irish queersThe St. Patrick’s Day Parade is a Catholic celebration beginning with a Holy Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It is an ancient affair by American standards, steeped in centuries of tradition celebrating the Saint who set Ireland on fire for Christ and it includes much Irish culture and lore. It is a rare iconic cultural event in a culturally starved country. The Irish Queers and Guinness would like to start a fire of their own to irrevocably transform this treasure of a tradition. The scandal is one in a long line of assaults on public morality and a troubling omen for the future of this benighted country.

Guinness Beers has an ironic sales slogan. They say “the Choices We Make Reveal the True Nature of Our Character.” Hmm, sure, spot on really. So what does it say about the character of Guinness, an Irish company that chose to withdraw support from an Irish tradition honoring an Irish Catholic Saint and instead chose to support a non-traditional, non-Catholic morally disordered political agenda? Got Character?

It is vital to note that the parade organizers allow no banners or groups to march promoting political causes; it is not that kind of parade. Why would Guinness try to force parade organizers to make an exception for the gay rights movement? Especially in light of the fact that in 1995 the United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously that private parade organizers are guaranteed by the First amendment to determine their own rules for their march? Guinness demonstrates an odd business ethic by pulling sponsorship claiming the need for “diversity” when clearly they are trying to coerce the uniformity of opinion onto a legitimately controversial topic. They will get no pass here. Guinness has proven their sales slogan to be an empty platitude for them. Still, one wonders if Guinness’ lack of character is nearly as devastating as the absurdity of the demands and statements made by the Irish Queers.

There is not a single statement, sign, banner, or message put out by the Irish Queers that possesses logical consistency or ethical integrity. The banners and signs are very troubling indeed for their misrepresentation of truth. Examine only a few. It is merely an unfortunate homophone, but on the lightest note, the Irish Queers insist that “there is ‘gae’ in Gaelic.” To the contrary, the Geal in Gaelic is an Irish Warrior, not an Irish Queer. I would like to see them explain that on the field of battle in the land of Éire.

The Irish queers arrogate a rather imposing stance on New York public employees marching in the ancient parade. The Irish Queers held signs reading: “cops and firefighters aren’t heroes when they support hate.” The specific and intended purpose of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade is not hate. That the protestors claim otherwise shows that they will assert incongruous premises with nary a care for truth in representation.

And consider a very bizarre false equivalent on this sign: “no queers? No cops either!” How did they reach this infantile conclusion?

Another false equivalent, a sign sporting pink shamrocks senselessly inquires: “it took the Church 367 years to apologize to Galileo, I guess we can’t expect an apology for homophobia anytime soon.” Well, no, first off because the Church is not homophobic and second, no apology is necessary for a morally ordered position. But more logically offensive is the disparity between the Galileo affair and the Church’s moral stance on homosexuality, there is no relationship and nothing to compare here, just yet another false equivalent.

Many signs said “bigotry shouldn’t be paraded.” How is the celebration of St. Paddy’s Day parading bigotry? This insult gets at the root of the Irish Queers’ violence against truth and society. One of the biggest insults the Irish Queers constantly hurl at those of us who oppose sanctioning the gay lifestyle is that we are bigoted and intolerant. I doubt they know what bigoted means, but even if they did, it is unlikely that it would temper their outrageous behavior.

This is something we ought to get straight, (no pun intended). Bigoted is defined as having “intolerance toward those who hold different opinions from oneself.” The great irony with this entire episode is that the real bigots are the Irish Queers, not the organizers of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade. The idea of the Irish Queers marching under a political banner at the St. Patrick’s Day Parade is as absurd as the NRA marching for second amendment rights at a Girl Scout parade. It is a non sequitur because there is no relationship between the St. Patrick’s Day festivities and gay rights. The real bigots are the Irish Queers who try to impose gay rights issues on those who have no interest in them concomitant to celebrating the Irish Saint.

Gay rights advocates are the most bigoted and intolerant class of all because disagreement is normally met with rigid intolerance if not threats and violence. To drive this point home, Bill Donahue from the Catholic League solicited the Heritage of Pride Parade organizers to see if they would allow him to march in their gay pride parades with the banner reading “Straight is Great.” They told him that he must attend “gay training sessions” before they would allow him to march. Bill Donahue said he rejected their rule and they told him the classes are “mandatory.” The hypocrisy is glaring because unlike the St. Patrick’s Day Parade that excludes all political banners, the gay pride parades encourage political banners, just not from the straight community. So they have a double standard. Also, gay pride organizers expect everyone to follow their rules, which are unfairly discriminatory, but they don’t respect the rules of other organizers even though those rules are clearly fair and possess no double standard.

The Irish Queers rage against reality intolerantly screeching the demand for “tolerance.” They rightfully claim this is a virtue, but again, like everything else in the gay pride movement, their definition of “tolerance” bears no resemblance to truthful tolerance. Imaginative conservatives understand that we are called to tolerate all human persons as precious images and likenesses of God. However, we do not tolerate unprincipled or disordered actions, and this is as it should be. Well-ordered society cannot tolerate bad behavior but must tolerate all persons!

By diametric converse, the Irish Queers clearly demonstrate that they clamor for tolerance of disordered behavior and they sanction intolerance and even violence towards human persons who disagree with them. Their error is that they refer to licentiousness as something to be tolerated and that precious human souls are to be degraded if acquiescence to their view is faltering or absent. This is the opposite of tolerance, but characteristic of the entire gay pride movement. To add further irony to this already insanely bizarre set of circumstances, the Irish Queers, though they tolerate all manner of aberrant behavior, will not tolerate the behavior of those persons they deem “hateful” or “bigoted” even if it is as innocuous as marching in a St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

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