Respect the rainforest, tame the Pope

Occasionally (okay, yesterday!), I’ll get a bit huffy about Bible-thumping
wingnuts and someone will say I’m being unfair, that I should respect religion.
But I do. I have great respect for religion the way I have great respect for a
baseball bat with a nail in it. Believe me, I respect that
baseball bat!

But it’s the wide berth I try to give the
Magisterium
that’s never respected! They’re forever beating us or annulling
our marriages or, in today’s latest twist, calling us a “threat” akin to the
destruction of the rainforests
. The Pope says that anything other than

heterosexual marriage is “a destruction of God’s work.” It’s as though he
pictures the world as a beautiful art museum…and then the gays arrive:

Mind you, when I think of things like the Amsterdam
drag nativity scene
(so tacky!) or Jonny
McGovern performing Beyoncé’s “Tranny Ladies,”
I can’t help but
wonder if the Pope has a point. Gay men can be destructive and often
useless and screechy – why, “Sex and the City” taught us that!

A former editor of the late, lamented fab magazine, Scott has been writing for Xtra since 2007 on a variety of topics in news pieces, interviews, blogs, reviews and humour pieces. He lives on the Danforth with his boyfriend of 12 years, a manic Jack Russell Terrier, a well-stocked mini-bar and a shelf of toy Daleks.

Keep Reading

Job discrimination against trans and non-binary people is alive and well

OPINION: A study reveals that we have a long way to go to reach workplace equality for trans and non-binary people

The new generation of gay Conservative sellouts

OPINION: Melissa Lantsman’s and Eric Duncan’s refusals to call out their party’s transphobia is a betrayal of the LGBTQ2S+ community

Over 300 anti-LGBTQ2S+ bills have been introduced this year. This doesn’t mean we should panic

OPINION: While it’s important to watch out for threats, not all threats are created equally. Some of these bills will die a natural death

Xtra’s top LGBTQ2S+ stories of the year

The best and brightest—even most bewildering—stories from a back catalogue brimming with insight