Can someone tell me what's going on with this headline in the Washington Post today?
This turns out to be a routine kind of story we've all read a dozen times. It's about a feud between neighbors that spirals out of control and becomes completely insane. What it's not about is the fact that one of the neighbors is gay. There is almost nothing in the text of the piece that even mentions this, and nothing at all to suggest it has anything to do with the source of the bad blood.
So why highlight it?
There is virtually nothing in the text of the piece that even mentions this ...
Oh PLEASE. it mentions gay flags repeatedly, it mentions that the male owner has a husband, it mentions their role in various gay civil rights groups. It's a consistent theme.
And why mention it? Because the complaining couple -- who from what I can tell are completely at fault, having assumed the risk of moving in RIGHT NEXT DOOR to a gay bar/restaurant -- are right-wing Christianists, and in case you hadn't noticed, anti-gay bigotry is kind of a big thing these days among right-wing Christianists.
Think this would have happened if it had been a country/western-themed bar-restaurant? I kinda have the feeling the probability is, y'know, LOWER.
FFS.
So every time a right wing Christian has a dispute with an open homosexual we assume the real reason is the Christian's distaste for homosexuality?
Guilty until proven innocent?
So every time an "MF" has a dispute with a progressive website we should assume that said MF is not a whining snowflake?
Of is that "MF"'s does what "MF"'s is?
Did you miss the parts about the anti-gay slurs?
Innocent until they literally confess, despite repeated hostile acts and significant evidence of bias?
There is not a single thing that you cited that indicates that the dispute is about the restaurant owners being gay. There is a fair amount of evidence that, rather than gayness, the dispute is over one party wanting to buy the property the other is on and change the town's rules on development.
Reread the last paragraph of the OP. The story IS about gay owners, and it mentions and implies that they are gay repeatedly; ergo the statements in the OP that claim it does not are provably false. And while there is nothing in the WaPo story that says definitively that "all this happened because the Christianists don't like gay people," so technically it is correct that the story does not formally state that, there is certainly overwhelming historical context that strongly suggests that it's the "source of the bad blood."
"There is nothing in the story to suggest that the spike in vandalism against the local synagogue had anything to do with the recent opening of a nearby Nazi crustpunk bar."
Please ...
Kevin, Kevin, Kevin. SIGH. I've been to the Plains a bunch of time and I live in Northern Virginia. This is entirely about gay bashing. Virginia is currently a battleground between the reactionary conservatives who want the world recast in how they feel things should be versus the rest of us who got used to a multicultural welcoming community. I mean a couple of welcoming churches and a JCC near me have been vandalized by wacko conservative trying to make us all adhere to their values.
Editing to add - Did you gloss over the allegations of the nasty neighbors using the F word towards their gay nieghbors? And the husbands use of the hoary trope, "Some of my best friends are gay!"
Oh, you beat me to it.
I actually wouldn't be surprised to find out that there's a rich Republican bankrolling the Xtians' legal fees.
None of which constitutes evidence that the dispute concerns anyone being gay. "Hey, there are a lot of people who dislike gays who live in that area," does not, in any way, constitute such evidence.
The nasty neighbors used the offensive word, there's a mountain of evidence that they hated the neighbors for being gay and they coveted the property. It can be a twofer.
The article does cover the restaurant owners' sexuality as part of the trouble, although it doesn't seem to be at the center of the dispute. It was much more about the conservative couple regularly entering the restaurant without masks during the covid pandemic, and complaining about the restaurant's trash bins. Then things escalated after the restaurant banned the couple from their restaurant.
This comment over on Reddit gives some interesting context
https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/150laof/a_gay_couple_ran_a_rural_restaurant_in_peace_then/js44mqh/
Quoted below
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In a lot of ways, though, that parallels the changes in the GOP over the last 50 years. Being a gross, massively insecure clown who's constantly mad that you can't force everyone to bow down and worship you is practically a requirement for party membership now. Arguably this attitude started with Nixon (who spent his whole life butthurt because Whittier frat boys didn't want to hang out with him) but however it began, it's like their defining characteristic at this point.
Much appreciated.
I hope their son doesn't win that seat.
Suffering the consequences of being an asshole doesn't mean one is being persecuted. What snowflakes.
Also, of course their son's name is Regan. I bet they don't pronounce it ree-gan though, like it's spelled, but ray-gan like the shithead.
This once, I am so taken aback by Kevin Drum's reaction that, were it anyone else, I would have thought the person hadn't actually read the article in its entirety, but skimmed it in quite a hurry.
I admit to not having read the full Washer website page that a commenter on The Post site provided, but one thing did catch my eye - mention of an older relative, & Louisville. This family is not just a family recently arrived from NoVa. They're like some with whom have I had contact with ties to that city.
Variatons of John Kerry's question "How do you ask the last man to die for a mistake?" apply.
Kevin, a dispute can arise that is caused by factors that it is not ABOUT. This is not really a dispute about trash any more than the false flag attacks that led to wars with Mexico and Vietnam were what those wars were about.
If the Washers wanted to coexist with their neighbors without friction, they could have. Instead, they refuse to make reasonable accommodations. Now, because they neighbors run the most popular restaurant in a very small town, they have divided the community, too.
Divide and conquer. It's an old strategy.
From the article:
‘I like you, but the faggots you work for, I can’t stand’.
I think the problem stems from the fact that you didn't read the article in the Washington Post.
I read the Washington Post on a regular basis and usually like it. And I read this article for awhile (it got boring) and came to the same conclusion that Kevin did.
But the real answer is that it appears that there was a conscious decision at the Post maybe 5 years ago to highlight issues related to historically disadvantaged peoples. The paper posts more articles on these subjects. Articles on "regular" issues have a paragraph or two on how this development (usually) disadvantages these groups. And it is in more than just the regular news. The Sports section these days features the WNBA like it is a Major League on par with MLB or the NHL (like they are trying to tell me BE INTERESTED IN THE WNBA) and the columns rarely are about sport as much as the politics of sport (in today's paper there was a column on Sen Tuberville). Style, Metro, even the obits, similar story.
I have been reading the Post for forever and it used to be that about 10% of the articles had a clear left slant. Now its maybe a third? I am a normie Liberal who often agrees with many of these positions... but I also treasured the old Post because it (along with NPR) covered news in depth and generally from a non-partisan point of view. It was a great source of information. These days (like NPR), it has turned into an outlet with a clear partisan position, and I just do not trust it as much. It's unfortunately validating some of the criticism of the Right about the mainstream press. Kind of an own goal...
When one political party embraces racist and sexist bigotry, a non-partisan editorial position is no longer ethical.
Writing about people who have traditionally been excluded from mainstream journalism and writing comprehensively enough to examine how the new super mega highway that was fawned over in days past may actually have negative impacts isn’t “liberal,” it’s eliminating past bias that you likely were unconscious of.
My, how contemptuous of you! Presuming that I am unconscious of bias, that I am not "liberal" because I do not meet your litmus test, whatever that might be...
And you weren't? FOAD you twisted little man.
Really? Personal Insults? MAGAite.
Jeesh, I hope the Washer financial dynasty is able to recover from this self inflicted wound and Regan Washer can buy a larger cowboy hat.
They literally called the restaurant owners an anti-gay slur.
While the owners being gay may not have been what started it, it sure seems to be a contributing factor at a minimum for these conservafucks. It's too bad they haven't been run out of town yet.
I drive past this place on I-66 every few weeks. I'll have to stop in sometime.
Well, In spite of all of the above I side with Kevin. When I read the article I was thinking that this is just an old fashioned small town feud. Just change the labels. Black- white, gay- conservative, local- out of towner. Just the news please (good luck with that) and this hardly qualifies as news.
This is very much about White Christian Male assuming he would bulldoze his way into getting what he wanted. This would never happen in the reverse, it's all about the group that has traditionally been in power attempting to cling to that power. You wouldn't see this sort of a-holery behavior by any other group.