Redskins and Gay Marriage: Media Says '*Poof* You're a Bigot'

You know, things have really changed around here. One night I go to bed, secure in my place in society as a Friend of the Gay Man. The next morning I wake up, and I’m a bigot. One day I’m walking around blissfully indifferent about the name of the football team representing our nation’s capitol. The next day, I’m a bigot. How does the media do this?

For two decades I was a flaming liberal on the issue of gay rights. I vigorously defended the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) to my conservative friends, immediately embraced the idea of giving committed same-sex couples all the same rights as married couples through civil unions (this was the mid-nineties), never skipped a beat in my relationships with friends and family who came out, and always admired the rebellious, f**k you attitude of a gay community that thrived economically while not giving a damn if anyone accepted them or not.

Then, literally, overnight, I’m no longer a Friend of the Gay Man. Instead, *poof* I’m a H8-ful Nazi bigot because I don’t want to alter the definition of the two-thousand year-old institution of marriage. This, even though, I don’t want to alter the meaning of marriage for anyone — gay or straight, atheist or Mormon. But that is just one perfectly logical and acceptable reason to oppose same-sex marriage. I do have another reason…

From a mile away, I can see the wicked politics at work in the same-sex marriage movement (not everyday gay couples who simply want to get married, but the political left driving it), and the politics have nothing to do with treating gays with respect and humanity. It is all about the left’s never-ending crusade against Christianity and the Church.

Look around. We’re already way beyond live and let live. My most cherished rights as an American are already being trampled by an Orwellian-named fascist called Tolerance.

And who is responsible for all of this? Not the permanently outraged on the fringes of the left forever on the prowl to tell others what to think and do. No, it is their closeted allies within the mainstream media. Grabbing their talking points from Media Matters, the Center for American Progress, and Barack Obama — *poof* we’re bigots. Yesterday, we were fine; today: bigots.

Somewhere, someone in the hollowed-out JournOlist volcano flips a switch, and just like that the media is collectively screaming homophobe at anyone who dares to bitterly cling to Barack Obama’s 2011 definition of marriage.

Now we are seeing the same thing with the Washington Redskins football team. One day nobody thinks twice about the name Redskins. The next day the switch is flipped and if you still hold the position everyone else did the day before, *poof* you’re a bigot. Apparently 80% of us just don’t understand, including 91% of those who are apparently too ignorant to know they are being slurred.

If I may be so bold as to disagree with Charles Krauthammer, although he is correct that language evolves over time, he is incorrect as to how the word Redskins has evolved. In the case of the word “Redskins,” what was once a slur is no longer a slur, thanks in large part to a football team revered for decades by millions. Why would we want to turn back the clock on this small victory for racial progress?

But none of the nuance, reason, logic, tradition, history, or science matters when a small group of elite bullies who command 95% of our nation’s media coordinate to manufacture a sinister magic wand that goes *poof*.

 

Follow  John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC