Uneven vs. Steven: NJ anti-gays find their fall gay

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12/08/2009

by Jeremy Hooper

Jerseyequal-3 New Jersey marriage equality isn't really about the thousands of gay and lesbian Garden Staters who are denied basic fairness. It's not about the 2006 Supreme Court decision that demanded legal parity. It isn't about yesterday's hearing, where there couldn't have been a more drastic difference between the pro-equality side's heartfelt testimony and the anti-LGBT side's illogical condemnations. No, no -- none of those things are of concern.

So what is it all about? Well, to hear Focus on the Family and the New Jersey Family Policy Council tell it, the entire procedure is designed for no greater purpose than to appease Garden State Equality's Steven Goldstein:

*Source: Gay Marriage Vote in NJ [FOF]

Because they always need a scapegoat. Be it Tim Gill, President Obama, or Spongebob Squarepants, these professional "pro-family" activists have to create some sort of figurehead who they can cast in the aggressor role, so as to detach the debate from the public at large. Since they want, nay, need to mask their own sweepingly discriminatory work in order to stay financed, they've adopted a strategy where they (a) pinpoint one person or group who is supposedly interfering with the natural order of things, (b) cast themselves as the victims of that particular person or group's supposedly underhanded dealings, then (c) focus their supporters' ire towards that one targeted place. The goal is obvious: To pull focus from the countless folks who suffer at the cruel hand of the "pro-family," and instead place it on the one "whipping queer" who they claim has unfairly created the "fight."

It's smart, as far as unduly unrighteous tactics go.

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