Posted on 03/23/2014 4:11:05 PM PDT by NYer
Bill Donohue comments on his exchange with officials from New York’s Heritage of Pride parade:
For the past few days I have been engaged in an e-mail conversation with officials from the Heritage of Pride parade, New York’s annual gay event; the dialogue has been cordial. I asked to join the parade under a banner that would read, “Straight is Great.” The purpose of my request was to see just how far they would go without forcing me to abide by their rules. It didn’t take long before they did.
Today, I informed Heritage of Pride officials that I objected to their rule requiring me to attend gay training sessions, or what they call “information” sessions. “I don’t agree with your rule,” I said. They responded by saying that attendance was “mandatory.”
The St. Patrick’s Day parade has mandatory rules, too. It bars groups representing their own cause from marching, which is why pro-life Catholics—not just gays—are barred from participating under their own banner. But only gays complain: they refuse to abide by the rules. Indeed, they went into federal court seeking to force a rule change. They lost. In 1995, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that private parades have a First Amendment right to determine their own rules.
It is hypocritical for gay activists to complain about having to abide by the mandatory rules of the St. Patrick’s Day parade, and then inform me that I cannot march in their parade unless I respect their mandatory rules, rules that I reject.
Good luck to the Heritage of Pride participants. I may be watching it from afar, but I sure won’t be downing a Guinness afterwards.
It will be run by the Gaystapo..
Ya, pretty much. His attempt was a mistake in the first place, I think he would lose more than he would gain. And as far as saving face, ya, you're probably right, but I'm not going to blame the guy for it. He lucked out at being given (or creating) a chance to back out from his mistake.
Somehow this is OK but excluding a gay banner from the St. Patrick;s Day Parade isn’t?
I’m for allowing both exclusions.
Careful there! You're talking sense! < /sarc>
A parade MUST allow gay groups to march while promoting their “gayness”. But a straight group isn’t allowed to promote it’s “straightness” in a gay parade.
Have you ever been at a meeting surrounded by angry gay male activists? Well, I have, and it’s not about “let’s all meet at 86th Street and Madison Avenue.” Bill Donahue has a long history of battling angry gays over their evil behavior towards various Catholic churches in the city. It would have been a perfect opportunity for them to attack him and/or “reeducate” him.
I have no doubt that if Bill Donahue was not a part of this parade, it might have been a straight-forward logistical meeting. Pun, unintended.
“Ya, pretty much. His attempt was a mistake in the first place”
I agree completely, his attempt was a mistake. The gay activists had absolutely nothing to lose by saying “sure, you can march in our parade,” since there was never even the slightest chance that Bill Donohue was ever, in a million years, going to march in a gay pride parade. It was an obvious bluff by Donohue, so why wouldn’t they call it?
You’re full of it! Donahue would have gladly marched in the parade. And if you think the activists had nothing to lose, you’re wrong again. He would have had things thrown at him and would have been cursed in the most scatological terms. Fox News, at least, would have reported on this - and certainly my pals over at Gay Patriot would have made a huge deal of it. And Breitbart and all the other conservative media outlets.
No, this is not how we compete. Donohue is playing on their turf, the ideology of radical tolerance. They called his silly bluff and now he looks like a fool. There is no equivalence between a straight (or at least non-ideological) parade and a specifically queer one.
Nonsense. He was never going to march. He even admitted that the whole point was to see how far he could get before running into ANY “mandatory” rules. He never intended to actually march, he was trying to prove a point.
In no way does he say that. Of course he was testing the system! And if they had allowed him to march without any nonsense about sensitivity training, he would have marched (with perhaps others from his organization) under the “straight” banner. Why this is so difficult to believe is beyond me. Others need to challenge these creeps.
Except the language about “sensitivity training” comes from Donohue, not the parade organizers. Anyone who has ever participated in a parade (as Donohue has done many, many times) knows what type of meeting this was. They happen with nearly every parade, particularly in nyc, where the NYPD is pretty strict about logistical issues.
Just keep repeating your mantra and your naïve assumptions about the people who run the New York City gay pride parade.
He won’t attend the orientation?
Okay, I’ll say it.
What. A. Coward.
He got his bluff called, and made himself look the fool. Worse yet, all of us who agree with him look like fools by association.
Why can’t we have leaders with the courage of their convictions? No wonder we’re losing the country - we’re stuck with whiners and excuse-makers.
Be the bigger man, Bill. Show them how it’s done. Go to the information session, learn the safety protocols, ignore the briefing like everybody does, then proudly march in the parade under your own banner, spreading your message to those desperate for it. Come on.
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