Who’s Who at the Values Voter Summit 2012
Right Wing Watch takes a look at this weekend’s Values Voter Summit, the annual meeting of some of the right wing’s craziest elements — Birthers, bigots, homophobes, conspiracy theorists, Dominionists, and a host of miscellaneous fundamentalist fanatics: Who’s Who at the Values Voter Summit 2012.
Tony Perkins
Tony Perkins is president of the Family Research Council, the main organizer of this weekend’s summit. Perkins leads the group’s efforts against gay rights, abortion rights and church/state separation.
The FRC has one of the most anti-gay platforms of any major political organization, including expressions of support for the criminalization of homosexuality in the U.S. and abroad in countries law Malawi and Uganda. Senior fellow Peter Sprigg said he would “much prefer to export homosexuals from the United States than to import them into the United States because we believe homosexuality is destructive to society.”
Perkins himself frequently reflects the extreme views of his organization. He:
- said Islam is “evil”;
- attacked the media for dismissing conspiracies about Obama’s birth certificate;
- demanded Christians who voted for Obama “repent” since he has a “disdain for Christianity”;
- linked homosexuality to pedophilia and compared it to alcoholism;
- warned, “I don’t know if the country can survive ” another Obama term and that the president’s reelection would ” destroy this country.”
- called gay rights activists “intolerant,” “hateful,” “vile,” “spiteful” and “pawns” of Satan and said that homosexuality is “man shaking his fist in the face of God”;
- denounced hate crimes laws for promoting “chaos” and leading to the “indoctrination of our children in schools and the loss of religious freedom and the freedom of speech”;
- wrote that the anti-bullying “It Gets Better Project” is “immoral,” “disgusting,” and promotes “perversion”;
- denied that there was a correlation between anti-gay bullying and depression and suicide, saying instead that gay and lesbian teens know they are “abnormal” and “have a higher propensity to depression or suicide because of that internal conflict”;
- wrote that senators would have “the blood of innocent soldiers on their hands” if they vote to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and allowed gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military;
- insisted the government may introduce the “promotion of same-sex relations ” as a means of “population control”;
Following the deplorable and tragic shooting at the Family Research Council’s headquarters, Perkins has tried to blame the incident on everyone from the Southern Poverty Law Center to the Obama administration. The unconscionable shooting, however, should not be used as a way to conceal his organization’s virulent language targeting gays and lesbians.
That’s just the Tony Perkins section. Read the whole horrifying thing.
And by the way, one of the featured speakers this year: Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan.