We’re told that when a dog bites a person, that’s not news, but it IS when a person bites a dog.
Jan Brewer has bitten a dog. Brewer is governor of Arizona, and the dog she bit was her fellow Republicans, who had tried to pass a law letting businesses withhold services for gays on religious grounds.
Things got so heated out in the already over-warm desert, that even some of the legislators who backed the bill saw the light.
When Brewer vetoed the anti-gay bill, she did the right thing. Not entirely for the right reason, but nevertheless, the right thing.
If the bill had become law, it wouldn’t have caused a massive cutoff of gay customers. A few yahoos in the sticks and maybe a few in the big cities would have put up the “no gays need apply” signs.
Not much else would happen.
But what company wants to be seen as being bigots? None -- even if they are. So all kinds of people would have stopped doing business in Arizona.
And what would come next in a state that would pull something like this?
Separate but equal schools? Straight-only drinking fountains? Slavery?
No… the bill would have been a terrible step in the wrong direction, immoral in the broader picture.
Furthermore, your average gay guy or lesbian woman does not exactly wear a yellow Nazi style armband declaring their sexual orientation.
And to the best of our knowledge, even the National Security Agency with its apparently all-knowing spy capacity can’t tell that from afar.
Of course, modern technology may actually lead to an eventual gay-dar, similar to the metal detectors that are popping up like dandelions or mushrooms. But for now, you have to rely on instinct and that’s not awfully reliable.
Barry Goldwater, the late US Senator from Arizona and grandfather of the modern libertarian movement was spinning in his grave.
Goldwater also was a World War II military pilot. Asked late in life about whether he’d accept a gay gunner on his crew… he said something to the effect that as long as the guy knew how to shoot at a Messerschmidt, he didn’t care what else he was.
So the questions are: is a gay man’s money green?
And as a business owner, do you want him to spend it at your place or your competitor’s?
At least the proponents came out of their own closet. Now, we know who you are.
Shrapnel:
--Leaders of some anti-gay groups say they will continue to “fight for religious freedom.” Thus is written another page to The Good Book of Stuffing Our Religious Beliefs Down Your Throat. Throw anti-gay into the same cauldron as some of the other things they want stopped and are chipping away at.
--Misreading the will of the people has become a competitive sport. That’s because politicians generally preach only to the choir. But sometimes the sopranos don’t vote the same way as the altos.
I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com
© WJR 2014
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