Oklahoma State Senator Tom Woods was at a forum with other law makers when a woman asked:
“Why does the Legislature have such an obsession with the LGBTQ citizens of Oklahoma and what people do in their personal lives and how they raise their children?”
She then went on to bring up the Nex Benedict case. This was a non-binary student who died after receiving a beat down from three girls in the school bathroom. Although, the police are currently stating that Benedict did not die from trauma.
Senator Tom Woods responded by saying:
“We are a Republican state – supermajority – in the House and Senate. I represent a constituency that doesn’t want that filth in Oklahoma… We are a religious state and we are going to fight it to keep that filth out of the state of Oklahoma because we are a Christian state – we are a moral state.”
I have no idea what morality he is practicing, but in my universe his ersatz morality is resolutely immoral. I would apply my immorally moral to this man. If nothing else using such a pejorative as filth to denigrate a whole class of people is immoral. Within the bounds of the Golden Rule, people being who they are, and loving who they love are not immoral acts ~~ Book of David 1:1
Christianity, at its best, is a loving, accepting religion, providing a sense of community to many, ministering to the the poor and needy, giving a sense of purpose in a chaotic and unfathomable universe that is exceedingly arbitrary in its treatment of living things.
By and large, though, that is not what is practiced in this country, especially in the Bible Belt. To me, it appears that more than a few ostensible Christians in these here Uniteds are having fantasies about renewing the Spanish Inquisition, or at least of setting up a theocracy. Talk about your Sharai law, it would be that, just a different flavor.
One of the few prayers I still say: God save us from the religious.
A couple links about the story:
Report: Oklahoma senator calls LGBTQ+ ‘filth’ when asked about Nex Benedict, gender legislation
Video Shows Nonbinary Teen Nex Benedict Reflecting on Fight Before Their Death
We need to do better.