Michael Cobb’s God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence – the “Like Race” Analogy

Posted on December 10, 2014 by virgowriter

Michael Cobb’s God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence – the “Like Race” Analogy

In 1967, The Supreme Court rendered a verdict in Loving v. Virginia. Their decision struck down laws in our country that prevented interracial marriage. The case was a result of the Loving couple—Mildred and Richard Loving—of mixed race, who were sentenced to one year in prison for violating the Racial Integrity Act of 1924, which contained an anti-miscegenation statute that made interracial marriage illegal.

They could serve a suspended sentence if they left the state of Virginia and could only return to visit family if they did so separately.

This case, and the type of misguided, bigoted laws it challenged, is often used in arguments in favor of gay rights. Why? Well, in principle, the case attacks injustice that has been perpetuated by antiquated moral arguments. We can’t mix races… that would be unnatural. Think of the children of such a union… These were the type of reasons offered to justify keeping different races from marrying.

In his book, Michael Cobb understands why gay marriage specifically has approached our fight in the same manner as those who challenged Loving v. Virginia. He also sees several other places where our community has invoked the “like race” analogy. And although he understands why this important, he also believes that doing so has limited us in the long run. Basically, we need to find our own language to express what we have—and what we continue—to experience as members of the LGBT community in this country.

But what is the “like race” analogy? As Cobb discusses, when those within our community “argue that they are “like race,” the less legible category, queer, relies on assumptions about the more known category, race, which has more value and legibility as a conception of the history of the United States” (45). Therefore, this analogy works because race is understood to be a “legitimate form of minority difference”, and as such has been “deemed worthy of explicit government action,” dating back—but not limited to—the end of slavery (117). Basically, this continues to work because it “provokes emotions that influence law and politics” (132).

According to Cobb, there are a few important flaws in this comparison because it limits our ability to present a clear idea of our own experience, which contains its own history, unique struggles and experiences. First, the “comparison between queers and people of color is emotional, not genetic” (13). This distinction is important, for the “pain and violence” inflicted on our community is similar to the “pain and violence” inflicted on racial minorities by conservative groups and individuals (19). The comparison should stop there. Yet the comparison is often misunderstood to be about a lot more. Perhaps for this reason, “this assertion of a “like race” status sidesteps authentic or realistic claims that riddle and often limit much minority-based writing and politics” (Cobb 13). Furthermore, referring to the work of Janet Jakobsen, we should worry about what happens, because by aligning the queer experience with those of race, “historical specificity is elided, forgotten, or undercut” (45).

Basically, we stumble telling the complete story of our own experience.

This is why Cobb sees that the analogy fails to fully explain the community’s experience. In order to accomplish this ourselves, we must find, develop, and use our own language. As Cobb states, this “like race” analogy, “is a substitute for explicit testimonials and definitions of minority sexuality” (46).

Here is a different way to understand Cobb’s point: any time you suggest one thing is like another, you always fall short, for what it is like fails to describe what it is. We’ve done a good job using instruments forged and harnessed by others; now we need to move forward on our own, and maybe then we will be able to effectively convey who we are. Doing this stands the best chance for those on the outside to see us as a unique group, worthy of not just equality but respect. And when that happens, we won’t need the Supreme Court (or any court) to step up on our behalf.

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Michael Cobb’s God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence – – The Hate State Colorado’s Amendment 2 and California’s Proposition 8 – What Happens When One Religion Influences the Mainstream

Posted on December 5, 2014 by virgowriter

Michael Cobb’s God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence – – The Hate State Colorado’s Amendment 2 and California’s Proposition 8 – What Happens When One Religion Influences the Mainstream

Satire is a fairly effective rhetorical tool that can be used to exaggerate the elements of an argument in order to demonstrate how absurd they can be. Few media outlets are as successful at doing this as Comedy Central’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. In the recent clip “Left Behind” Samantha Bee picks apart an outspoken Christian who feels, similar to gays, that he is persecuted for being anti-gay (http://goo.gl/N7WAes) . One of the several amusing aspects of this segment is how ridiculous this individual is made to look, in part because his flawed argument attempts to suggest that the current mainstream political climate has persecuted him. No longer is he free to espouse his bigotry (except in the rare place where it’s allowed, like one of the 330,000 places of worship across the country). Basically, he believes that gay bullies need to learn to be more “tolerant of his intolerance.”

What this gentleman and people who believe what he believes miss is the distinct difference between intolerance and disapproval. You can disapprove of homosexuality all you want; it’s a free country—you’re entitled to your beliefs. The problem people who feel they are now being unfairly targeted for espousing anti-gay beliefs don’t realize is that disapproval becomes intolerance when beliefs and opinions are codified into laws, thereby forcing everyone to believe what you believe.

When one group’s beliefs push to remove basic equal rights from another group, that’s the problem.

In God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence, Michael Cobb examines what happens when these type of anti-gay beliefs, motivated by religious beliefs, have influenced anti-gay laws. Recently, they contributed to Colorado’s Amendment 2.images

Colorado’s Amendment 2 legally prevented members of the LGBT community from claiming minority status, which would allow them to gain protection against forms of discrimination. In chapter four of his book, Cobb asserts that proponents of this Amendment believed that members of the gay community were “morally underserving of the same protections as other traditionally discriminated groups” (117), such as racial groups. Therefore, when the gay community has used the same language often used to advance the civil rights movement (and beyond), conservatives got nervous and devised a way to prevent the gay rights movement from seeing similar success. Thus, the Amendment.

Sadly, enough believed the hate to pass it.

(Though not discussed in the book, a similar issue arose in California’s Proposition 8, YesOn8which made gay marriage illegal and codified marriage as only between a man and a woman. This link also contains the sadly amusing arguments in favor of this law.

Thankfully, both of these laws were eventually overturned by the Supreme Court, but not without a fight.

Cobb asserts that because anti-gay people have historically been able to support their anti-gay views in public and through legal channels, they feel entitled to continue to do so. They also, according to Cobb, have been able to use religious rhetoric to support their stance, sway an alarming amount of people (some of whom were not inclined to back their beliefs), and get these laws passed.

But what has always puzzled me is how “devout” religious people, in good conscience, can back such beliefs. Sure, the Bible has a couple (ok, four) mentions of anti-homosexual comments. So, if you are devout, perhaps you’re just obeying what you believe to be true, the word of God. But if we’re going to rely on this ancient text for guidance on sexuality, we need to enforce its stance on all issues related to sex and sexuality, including rape and adultery.

According to Deuteronomy (in the Old Testament), if a woman is raped in the city, both she and the man are to be stoned, for if the rape is “finished” without being prevented, she must have wanted it. Otherwise, she could have yelled for help. However, if the rape takes place in the country—with less people around—she would not be punished, only the man who raped her stoned (chapter 22). Should we reinstate this law?

Thankfully, for adulterers, Jesus (in John) overturned the Old Testament-era law that stoned those caught cheating on their spouses. But Jesus said a lot of things; most specifically, “if any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone” (John 8:7). Seems like those who are getting in the way of equal rights for the LGBT are throwing a lot of stones.

Now, I think most people—even conservative Christians—would not push to have these laws implemented in modern society. Barbaric, are they not? Furthermore, how does our population feel when other cultures, influenced by a religion different than Christianity, implement these types of laws?

For example, a woman in Hama was stoned in front of her father for being accused of adultery. Sounds awful, right? Of course. Yet this punishment was dictated by that culture’s religious beliefs—or at least a portion of that culture’s beliefs, I should add. Granted, this reaction demonstrates an extreme adherence to those beliefs, but it’s what they believe. Do they have the right to their beliefs? Do they have the right to hold people accountable strictly based on those beliefs? Care to guess how many of these cases are out there, and recent ones too?

From the outside, does this country’s anti-gay stance, when supported by religious rhetoric, look any different just because people are using laws instead of stones?

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Michael Cobb’s God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence –Religious Rhetoric in Tennessee Williams’ Suddenly Last Summer

Posted on November 30, 2014 by virgowriter

Michael Cobb’s God Hates Fags: The Rhetoric of Religious Violence –Religious Rhetoric in Tennessee Williams’ Suddenly Last Summer

Even though I’ve studied literature for decades (both in my undergraduate and graduate work), I still marvel at what a close eye for detail can reveal in a writer’s work. When that investigation uncovers important messages about sexuality in general and ideas related to homosexuality specifically, I’m even more intrigued. Even more interesting is discovering how well an older work still conveys a relevant message today, for often the most spot-on cultural commentary comes through literature.

In his third chapter, “Like a Prayer,” Michael Cobb devotes most of his attention to analyzing specific literature through a queer lens in order to uncover messages regarding homosexuality. It’s all interesting, but for my purposes here, I won’t rehash most of it, in part because it doesn’t serve this blog’s purpose.Williams

One discussed work, however, does—and what he has to say gets a little dense. He analyzes Tennessee Williams’ Suddenly Last Summer (100), which Cobb finds both “contemporary and explicit about its homosexual content” (100). In this 1958 play, Mrs. Venable “laments the loss of her child, Sebastian, a poet, to the perils of dangerous sexuality, but a sexuality that she had had the ability to control, participate in, and describe to others” (100). According to Cobb, in the play, Mrs. Venable uses her attractiveness to attract men for her son’s sexual pleasure (100). This rouse is designed to keep her son’s sexuality a secret, and her drive to keep this secret sealed even after her son’s death (as a result of pursuing this sexuality), leads her to consider silencing another character, who threatens to expose Sebastian’s truth.

Even more significant than the content for Cobb, however, is the language the characters use to process key events and details: religious rhetoric. Mrs. Venable suggests that Sebastian’s “sexual pursuits were actually searches for God” (106). Sebastian has perhaps also internalized this belief, for in a key scene, as he and his mother are sitting on a beach. There, they observe newborn (hatched) turtles fighting to reach the sea for the first time before flesh-eating birds devour them. Some are unsuccessful, and their deaths are rendered explicitly. Reacting to this scene, Sebastian exclaims: “now I’ve seen Him” (106). This line suggests that Sebastian understands God to be destructive, for he sees the scene as “natural.”

In a telling response to this line of dialogue, Mrs. Venable says that her son meant that “God shows a savage face to people and shouts fierce things at them, it’s all we see or hear of him. Isn’t it all we ever really see and hear of him now?” (107). Clearly, she’s trying to understand her thoughts about God and how this impacts how she processes (and supports) her son’s sexuality. If the only message she heard from the Church was an intense denouncement of her son’s sexuality (and therefore her son), of course she has—unfortunately—developed a menacing view of Christianity.

Given the era in which this play was written (and set), it’s easy to understand why a mother who loves and accepts her gay son would see so much anger from God. During this time, to be openly gay was not only illegal in most of the country but also dangerous. These anti-gay attitudes were supported—often—by religious beliefs. So, here, a literary work was trying to openly court this problem, and in doing so was quite brave.

Yet, as I read through Cobb’s analysis of this and other literary works in the chapter, I couldn’t help fixate on this line from Mrs. Venable. Almost 60 years after this play, with so much shifting of public sentiment to now support gay rights in general and gay people specifically, I still hear—in person and through media outlets—far too much angry religious rhetoric aimed at gay people. And when the rhetoric also leads to continued acts of violence against gays and lesbians (for example, a recent gay bashing in Center City Philadelphia), I can’t help wonder why that hasn’t changed.

The title of Cobb’s book tends to rub people the wrong way, for they feel it misrepresents God’s love, compassion, even for gay people—for whom the Bible is often used against. God, in fact, does not hate us. Cobb understands this, and this chapter, as well as others, is not addressing all Christians, nor is he suggesting that God feels this way. Rather, the people who so vehemently denounce homosexuality are a minority within Christianity. The issue is that this minority is both loud and influential, for it they weren’t, there wouldn’t be a need for literature to continue to argue against all the religious rhetoric used against us.

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