“God Killed Him For Loving Fags!” (UPDATED)

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing click to enlargeUpdating from Monday's DKos post... A guitar playing man who was supportive of same sex marriage passed out at my feet a little after 5pm. The medics gave him CPR for over 20 minutes before they moved him. He looked bad. The crowd was very compassionate about the man's condition except, of course, the crazy fundamentalist "Christians" on hand to protest. I asked on protester why wouldn't he pray for the guy instead of shouting about anal sex? He replied "God killed him for loving fags!" I thought the man died and the badgering by the fundamentalists really shook me up. But I have good news today. Petrelis Files and Pam's House Blend learned a lot more about the idiot yelling and the gentleman who collapsed. The fundamentalist is named Kevin Farrer and he has a website - Cry To God. He is a roofer from Fremont (Sonrise Roofing), according to the Golden Gate Xpress. It seems Farrer leaves a trail of hate wherever he goes - San Jose, Santa Barbara, and points east. The guitar player, Petrelis calls him Joni, is alive after suffering cardiac arrest and is in guarded condition at Saint Mary's Hospital. We are still casting the net out there for this man's real name. If anyone knows, please drop us an email. SPECIAL REQUEST FOR TCD FANS: The San Francisco Chronicle is pondering the addition of new cartoons for their paper - a process that seems to be initiated by Darren Bell, creator of Candorville (one of my daily reads - highly recommended). You can read the Chronicle article here and please add your thoughts to the comments if you wish. If anything, put in a good word for Darren and Candorville. I am submitting Town Called Dobson to the paper for their consideration. They seem to have given great weight to receiving 200 messages considering Candorville. I am asking TCD fans to try to surpass that amount. (I get more than that many hate mails a day, surely fans can do better?) This is not a race between the two of us, it is a hope that more progressive strips can be represented in the printed press of America. So if you read the San Francisco Chronicle or live in the Bay Area (Google Analytics tell me there are a lot of you), please send your kind comments (or naked, straining outrage) to David Wiegand at his published addresses below. If you are a subscriber, cut out your mailing label and staple it to a TCD strip and include it in your letter. candorcomment@sfchronicle.com or David Wiegand Executive Datebook Editor The San Francisco Chronicle 901 Mission St. San Francisco, CA 94103

Feminists 1, Biblethumpers 0

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing click to enlargeWhen I was growing up in an evangelical family, there was a lot of bullshit in terms of what I had to believe. These days, the BS evangelicals must swallow is a lot higher, wider and deeper than it was in 1979. But I think the general social trend is growing more progressive. The more we as a society grow in a progressive way, the louder and more idiotic the evangelicals must be to survive - the more attention they must draw to themselves. The more progressive pressure that is applied to evangelicals, the more they are forced to move farther to the right, thus the more inconsequential they become. For example let's look at the Ku Klux Klan. The KKK used to be a huge influence, especially in the American South. They were terrorists and those that are still members of the Klan should be regarded as terrorists. They should be put on the no-fly list and treated the same as Al Qaeda. Eventually, over several generations, America tossed out the idea of "blacks being inferior" and we have moved toward a more colorless society. Before you send me hate mail, let me say, racism is alive and well in America and we still have a long way to go. A very long way. When I was born in the 60's, Blacks in the South had to jump through unimaginable hoops just to vote. Now, the woman that handled my last voter registration issue at the local Board of Elections was Black. In less than 40 years, that is a HUGE change. Less than 50 years ago, a Black man marrying a White woman could lead to a lynching. Now, hardly anyone cares. I am a White guy who has been married to a Black woman for 15 years and never has anyone come up to me and said something stupid. We are just another American couple - not a mixed race couple, an American couple. Even when we travel to the rural parts of North Carolina, where Rebel Flags grace damn near every front yard, no one cause a ruckus, no one give us the disapproving eye. Nothing. Clearly, we are not living in 1960. Clearly Dr. King moved mountains. I think the internet helps. The web is a barrage of free speech - an assault of ideas ranging from sublime to spectacular. From recipes to lifestyles, you are constantly having your ideas challenged. Your way of thinking reevaluated. It as neurological Darwinism on fast forward. It happens one person at a time. Before I moved to the real town of Dobson, NC, I was well on my way to challenging the ideas of my evangelical family. The first thing on the list was religion, or at least the laundry list of crazy ideas I was required to subscribe to. And religion was the first thing to go. I went to the Synagogue, I went to the Mosque, I went to everything I could find. (I never could find a snake-handling church - that would have rocked!) I eventually dumped Christianity and went home. Same thing we race. I started dating out of my race in High School (more like mowed through according to my friends at the time). Then my political views were challenged. Tink Von Wagnersteinstadtdorffmacher is the new character in the strip - actually not new, I drew her years ago as she was one of the original characters but it is her first appearance. Her storyline is starting. Biblethumper Jr. has increasingly been questioning his father for some time. And now he has met Tink and Tink will change him more than he ever expected. The real life Tink is a girl I went to High School with. I loved spending time with her family. The stuff her brother and I got into was right out of Ferris Bueller. There was this one time we met this redneck with a donkey... oh never mind... Tink didn't read Teen Beat or magazines focused on the young female demographic, she subscribed to US News and World Report. After her brother and I would finish up a night of harassing rednecks on the back roads of Surry County, the Von Wagnersteinstadtdorffmacher family and I would drive to Hardee's at midnight for a round of biscuits and foreign policy chat. Where others challenged me on racism, they challenged me on politics. And I changed. Yesterday White males flocked to Barack Obama to vote for him in the Potomac Primaries. White guys voted for a Black man to pull this nation to safety. Change has been underway since Dr. King told us of his dream. Barack isn't campaigning on bringing change, he is change manifest. Obama is where he is at today because society changed, one person at a time.

Romney’s Secret Weapon Against Huckabee

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing click to enlargeIf somehow Mitt Romney can overcome Rudy's mistress/police scandal and Huckabee's religious fueled surge in the polls, he may have one thing that can help him in the general election - a lack of serious religious fundamentalism in his past. Yeah, I know, he is not my candidate either and I abhor his policies. I know he wants to crawl up into my wife's uterus and legislate what she does with her ova and I understand he is a nutcase when it comes to foreign policy and economics. All of that aside, he doesn't hold a candle to Huckabee. Huckabee IS A ORDAINED SOUTHERN BAPTIST MINISTER!!! You can't get more cranky than that unless you are wearing a Klan hood. Most of my issues surrounding Christianity stems from the Southern Baptists - they deny science, they generally believe the Bible is the literal word of God and are some of the most bigoted people I know. I actually know Southern Baptists who voted for Bush and STILL support him because he is God's instrument for bringing about the Rapture. Understand I am also not a Mormon, but you must admit, they do not have THAT track record. They have had their own problems (Blacks being not fully human, etc.) but they have made great strides in correcting those problems. Kinda like when Bill Gates realized the Internet WAS going to be important after all and moved the whole of Microsoft in that direction overnight. The likes of Jim Jeffords I do not associate with the Latter Day Saints whatsoever. To all of us secularists, Romney is much more digestible than Huckabee. He is not weighed down by that cross Huckabee drags around everywhere he goes. As a meth addict once told me, "come down off that cross, someone else needs the wood."

True Thanksgiving Story

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing click to enlargeSome years ago, one of my family members came up with the idea of renaming deviled eggs, "angel eggs." We had a good laugh at the craziness of it but over the years the name stuck. This year, my wife and I struck back with Satan's Ovaries!!! A good time was had by all. NOTE: This strip is dedicated to Crystal Mercer and the whole angel egg thing was her idea!