Holy hell. It's bad enough that Colorado's civil unions bill, SB 172, died in committee, but some of the homophobic testimony was downright deranged. The Wonk Room has the audio.
Douglas Napier of the Alliance Defense Fund led the formal opposition against the bill and maintained that civil unions would likely lead to same-sex marriage, despite a 2006 voter-approved constitutional amendment that defined marriage as a union between a man and a woman. The debate quickly disintegrated from there, as witnesses began quoting the Bible, regurgitating thoroughly debunked claims about ex-gay therapy and even predicting the end of times. The Family Research Institute's Dr. Paul Cameron - whose so-called 'research' on homosexuality has been condemned and refuted by most major medical organizations in the United States and Canada - provided the most colorful testimony.Some of the choice bits:
- "If you take all your clothes off and stand in front of a mirror, and your plumbing is on the outside, you're a male."
- "Every Coloradoan now has basically a $112 AIDS tax from gays in the United States...if we as a society allow it to be accepted, we will get more of it...when gays are partnered they are more apt to get sexually transmitted diseases."
- "They found Sodom and Gomorrah two years ago buried underneath the ash heap so that proves right there by archaeology that any society that allowed homosexuality, including the Jewish society, disintegrated completely."
- "If you vote otherwise, you are going to help end - not tomorrow, the sun will come up - but you will help to end this most successful civilization.