Today we have confirmation of the rift, and of the fact that Gina Loudon and her husband John Loudon were kicked out of the St. Louis Tea Party. On a discussion on Vanessa Roman's facebook wall, Ed Reggi made the following comment (I'll post the full quote + screenshot below):
For the record, Dana (who I sort of knew prior to her going Tea Party global) has NEVER said one homophobic thing. If anything she has always come across (to me) as very non-judgmental ...in the area of LGBT. However, I will suggest Chris plenty of other "Tea Party" folks, like Dr. Gina Loudon and her husband, do come across very much anti-gay and homophobic. Dr. Gina Loudon and her husband, former Sen. John Loudon both supported the recent National Organization for Marriage rally held in Clayton. NOM (as it is known) is a political organizational front for mostly fundamental christian members to send their tax-free donations out-of-state to help create anti-LGBT legislation under the guise of democracy and patriotism. Their recent $1 million effort helped oust three Iowa Supreme court justices all because they did their jobs granting same-sex couples the freedoms of marriage supported by the Iowa Constitution. Not only did these three Judges do their job by protecting a minority from the tyranny of the majority, it was an unanimous ruling was made by a 7 justice panel appointed mostly by previous Republican Governors -- ironic no?In response to this, Chris Loesch, Dana's husband (who also is a central member of the St. Louis Tea Party), replied:
You can see a full shot of that conversation and it's context here:
The tea party did a good job covering up the rift, but now there's no doubt that it's real. Of course, that doesn't stop "Dr. Gina" from advertising herself as a St. Louis tea party member:
Posts
I think that you are ignoring the real news story in all of this:
ReplyDeleteThe St. Louis Tea Party supports gay marriage.
Anonymous, maybe that's the reason. A different explanation might be that there were ego clashes between the Loudons and other members.
ReplyDeleteBut if the tea party kicked them out because they don't want to be seen as anti-gay marriage, it's a shame that they're not willing to own it. They basically have said nothing as a group about the subject.
Read the above dialogue from facebook. This Ed Reggi complains about how Gina Loudon supports the concept of marriage between a man and a woman and complains that someone who thinks that way is representative of the SLTP and Chris Loesch's response is to say that Gina Loudon has been removed?
ReplyDeleteWhat else is the takeaway other than the fact that by "removing" Gina Loudon for her views on traditional marriage that the SLTP is saying that anyone who doesn't support gay marriage isn't worthy of leadership in the SLTP?
I *wish* that were the takeaway, but there were a lot of other tensions and ego-clashes in the tea party. Notice that Chris Loesch's comments didn't say anything about the reason why the Loudons were "removed.' If the tea party as a group has a stance against homophobia, they should make it public.
ReplyDeleteThe Loudons were removed because of their views on traditional marriage.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. But on the other hand anyone can say anything as an anonymous commenter without any repercussions, so there's not really any strong reason to take the claim as evidence. Maybe they were kicked out for that. But, if so, why is the St. Louis tea party so quiet about it? Shouldn't they highlight the fact that they removed people for their extreme antics?
ReplyDeleteSo maybe they were kicked out for other reasons, like a clash of egos, or anger over Gina and John referring to themselves as founding members. Or maybe they weren't kicked out at all: there are some in the St. Louis tea party who claim that the Loudons have not been removed. If the tea party believes they made a justified decision, then they should publicly share it, not hide it.