Last night I was driving home from dinner around 10pm. Normally there would be almost no traffic. Instead there was traffic-- lots of it, everywhere. Grrrrrr... no matter which way I went I was snarled in back-up traffic. And it was getting worse the further east I went. It always thins out once you get to the eastside. That's when I realized-- that and seeing stragglers with No on 8 signs-- that protesters were protesting up ahead. I called a friend with eyes and ears to the ground to ask what's up. Big protest at Sunset Junction . Odd, I thought; no Mormons anywhere near Sunset Junction-- and probably no one who voted Yes on 8 unless it was someone too stoned to remember what Yes and No meant on election day.I was just a young boy the first time I heard about self-immolation for a political cause. It was actually more a religious cause but the context was pure politics: the Vietnam War. The images in 1963 of a Buddhist monk, Thich Quang Duc, setting himself on fire in Saigon have haunted me all these decades. From Frances Fitzgerald's: "the political climate in Saigon changed as if hit by the drop in pressure preceding a hurricane. Vast demonstrations broke out. The city people, who had for years remained passive, terrified before the Diemist police, crowded into the pagodas to kneel and weep, then, following the bonzes [Buddhist monks], burst forth into the streets calling for the downfall of the Ngos [the ruling family in South Vietnam]."How seriously are people taking the protests over the vote on Prop 8, a vote that deprives millions of people of a right to marry, that singles them out for second-class citizenship? Will snarled traffic make people stop and think? Would self-immolation? Violence against hate groups like the Mormon "church?" Can a boycott of Utah's $6 billion tourist industry do anything to root out the hatred and bigotry at the heart of that bizarre cult that has thrived on engendering a sense of persecution among its grotesquely ignorant, brainwashed followers? Sure, Utah is as much a reactionary hate state as Mormonism is a destructive and dangerous aberration in America... but what's going to really help change people's minds?I'm guessing Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi had the winning strategy, far more than Abu Bakir Bashir or brawling monks . Striking out violently against the Mormon Establishment is counterproductive. The hard work it takes to change people's minds and bring them out of the Darkness of Hatred and Bigotry is the only effective way to go about bringing real change. I'm glad today's peaceful demonstration has moved from Sunset Junction to the Mormon cult's main temple.If you buy goods and services from these Mormon businesses you are contributing to the bigoted Mormon hierarchy's anti-gay jihad:Black & DeckerSky WestLa QuintaFranklin-CoveyAmerican ExpressIomegaHunstsman ChemicalOakleypriceline.comAlbertsonsNu SkinMarriotJet BlueNovellBain CapitalDell

Labels: Mormons