TIRADE!

It's TIRADE season on the right, a nifty little acronym I coined to describe most of the discussions surrounding gay rights, gay marriage, gay-please-don't-bash... Tired Invective Repeated And Discredited Endlessly.

This particular tirade comes courtesy of Big Jimmy Dobson and the Focus on the Family gang, with their shiny new letter-to-the-editor generator up (big hat tip to Pam's House Blend for the alert) so that the faithful minions not only don't need to form their own opinions, but also don't need to go to through the annoyance of coming up with their very own words articulating them. The form provides a four-paragraph letter and several options for each paragraph the plagiaristwriter can choose from. As a community service message, Boltgirl On The Loose provides you the text of all the options so you can recognize when your local newpaper's LTE section has been slammed; helpful translations of or comments on each are provided in italics.

Paragraph 1:

Option 1: For centuries now, in every civilized culture, marriage as the union of one man and one woman has been the building block of society. But it may not be true in America for long -- unless Congress approves the Marriage Protection Amendment. Marriage as the union of one man and one woman has been the building block of society, except where men have been allowed multiple wives. Like, say, that Solomon guy who racked up 700 better halves to go along with his 300 concubines.

Option 2: The U.S. Senate is poised to vote on the Marriage Protection Amendment, and the stakes couldn't be higher for our country and its future generations. Much higher stakes than the chump change represented by the NSA surveillance program, or outing a covert CIA operative, or the Abramoff scandal, or, oh, I don't know, maybe an illegal and disastrous war in Iraq.

Option 3: Liberals argue that the Marriage Protection Amendment, which would define marriage solely as the union of one man and one woman, would write discrimination into the U.S. Constitution. Nothing could be further from the truth. Because we say so. Trust us on this one. Just because it looks, quacks, floats, nibbles watercress, produces ducklings, and appears in AFLAC commercials... well, nothing could be further from a duck.

Option 4: Marriage has been under attack ever since no-fault divorce laws made it easier for us to discard our husbands and wives. Now, the attack is coming from those who want to open up marriage to same-sex couples -- and only the Marriage Protection Amendment can stop them. The Marriage Protection Amendment: keeping divorce heterosexual.

Option 5: Never mind that an overwhelming majority of Americans oppose gay marriage. It's perilously close to becoming the law of the land -- unless citizens like us step up and demand our federal lawmakers pass the Marriage Protection Amendment. Never mind that an overwhelming majority of Americans have, at various times, opposed interracial marriage, the admission of women to institutions of higher learning, or suffrage for anyone not a landholding white male--civil rights are to be decided by majority rule, because that's what makes America great.

Paragraph 2:

Option 1: Yelling "discrimination" is just one strategy the left has used to defeat this amendment. They also have argued that gay marriage is a civil rights issue akin to the African-American struggle for equality. No less a civil rights icon than Jesse Jackson has denounced that claim, noting that "gays were never called three-fifths human in the Constitution." No less a civil rights icon than Coretta Scott King noted that discrimination anywhere equals discrimination everywhere. But what did she know; did you see how Those People acted at her funeral?

Option 2: Amendment opponents have asked, "How does one couple's gay marriage threaten anyone's heterosexual marriage?" This question misses the point: The goal of gay activists isn't the individual relationship of any two people; it is the revision of national policy to say that gender, especially in child-rearing, is inconsequential. Look at those uppity homos attempting to effect a policy that is broadly applicable to all couples rather than focusing on one individual relationship. Next they're going to argue that religion, especially in child-rearing, is inconsequential.

Option 3: Amendment supporters have been disparaged as "bigots." How can that be, when the language being proposed is similar to the language of the Defense of Marriage Act, passed by 427 members of Congress? Are they -- and former President Clinton, who signed the bill into law -- bigots, too? In a word, yes. The optional word for Democrats is "cowards."

Option 4: It's important to note that those who support the amendment aren't trying to deprive homosexuals of any of the legal protections they currently enjoy; gay marriage has never been a constitutional right in America. It is not "discriminatory" to want the law to continue to provide for reasonable limitations on who can marry. Just like it wasn't discriminatory to want to continue to provide for reasonable limitations on the types of jobs women could fill, or reasonable limitations on who is allowed to eat at my lunch counter.

Option 5: Backing the amendment is not about bigotry. Marriage is open to any two individuals who meet certain criteria regarding age and blood relationship, and who are of the opposite sex. Gay activists seek not to end discrimination, but rather to completely redefine -- and thus undermine -- the foundational institution of marriage. Again, just like voting being open to individuals who met certain criterial regarding skin color, gender, and property holdings. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and her herd of banshees completely undermined the institution of suffrage, paving the way for abominations such as Barbara Jordan to be elected to public office.

Paragraph 3:

Option 1: Without the MPA, there's nothing to prevent activist judges -- like those on the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, which legalized gay marriage a few years ago -- from creating not only gay marriage, but legalizing polygamy and even marriages between people and their pets. Because the legal requirements for entering into a contract in this country (say, having attained the age of majority and being mentally competent) will never stand in the face of withering attacks by the legions of men seeking to marry their box turtles.

Option 2: If the MPA were to be voted down again, as it was two years ago, we may very quickly see as many as 50 different state definitions of marriage -- not just homosexual marriage, which has already been legalized in Massachusetts, but marriages among multiple partners or even between siblings or other blood relatives. And the reciprocity clause can't have any bearing here.

Option 3: Even some conservatives say there's no need for the MPA because state marriage-protection amendments are sufficient to preserve the institution. The problem with that logic is that a federal judge has already struck down Nebraska's marriage amendment -- only a federal amendment can put marriage outside the reach of federal judges. That, and a waiver of the requirement that federal law pass Constitutional muster.

Option 4: Think of the MPA as a shield between our traditional values and radical judges intent on forcing their politically correct agenda on our nation. Without that shield, it's only a matter of time until marriage loses all meaning -- and social science data indicate children will suffer the most when that happens. It's science if NARTH and Paul Cameron say it is.

Option 5: Why is the MPA so essential? Because without it, marriage is at the mercy of judicial activists bent on overriding the will of the people and the role of the legislative branch by creating homosexual marriage -- and maybe even legalizing bigamy while they're at it. And man on dog; never forget man on dog.

Paragraph 4:

Option 1: So don't delay: Contact your senators today and urge them to support the Marriage Protection Amendment when they vote the first week in June. Because doing otherwise will make Baby Jesus cry.

Option 2: The Senate must act next month, when a vote is scheduled, to pass such an amendment. Because legal recognition, societal acceptance, and their inherent beneficial effects on relationship stability are the last thing we need. If those homos act any more like us it will be twice as hard to demonize them.

Option 3: Efforts to pass such an amendment stalled in Congress two years ago, but we have another chance before senators vote in early June to convince them to do the right thing this time around. We're hoping the general dumbing-down of political discourse over the past two years has rendered more of them unconscious.

Option 4: The men and women we elected to serve us in Washington must understand these truths -- and vote the right way when they take up the matter in early June. Because otherwise the terrorists win.

Option 5: We must help our senators see beyond the liberal spin and demand they vote the will of their constituents when they consider the amendment in early June. Because the will of the 506,000 people living in Wyoming deserves the same weight as the will of the 19,000,000 people living in New York.

Keep an eye on the paper, and don't hesitate to call bullshit if some permutation of this fill-in-the-blank letter shows up. Feel free to wonder, in print, why the FMA supporters need to have their own thoughts spoon-fed to them before they can commit them to paper. There's nothing new in the arguments presented here, and nothing that hasn't already been refuted from here to Colorado Springs again. Vigilance!