Friday, May 08, 2009

TEMPESTS IN TINY TEA CUPS

Not long ago, Miss California, Carrie Prejean, was asked by Miss U.S.A. pageant judge, Perez Hilton what she thought of same-sex marriage. Never mind that it was a politically loaded question that should never have come up -- she answered it.

It was not an unambiguous, straightforward answer. Prejean, who finished second in the pageant, first said she was glad to live in a country in which people could make that decision for themselves, then -- almost as an after thought -- gave the opinion that marriage should only be between a man and a woman.

It is an opinion to which she is entitled, but the first part of her answer and subsequent actions opened her up for charges of hypocrisy. You can’t be glad to live in a country where people are allowed to make their own choices while lobbying to make certain that some people are not allowed to make the choice.

Perez Hilton is a nationally know blogger and a jerk, who is living proof that being gay and being a jerk are not mutually exclusive. The next day, he used a shrill, disrespectful gutter term (bitch) on his blog to describe Prejean and called her stupid. It was in bad taste, demonstrating only that Perez has no class.

Prejean, on the other hand, put her own classiness under suspicion the next morning, by suggesting that she had not won the contest because of her answer. Many on the religious right immediately dropped the suggestion part and began to print it as a fact that she had lost because she opposed same sex marriage.

Then, risqué photos of Prejean turned up on the Internet. As far as risqué goes, they were tame. ( Yes I did some research.) But it was the type of thing those on the religious right -- which is fronting Prejean to suit their agenda -- would have used as evidence, just a few years ago, to prove that she was morally unfit to win a beauty contest.

However, there are standards and there are standards. When radio super moralist Dr. Laura Schlessinger’s full frontal nude photos turned up on the Internet a few years ago, she got a pass from fellow pontificators on the right. The photos were passed off as a youthful indiscretion, even though she was pushing 30 when they were made.

Prejean appears ready to assume a career as a professional moralist. Hey, if they throw you lemons, make lemonade. I would imagine there’s a book in her future and years of profitable appearances ahead of her.

It could not mean any less to me what Miss California’s opinion of gay marriage is -- nor what a celebrity blogger like Hilton thinks. I only looked at his blog long enough to verify the facts.

What worries me is that so many Americans take either Carrie Prejean or Perez Hilton seriously. Oh age of enlightenment, what happened to you?

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