Last week, as we reported here at The Bilerico Project, lawyers for three same-gender couples in South Dakota announced that they intend to file a federal lawsuit challenging the state's marriage discrimination amendment.
This makes Steve Hickey -- a Republican state representative, an evangelical pastor, and an original co-sponsor of the state's failed "right to discriminate" bill -- spitting mad, so he submitted an incredibly vile, homophobic, lie-filled letter to the editor of the Sioux Falls Argus Leader outlining the alleged risks of anal sex.
He titled it "A One Way Alley for the Garbage Truck." Seriously.
From Rep. Hickey's letter:
Consider this an open letter to the medical and psychological communities in South Dakota. The subject is homosexuality, which is about to be a front-page topic for the next few years in our state. I'm asking the doctors who practice in our state, is the science really settled on this issue or is it more the case that you feel silenced and intimidated?
Certainly there are board-certified doctors in our state who will attest to what seems self-evident to so many: gay sex is not good for the body or mind. Pardon a crude comparison but regarding men with men, we are talking about a one-way alley meant only for the garbage truck to go down. Frankly, I'd question the judgment of doctor who says it's all fine.
South Dakota docs, it's time for you to come out of the closet and give your professional opinion on this matter like you capably and responsibly do on all the others. Somehow the message we are presently getting from the medical community is that eating at McDonalds will kill us but the gay lifestyle has no side effects. Truth be told it seems self-evident the list of side effects would read far longer than anything we hear on a Cialis commercial.
The rest of the letter, which you can read here, is full of malicious anti-gay talking points that have been debunked and discredited for decades (homosexuality is responsible for "the downfall of past civilizations;" gays and lesbians have "broken identities;" homosexuality can be "[transferred]" to "innocent and impressionable ones in... locker rooms;" etc.). Oh, and there's some 21st-century transphobia thrown in for good measure.
Rep. Hickey's screed is really a Paul Cameron-style tour de force of gutter-level bigotry. And, as he told Talking Points Memo, he stands by every word.
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