Last month, the New York Senate tried and failed to bring equal marriage rights to the citizens of New York. If you don’t remember, things went south when eight cowardly Democrats betrayed their caucus and joined the Republicans in defeating the bill. One of those Democrats was Senator Hiram Monserrate of Queens, who, before his vote, had become notorious for being charged with “slashing his girlfriend Karla Giraldo in the face with a broken glass.” Continued:
Monserrate was found guilty of the lesser charge of third-degree assault for dragging a bleeding Giraldo down the hallway of their building after the alleged attack. That charge is only a misdemeanor so the lawmaker will be able to keep his seat in Albany.
Despite initially claiming Monserrate attacked her, Giraldo had refused to cooperate with the prosecution in the case.
Oh, and there was video!
(via NY Daily News)
Classy!
So why am I bringing this up? Well, it seems that a group calling itself the “Coalition for Morality” has been dispersing these flyers in support of Senator Monserrate:
Classy again! So who are the generically branded “Coalition for Morality”? We don’t quite know. My Googling has come up dry, and the others who have reported this have had similar results. For all we know, Monserrate could have printed them up himself!
But I do know this: This little flyer is revelatory of the worldview which seeks to deny equality to the LGBT community. It may seem abhorrent to people with any semblance of a moral compass that a man caught assaulting a woman on camera could be held up as a paragon of morality, but it really shouldn’t be surprising. There are indeed many conservative religious people out there who hit the fainting couch over two consenting adults of the same gender falling in love, but at the same time really don’t mind the idea of abusing women. I mean, let’s get real here. Respected conservative “thinkers” have penned pieces as recently as last year which seem to support the idea that marital rape doesn’t exist! (Dennis Prager, I’m looking at you.)
So there you have it. According to some people, Hiram Monserrate, abuser of women, can claim moral authority over gay people who choose to live our lives with integrity.
Gross.
