>it was blatantly UNCONSTITUTIONAL).
>
>  Iraq went from our last bastion against Iran, our allies in the balance of power
>in the middle east, to unspeakably evil villains who deserve nothing less than

Was anyone else reminded of Eurasia and Eastasia in _1984_?

>>an endless rain of death from the skies.  And so we did.

AND we defended a country where half of the population can't even vote,
and is essentially legally dead when married, or legally minors from the
time they're born.  A country where a man can beat his wife to death if
he pleases, AND where a little girl could legally be mutilated by having
her clitoris sliced off and her cunt sewn up.  There are other countries
that are this bad in the world toward half their population -- gee,
South Africa springs to mind.,  What do we do?  Boycott `em.  What do we
do with Kuwait?  Fight wars for `em.

>  Now Bush wants to fight desert storm at home.
>
>  Very scary.
>
>  Every person who is fighting for their civil liberties is fighting for my liberties as
>well, because the lost of one right for anyone of us is a loss for us all.

People who deny basic liberties to ONE group don't stop there.  They're
far too well-versed in the skill to apply it to only one group.  The
minute one group is in jeopardy, I just have to wonder when they're
going to start stomping on me (as if they've ever NOT . . . )

>  I don't interpret any of the rights or "special privilages" that any of these minority
>groups have asked for as denying me any of my rights in any way.  They're just
>asking for legal assurance of the rights that a minority of us enjoy and can deny
>them at will.
>
>  Blessed be,  Ciaran.

Not only that, hon, but when you get one of those basic and stolen
rights handed back to you from On High, you're supposed to be
GRATEFUL!!!  Grateful because someone hands something back to you that
they took in the first place, and that you shouldn't HAVE to fight for.

Blessings,
Janis