Family Group Compares Homosexuality to Nazism
Published July 27, 2009 @ 03:07AM PT
Wow. That's pretty much all I can think of as a response to this. But it's true...a staff member at the Illinois Family Institute (IFI) has penned a screed that not only compares LGBT people to Nazis, but urges the Christian Church to fight homosexuality as if it were akin to nazism or slavery.
The article, written by Laurie Higgins, IFI's Division of School Advocacy Director, describes how since the Christian Church acted too late in combatting nazism, it shouldn't be haste in acting to defeat homosexuals. After reading that, and reading Laurie Higgins's bio (where you'll see she's a former school teacher), I can only be thankful that someone with this much hate in their system isn't in charge of teaching children anymore.
Here's an excerpt, and prepare to be horrified:
What is alarming about the account of the German Evangelical Church's reprehensible failure [to fight nazism] is its similarity to the ongoing disheartening story of the contemporary American church's failure to respond appropriately to the spread of radical, heretical, destructive views of homosexuality. Don't we today see church leaders self-censoring out of fear of losing their positions or their church members? Don't we see churches criticizing those who boldly confront the efforts of homosexual activists to propagandize children and undermine the church's teaching on homosexuality? Aren't the calls of the capitulating German Christians for "a more reasonable tone" and a commitment to "honor different views" exactly like the calls of today's church to be tolerant and honor "diversity"? Don't pastors justify their silence by claiming they fear losing their tax-exempt status (i.e. government assistance)? Don't they rationalize inaction by claiming that speaking out will prevent them from saving souls?
What is even more reprehensible in America, however, is that church leaders don't currently face loss of livelihood, imprisonment, exile, or death, as they did in Germany, and yet they remain silent.
Someone give this "religious" writer a history book, and maybe let her know that LGBT people were also victims of the Holocaust. But beyond the historical point, isn't this disturbing? It's literally a call to action to churchgoers to combat homosexuality as if it were akin to the threat of one of the worst, most violent movements ever to exist in the history of the planet.
I say this goes beyond even the Fred Phelps level of hatred and anger toward LGBT people. And the scarier part? The Illinios Family Institute is relatively mainstream within the conservative movement. Note that former GOP Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee will be keynoting their fall 2009 conference in Chicago. Is it fair to say that Mike Huckabee thinks that homosexuality is as big a threat as Nazi Germany? I know Huckabee is conservative, but is he that crazy?
Here at change.org, we've started at action where folks can write the Crowne Plaza O'Hare - the venue where the Illinois Family Institute's Fall Conference with Mike Huckabee will take place - and urge them to refuse to host the IFI's conference. Political organizations will often stake out controversial positions on social issues. But does the Crowne Plaza O'Hare really want to endorse a conference by a group that actively compares homosexuality to nazism? Isn't that like hosting a conference by the Klu Klux Klan?
Please consider taking action, and sending the message that comparing homosexuality to nazism is not only disgusting, it's also dangerous. The IFI is entitled to hold whatever views it wants. But what Laurie Higgins does in her piece is fuel the fire for violence. And while she has the right to say it, we also have the right to let others (like the Crowne Plaza O'Hare) know just what we think of it.
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Comments (26)
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Michael is the Communications Director for the Human Rights Program at Harvard Law School, and previously was Communications Director for Pax Christi USA, a progressive Catholic human rights organization.
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There is something funny here, and I am not quite sure I can figure it out. It seems to me that it is Higgins who is embracing a Nazi code of hatred and organized extermination -- a 'chrisian' fascism.
The political agenda of homosexuals is fueled by a desire for fair treatment under the equal protection clause of the constitution so that we too can have our loving relationships recognized.
Posted by Wharton Sinkler on 07/27/2009 @ 03:41AM PT
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What is so funny that I am going to cry is that sadly, The same type of Christians as the Illinos Family Institute and those like them used the Bible to approve of slavery and even Hitlers initial rise to power.
Maybe ironic is a better word
Posted by Rebecca Campbell on 08/02/2009 @ 05:25PM PT
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Michael,
UGH! I am so pissed I honestly don't know if I should laugh, cry, get angy, hit something/someone. You know that I would love to "Christian" bash, but that doesn't make sense either, considering that not all Christians (or religious folks for that matter) are against us. HOWEVER, the Talibangelicals are 1) overstepping their bounds and 2) are not much different than the REAL Taliban.....SSDD (Same Shit, Different Dogma.)
I don't remember the exact phrasing, but there was a saying when I was younger (that I wish I could remember.) But it basically warns the oppressor of what happens when you oppress groups of people after so long, they 1) rebel or 2) become exactly as you have portrayed them.
For example, a man is married to a woman for 15 years. Day in day out, she calls him a liar and a cheat. Now over those first 15 years he always told her the truth and was always faithful, but she nagged him every day calling him a liar and a cheat. Finally he says to himself, "if I'm going to be accused of it, I might as well do it."
If these people think that comparing us to Nazi's is fine go ahead (I really wish one of them would answer one question, since when does the oppressor get to claim "victim" when they are shoving their religious dogma down other people's throats?), but I have to tell you, one of these days, they are going to "mess with the wrong fag," and they aren't going to know what hit 'em. One thing they need to remember, it isn't just heteros that "snap." Push any one person far enough, and any one of us is capable of snapping.
Am I encouraging violence? Of course not, I just don't want anyone to be surprised when it finally comes down to it, we won't go down without a fight, even if it is literal.
Posted by Dave Hershey on 07/27/2009 @ 08:15AM PT
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You would think anyone able to construct complex English sentences would be able to tell the difference between an ideology (socialism, Nazism, christianity) and a demographic (Jews, men, gays). (I have long maintined people should not be allowed to compare things to the Holicost or Nazism without the written persmission of the Jewish Anti-defamation League.)
Posted by Lance Barclay on 07/27/2009 @ 11:39AM PT
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It wasn't just Jews who were victims of the Nazis ("the Holocaust," yes, but not the Nazis). So that doesn't really make sense. And also, Jews are not free from discrimination against other groups, so that doubly doesn't make sense. No matter how oppressed you have been, you are still capable of oppressing another.
Posted by Luella - on 07/31/2009 @ 07:55AM PT
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Of course, I also realize that we should be aware of the group we are using as a metaphor for another - such comparisons should only be made very carefully and respectfully in the first place. Metaphors sometimes become a way to steal the subjectivity of another to heighten the subjectivity of one, rather than being equally respectful to both.
Posted by Luella - on 07/31/2009 @ 08:02AM PT
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Lance
The holocaust many people were killed.. there were 5 million non jewish people who were killed DURING THE HOLOCAUST and 6 million Jewish people. SHouldnt we remember the other people as well, who lost their lives to the Nazis. ADL is an organization which believes in surpressing the gentiles from the truth.
Holocaust - Non-Jewish Holocaust Victims -
http://holocaustforgotten.com/
Posted by Lara Nunes on 08/30/2009 @ 12:01AM PT
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You aren't kidding, Lance. Point well taken.
Posted by Michael Jones on 07/27/2009 @ 11:44AM PT
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Laurie Higgins is an intolerant person with an incorrect view of LGBT rights. The Illinois Family Institute is an intolerant organization which allowed that person to write nonsense. The entire article by Laurie Higgins is nonsense and from the excerpt, is composed of nothing but false information for justifying oppression towards LGBT people. However, the use religion to oppress the LGBT community is unjustified and LGBT equality is superior to oppression and always will.
Posted by Edwin Bonilla on 07/27/2009 @ 02:31PM PT
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Sounds like miss higgings is competeing with sarah palin and carrie prejean for "dumbest bitch of the century" award...
Is it possible to award it to more than one winner ?
Signed and sent.
Posted by Thomas McHugh on 07/27/2009 @ 03:23PM PT
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The hypocrisy is astounding...it's like I have said in other posts I have made, when we oppress the rights of others, we threaten our own...Dave Hershey said it pretty well in his comment above
Posted by William Brown on 07/28/2009 @ 12:17AM PT
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oh.my.god.
Wharton, I think you were looking for the word "Irony" to describe the device at play here. Well, that and this is just the most intolerant load of crap I have ever seen.
My response to any of my intolerant "friends" is 1) if you don't like homosexuality, then don't be gay and 2) good-bye. In all honestly, I have given up more friends lately because of their views on homosexuality than pretty much any other topic. The fight for LGBT rights is only a fight for equal HUMAN rights. This shouldn't even be an issue. And this is why I get so upset.
Posted by Lisa Smolen on 07/31/2009 @ 07:02AM PT
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Honestly, I think this is more innocuous than it sounds.
I think the only comparison being drawn is the "need to act quickly to stem the tide" of the gay storm brewing on the horizon. I think once you're in the mindset that X thing is evil, comparing it to evil thing Y is easier to do. It should be obvious to even the staunchest bigot though, that even if you regard homosexuality as 'sin', genocide is on a completely different level. (It's omnicide really--Nazis killed and oppressed anyone they disliked.)
Was this an idiotic thing to say? Absolutely. But I don't think there's a definite equation of being gay to being a Nazi, although the implication is certainly there on account of comments that are at least poorly thought out, if not actually malicious. Even when a comparison is relevant, bringing the Nazis or Hitler into is just bad form--and generally signals the end of rational discussion on any topic.
And there's another logical fallacy here: the Nazis were a powerful political group whose influence dominated Germany. While the core of the party and it sfanatics was probably quite small, they had plenty of people going along with or supporting itheir agenda, enabling them to hijack the entire country and half of Europe.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that gay rights is probably not going to lead to a political movement of the same scope and danger. Nor will it start world war 3.
Posted by Bryan Schultz on 07/31/2009 @ 10:13AM PT
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As a GLBT supportive gay minister, let me assure all GAY Christians that there are indeed GLBT churches out there
that not only talk the talk but stringently walk the talk. You have to be patient and look and compare but when you find
THAT church, you will never be sad again.
One simply has to ignore the RRR conservative wingnuts and work diligently to counteract their hate-mongering.
For those of you who have had to say good-bye to your friends because you are GLBT...what have you lost? Someone who you never really had in your corner in the first place. It used to bother me when I had to lose a friend. Not anymore. They have chosen their low road, I have chosen the higher path.
Be a lighthouse, not a BIC! ;-)
Dakotahgeo (Pastor Dak!)
Posted by George M Melby, Pastor/Chap... on 07/31/2009 @ 12:22PM PT
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Jones' tactic has merit, but it's not direct enough. The way one wages a campaign with a hotel is to book lots of rooms and then cancel them; schedule a "good" conference in a nearby hotel while their's gets lambasted and and beseiged with demonstrators (or, atthe very least imply that!); attack other hotels owned by the same chain as sympathizers, mostly by leaving no tip, cancelling events and targeting other groups who have meetings their as sympathizers; and focus a lot of attention on Huckabee who has accepted their invitation, to make his attendance simply untenable, or his absence appear purely political and hypocritical. They must become to the right what they are to the left: a nightmare whose dreadful repute is impossible to shed.
In attacking hypocrisy, the last and least useful tactic is to dignify their case with an opposing one - Alinsky made that amply clear. Instead, make them appear to be the fools we know they are, and alienate them from their own supporters who become embarrassed to be linked. That's a tactic quite unavailable to the crazy right wing, since, frankly, it's as unlikely that Nazis will advocate for gay politics as it is that we'll make their case. We're safe from such foolishness, Huckabee and the loney right are not.
Wait, that IS a viable tactic: Keep in mind the SA was key to Hitler's victory, and supposedly gay run and gay sympathetic, and celebrated by the SS until the "Night of the Long Knives", and murder of Rohm. It really is worthwhile knowing a little history - and much of it is handy, right here http://tinyurl.com/cn8c5. Given that history, the idiots yammering about Nazi and gay politics are ... quite simply ... idiots, and anyone listening to them equally idiotic.
Of course, the irony is that, for some gay people in Germany in the '20's, Nazis were a passing sex fantasy. But for the era of their victory, in the next decade, gays were a Nazi nightmare, as were th Nazi's a gay nightmare, in and out of Auschwitz.
So, maybe we ought to be their nightmare again again, but in domestic garb?
Posted by Joe Beckmann on 07/31/2009 @ 02:50PM PT
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People don't know their history do they? The Catholic church came out in support of the Nazi Party in the 1930's.
Posted by Kara Trabex on 07/31/2009 @ 04:37PM PT
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Really? I was not aware of that. The Church did sign the Concordant of 1933 in an effort to prevent or at least lessen attacks on Catholics and Catholic Institutions. It it that to which you refer?
Posted by Lance Barclay on 08/01/2009 @ 11:38AM PT
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And then there's always the current Pope's somewhat uncomfortable pre-war past. We'll probably never again have a Nazi pope, since they died before any future candidate was born - at least the German ones did.
Posted by Joe Beckmann on 07/31/2009 @ 06:25PM PT
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This article is to say the least, ill-informed...at the worst it is pure hatemongering. Firstly, the witers assretion that the Christian church acted too late to stop nazism is way off base..as a matter of fact the christian church went along with it and afte the war many christian organizations including the catholic church participated in the ODESSA underground to help fleeing nazi
s escape prosecution. POPE PIUS XII remained a silent partner throughout the war in order to regain independent nation status for the church..there is your acting too late to stop Nazism for you...they didn't act at all. Yes, some christians may have tried to speak out of help Jews, but christian churches as a whole did little or nothing.
As for likening homosexuality to Nazism...the writer is also forgetting about the millions of homosexuals persecuted by the Nazis and put to death in concentration camps. The homosexual purge of the nazi party with THE NIGHT of LONG KINVES pretty much se the tone Nazis would take with gays.
I am appalled that when certain groups want to discount a minority and dehumanize them, they immediately pull the NAZI card from their butts and accuse people of being like them...however, this tactic is more in line with NAZI behaviour than being gay or Jewish or Black. To dehumanize another group to prove yourself superior is simply a NAZI PLOY. So be advised to writer..be careful, you are making accusations that could be made about you... Pot Calling the Kettle Black Syndrome!
Posted by Ron Modro on 08/02/2009 @ 08:46AM PT
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While Laurie Higgins sounds like a real b**** she really doesn't compare homosexuality with nazism. She is comparing the reaction of the GUC to nazism and church reaction to homosexuality. She is wrong to do even this, but when you make a claim that is not supported in fact then you end up sounding like a hysterical alarmist. There is plenty you can criticize about what Higgins writes, without making unsubstantiated statements.
Posted by Tim Burton on 08/04/2009 @ 04:01AM PT
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Although Higgins does not equate homosexuality with Nazism, she is most assuredly comparing them. She implies that they both represent the "relentless and ubiquitous promulgation of profoundly sinful ideas." While she does not say homosexuality is the same as Nazism, she does imply that they are evil "ideas" on a par with one another.
Posted by Lance Barclay on 08/04/2009 @ 08:35AM PT
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Laurie Higgins= IDIOT
Posted by Melissa Latessa on 08/04/2009 @ 02:32PM PT
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I thought the Nazis made homosexuals wear pink triangles and sent them to death camps. I also thought that many Nazis would pick out young boys and girls from the selection lines for their personal use. How can gays be Nazis when all the Nazis wanted to do was kill them in alarming numbers? Sheer idiocy, yes. But chillingly insulting to those who died needlessly--this makes me mad.
I did sign that petition and circled it about.
Posted by S B on 08/05/2009 @ 02:12PM PT
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Alongside the Anne Frank Museum in Amsterdam , there is a cobblestone plaza with three large pink marble triangles, with Dutch inscriptions on them. they commemorate the gays and lesbians sent to the death camps along with the Jewish population and gyspsies. making an analogy of homosexuals to nazis is beyond revising history . It is slander and defamation of the lowest order. This should be a news item on all the major networks .
Posted by Hugh (Bart) Vincelette on 08/17/2009 @ 08:17PM PT
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a staff member at the Illinois Family Institute (IFI) compares LGBT community to Nazism ? well that just take the cake dont it, I guess these retards dont know the history of Nazis and what they did to the GLBT community back in the holocaust time...
News report the Nazis killed the GLBT people as well along with 5 million other non jewish people and 6 million jewish people...during the holocaust.
Pink Triangles for Homosexuals
http://holocaustforgotten.com/NewsGays.htm
This just tells me why its really important for stupid people like the Illinois Family Institute (IFI) should not be allowed to reproduce...
Posted by Lara Nunes on 08/29/2009 @ 11:50PM PT
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Oh BTW Michael I already signed it, back in ......
Lara Nunes Pensacola, FL
Sent letter to Crowne Plaza O'Hare Aug 01
But I will be passing it on too others as well.
Peace
Posted by Lara Nunes on 08/29/2009 @ 11:56PM PT
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