Like on this blog.Pittsburgh City Council President Doug Shields may introduce a resolution condemning an Oklahoma state representative's comments that included Pittsburgh in a list of cities gays are "infiltrating."
Yesterday, Mr. Shields said the resolution would likely be less strident than an e-mail he sent to Rep. Sally Kern, whose comparisons of homosexuals to terrorists have made national news. Mr. Shields called her "the new national poster-child for hate, intolerance and terroristic homophobia."
Someone recorded remarks Ms. Kern made to a group of 50 fellow Republicans a few weeks ago, and they emerged online this week.
For those who have yet to see Council President Shields' whole e-mail, Sue has it posted here. In it he wrote:
As the President of the Council of the City of Pittsburgh, I require an apology from you for your senseless, mean spirited attack on one my colleagues and the Council as a whole. I would think, should you take the time to reflect upon your hateful, bigoted words. An apology is also in order to the GLBT community, their families and their friends. Short of a a miracle, I do not expect that you will. I find persons of your ilk completely blind to your ignorance. [italics in original]Melissa Meinzer, over at City Paper had this to say:
At the bottom of the page promises more in the next issue of City Paper. Perhaps my friend Sue is right, and I broke this story here in town, (I think so, but I can't be sure). If she's right, then remember you read it here first.Bruce Kraus, Pittsburgh's first openly gay councilor, has been on council less than three months. But he has a lot more sway than he may have realized.
Or so says Oklahoma state Rep. Sally Kern. By now, almost everyone has heard, or heard about, her anti-gay rant. In remarks Kern made in January that were posted on YouTube, Kern says that "the homosexual agenda is destroying this nation, okay, it's just a fact. Not all lifestyles are equal, just like not all religions are equal."
During the diatribe, which Kern has said were taken from a series of public appearances, she calls out our fair city of Pittsburgh as an example of a place where gays -- who Kern calls "the biggest threat that our nation has, even more so than terrorism or Islam, which I think is a big threat -- are taking over.
"Gays are infiltrating city councils," Kern says. "Have you heard that the city council of Eureka Springs is controlled by gays? There are others: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania."
:-)
24 comments:
I'm fairly sure you broke the story. I got some grief over that, but I think anytime a mainstream blog picks up a LGBT story we are doing something right.
I'm not sure folks in the heterosexual community understand just how deeply gay folks feel when someone publicly takes a homobigot to task. People may tsk tsk when they read something about a Kernesque rant, but it is (too) rare for someone to publicly take a stand denouncing homophobia.
When you get beaten down every single day by some bigot or another, you can't help but want to bask in the fact that someone - anyone - stood up for you.
Mostly off-topic process stuff.
1. Sue, who on earth would give you grief over the fact that 2pjs happened to break the story, and why? I hope it was good-natured grief.
2. I can't decide whether or not I dislike the MSM's habit of saying things broke "online." When stories are broken in newspapers, do they say it first broke "in a newspaper"? "On a television show?" They usually just go ahead and name the media outlet. I'd like to learn the official version of the thought-process behind the seeming double-standard.
3. Then again, whining about not having been given credit is poor form. Although you did at least construct a smiley to show you weren't entirely serious. Or was it passive-aggression?
4. How did you find out about the clip, Dayvoe?
The smiley face was to show I wasn't serious. No whine was intended.
I think I saw the link originally at crooks and liars. I just happened to click on it as I was doing something else and once I heard her mention Pittsburgh I knew I HAD to post on it. It was too beautiful a trainwreck not to write about.
Thanks to Doug Shields for his quick reply, and cheers to Bruce Kraus for being an out gay may and PUBLIC SERVANT.
I am an out lesbian and am always appreciative when others, gay or not, speak up for what is right and just.
Thanks Doug and Bruce!!!
(And maybe we should outlaw REPUBLICAN marriage.)
John K. says: Am I missing something but are left wingers the only ones who notice these things. Councilman Kraus is gay? And? And the left wing City Paper breaks the story. Is there a reason left wingers are always exposing people's sexual orientation and skin color? Limbaugh is right on this one. Liberals just have problems.
Did you miss the whole inspiration for this thread? A bigoted RIGHT WING REPUBLICAN made horrible and disparaging comments about gay and lesbian people and their relationship to our city government. Get educated before you spout off!
Rush Limbaugh said something useful? I must have missed it.
Good natured grief. I think people can get a little pigeonholed ... the lesbian blog should cover lesbian issues ... blah, blah, blah ...I think it makes more of an impact when a MSM blogger catches a LGBT story. Good for David.
John K. is as dumb as the day is long.
Thank goodness he chose the hard-right team to root for.
But, to answer John K.'s original question:
Yes, John, you are missing something. It is a chronic condition, and I do not expect a cure.
I need to find a way to use the word, "ilk", more often in everyday conversation.
Where is my dictionary?
"... a MSM blogger ..."
Wait. There are MSM bloggers now? Consider my mind officially blown.
In any case, I'll be sending along your MSM membership card -- along with complimentary cowls and goat masks. Just pray that the Trib's Colin McNickle won't be the one carrying out the initiation rite.
As for who "broke" this story, this is purely a semantic point, but ... if Dayvoe got the story from another Web site, I'm not sure he can claim to have "broken" it, any more than the Post-Gazette can claim to have broken an Associated Press story it happens to publish in its own pages. In both cases, the heavy lifting was done by others; the local outlets simply introduced that material to a Pittsburgh audience.
Which is still great, don't get me wrong: I'm not trying to take anything away from the public service of notifying Pittsburgh about the ravings of this homophobic cretin. It was well spotted. But to say 2PJs "broke" the story seems a bit of a stretch, at least in MSM terms. Which are, of course, the terms the PJs have to use, now that they are among the Illuminati.
-- potter
P.S. It would also be incorrect to say City Paper "broke" the news of Kraus' sexual orientation, of course. But we all knew that already, yes?
John K. says: Where is my pee-pee? Am I missing something? I want my pee-pee back!
Mr. Potter,
Be sure to note in "Slag Heap" that the Pittsburgh Lesbian Correspondents broke the story about our local MSM bloggers breaking the story about the Kern rant.
Sue
Well, "break" is sort of a metaphor. It was a passing comment buried in another story, until someone from Pittsburgh "discovered" that the nice lady referenced Pittsburgh and why.
That "broke open the discussion" to the point that the president of council fired off an irate letter, so in a sense it is technically correct to say the story "broke" out into the open at a defined point in time, thanks to Dayvoe's alertness.
"It would also be incorrect to say City Paper "broke" the news of Kraus' sexual orientation, of course. But we all knew that already, yes?"
I dunno about that. To say that would be more correct than to say that Kraus broke it, for example.
PS -- I had coined the phrase Main Stream Burghosphere (MSB) to refer to 2PJs, the Comet, and the Burgh Report, but that was of course a conceit based on arrogance.
Whoa;
Let me clarify things a little on something.
When I wrote about "breaking the story here in town", I wasn't saying anything other than that I was (possibly) the first in town to blog on it. It was meant as a goofy thing to say.
Very sorry if anyone took it as anything other than that.
The way things are here in the blogosphere, I am absolutely 100% convinced that had I taken a nap that afternoon and missed listening to Sally Kern's rant, someone else would have posted on it a few minutes later. No doubt about it.
Yeah, we're right there with you, David. Just having some fun with this.
John K. says: Just curious, are there are any more politicians who the left thinks they should talk about their sexual orientation? Any more bedrooms the left feels a need to peer into? You folks really missed the Spitzer story though. LMAO
John K,
You are chronic indeed, but institutionalization may still be your boon.
John K. says: LMAO, I am chronic? LOL LOL I am not peering into bedrooms ala the left and making a point of the sexual orientation of any local poitician. You lefties are really out there on this one. LOL LOL LOL
John K. says: Wiener. Dicky. Pee-pee. Weenie. Dinkum. Mine is the best! LOOK AT IT!
Bram,
Does that mean that my blog is sort of like the City Paper of the MSB? Cool. That means we get Dan Savage and you get Ruth Ann.
Of course, it could also reflect that almost every male blogger in Pittsburgh has a "Being John Malkovich" fetish about Tony Norman.
Sue aka Alternative Stream Blogger (ASB)
I wish some of you would spend half the time you do on here harassing each other and write to Sally Kern and other Oklahoma leaders and let them know how unacceptable her remarks were.
Then you can take credit for doing something worthy,
I'll go you one better, Anon. Forget Sally Kern. Find one person you know who lives in Jane Orie's district. Persuade that person to call Jane Orie and share their disappontment that she wants to embedding Sally Kern's values into our State Constitution.
Pick another Senator and discourage him or her from embedding Sally Kern's values into our State Constitution. If each commenter on this list can persuade five people in five different Senate districts to make that call, we could have an impact.
who ever broke it, so what?
Thanks Council President Doug Shields for taking the time to speak up! it is very much a ppreciated.
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