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Exodus International - News.

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Pattern Recognition

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[John Cannon]

Interesting billboards.....

In St. Louis, we had two billboards erected by Exodus International about a month ago which featured the face of an African-American gentleman with the headline, 'I Questioned Homosexuality' with the website address of Exodus.

Both were defaced. One of them featured the large spray-painted words, 'You Right-Wing Scum, Your Time Has Come.' The other one had purple paint balls thrown all over it.

I guess this must be an example of that 'tolerance' from my liberal friends and neighbors I hear so much about.....

[Streak]

John, really. Do you take responsibility for the hateful actions of Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity? Are you responsible for the idiot people who parade outside military funerals? Should we treat you as if you are Ann Coulter and assume that you too want Muslim leaders to be killed and their followers converted to Christianity?

No, of course, you aren't. Why are the rest of us liberals suddenly lacking in tolerance because of idiots in your town?

[JoeG]

Seems some people will never get that extremists in any group do not rpresent the views of the entire group.
John, I would never condone the actions of those who defiled the billboards in your town. But aside from the tolerance issue, did you ever consider that it was a bunch of bored teens looking to make trouble and who really don't give a rat's ass about liberal or conservative? Let's not be too quick to lay blame where it may not belong.

[John Cannon]

'Focus On The Family' featured their 'Love Won Out' conference (ministry to homosexuals) in St. Louis a few weeks ago (Exodus International was affiliated with the conference (somehow), though 'FOTF' wasn't tied in with the Exodus billboards).

The location of the conference was at a church in the area - which was egged by demonstrators a few days before the conference. This was a few days after the defacing of the billboards.

Joe - they may have been 'bored,' they may have been teens - all I know is that they didn't express 'tolerance' with ideas that they personally had disagreements with....

Streak, with regards to Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity, to my knowledge none of them have engaged in unlawful behavior - they've only expressed controversial opinions.

I was only noting that my liberal friends and neighbors have drummed the 'T-word' into my head for years - yet when a silly billboard is put up or a church has a conference that may feature ideas different from one's perspective - it's apparently OK to engage in lawlessness and be completely 'intolerant.' None of these unlawful acts were condemned by the gay activists in our area, by the way.

The conference went on schedule and they set an attendance record of 1,800 people. Several hundred gay activists demonstrated peacefully and were given coffee, donuts, and 'porta-potties' by the conference organizers and attendees. Fortunately, in the end, 'tolerance' was expressed and democracy won out.

[streak]

Ok then. I am sure no conservatives break the law. If you need to paint us all with that brush and so easily dismiss the belief in tolerance that many of us truly believe, then by all means do so.

BTW, personally, I would prefer that Ann Coulter, Hannity and O'Reilly only egged signs. Their brand of hatred is far more destructive (in my opinion).

[freethnkr1965]

If only blacks had "tolerated" the different perspectives of the KKK and segregation. If only women had "tolerated" the different perspective that they shouldn't be allowed to vote. If only those damn gays would "tolerate" being second class citizens - wouldn't the world be a better place.

Your whine of "you won't tolerate my bigotry" is wearing thin.

[Alice Venturi]

John:

I was only noting that my liberal friends and neighbors have drummed the 'T-word' into my head for years - yet when a silly billboard is put up or a church has a conference that may feature ideas different from one's perspective - it's apparently OK to engage in lawlessness and be completely 'intolerant.'

So, by your reasoning, I ought to be condemning all conservatives because some conservative nitwit/s defaced an Islamic Center in Northern Virginia. My conservative friends and neighbors all tell me how Jesus teaches Christians to love everybody - yet when a non-Christian group dares to have other views it's apparently OK to engage in lawlessness.

I suspect that the decision of whether or not to get huffy about these sorts of things depends on whose ox is being gored.

[sleepy in slo]

If a billboard is free speech, why isn't the text spray-painted on top of it? The only real difference between the two is that one costs thousands of dollars and on costs $5. Advertising isn't speech anyway, it's leveraging money to blast your message into as many people as possible. Thus: billboards should be defaced as a general rule.

Here's the problem: two people pontificate on the same corner, they drown each other out, neither is heard. Do they violate each other's free speech? No, but they do make impotent each others speech. So: they agree to alternate their speeches or to have separate street corners. Exodus + defacers have to learn to share space or they'll just blot each other out.

But you say: EI payed for the billboards! The defacers ought to do that. An opinion is not more valuable beacuse the person holding it is rich; so why should people find out about EI's position just cuz they got the dough? This is the fundamental problem of having demovcracy when access to voters is commodified; it doesn't work.

If you don't already understand this, you're not paying attention.

[John Cannon]

Gee whiz, folks! I think we need to lighten up a little (!)

My intention was not to 'broadbrush' all liberal folks - if it came across that way, I sincerely apologize.

My ONLY points (after seeing the initial posting of the photos of the billboards) were to inform people that similar billboards were vandalized recently in the St. Louis area along with a church hosting a conference with similar themes. In the mainstream media, conservatives (particularly Christian conservatives) are ideologically painted as 'intolerant,' while liberally minded folks are highlighted as the most 'tolerant' among us. Does anybody disagree with that?

I just thought it ironic that the ONLY billboards that have been defaced (in my memory) in the area where I live came from those who profess this 'tolerance.' Interestingly, there are several posts on this thread (who disagreed with the billboard's message) which intimate that what the vandals did was OK by them (!).

If you're comfortable with this kind of lawlessness - please don't move into my neighborhood......

[streak]

Seems like a couple of points here. One is that most liberals here heard your statement as a denigration of all liberals. It also sounded as if you didn't think that there were similar conservative idiots.

The second one has to do with what tolerance is, I think. If you believe that gays are born gay, isn't there a bit of bigotry in telling them they shouldn't be gay? freethinker makes that connection for sure, suggesting that it isn't intolerance to criticize white supremacists.

[The Atheist]

Can one hate bigots?

I went to college in STL. I've been of the more "liberal" persuasion for awhile, but I had friends who were significantly more active in being "left" than I. After 9-11, there was an ongoing conflict between campus political groups over the issue of the then coming Iraq war. Pro and anti-war groups each began by setting up their own posters and painting their own portions of the construction walls which were cleared for use in advertising campus events and what not. In the second phase, both groups made slight alterations to the opposing group's posters, so as to reverse its intended meaning. In the final phase, the "left" simply scrawled "imperialist" over the pro-war signs, and the "right" painted "nuke 'em 'til they glow then shoot 'em in the dark" over the anti-war signs. A friend of mine was part of the "left" side of the conflict, and she was proud of her efforts. I made it a point to politely disagree with what she did.

Sleepy makes good points, which I agree with in principle. But in practice, I always find it more useful to allow people greater freedom in expressing their views, even if I disagree with them. If people feel safe expressing themselves, then they will express themselves more completely, and most of them will then expose themselves for the fools they are, and knowing just who is a fool and the extent of their foolishness is always a good thing as far as I am concerned.

As far as the "lawlessness" of defacing a billboard is goes, I am not concered with that. Defacing someone's personal property or that of an organization or the public is not in the social interest. However, a billboard is only meant to advertise; only by being completely removed or defaced so as to be illegible is it rendered damaged. Indeed, I disagree with the actions of "vandals" on the grounds that the only thing that grabs your attention more than a billboard is a billboard that has been defaced. Someone once said that there is no such thing as bad publicity.

Freethinker also makes good points. Tolerance asks for tolerance. We may not even respect each other's differences, but we respect each other's right to be different. If you don't hold up your end of the bargain, what is my incentive to hold up mine? So I think that it is not wrong to be "intolerant of intolerance." However, depending on the nature of the intolerance, one may be better served by tolerating it.

[Carlos]

Nice to see your comments again The Atheist. I thought you got lost somewhere.

[The Atheist]

Well, as far as some are concerned, I'm still lost ::laughs::.

[John Cannon]

I guess if you want to be 'intolerant of intolerance' - then do so; just don't make the claim that you're tolerant because you're not.

Protestors at the 'Love Won Out' conference made their disagreements ('intolerance?') known by protesting the conference in a lawful way - and made their point. Egging churches and vandalizing billboards is lawless behavior - of which there is no defense; it's cowardly and immature.

You're right, the actions did receive publicity in the press in St. Louis and, most likely, did more harm than good if you disagreed with the themes of the conference. 1,800 were in attendance (350 of them pastors) and it was the most well attended of the 37 'Love Won Out' conferences that 'Focus On The Family' has held since the ministry's inception.

[Alice Clay]

Disagreement doesn't equal intolerance. I may disagree with you, but that doesn't mean I hate or refuse to tolerate you. I believe in free speech and would fight for the right of anyone to say anything no matter how much it pisses me off.

People will protest what they disagree with. "Love Won Out" teaches that people choose to be gay, which is simply untrue. Many GLBTQs have been hurt badly by that "ministry's" teaching. When they came to my town, we had an alternative conference as a peaceful protest. I cannot adequately relay the pain of one pastor, whose partner who had been killed just a few months earlier...pain compounded by the fact that his in-laws, who had never accepted him, were attending "Love Won Out."

Having said all that, it angers me when someone defaces another's legal property (ie billboards, churches). Yeah, it's lawlessness and that absolutely should not be tolerated.

[John Cannon]

Alice, I would agree with you and I appreciate the delineation between 'disagreement' and 'intolerance.' I think to protest peacefully equates to 'disagreement.' To disrupt it, prevent others from attending (and the obvious egging, billboard defacing) equals 'intolerance.'

With regards to the conference itself (and it's not my intention to get into a debate on homosexuality), I thought the best letter to the local St. Louis newspaper on the subject came from a Brad Allen from Springfield, Missouri who wrote,

“The coverage of the Love Won Out conference did not mention the hundreds of people who, like me, attended the conference because they want to be free from same-sex attractions.

The coverage was fair to everyone, except those who found the message delivered at the conference to be a breath of fresh air in a world that tells us that change is not possible and a church that tells us that change must happen. This conference provided the needed link between my belief system and my experience. Some of us were in tears because we finally found hope.”

I thought that was a superb letter and it reflects the mission and purpose of the 'Love Won Out' ministry.

[The Atheist]

Okay John, we won't get into a debate on homosexuality. I agree that coverage should be total, so I'm all for hearing the opinions of those who attended the conference because they wish to stop being attracted to people of the same sex and believe that this conference may help them to achieve that.

My problem with the "Love Won Out" ministry is that though they may try to carefully walk the line of "we are only here for those who want our help," I think that their name itself implies that homosexuality is without or incapable of interpersonal love and/or outside the love of God, and thus bad.

Regarding "intolerance" versus "disagreement." Let me clarify my "intolerant of intolerance" comment. For example, I come across someone who espouses the beliefs of godhatesfags dot com, or someone who hates black people and believes them all to be criminals, or, relevant to my situation, a japanese person who thinks that the japanese need to preserve their racial purity and kick all foreigners out of the country.

I disagree with these people. Knowing that someone believes something similar to one of the above things, usually makes me dislike them as a person to an appropriate degree. Due to this feeling, I consider myself "intolerant" of this person, because I now feel about them some degree of what they do about whomever they hate, save that my feelings toward them have a definite reason, whereas in my opinion, their feelings are irrational. I will walk up to this person and express my disagreement with what they believe. Then I may engage them in debate, but I will not try to harm them, silence them, and I will not tell them that they are not free to hold their beliefs. In that way, I "tolerate" them and their intolerance of others. If they will not or cannot debate, but insist on parroting their same points without argument, logic, or evidence, I may simply call them a bigot and/or a fool, as an expression of my feelings about them, but this is regardless of the color of their skin, their gender, their social status or sexual orientation, and again, I will not try to harm or silence them. Would you consider that intolerance? Would you, Alice? That is why I wanted to make the distinction, because it doesn't seem entirely clear. Clearly tolerance doesn't require agreement, but neither does it require liking someone. And yet, I want to consider someone "intolerant" if they dislike black people for simply being black, even if they "tolerate" the existence of black people.

When I went to an anti-war rally in college, following the opening speeches there was an open mic time during which two pro-war people got up to say their piece. Neither of them were offensive or aggressive, they just wanted to make their difference of opinion known. Despite that, many people were shouting things during their time on the mic, trying to shout them down. Though those in the crowd certainly have their right to shout their disagreement, I felt that it was not in the spirit of "open mic," so I shouted at people of my own camp, telling them to shut up and let the pro-war people speak, as we would want them to let us speak. Some listened to me, some did not.

In the case of the billboard however, I did not agree with your feelings on it, John, because I felt that though what the "vandals" did was illegal, they did not hinder the billboard's intended purpose.

[sleepy in slo]

Atheist, your points are good ones (I'm back a few pages referring to your experience in college), and for the reasons you mention I wouldn't suggest a political campaign focusing on crude vandalism, with contrary epitaphs scrawled across political posters.

The parody billboards shown above belong to another tradition though, that remixes a message to show it's absurdity. Rather than vandlize an EI billboard, I would suggest someone conduct some "improvement" and replace it with one of the alternatives shown above. I think that attracts attention in an effective, enjoyable way.

I don't think of this issue as one of tolerance vs. intolerance and trying to figure out what tolerance really is. That discussion assumes that this situation should be looked at in some sort of unique way because of its implications for being tolerant or not. I think that sphere is irrelevent.

It's no longer possible (if it ever was) to send out a message unaltered to be recieved by the masses. Aggregate humanity is a prism that reflects, refracts, and reinterprets a message continuously as it travels through the world. You have a conference, people show up and protest, those messages get mashed up by the tv and newspapers, whose converage is in turn altered and analyzed on the internet, which is reported on in the news and...

All this to say: of course coverage in any one medium is partial and incomplete. Of course billboards were remixed and posters 'vandalized.' That's people leaving comments on your original (physical) message board post. In many ways, this makes communication more democratic.

Of course, many people don't like the 'lawlessness' of uncontroled communication. It's messy, it's harder for wealth to control, it's harder for centric views to dominate...Good Riddance!

Oh and if anyone could actually warrant the implicit claim tha 'lawlessness' should be pejorative...

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