Anti-Equality Spokesman Warns of Civil War, Because of Course

Welp, the Family Research Council is publishing reliably reasonable statements about the recent marriage equality victories in the US.  Via the agency's blog, authored by Rob Schwarzwalder:

"I’m haunted by the memory of William Seward’s comment, immediately before the Civil War, that strife between North and South over slavery constituted 'an irrepressible conflict.'

Millions of Americans simmer with resentment at the coerced redefinition of marriage the courts are imposing on them, despite referenda in dozens of states where they have affirmed the traditional definition of marriage quite explicitly. 

The Dred Scott decision did not decide the issue of human bondage. The Roe v. Wade decision has not decided the issue of abortion on demand. And the continued federal court confusion over same-sex unions only postpones a day of legal reckoning that could create a measure of civic sundering unwitnessed in our nation for decades.

Even if the Supreme Court has valid reasons for postponing their decision on this issue, postponement is not resolution. I fear that whatever decision the Supremes finally reach will not resolve it, either."

Three observations.

One, from the blogs of the conservative advocacy groups that I read, the "simmering resentment" primarily seems to be that of the dozen or so well-off white Christian heterosexual anti-LGBT men who lead these agencies and who are therefore big-time pissed off that they are publicly losing on the marriage equality front in the US and might have to come up with new strategies to maintain their relevancy and livelihoods.

Two, it's neat how white Christian heterosexual anti-LGBT men so often co-opt historical slavery, which so many of them insist, in other contexts, has had no lingering impact on African-Americans today. If this man were a person of color threatening war and civil uprising, especially a non-Christian, he'd be widely lambasted as an un-American terrorist.

Three, I'm somewhat intrigued by the rightwing "bunker survivalist" mentality.  Like, I watch those shows on Netflix of people who stockpile food rations and, oh yes, guns. Lots of guns and ammo and traps and such. And, it seems like they're almost always featuring white hetero families with a strong patriarchal figure leading the charge, at least when all the guns and militaristic planning is involved.

I don't doubt that some of what many of these people do is genuine concern about civil unrest and survival.  I mean, I have a plan - do you?  If you see something, say something!

But,  and perhaps it's due to that way they talk about their armaments, I always get this inkling that, like, maybe some of these people want the civil unrest to happen? I don't know because maybe they're unhappy with the current societal structure and set of rules, but if something BIG happened, they would finally get to be like, BA-BAM and shoot shit up without consequence. Like, all the planning, all the warning maybe is a bit of a hopeful fantasy for some people?

Anyway, my point is that of all the harms to society that bigots tell us will result from same-sex marriage, the suggestion that it will cause civil war is just so fucking absurd that I start questioning what else is going on behind such a suggestion.