So Says Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern

By Alex Vaughn

Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern chose to continue her history of making outrageously inflammatory and hateful comments towards the Gay community on the eve of the 10th Anniversary of 9/11. As the world reflected 9/11, the worst terrorist attacks on US soil, she used the opportunity to claim that gay love is in fact worse than terrorism.

Kern explained that her current book titled “The Stoning of Sally Kern: The Liberal Attack on Christian Conservatism and Why We Must Take a Stand” was written in response to the backlash she received in 2008 as a result of her attacks on the gay community with similarly hateful statements in a nationally-released video. Kern had expressed that school children were being “indoctrinated” into the gay lifestyle, and that “studies show that no society that has totally embraced homosexuality has lasted more than a few decades.”
“[Gays] are the death knell, in this country. I honestly think it’s the biggest threat… that our nation has, even more so than terrorism, or Islam, which I think is a big threat,” Kern was recorded in her speech.

Now, in an interview with anti-gay activist Peter LaBarbera, Kern explained, “In the last… fifteen to twenty years, we’ve had maybe three terrorist attacks on our soil with a little over 5,000 people regrettably losing their lives. In the same time frame, there have been hundreds of thousands who have died because of having AIDS. So which one’s the biggest threat?”

“Which has destroyed and ended the life of more people? Terrorism attacks here in America or HIV/AIDS?” she asked.
She then went on to say that in addition to HIV/AIDS deaths, homosexuality is more dangerous than terrorism because people hear about it everyday, as if talking about homosexuality somehow destroys a nation.

“And you know, every day our young people, adults too, but especially our young people, are bombarded at school, in movies, in music, on TV, in the mall, in magazines, they’re bombarded with ‘homosexuality is normal and natural.’ Fortunately we don’t have to deal with a terrorist attack every day.” She went on to explain, that, “It’s more dangerous, and yes I think that it’s also more dangerous because it will tear down the moral fiber of this nation.” According to Kern, “We were founded as a nation upon the principles of religion and morality. If we take those out from under our society, we will lose what has made us a great nation, we will no longer be a virtuous people, which we see happening already. And without virtue, this nation will not survive.”

Her comments have caused uproar and as the recording of her statements went viral, they caught the attention of lesbian talk show host and comedienne Ellen DeGeneres, who made light of the speech by attempting to contact the representative and author on her talk show, with the aim of “clearing up misconceptions” that she may have. She was unable to leave a voicemail.

This is not the first time Kern has marginalized and attacked diverse minority groups. Kern was reprimanded earlier this year by the Oklahoma House when she said that African-American people “don’t work as hard” as white people. She also said last April that people of color don’t work hard in school because they think the government will “take care of them.”