ellen_datlow

I really hate saying anything bad about anybody, but I really *do* wish he'd shut up about this already. Yeah, Mr. Card. We get that you don't like gay marriage already. So may I recommend not marrying a man?

ETA: Also:

The first and greatest threat from court decisions in California and Massachusetts, giving legal recognition to "gay marriage," is that it marks the end of democracy in America.

These judges are making new law without any democratic process; in fact, their decisions are striking down laws enacted by majority vote.

What bugs me about arguments like this is that people's rights should never be decided by majority rule.

Not to belabor the obvious, but why does anyone give a damn? My worry is that he's writing these diatribes solely to garner the attention from disillusioned former fans, because they're the only individuals willing to read such a turgid mess. Seriously, folks: if you know an article is from Card, ignore it, and maybe the publications that run his work will notice that he's suddenly getting four hits per month, and three of those are from him.

You know, I notice that he doesn't link to his articles on the Mormon Time from his own website. Then again, I saw this quote in an article he did link to where he begged McCain not to choose Mitt Romney for VP:

"I'm a Democrat who voted for Obama in the primaries."

http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2008-07-20-1.html

What a strange, disturbed man... Best off sticking to fiction where no one has to know just how crazy he is.

the propaganda mill that our schools are rapidly becoming.

Oh, who does he think he's kidding? What, when the schools talk abstinence or whatever it's not propaganda, but when they talk about this, it is? If he's labeling this propaganda, then he should at least fairly recognize that everything else schools advocate should be branded the same. He can advocate whatever he wants, but he shouldn't try to cloak it in his stance being right and other viewpoints being propaganda. *rolls eyes*

I lost patience and couldn't even finish reading it, for fear I'd go on another rant about Orson Scott Card. Which I don't have time for tonight. *sigh*

Staggering stuff. In one article he conflates sexuality with procreation (sorry, I do it for fun, Mr Card), implies that marriage ought to be about property rights, argues that the government is the enemy of marriage when extending it, says that all life is about grandchildren (I don't have any yet! I'm not alive!) and, most ludicrously, that biological imperatives trump laws. This after telling us that "men routinely discard wives and children to follow the nearly universal male biological desire for diversity in mating." Why wouldn't Mr Card see the contradiction here?

I detest his political and moral views, but he's allowed to have them. What puzzles me, though, is how he gets away with such poor logic.

Part of me finds it extremely sad, because it's such a betrayal of himself as a writer, of his *characters*. I stopped reading Card years ago, but up through the early 90s at least all his novels were about the monsters created by traditional, patriarchal families. All the children are abused, one way or another, and their parents are at least complicit. And the horrible monsters called "buggers" turn out to be people you can relate to; the family you choose is more important than your family of blood.

Card slew his literary children as Abraham would have slain Isaac, because he thought G*d was telling him to -- and that's a bone-chilling thought for any writer. You could make a tragedy out of it, but I don't know if it counts if the protagonist doesn't *know* he's in a tragedy.

The first and greatest threat from court decisions in Massachusetts and New York, giving legal recognition to "abolition" is that it marks the end of democracy in America.

--Orson Scott Card, 1800

My god, will no one do anything about this heretic Joseph Smith and the filthy, depraved rabble that follows him around, defiling every Christian woman in sight? Are there not enough bullets in all of Missouri?

--Orson Scott Card, 1839

The first and greatest threat from our new president's decision to empanc- ARGH, MY GROIN!

--Orson Scott Card, 1862

For just this reason, Orson Scott Bigot has been on my "no-buy" list since the late '90s. It continues to appall and amaze me that someone who writes for a medium that demands open minds has such a closed one himself.

I just skimmed to find the crazy.

"And if you choose to home-school your children so they are not propagandized with the "normality" of "gay marriage," you will find more states trying to do as California is doing -- making it illegal to take your children out of the propaganda mill that our schools are rapidly becoming."

Wow.

"Regardless of law, marriage has only one definition, and any government that attempts to change it is my mortal enemy."

Main Entry:
mar·riage Listen to the pronunciation of marriage
Pronunciation:
\ˈmer-ij, ˈma-rij\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Middle English mariage, from Anglo-French, from marier to marry
Date:
14th century

1 a (1): the state of being united to a person of the opposite sex as husband or wife in a consensual and contractual relationship recognized by law (2): the state of being united to a person of the same sex in a relationship like that of a traditional marriage <same-sex marriage> b: the mutual relation of married persons : wedlock c: the institution whereby individuals are joined in a marriage 2: an act of marrying or the rite by which the married status is effected; especially : the wedding ceremony and attendant festivities or formalities3: an intimate or close union <the marriage of painting and poetry — J. T. Shawcross>

Looks like at least three, maybe six definitions to me. Merriam-Webster, the Great Enemy of our times. OSC, sharpen your sword!

His political argument (i.e., that this is not a matter for courts to determine) has some potential merit, but then he goes on to say that it's not a matter for the legislature to determine either. That's nonsensical, as marriage is a human institution, and can, therefore, be redefined by human action.

I'll grant him that human biology is a fact of nature. But marriage does not arise (or does not arise solely) from biology.

As for whether courts should be deciding things like this, that's very old ground that people have been re-tracing at least since Griswold v. Connecticut. He didn't add anything new to the argument, and it's silly to say that the MA and CA opinions are "dangerous for democracy" as if Griswold had never been decided.

I can't bring myself to read any of his books. At least hate is a righteous emotion, it's something you can fight against. But it's not that he hates homosexuals, it's that he pities us, and I cannot give someone the respect of reading their work who pities me for no damn reason but for what I do in the privacy of my own bedroom. Perhaps when he's dead I'll read those books, but not until then, not while he's still spreading this filth:

http://www.nauvoo.com/library/card-hypocrites.html

It gets most disturbing about a quarter of the page down. Search for "swift but mild punishment," what he advocates for young children engaging in same-sex experimentation.

The article is nearly hysterical. There's stuff about how gay activists of the 80s promised they wouldn't touch marriage, and he calls gayfolk "genetic mix ups". Classy.