Obesophobic bigotry

Mark Shea continues to have fun while making a point.  Much of the Gay Rights movement is a farce.  Anyone with half a brain could see it.  But just as Sean Strub points out for the Huffington Post, it's never about truth and facts when it comes to advancing Gay Rights.  Mr. Strub is upset because a new HIV awareness campaign is too harsh, too frightening.  Using graphic images of the ravages of various diseases linked to HIV, the campaign seeks to advance awareness of the toll it is taking, particularly in the gay community, where one in five men will become infected. 

You'd think that's just the kind of hard hitting honesty the gay community is looking for right?  Right?  Well, apparently not.  Mr. Strub cites several Gay Rights groups who are bothered by the ad, because it seems to focus on the fact that somehow the physiology behind male homosexual sexuality is a little more risky than good old fashion heterosexual sexuality.  Of course, the overwhelming testimony of medical science (you know, science that is always - ALWAYS - supposed to be listened to), suggests it is true.  And like the old anti-smoking campaigns of old, the new one simply tries to get gay men to take protection seriously, even by grabbing by the collar and shaking a bit.

But as Mark demonstrates with humor, there is little desire for truth or fact in the post-moder quest for sexual fulfillment.  Little things like facts, data, science, medicine - or tens of millions dead - won't stop what we want to happen.  So we have silly things like 'if a person is born with a tendency toward a certain something in some cases, then it's OK in some cases', as if that's supposed to mean anything.  As Mark points out, plenty of people are born with the tendency to be overweight.  That doesn't stop our media, our pop culture, our government, and our medical establishment from jumping over 'fat and obese' people as if they should be ashamed of themselves.  Yet it does keep those same groups dead silent regarding that other tendency which those same groups actually admit can be risky. 

Perhaps that's the problem Mr. Strub has.  Ultimately, gay rights is in many ways based on the same truth finding as the Emperor's New Clothes.  For the most part today, as agencies like CNN pine for the day when punishment is immediately handed out to anyone who criticizes homosexuality, asking about facts is simply verboten.  You don't do it for fear of the dreaded homophobe label.  Even though no one cares about the dreaded obesophobe label.  It almost makes you think that as a society we haven't learned anything from the last 5000 years of lessons.  Almost, though everyone assures me we are truly on the cutting edge of an enlightenment revolution, so that can't be the case.