Are fundamentalists now in charge of the nation's newsrooms?

[Cannikin]

In recent weeks two lesbian journalists at the San Francisco Chronicle were taken off of the same-sex marriage beat by Chronicle editor Phil Bronstein because they had gotten married themselves, albeit in a private ceremony with only a few friends present. Jay Blotcher, a gay stringer for the New York Times, was dismissed by Times editors after they learned he'd been a public relations spokesperson for the AIDS groups ACT UP and did some work for the American Foundation for AIDS Research—10 years ago!

Never mind that many Times staff reporters over the years were p.r. flacks before joining the team. Never mind that Botcher wasn't covering AIDS or public health for the Times. In response to a blistering letter from playwright Larry Kramer pointing out the many conflicts of Times health editor Dr. Lawrence Altman and other Times reporters, editor Bill Keller said, "Although is no longer in that role, his work was recent enough that we worry he is identified in the public mind as an advocate."

If these cases represent conflicts of interest—or even the appearance of such—what are we to make of the Los Angeles Times' Roy Rivenburg, who covers the same-sex marriage movement though he is associated with a radical evangelical Christian organization?

"Not everyone who opposes gay marriage is a Bible-thumper, a conservative—or even a heterosexual," Rivenburg, identified under his byline as a "Times staff writer," reported on March 13. "As the California Supreme Court stepped into the feud Thursday by halting same-sex nuptials in San Francisco, other voices were already weighing in against the idea… Some profess enthusiastic support for gay rights, including civil unions, but they draw the line at marriage. One reason is a belief that gay matrimony could open the door to legalizing polygamy and group marriage."

Full editorial:
http://www.365gay.com/opinion/Gist/Gist.htm

[undergroundpanther]

1. When

I went through a fundie phase..It was short but it left a faer in me of these people that Has not faded.Not all fundies are crazies but a 'moderate' fundie is a rare fundie.A moderate fundies willingness to tolerate the more dangerous fundie and thier failure to denouce the evil thier'brothers'deliberately do to infiltrate other churches,secular culture,the media,our governments,to me proves these alleged fundie 'moderates' are are comprimisedwith the extemists too much ,the effect of thier failure to speak out shows methey are more than halfway over the cookoo's nest and fail to aknowlege it for some reason and do the right thing,denouc4 fundamentalism as non-christian..All the liberal people who call themselves Christians need to basically get some guts,stand up to the bullies biblethumpers distinguish themselves from the dominionist,apocolypse nut,theocrat fundies and the congregation needs to get thier church to loudly denoucnce the fundies warped take on faith as not christian.Alot of fundie churches,Like AoG, independant, southern baptists,some methodists,catholics ect,have been infiltrated by these bully theocrats, dominionists and kingdom now nuts..

The fundies want to take over the world,and Jesus did not want to rule the world at all.Fundies and theocrats have a conflict of interest with thier God.
While I was on the"inside" of the Assemblies ogf God I discovered they had "cell churches" .These are organized little groups led by the church that would meet in peoples houses.It is part of the Shepherding" movement and it is dangerous to anyone with a psyche.

In these groups they would pray,eat desserts buut also if you were trusted enough they'd talk about influencing the media,stategy for pushing theocracy on a secular population they saw as evil.

Dominionists,Theocrats and Kingdom Now fundies tactics amazingly mimic the Islamic exteremist religious"terror" groups and even have "terror cells"(cell groups) living among us embedded all across the country indoctrinating people at homes. They look too much like the islamic exteremists they hypocritically yammer about as being such a danger to America. On appearances it looks like the fundies and Alqueda are the same kinds of organizations. If you switched up the religions they do,they are esssentially alike in thier core immorality and thier tactics and agenda to dominate the world.

Why Christians of good character in every church do not actively undermine the efforts of these people in thier churches,and force them OUT into the open to explain themselves and be honest about thier motives ..I have no clue.
Fundies will push until,they cause schizim,purges and until they control the agenda and atmosphere in a church.It is subtle and takes time but it happens.Churches change because of infiltrating extremists Than churches schizm because the liberals are sick of extremists.Than it starts all over again.

It's amazing to me how Christian fundies demand muslim moderates denounce the extremist fundie Mullahs and churches and followers..
While they cause so much militancy in churches here? Can you say projection? But because it's fundies making this point it doesen't mean it isn't a point.It's just a bigger broader more honest point than the fundies wanted I think.

Why Can't the Christian moderates do the same thing keep positions of auithoritry closed to thier own exteremist fundie preachers,churches and followers in thier own more liberal,accepting,spiritual and good churches? If you do not want to dominate the world than why let the extemists in your church motivate your bretheren to allow it in the name of your God if you think it is wrong and against Christian precepts?


What is a culture war really fighting against ? I think it is war against a person who is different and lives and behaves differently than thier attackers want the culture to be..If you strip away allthe particulars of culture wars through history like who's the scapegoat,colonialism or if it is religious or political or something else ,they really are wars between 2 kinds of human psychological orientations.

One psychological orientation side is people who seek approval and excuses for themselves from external authority figures and beliefs .People that want authority to put external controls upon thier own AND others soverignity by limiting social behaviors,Culure wars are started by people who have urges to impose thier ways upon human expression. The kind of people who prefer to trust an authority figure/system to tell them right from wrong .Those who put thier inner locus of control and personal power into authoritarians .A culture war also benifiets the authoritarian personalities themselves who gravitate to fundamentalism and other power structures in society who enjoy and get a feeling of omipotence in taking control of people's inner locus of control,violating/engineering thier consent.or using a reward and punishment game to justify superiority,entitlement or elitism over others for himself..Reactionaries who intsigate culture wars imagine turning society back time to an "order"fantasy where everyone knew thier place that never was or progress to a mythic utopia where everyone is the same or believes or looks like they do.

The other pychological side of culture war is waged against people who are tired of these sorts of power games ruining thier lives.People who seek changes instead of turning back, are chafed.Those who are not afraid of plurality and differences are offended by culture wars,Those who are thinking beyond reward and punishing are wary.Anyone who choose to control themselves on the inside who resists domination and can live and let live, andadmit people don't have to agree to co-exist in peace are targets of culture wars. People who don't seek or excuse violation of thier own or other's consent by authorities who want to do what they want or followers who do what they are told are a threat to cultures of domination. People who see and respect the inherent soverignity ,uniqueness and equality of human beings because they see others as like themself and can accept differences at the same time..They don't seek authority to take away thier responsibility, nor seek authority for getting away with being corrupt while pretending to be upstanding,they are not into that game..and they don't tolerate it because they have integrity and know right and wrong for themself..


Culture wars still happen maybe because a big part of humanity is still psycholoically beholden to an S/M and control VS get away with it sorta sociopathic / true believer mentality. Not enough people can connect the individual choice process to the welfare of our socieety yet, so they fail to recognize the multi leveled danger signs in individual authoritarian personalities who seek positions of power for different reasons than compassionate helpers looking to effect positive changes .

More and more people who can gain a sense of mental health and strength in thier own minds and who struiggle with discomfiting questions and think for themselves will create by thier numbers a sane society with reasonable boundaries of conduct because they have worked it out within themselves personally and apply it to thier relationships.Psychologically over time if we heal we may be strong enough get honest about ourselves and our social mistakes and not let authority figures,fear or sacred cows tell us how to live anymore.
Finally we might not want any more "culture wars"and really mean it this time.

Authoritarian personalities psychologically have proven time and again they really cannot handle having power in a sane way.Look at history.It's obvious. Where is the department of Peace?
Authoritarians want power so they can abuse people,con them and command them.They think they are superior they are narcissistic.
They want to abuse power and get away with it, They like the way power creates social illusions and gives leaders perks like,gifts and the benifiet of a doubt,.Authoriutarians need corruption, nespotism,P.R.and the illusion of"norms" to cover their ass and to color the function of politics.Nespotism can accomplish this for them..Thier ambition is overweening to get what they want and believe they are entitled to take it.They have a different morality.A machivellian one.And there are people on this same sick side of culture who secretly want to put their inner locus of self control into following orders in chains of command,they have a entality of slaves held by authorities and want to believe following orders somehow absolves them of the results of thier decision making process,thinking the powerful want or can create psychological boundaries for them they don't want to be consious of ,and they hope obedience takes away thier responsibility for thier own decisions to obey. Niether of these kinds of personalities can be trusted TRtHe authoritarian has no boundaries regarding scruples and the followers don't use enough of a will of thier own to disobey a corrupted order enough to know what scruples are, and both have no clue what is responsible,fair,sane,just or even what freedom is and what having it requires of us..

Both of these kinds of personality types need each other to keep the sick game going on,and neither cannot be trusted to reason out the complexities of social issues without thier own urges and reactions coloring and controlling how they percieve other people who do not fit any of those roles these two kinds of personality co-create for each other that damages any social system.

It's interesting to observe how these personalities get others motivated to let them become involved with political or religious structures for all the wrong reasons..until the structure itself collapses because it's too corrupt to bear the weight of it's own liars posing as good at the top.