Teaching Gay History & Manipulating Black Voters

In California a law was passed that requires public schools to include prominent gay people and gay rights milestones into the school's curriculum. Of course the Evangelicals and Tea Party members are organizing and working to get 504,760 signatures from registered voters to get a ballot referendum that would repeal this law. They are telling would-be voters that the new mandate would inappropriately expose young children to sex, infringe on parental rights and silence religion-based criticisms of homosexuality. I first read about this on a popular blog that has a large African-American following. Then I started to read some of the comments and I couldn't believe how vicious the homophobia and hate speech was in a large majority of the posts. Some of the homophobia was expected, but I didn't expect the amount of sheer ignorance that was prevalent in almost every comment. So of course I had to leave a comment of my own in hopes that someone would read it and see the world from a different perspective. So here's what I wrote:

After reading some of the comments, it's clear that I can't assume that everyone who read this article and are reading my comment are intelligent enough to see what's going on here. First let me explain one thing that most of the "Bible beaters" are missing... so listen close. This law in no way allows any school or teacher to teach or discuss ANYTHING DEALING WITH SEX OF ANY KIND... GAY OR STRAIGHT. I'm puzzled by the huge leaps, exaggerations and assumptions being made by those leaving comments here. If all I knew about this story came from the "Bible beaters", I'd think the schools were having classes that taught children how to have gay sexual intercourse complete with pictures videos diagrams and live demonstrations. I know I'm being a little facetious here but it's not that far from reality. The TRUTH is, this law allows the school curriculum to include FACTS about some very important people in American history that happen to be gay. Learning about the gay uprising at "Stonewall", or learning about the gay civil rights activist Bayard Rustin who worked in the trenches of the Civil Rights Movement as a close advisor to Dr. Martin Luther King (who was well aware of Rustin's sexuality and accepted him for who he was instead of condemning him), or learning about Glenn Burke who's a legend in Major League Baseball who refused to stay in the closet and live a lie just to keep his job, or learning about Harry Hay who started the first national gay rights organization and who's credited as the "father" of the gay right movement, or learning about Harvey Milk who lost his life fighting for ethnic, gender and gay equality... and there are hundreds of other notable brave figures and important events that are a part of American history that shouldn't be ignored just to pacify the ignorance of religious zealots. This country, it's citizens, and our children deserve better than that. America is a land governed by laws that ensures our freedom. This works because our freedom is absolute without the taint of religion. This ideal/promise is written in the first amendment of our Constitution in very plain English. It erects a proverbial wall of separation between church and state. When we start letting religion interfere with government, we are no longer a free country. Just look at how well establishing a religious dictatorship works in Iran. 

The other issue that needs to be addressed is the timing of this ballot referendum. I want people to open their eyes and realize when they're being played. The closer we get to the presidential election, you'll see stories and articles deliberately planted and precisely timed to manipulate the African-American community. Republicans have used this same tactic over and over again to distract us from real issues, and it seems to work every time. Remember President Bush and how he got elected? He had more African-American votes than any other Republican candidate in recent history. They know how prevalent homophobia is in our community, so they launched a PR campaign that targeted Black churches and got them all stirred up and scared that gay's would get equal rights if they didn't elect him. And that's all it took. The church my mom attends received faxed messages with urgent warnings about the so-called "gay agenda" to recruit their children and spread Aids to everyone. I couldn't even read the whole document because it saddened me that my people were buying into this B S. And as a consequence Bush got elected and proceeded to destroy and obliterate the Black middle class. So I beg of you, whether or not you agree or disagree with gay rights, PLEASE DO NOT LET THEM TRICK US THIS TIME because the stakes are too high and the future of our community hangs in the balance... gay and straight.