Posted 1:02 PM by Scoobie Davis

Jerry Falwell: Gay Smut Peddler?
The Mark Foley page scandal reinforces my belief that the contemporary Republican Party, especially its sectarian wing, has some serious sexual hang-ups. First, there's the widespread practice of serial marriage among GOP bigwigs. Regarding homosexuality, there are two Republican pathologies; the first is closet tolerants such as Ann Coulter who defended Jerry Falwell for blaming 9/11 on gays but who has a big reputation as a fag hag. Then, there are the self-loathing Republicans like Foley and GOP apologists (like Fox News Democrat Tammy Bruce).

As luck would have it, this weekend I found a videotape of Jerry Falwell's Old Time Gospel Hour program from 1993. During the Clinton presidency, Falwell devoted part of his show to hawking videos to his flock (at high markups) accusing Clinton of drug dealing, serial murder, and everything except sinking the Lusitania. The tape has a Falwell-narrated infomercial for his video exposing "the radical gay agenda." I'll upload the commercial to YouTube as soon as I learn how, but the transcript (which I abridge for space considerations) of the ad is very revealing. It seemed to me that Falwell was pitching the video to evangelical closet queens. David Kuo's revelations in his book Tempting Faith that members of the sectarian right often speak to each other in code made me think that it wasn't a coincidence that Falwell uses the word "blow" three times in his short pitch. While Falwell is speaking, the video portion shows footage of gays and lesbians frolicking in various stages of undress (quick note: The last sentence explains Falwell's comments after 9/11 pointing the finger of blame at gays and various liberal groups):

FALWELL: I want you to fasten your seatbelts right now because I'm going to tell you something that will, I think, blow your mind--about this tape right here. This is the tape that nobody in Washington knows how we got. You see, let me explain: during the April 25th [1993] homosexual March on Washington, I sent two camera crews undercover and incognito to infiltrate the anticipated one million gays and lesbians in that parade march on the nation's capital. Our camera crews attended dozens of unbelievable events. I mean they attended marriages of hundreds of gay couples . . . What they filmed was undoubtedly triple X-rated: nude lesbians blocking the street and nobody arresting them--dancing in the street, nobody arresting them. It was just as if Sodom and Gomorrah had stepped out of the Old Testament pages and visited our nation's capital . . . I watched in amazement as I saw a gay rights dance, a radical fairy get-together, and so much more that I cannot show you on this television station . . . It includes my biblical commentary which clearly tells you blow-by-blow what you are seeing and defines what you and I can do to stop the implementation of this radical gay agenda before it's too late for our country. God help us if we don't succeed. This tape will cost you $35 on your Visa or Mastercard plus three dollars for shipping and handling . . . I sincerely believe that only if everyone in the church of the Lord Jesus Christ today gets informed and becomes involved--rising with a mighty voice in unison, exposing sin as sin--can we avert the judgment of God upon this nation which, I believe, is imminent. . .

Falwell's pitch and the video excerpts remind me of the old saying that Democrats and Republicans read banned books--it's just that Republicans form censorship committees and read them as a group. Similarly, fundamentalist homophobia allowed Falwell to make a quick buck by giving voyeuristic kicks to latent homosexual fundamentalists who wanted to watch gay porno and not feel guilty about it. It's good work if you can find it.