Monday, December 19, 2016

McCarthyism

Has McCarthyism returned, are we going to have witch hunts again?

Besides the hunt for “Reds” Sen. McCarty also tried to weeds out “Homosexuals” from the state department.
Trump Ally Calls for Incoming Administration to Purge the State Department of Pro-LGBTQ Employees
HRC Blog
By Stephen Peters
December 16, 2016

Today, HRC called on President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence to denounce comments made by Tony Perkins calling for a purge of pro-LGBTQ State Department employees. Perkins, a close Trump ally and the head of the rabidly anti-LGBTQ Family Research Council, called on the incoming administration to have pro-LGBTQ employees “ferreted out” and “replaced by conservatives.”

“Tony Perkins’ proposal to purge pro-LGBTQ employees from the State Department is beyond the pale,” said HRC President Chad Griffin. “Perkins is hatefully suggesting pro-equality, career civil servants be rounded up and sent packing for doing their jobs.  The incoming administration should immediately denounce Perkins’ illegal and vindictive proposal. The State Department plays a crucially important role in America’s efforts to advance LGBTQ human rights around the globe. In countries with hostile anti-LGBTQ regimes -- like Russia, Syria and Egypt -- lives are literally at risk. Countless LGBTQ people depend on the State Department’s efforts, and we cannot and must not leave them behind.”

The Family Research Council (FRC) is known for virulent rhetoric that has earned them designation as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. FRC has a long history of demonization of LGBTQ people that has nothing to do with disagreements over public policy issues such as marriage equality or non-discrimination laws.  Among FRC’s many anti-LGBTQ statements devoid of facts are their linkages of gay people to pedophiles, their call for exporting gay people from the United States, their position that there should be criminal penalties for homosexuality, and their thoroughly debunked claim that one can change their sexual orientation.
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ by George Santayana.
Are we going to repeat history? Are we going to repeat the Salem Witch Hunts? Are we going to repeat the “Lavender Scare” of the forties and fifties?

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