This Is Why We Oppose Them

On Monday, the New York Times published an article concerning the role three American evangelicals played in the Uganda's recently proposed anti-homosexuality legislation.

If you don't know the details of the law (full text here), it basically singles out and punishes gays for having homosexual relationships. More specifically, it levies seven years imprisonment on those who engage in same-sex sexual relationships, regardless of their nature and life sentences for "aggravated homosexuality". Even worse, it requires citizens "in authority" to report observed homosexual behavior to the police within 24 hours. Failure to do so would result in prison time or heavy fines. Earlier versions of this bill called for more prison time or death sentences, but these have since been removed due to international threats to reduce Uganda's foreign aid.

Anyway, the New York Times revealed some interesting details regarding the involvement of Scott Lively, Caleb Lee Brundidge, and Don Schmierer, all American evangelical Christians. Last March, Uganda held a well attended and broadcast conference exposing "the gay agenda", where the three evangelicals spoke as homosexuality "experts." They covered the usual ignorant crap we're used to hearing in the US: gays want to recruit children, they want to destroy traditional marriage, etc. Nothing new, but in a place like Uganda, where education is uncommon and homophobia is already rampant (a Ugandan government minister recently said, "Homosexuals can forget about human rights, and "corrective" rapes of homosexuals are common in an attempt to turn them straight) it yielded unsettling results.

Now that this bill is making its way through the Ugandan legislature, the Americans involved are now acting shocked at the results of their rhetoric, saying they feel duped and that "Some of the nicest people I have ever met are gay people." My question is: what the hell did you think was going to happen? You go around telling lesser educated peoples that the gays are coming for their children and act surprised? And way to repay those gay peoples' kindness, jerks. This is a perfect example of why I oppose fundamentalist efforts to oppose their beliefs on others. In the end, their ideology is going to destroy the lives of innocent people.