76-year old Pat Boone, the moth-eaten movie star/treacly warbler whose born-again fervor compels him to dehumanize LGBT Americans at every opportunity, has written one of the most disingenuous commentaries I've had the misfortune to read this year. He's a frequent contributor on World Net Daily, where homophobic opinion pieces are as common as gay slurs in Uganda. Some WND writers, like Boone, bash queers in the name "Christian love." Others take the low road, portraying gays and lesbians as child-molesters, disease-ridden deviants, and fecal matter aficionados. I actually prefer the latter approach since it lays bear the depraved, sex-obsessed minds of these bigots. But Pious Pat is a more artful homo hater - or at least he thinks he is.
As Christian extremists are wont to do, Boone starts his piece by bragging about his gay friends. He mentions two, both victims of AIDS, who are no longer around to confirm or deny Pat's self-proclaimed "affection" for them. About Rock Hudson the creaky crooner writes: A major, iconic movie star, he too was homosexual. But the world didn't know that, until he was famously revealed to be dying of HIV/AIDS. He, and those close to him, knew well that if his sexual proclivities were known, he could never have been the superstar ladies' man... So he and those who profited from his stardom kept it quiet until almost the end. (Yes, Hudson was forced to cower in the closet because of organized religion, the Hays Code, and people like Pat Boone.) My wife, three friends and I were with him the night before he died... He couldn't speak, and his emaciated body bore no resemblance to the one millions of women had dreamed of. But his eyes shone as our little group gathered by his bed to pray with, and for him. Obeying the admonition in James 5 in the New Testament, I poured a little oil on his bare chest and rubbed it in with my hand, praying for him to be healed and restored. (If Boone obeyed Jesus' admonitions to "Do unto others" and "Judge not" he would have ended his article at this point. But no such luck.) I relate the above to make it extremely clear I'm no homophobe. Far from it. I've flourished in the entertainment business for over 50 years now and I've always had good friends who were, and are, homosexual.
Like homophobes everywhere, Pat Boone is reluctant to use the word "gay." By repeating homosexual, homosexual, homosexual, homosexual, homosexual he defines our humanity by a libidinous act. And here the mask of Christian kindness slips away: Based solely on what they do to please each other sexually, they demand special rights, privileges and entitlements. By their own pronouncements, they are no different in any other way from other Americans – the only things that set them apart from the other two men I describe are the things that satisfy them sexually. (No mention of the profound love gays and lesbians feel for their life partners and children, or the selfless acts they perform for others. To fundies like Pat, it's all about carnal gratification. That is his focus, not ours.)
After dwelling on the sheer "wickedness" of marriage equality, Boone throws his prayerful support behind the military's discriminatory Don't Ask Don't Tell policy. Pat rejects Admiral Mike Mullen's recently stated reason for overturning the ban, which is "because it forces gay troops to compromise their integrity by lying." Boon-dawg never served a day in the armed forces, yet he thinks he knows better than Mullen, General Colin Powell, and other military leaders who currently oppose DADT: The obvious, expressed purpose of the policy is that the subject never come up or be discussed. Sexual proclivity, if not violent or a menace to someone else, should be a private matter. If a soldier has a "foot fetish," is attracted to young boys or feels compelled to masturbate frequently, should he volunteer – or be required – to confess those urges, for "integrity's" sake?
Wow, it sure didn't take long for this non-homophobic "family values" guy with his dead "homosexual friends" to link sexual orientation - a natural biological variance - with pedophilia and fetishism. Mr. Boone, like most of the columnists on World Net Daily, is a relic from a bygone era where wives were treated like chattel and small children were beaten with leather belts. He is a cultural curiosity, a grim exhibit appropriate for display in the Creation Museum, alongside the fake velociraptor and that mannequin of a young girl merrily grinding her wheat.
Pat Boone is singularly unqualified to discuss LGBT issues, regardless of how many closet cases he encountered during his blessedly brief career in Hollywood. His knowledge of gays and lesbians is as deficient as his empathy for others, his Christian compassion as phony as a plastic Jesus wobbling on the dashboard of a Buick. Did I mention that he starred in a 2005 documentary called "Fuck?" Peddle your make-believe tolerance elsewhere, old man.