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Sunday, February 06, 2005

Sticking it to Margaret Spellings at home... and fearing homosexuality

What appears to be an editorial from the Houston Chronicle features this about Spellings:

"She graduated from Sharpstown High School and the University of Houston and headed to Austin, working as a lobbyist for a school board association and later as Gov. Bush's education adviser. She is married to Washington attorney and lobbyist Robert Spellings and is the mother of two teenage daughters by a previous marriage."

This usually means that the subject has had a divorce. Washington Times:

"The former Margaret La Montagne, a divorced mother when she came to Washington in 2001, lived with her two young daughters and her sister in suburban Virginia until Austin, Texas, lawyer Robert Spellings publicly asked her to marry him at a dinner honoring Bush political director Karl Rove that spring.
    Mr. Spellings has two sons from a former marriage. "

So divorce is okay in a Republican's "family values" home but not homosexuality? Or gay marriage, or gay parenting? Was Spellings aware that Buster himself is a child whose parents are divorced? Doesn't she think it would be beneficial to portray a family who's going forward after divorce? That, after all, is what she'd be killing if she wants the cash for "Buster" pulled altogether.

I should grant that this is kind of comparing apples to oranges. But isn't it playing by the bible-thumpers' rules?

More editorial from Chron.com:

"Spellings started with a stumble last week by denouncing PBS for spending public money on a cartoon featuring among a cast of characters two lesbian couples. According to the new secretary, many parents would not want their children exposed to such life-styles.

Gay people pay taxes, too, and have the right to be objectively portrayed on a federally funded medium rather than be airbrushed out of existence. Spellings and her department should stay out of the culture wars and resist the sway of partisan ideologues who care more about advancing their agenda than about teaching children how to read, write, calculate and reason."

CNN.com has a really good interview and bio of Spellings from a few days ago, where she defended her "Postcards from Buster" stupidity:

"On lifestyle issues, I think it's appropriate for parents to deal with those and address those as they see fit, in their own way and in their own time," Spellings said. "I believe that as a mother, and I believe that as a policy-maker. For the Department of Education or public broadcasting to get into things that are, you know, in a grayer area, is just not something we need to do."

A grayer area? How are people supposed to address the idea that people have gay parents, by buying a copy of Heather Has Two Mommies and having done with it? By drawing their own stick figures on the chalkboard?

If parents don't want to deal with it, should they allow their children to watch "Postcards From Buster," now that there's been so much freakin' publicity about it? (I even heard about it on the CBC in Toronto. Granted, the animation studio is in Montreal, but still.) Should PBS be a "safe harbor" where no controversial topic should be addressed, and everything should be programmed along the lines of William F. Buckley's Book of Virtues? Blecccchhhhh!

Meander:

When I was a kid (and long before I had any interest in men) I didn't realize it but I knew a fellow student, at least one grade away, who had two mothers. To my knowledge he had no father, and neither of the mothers was presented as a "nanny" or anything like that. It's different of course when you go to a pricey private school (don't get your feathers in a lather, kids; I almost said SNOOTY) but it didn't seem odd to me at all. I didn't know this student that well -- not much more than just an acquaintence -- so I guess I didn't really think about it at the time. Should the idea -- or the fact behind the concept -- that two mothers MIGHT mean there is NOT a father and mother raising the child, and the two mothers love each other as do a mother and father, be introduced by a TV show or what?

Here's the thing. Does a child younger than teenage years grasp the concept of adult love between two people? The child may be able to grasp the idea of "I love my mother," "I love my father," "My parents love me," and physical love in hugs and kisses. The teenager is trying to grasp the idea of "I love my boy/girlfriend with my heart, soul and sexuality" but that's something you grow into. Isn't it?

The fear of showing homosexuality -- as normal for someone, anyone -- I guess means our children could grow up to realize they are homosexual instead of hiding inside a hetrosexual mandate. Yes, MANDATE.

Think about this: would any child of homosexual parents NOT be exposed to the typical pairing of hetrosexuality (which tends to be what happens to procreate the species)? How many opportunities in books, television, movies are there to see heterosexuality? Countless!

The fear of homosexuality itself seems to be "homosexuals are a) coming after our children to make them gay just like them and b) coming after ME to make ME gay just like them -- and make me less of a manly man, or womanly woman". You could give the "lady doth protest too much" argument to this (as you might the "American Operator" character in The Manchurian Candidate which I saw this weekend -- the original one with Sinatra and Angela Lansbury): anyone who castigates a demon to the ends of the earth is a demon himself (or AFRAID he is a demon himself).

Labels: Originally published

... Scribbled by Bill T ... 2/06/2005 04:31:00 AM ... Email this entry ...
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