This Ain't No Mister Rogers!
Links via Pinko Feminist Hellcat and Pam's House Blend. A new reality series in which three white, self-described "Christian" families get to pick their new neighbors from among a group of minority families is already drawing fire. And it hasn't even aired yet.
The show is called "Welcome to the Neighborhood" and it's coming to ABC July 10.
"I will not tolerate a homosexual couple coming into this neighborhood," one of the neighbors, Jim Stewart, says on the show about one of the candidate families - a gay couple with an adopted baby. "I want a family similar to what we are," asserts another neighbor, John Bellamy, in a statement that would seem to dismiss at least six out of the seven candidate families.
The diverse group includes African-American, Caucasian, Korean, Latino and gay families, plus one family in which husband and wife are heavily tattooed, and another in which mom and dad are devoted to the practice of Wicca, sometimes known as witchcraft or paganism.
The show's first two episodes are filled with statements such as those above. Along with the show's premise, in which neighbors get to choose who will move into a vacant house on their cul-de-sac, the attitude reflected in the judging families' statements is raising hackles among fair-housing and gay anti-defamation activists - sometimes sight-unseen.
You know what would have been awesome? If the roles were reversed in this. If the Fundie families (and seriously, aren't real Christians just a little bit sick of these people making Christians in general look bad? When are we going to start hearing some disavowals from Christians wrt the utter nonsense the Fundies spew?) had to compete for a coveted home in a spendy neighborhood, and it was their ethnically, sexually, religiously diverse neighbors who voted them in or out.
Shit man, I could fit the bill for a number of these "diverse" families, but who the fuck wants to live next door to an asshole who hates you? An asshole who's going to go to PTA meetings and try to get comprehensive sex ed out or the teaching of evolution out of the local public school. An asshole who will probably light up the whole neighborhood with energy sucking Christmas lights and insist on watering his lawn all day during a drought. An asshole neighbor who'll give you the stink eye every Sunday 'cause you slept in instead of going to church.
Talk about building a "love thy neighbor" house... I think a dome house would be an easier sale.
The show is called "Welcome to the Neighborhood" and it's coming to ABC July 10.
"I will not tolerate a homosexual couple coming into this neighborhood," one of the neighbors, Jim Stewart, says on the show about one of the candidate families - a gay couple with an adopted baby. "I want a family similar to what we are," asserts another neighbor, John Bellamy, in a statement that would seem to dismiss at least six out of the seven candidate families.
The diverse group includes African-American, Caucasian, Korean, Latino and gay families, plus one family in which husband and wife are heavily tattooed, and another in which mom and dad are devoted to the practice of Wicca, sometimes known as witchcraft or paganism.
The show's first two episodes are filled with statements such as those above. Along with the show's premise, in which neighbors get to choose who will move into a vacant house on their cul-de-sac, the attitude reflected in the judging families' statements is raising hackles among fair-housing and gay anti-defamation activists - sometimes sight-unseen.
You know what would have been awesome? If the roles were reversed in this. If the Fundie families (and seriously, aren't real Christians just a little bit sick of these people making Christians in general look bad? When are we going to start hearing some disavowals from Christians wrt the utter nonsense the Fundies spew?) had to compete for a coveted home in a spendy neighborhood, and it was their ethnically, sexually, religiously diverse neighbors who voted them in or out.
Shit man, I could fit the bill for a number of these "diverse" families, but who the fuck wants to live next door to an asshole who hates you? An asshole who's going to go to PTA meetings and try to get comprehensive sex ed out or the teaching of evolution out of the local public school. An asshole who will probably light up the whole neighborhood with energy sucking Christmas lights and insist on watering his lawn all day during a drought. An asshole neighbor who'll give you the stink eye every Sunday 'cause you slept in instead of going to church.
Talk about building a "love thy neighbor" house... I think a dome house would be an easier sale.