Will Artists Be Next?

The passing of Proposition 8 in California represents what is flawed about our United States of America. The bill’s passing born into the midst of an Obama presidential win makes the whole situation ripe with irony and bittersweet duplicity.

The bill, which denies homosexuals the right to marry, is yet another inexplicable reminder that this country has the case of selective religious interpretation that has historically gold-starred homosexuality as the sin of all sins yet conveniently eradicated penalty for other actions that are highlighted in religious doctrines as being up for reproach. Playing on the fear and guilt of part-time sinners, the bill, while denying the lifestyle choice of marriage for millions of people, is one step towards the theocratic government that the corporate funders of the bill are striving for.

One of these proponents is Howard Ahmanson. The Ahmanson name is attached to some of the most familiar institutions in Los Angeles, including the Ahmanson Theater, the Ahmanson Foundation and Ahmanson Ranch, just to name three. Last week, reporter Max Blumenthal uncovered the fact that Ahmanson was the third largest private donor to Proposition 8, the anti-gay initiative that overturned the right of gay people to marry in California. Ahmanson, a long-time donor to anti-gay causes, is a follower and major funder of the late Rousas John Rushdoony, an author and radical theologian who promoted replacing democracy in the United States with a theocratic government.

Rushdoony believed that U.S. law should be based on Mosaic laws in the Old Testament. In his 1,894-page screed The Institutes of Biblical Law, Rushdoony advocated instituting the Old Testament’s punishment — death by stoning and other forms of execution — for homosexuality, adultery, incest, lying about one’s virginity and other behaviors. Those eligible on Rushdoony’s long list for execution include disobedient children, unchaste women, apostates, blasphemers, practitioners of witchcraft, astrologers, adulterers, and, of course, anyone who engaged in “sodomy or homosexuality.”

Read more here: http://www.pensitoreview.com/2008/11/12/top-prop-8-donor-funded-gay...

This type of legislation disturbs me because it indicates that people feel that they have the right to vote on the personal choices of individuals that has absolutely nothing to do with them. I feel the same anger of this as I do with the audacity people have to think that abortion rights are up for a vote and not something that should be at the discretion of the woman. What's next? If Rushdoony has his way, disobedient youth will be charged as adults...wait, that happens already.

I don't believe its a question of whether or not you agree with homosexuality, but whether you agree and support the right, the human right of people to live without fear of being oppressed, victimized and legally bound to rules that others do not live by. I choose to speak out about it because I understand that once it becomes okay to deny homosexuals the right to choose how they live, then the next target will be those of us who are heterosexual and choose to live outside of the box of conformity. Artists, beware.