aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South

Friday, August 26, 2005

Falwell softens on gay rights

Jerry Falwell may still believe we choose to be gay (remember Chris Matthews asking him on Hardball, ”How old were you when you chose to be heterosexual?”) but he has apparently come around to believing we deserve basic human rights. Today
Southern Voice reports on his August 5 appearance on MSNBC’s “The Situation with Tucker Carlson:â€Â�

“I may not agree with the lifestyle,” Falwell said. “But that has nothing to do with the civil rights of that… part of our constituency.

“Judge Roberts would probably have been not a good very good lawyer if he had not been willing, when asked by his partners in the law firm to assist in guaranteeing the civil rights of employment and housing to any and all Americans.”

When Carlson countered that conservatives, “are always arguing against ‘special rights’ for gays,” Falwell said that equal access to housing and employment are basic rights, not special rights.

“Civil rights for all Americans, black, white, red, yellow, the rich, poor, young, old, gay, straight, et cetera, is not a liberal or conservative value,” Falwell went on to say. “It’s an American value that I would think that we pretty much all agree on.”

Was Soulforce a factor in the shift? Soulforce has done extensive outreach to Falwell:

Soulforce was founded by Mel White, a gay man who had worked closely with Falwell (even ghostwriting his autobiography) and his partner Gary Nixon.

White and Nixon founded Soulforce and moved into a rented house across the street from Falwell’s church in 2001, after they realized that Falwell was not going to change his views and accept gays without long-term persuasion.

“I think last month when he dealt with his heart condition, he got closer to his maker,” Nixon said. “And I think he knows in his heart that what he was doing is wrong.”