Bryan Fischer, off the deep end

Bryan Fischer of the Idaho Values Alliance has gone off the deep end in his endless efforts to paint homosexuals as a predatory fringe element in society, rather than a robust (about 8-10 percent) and overwhelmingly law-abiding segment of our population. The Idaho-based LGBT blog PrideDepot has been following Fischer's fearmongering - and how the traditional media falls for it, time after time after time  - in recent posts including here (Monday) and here (Tuesday).

Comments

[Kitt@work]

I wasn't even aware of Pride Depot blog until Mountain Depot referenced it one day. What a find.

[theresa]

My opinion, and perhaps only mine, is that NO Bryan had fallen OFF the deep end ages ago, and seems to really love it there - zero intent of coming back .....

t

[tvanegas]

Fischer is a maniac. Unfortunately or fortunately, however you choose to look at it, the guy has managed to help move the Idaho Republican party further to the right. The Republican party, by catering to the extreme Right, is making itself less relevant to the average Idahoan. Hopefully the Democratic party can take advatage of that.

[Julie in Boise]

tvanegas, are you a buuf'er? I think I may know you! Thanks for stopping by here.

You're right: Fischer has been a key player in the Idaho GOP's reactionary retrograde lurch. (I refuse to say they're "right," even if it's great shorthand.) And Dems may well be able to capitalize on it.

t, you are also right, er, correct that Fischer went off the deep end years ago. It is interesting, though, how his rhetoric seems to get ever more heated as reality dawns - per a recent Pew study - that a majority of young (under 30) Americans are fine with gay marriage and acceptance has risen in all older age groups as well.

The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. History is leaving him behind, and it will abandon the Steve Thayns, Adam Grahams, et al of the world just as surely.

[sharon fisher]

Actually, I was grateful to Bryan Fischer (by way of MountainGoat) a while ago for alerting me to a letter sent out to residents of District 21, on Republican party letterhead, from Republican precinct captains, encouraging people to consider a slate of faith-based challengers against the incumbents in this district, which he attributed to causing the loss of the incumbent I was facing. I'm still trying to find out more information about those letters and how they came to be.

Just goes to show that there's always some point of commonality between two people they can agree on, and then work from there.

[Julie in Boise]

Sharon,

And they say they don't want a theocracy. It's bullpucky.

The question is: Do most Idahoans? I don't believe we do, whether in Boise's North End, Kuna, or anywhere else.

[tvanegas]

Hi Julie, I do attend BUUF, though I haven't been in a while.

[Bubblehead]

First off, I agree that Bryan Fischer is way off the deep end in trying to imply that law abiding gay citizens are any more of a risk of being child molesters than anyone else. That being said, I'm interested in Julie's claim that homosexuals make up 8-10% of the population. Most studies put the number at 3-5%, including this recent poll by Hunter College that says 2.9%: http://www.pollster.com/blogs/moore_hunter_colleges_lgb_poll.php

There are a lot of facts we have to use against Bryan Fischer and his ilk. We should use them.

[Julie in Boise]

Bubblehead,

Not my estimate. The 8-10% was cited in one of the Pride Depot posts, via a UCLA researcher. It sounds high to me, too, but anything below 3% is probably wrong as well.

Of course, the LGBT community has an interest in using the highest estimates it can find and Fischer et al the lowest. I'm guessing that as homosexuality becomes more accepted, better estimates will eventually result.

[Bubblehead]

I looked at the source document used in the Pride Depot report, and it looks like they had a typo. That report said there are 8.8 million GLBs in the U.S., which works out to 2.9%. The Pride Depot report mistyped and said 8.8%