Republican Iowa State Senator Dennis Guth unleashed one of the most disgusting homophobic diatribes on the Senate floor yesterday, accusing the media of tricking the public into accepting gay relationships and claiming that they are a health risk to the general public.
Watch, AFTER THE JUMP…
Said Guth:
"The media, for the most part, has bamboozled us into thinking that having a relationship outside of the boundaries of monogamous, heterosexual marriage is positive, happy and fulfilling. Movies, television shows, articles and magazines abound with this theme, giving partial information to a vulnerable audience: our children."
He added:
“Just as there are multiple ways that your smoking hurts me, such as secondhand smoke, increased insurance costs, cost to society of days lost for poor health, so it is with same-sex relationships. There are health risks that my family incurs because of the increase in sexually transmitted infections that this lifestyle invites. For example there are more and more medical tests required before giving blood or giving birth.”
Guth said people should speak out against what they see as wrong:
"If I saw someone going the wrong way on a one-way street, I would make every effort to stop and redirect them."
Guth said his remarks were inspired by Focus on the Family's 'Day of Dialogue', a response to tomorrow's Day of Silence sponsored by GLSEN, in which students take a vow of silence to stand up against homophobia.
Guth cited the suicide of New York therapist Bob Bergeron in his remarks:
"Bob Bergeron was a happy-go-lucky homosexual therapist who at the peak of his career committed suicide this January. In a note found addressing homosexuality he said, 'it's a lie based on bad information.'"
Openly gay State Senator Matt McCoy responded to Guth:
”I was frankly just a little bit taken aback by some of the things that I heard today, as I know some of my colleagues were as well… Much of what you heard today on the floor of the Senate is warmed-over rhetoric that has been invented by the Christian right, extreme groups. What I heard today was ignorant and I know where it came from, and I think that I am not gay by choice. I am not gay by choice, but I choose not to be ignorant.”
Watch, AFTER THE JUMP…
