Untitled [to avoid mean spiritedness and profanity]

“Before we marry the guy next door, don't you think we ought to have a fling with a tall dark stranger and see if he can support us in the manner to which we'd like to be accustomed? And if he can't, we can always marry the steady beau who lives next door.”

—Richard Land, in an NPR piece that aired January 13th

[Richard Land is the president of The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention.]

The quote above was made in an effort to explain the need for a meeting that was scheduled to happen this weekend. At that meeting, 150 influential religious Conservatives ended up deciding [on the third ballot] that Rick Santorum is the Republican candidate that they want to support, collectively, as the anti-Romney. I found it absolutely fascinating that Dr. Land chose the words he did in making his analogy. I was all set to send him a letter congratulating him for finally facing his own homosexual tendencies. I was all set to thank him for taking a courageous position in support of same sex marriage—noting, of course, that said position is only “courageous” in the sense that it is likely to be unpopular among the narrow-minded sorts of people that he represents. I was all set to give him plenty of words of encouragement for taking his uncharacteristic stand in favor of equal protection for a segment of the population that his organization has until now been irrationally hostile towards.

I was, of course, also going to point out to him that so far there are actually very few jurisdictions in these United States where he would be afforded the opportunity to marry the steady beau who lives next door. I was going to point out that this must change if America is to live up to its ideals. I was going to point out that because the institutional bias against social justice for that segment of the population is so strong, we need for him and his friends to join in the effort to try to convince not only Rick Santorum and not only Santorum’s rivals for the Republican nomination, but also politicians throughout the country (whether they're on the national, statewide, or local stage). In fact, the fight to establish equal rights for all members of our society, including the homosexual members, is a fight that would benefit greatly from his efforts at convincing all of his constituents within the Southern Baptist Convention.

Alas, for some stupid reason I decided to do a Google search on Richard Land, at the very least to find out whether other NPR listeners had picked up on what seems to be such an obvious Freudian slip. Perhaps others had commented on this. Perhaps others have already deluged him with letters such as I was about to write. That’s when my thrill at his change of heart turned to disgust at his hypocrisy and sanctimonious deceit.

What I discovered was that on the very day when the NPR piece aired, it was also reported in an article in the Baptist Press that Land and 38 of his pals had signed an open letter to U.S. citizens in opposition to same-sex marriages. The letter itself was dated one day earlier, on January 12th. Given the early hour during which the NPR piece aired, I’m guessing that Land’s contribution was recorded either on or before the 12th.

You can reach your own conclusions. My own conclusion is that Richard Land is clearly a two-faced hateful sonofabitch and if you support his twisted ideology, you ought to be ashamed of yourself.