Monday, August 16, 2010

Monday Morning Demagoguery

This is why we can’t have nice things.  The demagogues like to tell us that those nice things are actually shit sandwiches.  To wit, this quote from the Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, the president of some stupid anti-gay group called Human Life International:

[A] society cannot long survive this kind of violence done to its basic values, and history surely shows many societies like Ancient Greece, whose rapid decline was preceded by the proliferation of the gay lifestyle and its public acceptance.

The rapid decline of Ancient Greece?  Really?  You mean the society that lasted for a good, oh, six centuries whilst allowing (encouraging?  Idealizing?) homosexual activity throughout?  You mean the tiny collection of city-states and their colonies that managed to basically conquer the entire known world, taking down the greatest empire to date in the process?  You mean the society that had an indelible impact on the Roman Empire and Byzantium?  You mean the society that indirectly caused the Renaissance when the first Humanists began to bring Greek manuscripts back to Western Europe?

That society?

If that’s your definition of “rapid decline,” I’d say you should encourage homosexuality in America, Reverend Euteneuer.  That means America will be certain to maintain a dominant world position for several centuries, which will be followed by an impact that reverberates through the next two millennia.

I’d take it.

(via Right Wing Watch, by the by)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Yeah, we always heard about THE fall of the Roman Empire, as if it was an instantaneous event. Learning real history in later life taught me the fall of Rome took centuries.

Of course an immediate fall fits better with A God who gets you if you sin.