So he was a homo? Really?

Opponents of marriage equality love to position themselves as defenders of morality.  Why, then, are their actions so often despicable?

This is Mecklenberg County Commissioner Bill James.  During a a debate on whether to offer domestic partner benefits to county employees Commissioner Vilma Leake spoke of her son, who died of AIDS in 1993.  Bill’s response to this tragic, personal story was to lean over to her and say,

So he was a homo?  Really?

Having displayed his Christian virtues of kindness and compassion, Bill might have stopped there.  But no.  The next morning, he lied about the incident on radio station WBT. He told radio host Keith Larson he was simply asking Vilma for clarification, and claimed:

Before I could get completely through it, she reacted and made some sort of comment to the effect that somebody needed to hurt me.

Ah, so he didn’t mean to say “homo.”  She cut him off!  It was all Vilma’s fault! Except at this point the host played the clip of Bill saying,

So he was a homo?  Really?

Bill’s first response was to say, “What the heck was that?” And when the host told him exactly what the heck it was, Bill paused long and hard before answering, “If you say so.”

Next, caught in a clear and stark lie, Bill changed tactics and said he didn’t know “homo” was a derogatory term.  And since then, he’s gone on a two-prong attack. He’s called Vilma a hypocrite, because decades ago she married a clergyman in a church that opposed homosexuality.   And he’s shocked – shocked! – that this woman has threatened him with violence (actually, she said, “You’re going to make me hurt you.  Don’t do that to me.  Don’t talk about my son.”).

Let’s recap Bill’s strategy in the civil equality debate:

1. Degrade
2. Lie
3. Attack

Even if Bill genuinely didn’t know “homo” was derogatory, it’s still true that his first defense was to lie about saying it.  We see this constantly from anti-equality forces: they toss out deceit after deceit, and see which ones they can get away with.  Meanwhile, we spend the bulk of our time on the defensive, debunking their falsehoods even though the news cycle has moved on to the next deception, leaving the truth unheard.

The pattern is clear:  Our opponents abandon their moral principles in the course of their moral crusade.  Either they know they’re doing this, and it’s a failure of character, or they suffer a kind of unreasoning moral blindness when it comes to homosexuality.  That’s the mark of homophobia — which they claim doesn’t exist.  Even as they prove themselves wrong, again and again.

PS:  Bill James made one comment on WBT that hasn’t gotten much attention:

If she’s going to use her dead son’s tragic death as justification for allowing the behavior to go on – you know, more of that behavior to go on – I don’t think that she’s honoring her son’s memory.

“Allowing the behavior to go on.”  Let that sink in and give you a chill.