It seems that even the notoriously liberal San Francisco Chronicle finds the condemnation of teenagers based upon their religious beliefs to be out of bounds.

THE IRONY was obviously lost on the clueless San Francisco supervisors when they passed a resolution warning that a Christian youth gathering could "negatively influence the politics of America's most tolerant and progressive city."

Spare us the doomsday hyperbole, supervisors.

We can safely report that the politics of San Francisco suffered no discernible shift in ideological alignment from the convergence of 25,000 Christian teenagers listening to rock 'n' roll music and words of inspiration. There was no evidence of any surge in support for the Iraq war, affection for President Bush or oil drilling off the California coast. The medical-marijuana clubs were still doing business as usual, public dancing was still legal, the petition gatherers were still working Market Street for the latest save-the-planet cause.

The supervisors' reaction to the evangelical Christians was so boorishly over the top that only one word could describe it:

Intolerant.

Not, mind you, that the quoted politicians are particularly contrite.

Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, was quoted telling counterprotesters Friday that the gathering Christians were "loud, they're obnoxious, they're disgusting and they should get out of San Francisco." On Monday, however, Leno struck a more reasoned tone, acknowledging that his rally cry was "not one of my prouder moments." He said the youth group was "welcome in San Francisco," even though he does worry that its religious rhetoric could "under a cloak of love" feed a "fearful world's appetite for hate."

No, nothing this group of kids did fed hate – that was your job, Mr. Assemblyman, and the job of the idiots on the Board of Supervisors who engaged in nothing short of hate-speech under the guise of promoting “tolerance.”

But the best part of this is the conclusion of the Chronicle editorial.

The gathering was not an "act of provocation," as the supervisors claimed. It was a get-together of young evangelicals whose lifestyles and religious views just happen to be in the minority here -- apparently making them open season for politicians to chastise.

The young people who came to San Francisco to affirm their faith and enjoy a day of rock music deserved better. They deserved to be welcomed by a city that was as tolerant and progressive as its sanctimonious supervisors like to profess.

I wholeheartedly agree with the Chronicle on this one. In fact, I can think of only one thing more that these young people deserved – and that would have been for the San Francisco Chronicle to have printed this editorial while Battle Cry was still in session, rather than a couple of days after the event was over.

And by the way -- too bad the paper could not find its way clear to condemn the other act of religious intolerance by the Board of Supervisors. I guess that anti-Catholicism is still an acceptable, even fashionable, prejudice in Sodom-by -the-Bay

Posted by: Greg at 01:35 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 511 words, total size 3 kb.