Geez. I was only gone an hour.
First, Rev. Jerry Falwell has died. My condolences to his family. He was a big ol’ homobigot, but I can’t celebrate his death. I imagine there are lots of people who think he’s somewhere hotter than Alabama in August, but I’m not much of a believer in hell. I do think he’ll be shocked by some of the people he meets in heaven. Fr. Michal Judge, anyone?
Second, the Birmingham City Council has taken a step toward tolerance for all people, unanimously approving the inclusion resolution proposed by Councilor Valerie Abbott. Good on them! No word yet on whether Joel Montgomery was in attendance.
UPDATE: Joe at Bessemer Opinions reports that Joel Montgomery was not at the meeting. He also passed along this little funny: when the clerk (or whoever it is) read a summary of the resolution, she said “homophibia”, and Council President Smitherman corrected her. I have a question. If homophobia is fear and hatred of gays, is homophibia fear and hatred of frogs?
SECOND UPDATE: Here’s a link to the revised resolution, thanks to the Birmingham Terminal.
I am sitting here saying “homophibia” over and over and just cracking up. At first I thought “it’s the shin bone of a gay man!” but that’s homotibia. You’ve got to be right: it’s fear and hatred of frogs. Or maybe drunken toads.
Homotibia — LOL!
I was there–would have spelled it homopheebia. We were imagining something less than pretty when the resolution was not allowed to pass by consent at the beginning of the session and I was dreading more bloviation from one Councillor (who managed to demonstrate yet again that the voters in his district are currently as well represented as those in Montgomery’s).
It finally came up about 12:15 and was over fast [time for a couple of sudokus and catnaps] and was unanimous. I’m in a forgiving mood for the three hours in the Council Chambers after the delay turned out to be their desire to vote publicly and unanimously! Nice to see grandstanding for a good cause!
Thanks, Helen — for your report and your patience.
I’m pretty sure that homophibia is a condition that causes you to tell lies about gay people.
Good one, Roy!
Then to tie the two stories together, Jerry Falwell was both homophobic and homophibic.
“Then to tie the two stories together, Jerry Falwell was both homophobic and homophibic.”
Yep.
He was so much more.
Amy Goodman recited a concise litany of deeds, statements and concluded with praise from John McCain, on Democracy Now! Wednesday morning: http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/16/140212 [the rest of the hour was a 95th birthday interview with Studs Terkel]
Former Bush appointee for Faith-based initiatives, David Kuo gives a blistering eulogy on Falwell’s flaws: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=10215606
[...] race for the State House and that William Bell fully supported the inclusion resolution that finally passed the Birmingham City Council after some childish nonsense from a few other Council [...]