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1

"Get in the ovens" is my favorite kook insult in this kook-insult-heavy season. Only question: how do people like this figure out how to use email?

Posted by Fnarf | November 8, 2008 10:50 AM
2

How do we make this the first link that comes up when you google "Garrett Lonegrin"? Right nothing comes up, but I'd be delighted to make this delightful screed the guy's defining contribution to history.

Posted by Jessica | November 8, 2008 10:54 AM
3

Well... um, at least credit him with being honest about his blatant bigotry, I suppose.

What I hate are the Sarah Palins of the world. The "I love gays, I just don't think they deserve special rights" crowd. The saccharine smile. Talking love and civility while quietly sliding the knife into your kidney.

Posted by Reverse Polarity | November 8, 2008 10:56 AM
4

He must be reading from a different translation of the Bible than I'm familiar with.

Posted by flamingbanjo | November 8, 2008 10:59 AM
5

This sounds like a job for the A-Team.

Posted by Matthew | November 8, 2008 10:59 AM
6

I am shocked and dismayed that you failed to give us Garret Lonegrin's email address.

Posted by guy | November 8, 2008 10:59 AM
7

Before you take his God comment and run with it: Just know that most Christians are NOT hatemongers; And none, not even the "fundamentalists", would talk like this guy!
I'd also like to think he's the only one with such twacky thought processes, but... -sigh-

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 10:59 AM
8

I feel bad for the ignorant. I can only imagine the misery this man and those like him must live in.

Posted by Jonathan | November 8, 2008 11:00 AM
9

That is the conservative coalition I had warned Dan about. The issue of civil rights isn't demographics, but a common destiny were this increasingly fragile demographic to break up over mutual stupidity. When Dan says he doesn't mind being grouped with racists, that is a fine example of those with whom he doesn't mind being grouped.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 11:06 AM
10

You should just shoot off his address to the Secret Service.

Or we could just tar and feather. I'm all for a good tar and feathering.

Posted by stilettov | November 8, 2008 11:06 AM
11

I love the sentence construction. 'A' was bad enough but 'B' was...something good.

I too would like his email, merely to set him straight on this language issue.

Posted by gimmeaminute | November 8, 2008 11:08 AM
12

@ 3

not sure how much we can credit him, his email has the sound of somebody lashing out and screaming his brand of 'truth' because he has to keep it bottled up in polite society. E-mail offers him an outlet to speak with the kind of honesty usually only seen in the outbursts of tired old drunks at the local pub.

Posted by Jonathan | November 8, 2008 11:11 AM
13

Wow, there is no way this is real.

Also, 7: No. Your church is a hate-mongering organization.

Posted by Nick | November 8, 2008 11:14 AM
14

Gee, yeah. Feeling like an underdog is so awesome. Losing is the best! I will so miss that great feeling...

Posted by elenchos | November 8, 2008 11:24 AM
15

I was really bummed after learning that Prop 8 was passing in California, but then I remembered how long and how hard Black people struggled to be respected and treated equally by the majority of white people in this country, and I feel a little better about where we are in the fight for marriage equality.

There will always be some racist/homophobe jerks like this, but I have hope - it was very close, and has been pointed out by others, every major civil rights advance in this country has come through legislative or judicial change, not elections.

Earlier this year the HRC posted a memorial to Mildred Loving, one of the plaintiffs in the Supreme Court case that outlawed laws banning interracial marriages. She supported marriage equality for all - if you haven't read it, check it out:
http://www.hrcbackstory.org/2008/05/mildred-loving.html

David, thanks for your stories and slog posts about your marriage and in-laws' reactions. Sorry it's made you a target for losers like Garrett.

Posted by asteria | November 8, 2008 11:26 AM
16

13, if you assume all churches are the same, and all Christians are the same, you are a bigot.

Posted by lee Gibson | November 8, 2008 11:26 AM
17

The appropriate reply to all these e-mails is, "Sour grapes much, loser? Excuse me while I send my resume to the White House."

Posted by Gitai | November 8, 2008 11:29 AM
18

That's Brendan Kiley's idea of humour, you idiot.

Posted by humour | November 8, 2008 11:30 AM
19

Here's a productive strategy, for those who didn't think I had one:

Start a petition to outlaw the rights of churches using state money to care for at-risk children in residential treatment centers to allow outside evangelists to come in and use their pain to convert them into fundamentalists. This happened to me at Catholic Charities when I was nine. I feel that this violated MY rights, as my family is Jewish. It also looks to the future in that it stops people from indoctrinating kids against you by manipulating them using your tax dollars.

Catholic Charities (you know the people who won't adopt out to gays) only started to care for children who weren't actual orphans in the late sixties--again, check out their website--I presume as an adjunct to their stated goals on abortion. I have seen many kids returned to abusive parents after just enough time has been invested to cause them to think that their suffering is caused by original sin, and that adhering to Christian belief will cure their 'spiritual' suffering.

Currently, Catholic Charities are the 'first-response' group for placing abused children due to their lowballing secular organizations on bidding for state contracts (because a child's life is 'priceless'). This in turn limits their ability to provide adequate in-house medical care; moreover, it leads to an incredibly high rate of professional staff turnover. Most of these are minority kids, whose resultant attachment disorders are a perfect match with the idea that their misfortune is caused by their 'sinful' behavior. Some might even turn into whackjobs like this asshole.

They should not be able to use poverty and 'faith based' initiatives to convert abused children to Christianity with taxpayer funds. Who's with me?

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 11:32 AM
20

nick@13:
You, too, speak without knowledge.
My church has a giant rainbow flag with the words "all are welcome." Also, Pastor preaches out of the Bible, which says "God so loved the world..." The word "world" does NOT translate into the word "heterosexuals"!
Also, I know of no one in my church who have any praise for Palin, or especially the Mormons.
So, speak of things you know about! Your ignorance compares with David's emailer.

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 11:37 AM
21

@7: This week 84% of weekly churchgoers in CA believed the lies when their leaders told them...
Their marriages will crumble
Buttseks will be taught in kindergarten
Their churches will be taxed
They would lose their freedom of speech

40+ years ago churches used scripture to argue against desegregation. And their followers believed it, and were still repeating those lies to their children when i grew up in SC in the 70's-80's.

You might not call that hatemongering, but it sure as hell isn't the compassion Jesus taught.

Posted by W. T. Foxtrot | November 8, 2008 11:39 AM
22

well, at least he acknowledges that barack obama is super.

Posted by douglas | November 8, 2008 11:41 AM
23

"Garrett Lonegrin" seriously needs a big black cock in his coochie.

Posted by I'd be happy to oblige | November 8, 2008 11:43 AM
24

The flip side of that 'so loved the world' schtick is the abysmal hatred for people who, regardless of how compassionate they are to their fellow human beings, lack the faith of those to whom that 'love' is given. Finding other-worldly comforts instead of dealing with the naturalistic world allows people to think that homosexuality is not biological, but spiritual in nature, that being black is a physical manifestation of a spiritual evil, that muslims are all the same, and whatever the preacher says is Gospel.

It's nice that you are a liberal Christian; however, you are the candy coating to the creamy center of swirling hate, superstition and insanity that constitutes the faithful base of the bigot portrayed above. Simply acknowledging your liberality should therefore obligate you to battle (not just condemn) that man as well as 'loving' us.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 11:48 AM
25

@21:
California also elects Republicans on a regular basis! What's that tell you?
Also: "their marriages will crumble"...
Uh... most do! Gay, straight, interracial, interspecies... Marriages usually last until the "seven-year itch." Can you guess how long that is? C'mon, take a guess!

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 11:51 AM
26

@13 Nick,
What part of this sounds like hate to you?

>Gathering 4,000 pounds of donations for the food bank
>Sewing quilts and making baby supply kits for families in transitional housing
>Knitting hats and mittens for the homeless
>Running a downtown hygiene center and soup kitchen
>Sponsoring several Sudanese "lost boys"
>Operating a shelter for homeless teens
>Working on Habitat homes

That's what my church has done.
Nick, how about you?

Posted by Jeepers | November 8, 2008 11:52 AM
27

How do I get this through your ignorant skulls:
These hatemongers (Mormons, Catholics, Baptist posers, etc.) are not true Christians!!! Do you also assume that all who call themselves hetero are, in fact, hetero? Or veterans? How 'bout all those who proclaim "I am Jesus", are they Jesus?
Are you really that dense? Sad.

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 11:58 AM
28

Here's the hate, Jeepers: every mouthful of food you send is delivered together with a dose of Christian love. Jesus didn't deliver that food, you did. Those homeless kids, of whom I was once a part, are made a captive audience to all sorts of evangelical loonies, who teach them to read into their situation as if it were significant on some diaphanous spiritual plane. As for me, charity is a fishhook. You "fishers of men" can keep your milk and morality. I'd rather starve.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 12:02 PM
29

@27: Are we really going to have the "Catholics aren't real Christians" argument? Really?

Posted by Darcy | November 8, 2008 12:03 PM
30

ChristianLeft--look up the words "no true Scotsman". It's a logical fallacy.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 12:03 PM
31

Well, at least the asshole isn't a hypocrite that spouts, "Hate the sin, Love the sinner".

Posted by yucca flower | November 8, 2008 12:05 PM
32

Yup. They sure did vote down "faggot weddings." And as a result of that they've united and re-radicalized the queer communities and caused an entire generation of youth to re-think their spirtual relationships and church affiliations.

Churches and conservatives have truly screwed the pooch this time, but they're too stupid to realize what they've done until it's too late to do anything about it.

Posted by DanB | November 8, 2008 12:08 PM
33

#2: I just checked the google and this post now appears as the only result for a search on “Garret Lonegrin”

So to prospective employers and online daters: Garret Lonegrin is not such an asshole when he is not smoking crack. Go ahead and hire him, or marry him. But he does get a little cranky when you try to get the gun out of his hand, unless he is already passed out drunk.

Posted by Rain Monkey | November 8, 2008 12:10 PM
34

@29: yes.
@30: I'm not a Scot. True Christians believe that God is Love. We don't harbor the hate displayed in the email, or in the posts @10, 13, 19, 21, 28, 30... (so far)

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 12:13 PM
35

ChristianLeft - the problem is that the "True Christians" as you describe them are in the vast minority in this country. I have seen some efforts in recent years to combat this (e.g., Sojourners), but your "True Christians" are still too small of number and too soft of voice.

Posted by Julie in Chicago | November 8, 2008 12:19 PM
36

And Dante inscribed on the Gates of Hell that it was created by "Eternal Love". Christian love is, apparently, subject to perspective. Everyone who rejects Jesus is the antichrist according to Scripture, which, given your stated beliefs, includes Mormons, Catholic, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Atheists...all of whom descend into the eternal flames of hell. This is Christian 'love'? One hell of a high maintenance relationship. Count me out.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 12:20 PM
37

@25:

Southern and rural Californians like their Republicans, Northern & Bay Area Californians like their Democrats & Greens. WTF does that have to do with christian attitudes toward race and orientation?

Did you just give up and start arguing my side? Yes, half of all marriages end in divorce, and the numbers increase in areas with a higher evangelical population. Yet churches point to same-sex marriage as a threat to the sanctity of marriage. Ignoring this hypocrisy and responding with something about interspecies relationships kinda freaks me out. But thanks for sharing what goes on in your mind. It explains a lot.

Posted by W.T Foxtrot | November 8, 2008 12:20 PM
38

By the way, 'lonegrin' is a pun on Lohengrin--from Wagner's opera and Nordic myth--the guy is one of those White Nationalist/supremacist Christians. Not that, given his rant, this should come as a surprise. But googling his name will prove fruitless.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 12:23 PM
39

Dave, I'm so sorry that this "Garret" took time out from eating his own doody to send you this hateful, subhuman little email.

And I'm fucking looking forward to helping a galvanized progressive community fight the Prop 8 decision, and work to pass marriage equality laws in other states.

Posted by Anne | November 8, 2008 12:39 PM
40

Being the underdog is so noble and romantic.

Posted by sockpuppet | November 8, 2008 12:47 PM
41

@35: Yes, I agree. This saddens me. But the problem isn't just here; it's the whole world.

@37: Reread my post. What is your side? Are you assuming I'm one of them? I (and many like-minded believers) signed the petition at Huffington Post. I think if gays want the misery of marriage and divorce, they are welcome to it!

@36: You get your information on Christianity from Dante? Really? That's the same as if I got my info on Creationism from Darwin, or info about gays from Tennessee hillbillies. This explain why you speak without knowledge.

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 12:48 PM
42

I was making a point about a thread fairly common in Christian belief up to today. Dante expressed it in a fairly concise and well-known passage. Would you like me to quote Niebuhr? Barthes? Even Bonhoeffer, who at most other times I am inclined to respect, has some serious low-points in his philosophy. I reject your beliefs in toto, pal. I do however, respect your right to express them.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 12:58 PM
43

Oops, I shoulda added a link to HuffPost's petition.

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 12:59 PM
44

This has zero effect on me. I'm with Fnarf. I'm surprised he used his space bar correctly.

Posted by Mr. Poe | November 8, 2008 1:00 PM
45

@34: Oh, please. Frankly I disagree with the above comments that label all Christians as bigots, but "True Christian" is a term you've just employed to include yourself and other people with whose Biblical interpretations you agree. Other groups of Christians employ the same tactic all the time (see email). Just because Catholics, Baptists, et al. do and say shit in the name of Christ that you don't agree with doesn't give you some sweeping authority to unilaterally declare them all non-Christian.

Posted by Darcy | November 8, 2008 1:01 PM
46

@42: You do not! You spouted nothing but hate and ignorance since my first post this thread! Hypocrite!

Posted by ChristianLeft | November 8, 2008 1:04 PM
47

I am coming to the conclusion that the problem for humankind is monotheism. Monotheism has been behind two thousand years of this kind of murderous hate. It seems to imbue it's followers with a rabid ignorance.

Posted by Vince | November 8, 2008 1:09 PM
48

We should start our own religion. Not only would it be tax exempt but we could make up any damn rules we wanted like Queer Marriages For Everyone! and scream One-man/One-woman marriage laws violated our 1ST Amendment rights.

Posted by Y.F. | November 8, 2008 1:17 PM
49

My dear Sir,
My disdain for your beliefs is not based upon ignorance, but KNOWLEDGE of them. My respect for your ability to express them does not go so far as to endorse them or be cowed into not engaging them in dialogue. I'm sure many people here disagree with me, but they don't call for me to be silenced. I wonder, however, what would happen if your church were to gain an inordinate amount of power over the other denominations that you describe as 'fake' Christians. What my respect DOES mean is that in spite of my contempt for, say, seeing a Hmong woman who does not yet know English out in the rain handing out pamphlets that quote Revelations with respect to the evils of gay marriage, I do not call for your church to be persecuted by angry mobs. History standing as judge, I cannot say the same for Christianity as a whole. This occasions my invective.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 1:17 PM
50

Conservatism will be back. You’ll see. And when it does and Sarah runs STRONG in 2012, we wil deal with both of you.

Yeah, yeah, after everybody stops laughing at what a twit she'll still be four years from now. Face it: once a joke, always a joke.

Posted by Sarah's Big Poofy Hair | November 8, 2008 1:22 PM
51

Many progressives considered leaving the US in the past 8 years to any other rich, progressive foreign nation.

At first, I wondered where people like Garrett might consider moving, but there's no backwards rich nations for them to move to.

But why don't they just follow Palin back to Alaska? It's far enough away that we could ignore them. They obviously are fond of the governor. There's plenty of drilling for them. Plus, they can keep an eye on Russia for us.

Posted by Fawxer | November 8, 2008 1:22 PM
52

@46: quick! somebody call the WAHHHHHmbulance!

Posted by belle absente | November 8, 2008 1:36 PM
53

@49

From one atheist to (I presume) another: knock it off. You're making us sound like jerks--resentful, ungracious, gross-generalization-making, history-simplifying, fake-ass-line-in-the-sand-drawing jerks. We need as many people in the progressive camp as possible; dismissively insulting a huge and heterogeneous chunk of the population ain't helping.

Posted by maximus of gloucester, to you | November 8, 2008 2:03 PM
54

@53:

That's awesome that you responded to a post with the words "they don't call for me to be silenced" with "knock it off".

Posted by The People's Front Of Judea | November 8, 2008 2:15 PM
55

@54

That's awesome that you missed the point.

Posted by maximus of gloucester, to you | November 8, 2008 2:32 PM
56

@55:

That's a shame you don't have a sense of humor.

Posted by Judean People's Front | November 8, 2008 2:34 PM
57

Personally, I think you should forward this one to the police.

Posted by Greg | November 8, 2008 2:37 PM
58

What did I say that was untrue, Maximus? Apparently you, too, are an Atheist for a reason.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 2:39 PM
59

All churches, Christians, etc. are exactly alike. There are no differences or disagreements between them whatsoever. When any one Christian does something wrong, all Christians are equally responsible for it.

Posted by Greg | November 8, 2008 2:50 PM
60

All churches have equal tendencies to harden in their dogma, enforce conformity, and abuse power--to a greater extent than most, as they hold the keys to the "afterlife". Baby churches may be cute, but I have seen them as adults. Sorry.

Posted by That annoying 'interest troll' | November 8, 2008 3:01 PM
61

What, is it wrong to burn a couple witches at the stake every Sunday?

Posted by Greg | November 8, 2008 3:26 PM
62

Actually, the joke's on him. It's always been on people like him. Stupid people buy the crap, and fight the wars and clean up after the rich, and never even know that they've been used. They just hate - with that special hate of the stupid, who dimly realize they are not in control of their lives, but have no reason why.

If he's young enough, it will be fun to see him slide into middle-age and beyond, knowing that whites are no longer the majority in this country. What will he think of "the ovens" then?

But the best joke will be at the end, when he breathes his last breath and he vanishes. No soul to save, no God to take him to the promised land. Nothing. Just another dead animal on the cosmic roadside. His whole life will have been a sick joke in an indifferent universe.

Posted by Have a nice day! | November 8, 2008 3:39 PM
63

@ schmader - crazy bigots, and conservatives in general, already felt like underdogs, e.g, the war on Christmas.

Posted by UnoriginalAndrew | November 8, 2008 3:47 PM
64

Hi interest troll--sorry for the harsh tone of my earlier comment; if it's any defense, I was caffeinated to the eyeballs, which makes me cranky (and apparently also wrecks my senses of humor and proportion.)

What I was trying to get at was this: turning a political discussion into an ideological referendum on religion almost always backfires. It becomes a distraction; instead of talking about racism or gay rights or economic inequality or whatever, we end up talking about the Inquisition. Instead of talking about what we ought to do, we talk about Who Is Right.

I think you can see this derailing tendency at work in your comments. At the top of the thread, you make a very reasonable point about not being tricked by our opposition to Prop 8 into making common cause with racists; by the end, you're talking about the universal characteristics of "all churches" anywhere ever. (It's probably obvious that in my earlier comment I was thinking more about Prop 8 than about the idiotic e-mail that started this discussion.)

Anyway, sorry for being a prick. Carry on.

Posted by maximus of gloucester, to you | November 8, 2008 5:13 PM
65

@ChristianLeft: Calm down. Seriously. Listen, as one Christian liberal to another.

Reread the original letter from Garrett L that started this thread. I smell fear and guarantee that tomorrow morning, the first Sunday after Obama's victory, evangelicals will gather in their churches in shithole trailer parks across the country to lick their wounds, blame the "liberal media" and hatch delusional plots of revenge, i.e. Sarah Palin in 2012. They know that their days of dominating the country's political discourse are coming to an end.

Jerry Falwell is dead, D. James Kennedy is dead, Focus on the Family is a joke, and Pat Robertson is about 153 years old. Remember the original premise of the religious right: if Americans elect "godly" leaders, all problems will be solved because God will bless the country with peace and prosperity. Well, eight years after one of their own made it to the White House, that hasn't happened. We are at war in two countries and the economy is in the toilet. And last Tuesday voters said they had enough. I see the blue landslide not only as a repudiation of Bush's policies, but of right wing dogma in general, religion and all. The idiotic beliefs of the religious right have been measured and found wanting. Ten years ago few people other than evangelicals and ex-evangelicals, for example, had ever heard of the Rapture. I remember when one of my coworkers, a speech pathologist, asked me about it when her patient had told her about those silly Left Behind books. She was amazed when I told her that we sang songs about the Rapture in my high school youth group in the 70s and saw films such as A Thief In The Night. She was even more amazed when I told her that Rapture theology goes back even further, to the 19th century. Fast forward to today, when Betty Bowers (and imitators) is a popular fixture in any bookstore's humor section. (I have literally fallen off pieces of furniture laughing at this parody.) Evangelicals beseeched God for years that their message would be known far and wide among the heathen. Note to evangelicals: Be careful what you pray for. The rest of us have seen and examined your ideas and the handwriting is on the wall.

Given the high visibility in the last three decades of the religious right, and as @35 points out, the low profile of religious progressives (which in some ways is intentional--I wrote papers about this in seminary, but I will spare you the details), one can hardly blame the nonreligious for their stereotypes. But there is hope. I predict Barack Obama will unite the country behind a progressive agenda in a way unseen since Roosevelt's New Deal. Will the evangelical right oppose it? Of course they will, but few will be listening. Their day is over. They will be the ones left behind as the rest of us, including religious progressives, move forward.

So what can religious progressives do? Keep on doing what you are doing. You belong to a progressive, gay friendly church? Good for you, so do I. Keep helping the less fortunate, keep welcoming all to your door, keep fighting for good causes. With the imminent demise of the religious right, perhaps nonreligious progressives will begin to trust us again and welcome us to the table.

Posted by RainMan | November 8, 2008 7:16 PM
66

Publish this morons e-mail address so we can share our love with him/it.

Posted by jamesb | November 9, 2008 8:55 AM
67

I wish these rednecks wouldn't clutch to God like he was their coach. If you are so heavy with God, then pay attention to what is written in the BIBLE and leave the judgment up to Him.

You're in for some shitty eternal hellfire for thinking you get a free pass to heaven because you are a republican, dumbass.

Posted by Erly | November 10, 2008 10:38 AM

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