ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, September 16, 1996 TAG: 9609160019
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LOUIS W. PAINTER
IN RESPONSE to Scott Johnson's Sept. 1 commentary, ''Homophobia is the courts' bigotry du jour'':
The dictionary defines a bigot as a person who is utterly intolerant of any creed, belief or race that isn't his own. A bigot may be dogmatic, fanatic, partisan, enthusiastic, extremist or die-hard. Bigots may be opinionated, prejudiced, obstinate, blind, narrow-minded or redneck.
It's easy to see that a bigoted individual could possibly be a very mixed-up person. It's also easy to see that this term could be slung toward most anyone, and to some extent it would apply to all.
A true bigot would be a unique character, for it would be very difficult to find many who would fit all of these categories. Some questions to ask regarding bigots: Is it possible for one to be a bigot against a bigot? Is a bigot a full bigot, a three-quarter bigot or a half bigot? And what makes a person who accuses someone else of being a bigot a nonbigot?
Are pro-life people or pro-abortion people bigots? Both groups are opinionated; both groups have enthusiasts and extremists; both are partisan to their cause. When people who fit these descriptive terms reach the fiery point of involvement, they become fanatics, which is another definition of a bigot. It appears the word ``bigot'' covers a multitude of people who have rather diverse, distinct qualities, and it's used many times out of context to falsely label someone.
I may be tolerant of Karl Marx's socialism and communism, as long as it's located in Russia or Asia, though that isn't good. But I would be an intolerant bigot against establishing socialism or communism in America.
The same analogy applies regarding homosexuals. I can tolerate, with some nausea, what they do in their own private cells. But when they want to bring it out into the open and try to sell it as normal behavior to all of America, then I become most intolerant toward such action.
Being intolerant of homosexuality doesn't make me a bigot. I don't blindly hold my view because I'm obstinate or narrow-minded. I have rational reasons for believing as I do. In fact, I consider myself broad-minded because I can see more reasons not to accept homosexuality than any reasons I might see to accept it. I consider myself broad-minded because I see more, not necessarily because I accept more. There is a difference.
Toleration may imply the allowance or sufferance of conduct that one might or should rightly oppose. For example, am I a political bigot if I do not tolerate political graft in the government? Intolerance isn't always as bad as gay and lesbian advocates might have us believe. What am I if I don't tolerate my young children playing in or near a busy street?
Pornography, in its varied forms, is an example of something intolerable to many, but that doesn't make those people bigots. How do you tolerate an obviously obscene picture? Do you just peek at it, look at only half of it or look at it upside down?
Remember, one of our definitions of a bigot is someone with no tolerance of any creed or belief that differs from his or her own. If I believe the God I believe in is different from the God others believe in, and if I say so and point out the rational differences, am I being true to my God and intolerant of others'? Or if I think the God I believe in is different from others, but I say no, that isn't so, am I being tolerant of other religions and their gods while being unfaithful to my own? Am I a hypocritical bigot toward my own religion?
To say someone is a bigot because that person will not tolerate homosexuality appears to be stretching the interpretation rather far. This accusation seems to be placing a denigrating definition on the so-called bigot; more so than for the unmistakably degenerate homosexuals.
People have to have a standard of conduct to regulate their actions. Within that standard is a leeway of tolerable choices that can be made. All choices aren't like grade-A milk, the best. In fact, some choices are so bad, like spoiled milk, that they cannot be used. When milk becomes spoiled, it's thrown out. When choices of life become intolerable, like the rancid milk, they are thrown out. The point of intolerance is reached only in those unique people inclined toward morality. Many times an obscene act in the eyes of the perpetrator will never reach the point where it's intolerable to them because the threshold of morality to them is very highly obscene.
To tolerate someone's belief is quite different from tolerating certain beliefs put into action. For example, to tolerate religious snake-handlers isn't the same as mingling among them in their practice or having them mingle with you carrying their snakes. This analogy applies to those homosexuals who hustle gay pride and are trying to impose their unnatural lifestyle upon everyone. And if those opposed to such actions resist them, they become the branded bigot.
Homosexuals are just one class in the family of perverts, including pedophiles, prostitutes and others. To object to any of these vile characteristics doesn't place anyone in the category of a bigot.
Louis W. Painter of Salem is a retired dentist.
LENGTH: Medium: 89 linesby CNB