Over in the Corner, Mark Steyn posted on GLAAD’s ”next step” for Phil Robertson and Duck Dynasty:
Having leaned on A&E to suspend their biggest star, GLAAD has now moved on to Stage Two:
“We believe the next step is to use this as an opportunity for Phil to sit down with gay families in Louisiana and learn about their lives and the values they share,” the spokesman said.
Actually, “the next step” is for you thugs to push off and stop targeting, threatening and making demands of those who happen to disagree with you. Personally, I think this would be a wonderful opportunity for the GLAAD executive board to sit down with half-a-dozen firebreathing imams and learn about their values, but, unlike the Commissars of the Bureau of Conformity Enforcement, I accord even condescending little ticks like the one above the freedom to arrange his own social calendar.
The spokesman in the quote above is Rich Ferraro. What gets interesting here is that Alec Baldwin made basically the same point about GLAAD and Ferraro after his suspension for the now infamous exchange with a photographer last month as Steyn does in his post. Here’s Baldwin in an interview with Gothamist calling out Ferraro and GLAAD:
“Martin Bashir’s on the air, and he made his comment on the air! I dispute half the comment I made… if I called him ‘c**ksucking maggot’ or a ‘c**ksucking motherf***ker’… ‘fa**ot’ is not the word that came out of my mouth. That I know. But you’ve got the fundamentalist wing of gay advocacy—Rich Ferraro and Andrew Sullivan—they’re out there, they’ve got you. Rich Ferraro, this is probably one of his greatest triumphs. They killed my show. And I have to take some responsibility for that myself.”
And here’s Ferraro’s response to Baldwin. Note the similarities between what Ferraro wants from Baldwin and Robertson:
Alec Baldwin’s team has not been open to turning this incident into an opportunity for public education and that’s unfortunate.
It’s a weird world when Mark Steyn and Alec Baldwin see the same villain.
One thing Mark left out, however, is that GLAAD is facing a backlash over their position on Robertson:
In the fallout over Wednesday’s suspension of “Duck Dynasty” star Phil Robertson by A&E for anti-gay and racist remarks, GLAAD is experiencing record levels of backlash.
“In the five-and-a-half years I’ve worked at GLAAD, I’ve never received so many violently angry phone calls and social media posts attacking GLAAD for us speaking out against these comments,” the media watchdog organization’s vice president of communications Rich Ferraro told TheWrap.
He said those reactions range from those who simply believe as Robertson believes to those who feel that GLAAD and A&E’s actions limit the reality star’s free speech.
“I don’t think this is about the first amendment,” Ferraro said. “I feel it’s more about the America we live in today. That is one where Americans, gay and straight, are able to speak out when people in the public eye make anti-gay and racist remarks.”
Maybe it’s time for GLAAD to take the “next step” and and sit down with people with opinions similar to Phil Robertson and “learn about their lives and the values they share?” I hope GLAAD doesn’t miss this “opportunity.”