Being gay is hard work, as almost all of us know. Besides being blamed for the moral decline of society by religious zealots and politicians, there are a lot of other horrific things that occur that people just need a group of people to blame-- and even in 2018 being gay still means sometimes being an easy target.
While we understand that being uninventive is sort of that side of history's schtick, at some point we need to take a step back and say: enough is enough. We've compiled the 14 most absurd things that gay people have been blamed for.
The Baltimore Riots
The Baltimore Riots were supposedly not incited by the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of the police, but by gay people! In case you missed it, U.S. Rep. Bill Flores, a
Texas Republican, went on record saying, “You look at what is going on in Baltimore today, and you see the issues that are raised there. Healthy marriages are the ones between a man and a woman because they can have a healthy family and they can raise children in the way that’s best for their future, not only socially but psychologically, economically, from a health perspective.” In an effort to divert attention away from the actual issue, Flores decided to shove his foot in his mouth.
U2
Russian politician Alexander Starovoitov publically criticized Apple for putting U2’s new album on users’ Apple devices for free.
Starovoitov claims that the technology giant is plotting to corrupt the youth of the world subtly because the album features “the band’s drummer, Larry Mullen Jr, embracing his 18-year-old son, Elvis, shirtless.” According to this Russian leader, the gay agenda’s main vehicle is dad-rock that only a few confused gay people actually listen to.
Divorce Rates
Fanatics have been claiming that homosexual marriage has been ruining the sanctity of the act for heterosexual couples. One could logically think that the demise of marriage is actually due to cheating, abuse, etc. but it’s probably easier to just blame gay people for your own relationship issues.
Hurricane Sandy
Plenty of natural disasters have been blamed on the gays, but right-wing Preacher John McTernan took to his blog of insane ramblings to call out the gay men and women of the world for causing a devastating natural disaster. "God is systematically destroying America," McTernan wrote, “Just look at what has happened this year." In addition to gays destroying the world, McTernan blames Obama’s support of marriage equality as a systematic dismantling of our country.
Japanese Tsunami of 2011
Although this Tsunami in
Japan caused 16,000 deaths and over 34 billion (dollars? yen?)in damages, some people had a different interpretation as to what caused it. Sentient clothes hanger Cindy Jacobs of the General’s International Ministry of Red Oak, Texas, found some “shocking” correlations between the “don’t ask, don’t tell” bill and the tragedy. Jacobs went on record to state: “Oopening up our military to open homosexuality. “When we break God’s law, it actually causes cycles of nature to come afterwards.” Umm...what?
9/11
The Reverend Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson sent off a firestorm when
they publicly stated that an angry God had brought terrorists against the United States. According to these crackpots, God had decided to wipe out our country due to abortions and homosexuality.
Hurricane Katrina
Although this hurricane killed 1,836 people, it was described by zealots as “divine retribution.” The Democratic Unionist Party—a right-wing political party in Northern Ireland—Councillor Maurice Mills went on record to state that New Orleans was being punished because people in the United States practice “sodomy.”
Climate Change
British politician David Silvester went on record to say that
God controls the weather and by British Prime Minister David Cameron allowing same sex marriage he went “arrogantly against the gospel.” Silvester went on to claim that this is why there are floods ravaging his country and homosexual love was altering the
climate of the world.
The 2008 economic collapse
Rick Santorum has a lot to
SAY when it comes to homosexuality, including that gay people don’t just cause natural disasters. Santorum went on to state that doing butt-stuff can also cause the economic to fall into shambles with, “Letting the family break down and in fact encouraging it and inciting more breakdown through this whole redefinition of marriage debate, and not supporting strong nuclear families and not supporting and standing up for the dignity of human life.” Non-nuclear families are in, Rick! Giving loans out to people who can’t afford them are definitely out.
Tornados
In May of 2013 a tornado swept across Oklahoma killing 24 and injuring 240. Instead of letting the families of the victims mourn in peace, the Westboro Baptist Church had to say their peace. Fred Phelp’s Jr. tweeted that their was a
direct correlation between the tornado and the support of openly gay NBA star Jason Collins. Not sure which is the bigger joke, that gay people can actually cause a natural disaster or the Westboro Baptist Church members tweeting.
AIDs
Although the disease has claimed over 36 million lives to this date, it is still widely considered a “gay” disease. Most people attribute this to the
AIDs epidemic in the United States where some of the first documented cases of AIDs were amongst the gay population, but since the disease affects every person of every race/ sexual orientation this logic seems pretty stupid.
The Lack of Ebola Vaccine
According to Right-Wing commenter Erick Erickson, the reason we all do not have an Ebola Vaccine is due to “fat lesbians.” Erickson blamed the lack of vaccine on the fact that National Institute of Health conducted a study on the relationship between sexual orientation and obesity. I’m not sure how he came to this conclusion but its so far detached from reality people probably believed it.
Droughts
During Anita Bryant’s “Save The Children” crusade, she decided that gay men were to blame for California’s drought in the 80s. Ironically enough,
Anita Bryant would go on to elaborate on this theory in her infamous and ironic Playboy interview.
Communism
So maybe communism isn’t considered gay people’s fault, but during the 1950’s there was a major fear that queer people were part of the communist regime. During what is now considered the
Lavender Scare, gay people were accused of working in the government to pass along information to communist parties and were subsequently fired from their jobs.
