Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos says
Republican values, courtesy of Sen. Tom Coburn’s top aide:
[Sen. Tom Coburn Chief of Staff Michael] Schwartz told the crowd about Jim Johnson, a friend of his who turned an old hotel into a hospice for gay men dying of AIDS. “One of the things he said to me,” said Schwartz, “that I think is an astonishingly insightful remark… he said ‘All pornography is homosexual pornography, because all pornography turns your sexual drive inwards.”
There were murmurs and gasps from the crowd. “Now, think about that,” said Schwartz. “And if you tell an 11-year-old boy about that, do you think he’s going to want to get a copy of Playboy? I’m pretty sure he’ll lose interest. That’s the last thing he wants!
Playboy makes you gay.
Wisdom, courtesy of the modern GOP.
I’m… not sure it’s true that turning inward makes you gay. Or, for that matter, straight. I think instead introspection might provide a little values clarification of your sexuality.
But… I don’t want to tell an ostensible “family values” guy like Schwartz how to have family values, or child sexual development, or anything but, um, eleven years old is a little young. But I digress…
Although, I guess, not all that young for “traditional family values“ types (my own great-great-grandmother gave birth to her first child at age 13… her 20-something husband. My great-great-grandfather was one of the original Southern Baptist ministers. Her first son, also a preacher, grew up to be one of the original authors of what became Christian Fundamentalism. But I digress…
And seriously, while people of faith — including people of evangelical faith — really are responsible for the vast amount of charitable and social work (where, as my Darwin-thumping secular-humanist father asks, are the Unitarian hospitals?) I have to hope Schwartz just misunderstood his hospice-owning friend. Because otherwise I’d worry whether his patients are receiving appropriate end of life care. But I digress…
I’m just sorry, I was trying to get a toehold into the analysis I think Schwartz is dumb: there’s no way reading Playboy makes you gay. If you’re not gay already. Even if you’re only eleven.
And I’m just sorry, but if you’re not introspective about your sexuality I have a feeling you’re going to do what an awful lot of folks like Schwartz eventually do and start abusing children because you get the mistaken notion that anything you can get the drop on is fair game.
And yeah, that’s a stupid accusation. But for crying out loud so’s claiming that reading Playboy makes you gay.
These guys need to get a grip! Just because it kills two rhetorical birds with one stone for you doesn’t make it true. Or even coherent! At the end of the day you have to get some kind of grip!
%#!#$!2$
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Tue, 2009-09-22 20:34.
Schwartz is self-evidently delusional. But I've wondered for a while (and I know I've mentioned this to you before, figleaf) about the homosocial and even latently homosexual elements of porn that depicts hetero couples. Where else do straight men spend time looking at other men's naked, around cocks without being automatically labeled gay? I just posted on this, myself - great minds thinking alike? Or just a shared allergy to batshit wingnuttiness? Anyway, my thoughts might be a little half-baked, since I can't view porn from a straight man's perspective. But I do see several potentially homoerotic elements, even if they're typically denied and repressed.
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Tue, 2009-09-22 21:29.
Right-O. Next up in Looneyland: being straight makes you gay!
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Tue, 2009-09-22 21:51.
Oh hell - that should be "naked, *aroused* cocks." I'm two for two tonight ...
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-09-23 00:15.
Man, masturbating to Playboy didn't even make me gay.
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-09-23 01:19.
The usual problem - Schwartz said nothing of the kind, he just agreed with his friend's remark about all pornography being homosexual. A wize conclusion about Playboy making kids gay was made by Mr Moulitsas, so I assume your "%#!#$!2$" should be aimed there?
["...that I think is an astonishingly insightful remark" sounds like more than simple agreement. But technically you're right. He's actually saying porn facilitates "turning you sex drive inward," i.e. masturbation, and *that* makes you gay. So I stand corrected. --fl]
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-09-23 06:03.
Personally, I think teaching kids about what porn is and isn't is probably a good thing to do before they start to get into the full swing of puberty and all that entails, but maybe 11 is a little bit too early.
After all, as the Simpsons so beautifully parodied, at that age macho boys think kissing a girl makes you gay! Which means that Mr Schwartz completely doesn't understand what "gay" means to children that age. At that age it pretty much just means "uncool", so this (completely nonsensical) analysis about homosexuality is fairly irrelevant anyway in that context.
Submitted by 3211 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-09-23 13:25.
Who still reads Playboy? The internet is for porn!
And I distinctly recall bookmarking all the sex scenes in the books I read at nine or ten, so eleven isn't that young. Although perhaps I was precocious.