How does that differ from the arguments by bigots who claim that blacks seem more prone to destroy their own neighborhoods than whites? Things aren’t always what they seem. One of the largest white supremacist organizations in the country is headquartered in Philadelphia. Meanwhile, Charlotte was the first school system in the nation to implement forced bussing to achieve integration.
I live in a fabulous gay mecca?
Sweet!
Daniel
That would be me. 
Count me as another Christian who thinks these people are going waaaaaaaaay overboard. I guess that whole “love your neighbor as you love yourself” thing doesn’t matter as much as Leviticus 18:22. :rolleyes:
You know, when I was a small child, I was constantly picking up rocks and bringing them home with me. Little bitty rocks. Big honking rocks. All kinds of rocks. I could never explain why – it just seemed like the thing to do.
Now I know why. I was preparing to chuck rocks at folks like the fine residents of Rhea County.
I have to agree with those who are criticizing the broad caricaturing of the South.
The current issue of the Columbia Journalism Review has an interesting article that examines press coverage of the South. The author makes the point, and i think makes it very well, that the South is often used as a whipping boy for problems that really are often national in scope.
Looking at bigotry like this and simply dismissing it as a Southern thing does a disservice not only to Southerners, but to people who encounter similar prejudices and discrimination elsewhere in the country.
Just my 2c.
Seems our dear friends were a mite confused as to what they were votin’ for at that there meetin’. A majority of them now claim they thought they were just asking the state to ban same-sex marriage.
How exactly that squares with the reported language of the resolution calling for the arrest of gay people and the banishment of queers from the county is unclear from the story.
Now there’s gonna be a special meetin’ to rescind the resolution. I guess being made a national laughingstock can motivate nitwits to action.
Well shoot, they didn’ want to get rid of the queers, they just wanted to keep ‘em in their place. Hell, nobody cuts yer hair like a queer. They c’n stay around jus’ so’s they don’t think they c’n get married or be equal to us normal foke.
:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:
I wonder how many of these folk moved there from Dade County, Florida after the 2000 Presidential Election.
is this county/town near Jasper, TN?
Just curious.
Aha, don’t you get it? They’re not bigoted, they just can’t read.
Exit the homophobic backwoods hick stereotype, enter the illiterate backwoods hick stereotype. 
Dayton is two counties over from where I grew up. I moved out as soon as I could. As do most smart people. Every now and then my mother asks when I’ll be moving back. When hell freezes over, Mom.
As a Tennessean and a Doper, I promise to redouble my ignorance-fighting efforts. It’s taking longer than I thought.
Maybe I am dense as a post, but there is a facet to this ongoing controversy that I utterly fail to grasp: why do these antigay types believe that they have the right to interfere with other people’s lives? I’m gay and I’d like legal recognition of my relationship with my partner, but that does not impact the lives of the Rhea commissioners–nobody is making them have gay marriages. So what gives them the right to tell gay Rhea countians to get out?
Conversely, I detest Christian fundamentalism, absolutely loathe it. But I support the right of Christian fundamentalists to attend their churches and their Bible studies to their hearts’ content. I support them in their right to live their lives the way they choose, so why don’t they return the favor? They can despise homosexuality as much as they please, and I’ll sneer at their religion, and we can live together in harmonious animosity.
From that article:
Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!
So it’s not just the gay population of Rhea County in dire straits, but also the kids. You gotta wonder what kind of education they are getting when mythology is taught as though it were science…
Yeah, I was going to comment on the creationism bit but didn’t get the chance to dig up the case where SCOTUS ruled teaching creationism is illegal.
I think they’re trying to save your soul, seeing as how homosexual sex is a sin and all.
And since they see it as a sin, they want to keep “unrepentant sinners” out of their town/county. Otherwise they might “tempt others to follow their lead and convert to homosexuality.”
These are not people who are particularly interested in any reality other than the one they’ve created in their own minds.
I note the county commissioner who drafted and submitted the motion that was passed is named “Fugate.”
I desperately hope the pronunciation, based on the precedent of “agate,” is something like “fuggit.”
That way, when people hear another one of his crackpot ideas, they can say, “Oh, Fugate.”
Hour away, give or take.
Re: pronunciation of Fugate, I was under the impression (though I could easily be wrong) that the U was hard.
I’ve heard it pronounced Fyoo-gate. An ironic side-note: same last name as the Blue Fugates of southern Kentucky who inbred themselves to the point where a recessive causing their skin to turn (in some cases) bright blue became rather predominant until the early to mid 1900s. From the Master himself on the issue. I know this because one team I was on during a retreat in High School decided to name themselves the Blue Fugates.
We were an odd bunch.
Ah, democracy; ah, Internet.
Governor Bredesen
Phil.Bredesen@state.tn.us
Rhea County Chamber of Commerce
chamber@volstate.net
Rhea County Council for Tourism and Economic Development bill@rheacountyetc.com
Local newspaper, the *Herald *
Herald@xtn.net
You know what to do…