Equal Rights Activists: Support Your Local Hate Group!

This?   This is going to be another of those “uncomfortable” rants.    Just warning.

That said.

I have this little problem with a few things that I’ve been reading and hearing lately.   And I’m hoping that you, reading this, do as well.   Or at least, that you will once you’ve had a bit of time to digest this. 

I’m tired of hearing protesting over “equal rights”, “civil rights”, and “oppressed minorities”.   Yes, I realize there are oppressed minorities out there.   By definition, oppression is almost always against a minority.   But that word?   Minority?   “You keep using that word.   I do not think it means what you think it means.”

A minority is a group which is smaller than the opposing group – known as the “majority”.   It does not mean “black” vs. “white”, or “trans” vs. “hetero”, or even “gay” vs. “straight”.   So when you refer to minorities, please – be specific.   Because I’m through listening to rants about the evil oppression of minorities, from someone who can’t quantify what they mean by “minorities” or “the oppressors”.  

On equal rights.   Equal rights are, by definition, equal.  

See how that works, Virginia? 

Equal means “being the same in quantity, size, degree, or value”.   Or, “a person or thing considered to be the same as another in status or quality”. "

I want you to think about that for a second. Equal.  Rights.   Rights which are the SAME in quantity, size, degree or value.  

Inevitably, the same people protesting for “equal rights” are also protesting against the rights of the groups they disagree with.   And herein lies my problem – “equal rights” now means “special rights for my group”.    “Equal rights” is now equated with “special rights for minorities is good, equal rights for everyone else is bad”.  

These same world-saving protestors (*cough*hypocrits!*cough*) mouth the phrase “equal rights” while demanding things that only benefit one side of the argument.   Or even demanding things that deliberately cut out the equality of the opposing side of the argument.   Some even go so far as to try to have the groups they disagree with labeled as hate groups.    

You don’t see the irony?   A group is cutting out the right of expression or belief from another group, and demanding only “their” rights be pre-eminent…and doing it with political pressure, force of volume, over-embellished statements, and emotional blackmail.  

That?   That’s called oppression.   See?   Irony.  

These same crusaders try to have the opposition shut down, or at least shut out of the media and shut out of having their free speech.    They label them with one of the “bad words” (racist, hate group, hate crime, anti-semite, etcetera) to have their voice silenced.   (See my rant about the Causist-Labeling Bat.) 

That kind of behavior, frankly, is about as far from true belief in equality as it gets.    Because here’s the thing – if you really care about equal rights, you mean “equal for all”, not “MY group’s rights”.   And everyone has the “equal right” to express themselves, and believe how they like.   Actions may be illegal – but their beliefs and expressions aren’t and shouldn’t be made that way. 

Case in point.   Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church.   I personally think the man and his followers are the kind of people who make you wonder if the doctor threw out the baby and swaddled the after-birth.  (See that?   Free expression.)  

But the man, and his people, have the right to be heard.   And the right to protest.   And the right to congregate in public about  issues that concern them.   Labeling them a hate group, blocking them from veterans’ funerals, or using the Peace Riders to block their access to public ground for purposes of assembly?  

That’s not equal rights, folks.  

Equal speech, equal rights, equal respect for everyone?   If you really believed in them, you’d be out there protecting the rights of the KKK to use the “N” word, or for Fred Phelps’ right to put up billboards proclaiming his view of God’s feelings about gays, or even arguing for the rights of abortion clinic owners, and standing up for the Neo-Nazi’s when they want to march on Washington.   

Funny – I don’t see a lot of people doing that.   The people crusading for equal rights always seem to be the ones on the other side, over-powering the “evil” group by sheer volume, or by calling names in the media. 

Both sides have the right to express their opinions.   There’s that “equality” thing.  But trying to pass a law to limit an opposing group’s ability to speak and gather isn’t an “equal rights” measure.   It’s fascism, plain and simple.  Trying to shove your group’s special rights views into my child’s head under the guise of school sponsored “edutainment” isn’t teaching equality either.   It’s brain-washing.  

So if you’re bitching that Westboro Baptist shouldn’t be allowed to protest funerals?   Or you want the KKK outlawed?  

You don’t really care about equal rights.  You care about Group-Specific rights.  

Here’s a litmus test.   If you’re trumpeting your beliefs over the beliefs of others by sheer volume, or if you are using the “Causist Labeling Bat”, or find yourself announcing that someone’s beliefs are “evil” or “unfair”…then you aren’t acting towards equal rights.   You are acting against them.   You only care about the rights of YOUR group.    That isn’t “equal”.    That’s “special”.  

If you are sitting there tolerating what the extremists have said –without shutting them up, shouting over them or using the causist-labeling-bat to devalue their opinions?   That’s a sign of belief in equality.  

I don’t hold the beliefs of any of the groups above.   I personally disagree with them.    What I do, though, is support their right to speak.   I support their right to protest, and march, and be present in the public eye.  

Because equal means equal.   Not special.   Not “equal for (group).”   Equal.  For everyone.   Whether you approve of them or not – that’s (again) why it’s supposed to be Tolerance, not Acceptance.    (Don’t worry – there’s a nice little rant coming on that topic too.)  

And yet there seems to be a sale on lately, because everywhere I turn I’m hearing about the “new crusade” for equal rights – on things that are inherently “special”.   

It’s not an equal rights argument if it “supports” anyone, my darlings.   An “equal rights” bill that only addresses treatment for one group?   Guaranteed that marginalizes another – and fifty years later, we’ll be coming back around for it.  

Your rights end at the tip of my nose.   Or at the tip of Fred Phelps’ nose.   And at the tip of Samir Shabazz’s nose too. 

But when you send my child home with letters disguised as homework, supporting your cause?  When you cover my damned car with flyers for your trans-love/tween-identity/vampire-rights rally, or when you paint pictures in support of your favored political candidate on the walls of public schools using public funds that I’m forced to pay for?   That’s no longer you exercising your rights.  

That is you abusing the public venue, and demanding we all pay attention to your attention whoring ways, because that’s just your “equal time”, and you just want your “rights”.

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