Notes from Evil Bender

I enjoy it when ID advocates make clear their stances on other issues, because I think a number of well-meaning, scientifically uninformed people tend to be sympathetic to ID, yet when ID advocates make their real agendas and beliefs clear, they demonstrate what they really want. And of course, they establish their credibility.

Plus, it’s too often hilarious. In example, check out Martin Cothran’s latest shot at Ed Brayton. Cothran seems positively obsessed with claiming Brayton is obsessed with anything gay.* But Cothran can’t help but display his ignorance and his privilege (emphasis added):

 In case you hadn’t noticed, activist homosexuals take it as a personal affront that you disagree with them. Why? Heterosexuals do not take it as a personal affront if homosexuals disagree with them. So what gives? Why do homosexuals have this deep-seated need to be agreed with? And why the violent reaction when you disagree with them? It has nothing to do with anything you might want to do to them. You may very well want to mind your own business and prefer them to mind theirs (and, possibly, not want their homosexuality waved in your face every five minutes). It’s not what you might do that bothers them: it’s what you believe. They simply can’t stand the fact that you won’t accept what they do.

The irony, it burns! I guess Cothran has never heard of Matthew Shepard. Or maybe Shepard’s killers aren’t the heterosexuals who Cothran is discussing. Or maybe he’s thinking of the vicious gangs of lesbians that Bill O is so afraid of. Cothran loves rhetoric, so I have to wonder how he could be so blind to the realities of homophobia that he would accuse gay people of being “violent” in their disagreement–and this in a world where actual violence against homosexuals is a very real, very horrific problem.

Given that Cothran thinks that its gay people who are violently shoving their lifestyle in his face, I can’t be surprised that he’s obviously never considered what it might be like to be gay, to have heterosexuality “waved in your face” all the time, to be told you’re different and evil, to be told you can’t marry the person you love; to be at risk of assault because you like the “wrong” gender. Cothran lives in a world of heterosexual privilege, and he’s so blind to it that he actually accuses homosexuals of perpetuating the acts they are victims of.

Despite Cothran’s protestations, it isn’t what people think that concerns me, it is the way that bigots try to make their bigotry enshrined by law and culture. Cothran claims that he wants to “mind [his] own business,” yet he does so while breathlessly worrying about those mean homosexuals who desperately want his approval, and who get all violent when they don’t get their way, so somehow I doubt he’s going to join in the calls to stop legislating anti-gay bigotry. I doubt he’ll help push for a world where people don’t face discrimination due to the gender(s) they’re attracted to. No, he’s much more likely to go on complaining about those mean gay people shoving their fashion sense in his face.

On the plus side, Cothran’s stellar reasoning is much easier to see here than it is when he defends ID. No need to know anything about science to see how ludicrous is his position: you just need to observe how the world actually works, and compare it to the Land of the Oppressive Gays that Cothran apparently sees.

*Naturally, for Cothran this is an insult. Cothran obviously doesn’t see why protecting the rights of the minority is a problem. I wonder why a straight Christian man like Cothran would feel that way. Hmm.

[Edit: fixed typos. Sorry about that!]

[Update: Cothran has responded on his blog by creating and refuting a strawman and failing to address my actual argument. But he did call me "hysterical," which is awesome. I can feel my uterus wandering!]