Tag: Carmen Rodriguez - Illinois Family Institute

Something unexpected happened following the posting on Illinois Family Institute’s Facebook page of my article on the divisive “HATE HAS NO HOME HERE” yard signs. Well, actually two unexpected and related things happened. One of the things is the Chicago Tribune’s restaurant critic Phil Vettel left a response. Here’s his piquant comment about my article:

This is bullsh*t.

I replied, “Such an inarticulate (perhaps even hateful) response from a Chicago Tribune writer. Surprise, surprise.”

Another commenter joined the conversation saying, “So prove her wrong, Phil! Bet you can’t.”

Vettel kinda, sorta took her up on the challenge with this:

Imagine the level of inarticulate hate (h/t Laurie Higgins) one must have to take issue with “Hate Has No Home Here.”

I’m not sure in what specific or even general ways my article was “inarticulate,” unless Vettel has redefined “inarticulate” in the same way “progressives” have redefined “hate” to mean the expression of ideas with which they disagree. Nor do I know what I said that would constitute “hate.” Maybe he meant that I hate the yard signs because of what they connote, in which case he’s still off the mark. I don’t “hate,” (i.e., detest) the yard signs. I object to them. I don’t like them. I think they’re divisive and counterproductive. I think they foment hatred under the guise of hippie dippy, kumbaya sloganeering.

This brings me to the other interesting thing that happened yesterday. The press contact person for the “HATE HAS NO HOME HERE” project, a very nice woman named Carmen Rodriguez, called to discuss my article. She began by insisting that I provide the evidence for my claim that the yard signs have anything to do with Trump, Trump-supporters, or conservative beliefs on immigration or the “LGBTQ” ideology. I pointed to the evidence I provided in my article, which is a piece that clearly links the signs to the election of Trump and the false allegation of bisexual North Park University student Taylor Volk that she received hateful “anti-gay” messages from a Trump supporter. While acknowledging that the article I cited did, indeed, make the link, she said that that article was in error. I asked if she had called the reporter who wrote the original piece to correct her to which Rodriguez responded with silence.

In an attempt to prove that the yard signs had nothing to do with Volk’s allegations, Trump, Trump supporters, or conservative beliefs, Rodriguez pointed to prior neighborhood campaigns, specifically mentioning a “ribbons for peace” initiative. When asked what prompted this campaign, Rodriguez faltered saying she couldn’t exactly recall, but it had something to do with someone in the neighborhood hearing some “nationalistic” talk. Hmmm, if I’m not mistaken that’s the kind of thing you hear from “progressives” who deem expressions of love for America as hateful “nationalistic” rhetoric.

She admitted that even prior to my article, her neighborhood organization had received criticism and complaints, and the complaints they received were from conservatives. That should tell her that I’m not alone in perceiving the signs as directed at conservatives and conservative beliefs. And those perceptions are the direct result of the decades-long, slanderous, and effective campaign by “progressives” to label conservatives “haters” and conservative beliefs “hate speech.”

Rodriguez even tried to convince me that she’s not really “progressive,” but her Facebook photos from a January 2017 march seem to tell a different story. One says, “DONALD, YOU IGNORANT SLUT.” Another says, “HOW MANY WOMEN DOES IT TAKE TO CRUSH A CHEETO?” Another, “MY CHOICE.” And another, “FEMINISM is the RADICAL NOTION that WOMEN are PEOPLE #notmypresident.” Hmmm. My astute powers of deduction lead me to believe she may be a dyed-in-the-wool “progressive.”

Once more for the dull of reading.

All decent people oppose hatred—and yes, conservatives are decent people. “HATE HAS NO HOME HERE” is a trite slogan stating the obvious. So, why make the yard signs and why litter one’s lawn with them? Clearly, something prompted the creation and dissemination of the signs.

The answer can be found not only in the eager gullibility of those who bought Taylor Volk’s hoax—which was the proximate cause of the signs—but also in the relentless epithet-hurling of “progressives” over the past 30 years or so. Whenever someone expresses an ontological or moral proposition or political view with which “progressives” disagree, they—“progressives”—shriek “hater.” It doesn’t matter to “progressives” whether the person expressing the forbidden view actually hates people. All that matters to “progressives” is silencing conservatives through invective.

The consequence is that the words “hate” and “hater” now have denotations and connotations. And everyone knows the connotations. Conservatives well understand that when the word “hate” appears, it’s likely directed at them. And that’s why these yard signs are divisive. If the creators intended for these signs to eradicate hatred, they should not have employed politicized language imbued with associations “progressives” have created.

To be clear, the reason so many conservatives object to these signs is not that “HATE” lives in their homes or hearts. The reason they object to these signs is that they know it is their ontological, moral, theological and political views that are deemed hateful and which are being tacitly targeted by these signs.

I believe Carmen Rodriguez. I believe she wants to promote dialogue and comity between people of diverse beliefs. I believe she wants to find a way for those who disagree to live peaceably together. But, as I told her, these yard signs will not achieve her goal.

Listen to Laurie read this article here:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Unexpected-Responses_audio_01.mp3

IFI depends on the support of concerned-citizens like you. Donate now

-and, please-

It was announced a week ago that the bizarre hate crime of which actor Jussie Smollett alleges he was a victim and the subsequent clean-up of his mess by incompetent fixer State’s Attorney Kim Foxx is going to be investigated by a special prosecutor. This turn of events reminded me of yard signs. On your leisurely summer walks, have you seen those yard signs that cropped up all over Illinois and other states over the past three years—you know, the ones with the banal expression “HATE HAS NO HOME HERE”? Who could disagree with such a statement, and, therefore, why a yard sign? Well, there’s text and then there’s subtext and history. The text expresses an important idea commonly held. So, why make a yard sign to announce a commonplace verity to every passerby every day for three years? Ah, now we come to the subtext, but first the fascinating history that the mainstream press did a very poor job illuminating.

On November 15, 2016, exactly one week after the election of President Donald Trump, NBC News Chicago reported that bisexual student Taylor Volk, then a senior at the purportedly Christian North Park University, said she had received two anonymous emails and a note taped to her door that contained “homophobic slurs,” “harassing, threatening language” and references to Trump. Volk further claimed that such occurrences were a “nationwide epidemic.”

Just three days later, on November 18, it was breathlessly reported that six social justice warriors (actually seven) from the North Park neighborhood had already created the yard signs. Kurt Peterson, Barbara Nordlund, Steven Velez Luce, Megan Trinter, Carmen Rodriguez, Jeanne Marie Olson, and Catherine Korda were the eager, hate-hating beavers who had yard signs ready to go just three days after the traumatized Volk was interviewed by the press.

But then things took an unexpected turn, though why it was unexpected is surprising.

A week after Volk’s story made the news, an investigation revealed her entire story was—wait for it—a hoax. But “progressives” can’t let either a crisis or a hoax go to waste. Gotta mine even hoaxes for propaganda gold. So, with very little press on the hoax, the gang of seven were able to disseminate their banal, virtue-signaling yard signs around the country and even the world, although oddly the website doesn’t mention the hoax in the group’s background myth.

Now for the subtext or subtexts. While the text suggests that community members reject hatred—which most community members in most communities do—the subtext coming on the heels of Volk’s Hoax is that Trump is a hater, that those who voted for him (you know, the “deplorables”) are haters, and that those who disagree with the arguable assumptions of “progressives” on immigration or the “LGBTQ” ideology are haters.

These yard signs are the neighborhood equivalent of “safe space” stickers that regressive public school teachers/activists affix to their desks and regressive corporate employees affix to their desks and cubicle dividers. These yard signs and stickers are cunning strategic devices. First, they are political announcements masquerading as noble humanitarian gestures. Second, their absence implies that community members, teachers, or corporate employees with naked yards, desks, cubicles, or offices are insufficiently “woke,” unsafe, intolerant, bigoted haters. And so, “progressive” mission accomplished.

Safety and hatred, like tolerance, ignorance, bigotry, and equality, have been redefined. Now safety refers to and requires the affirmation of “progressive” assumptions about immigration and about the nature and morality of homosexual acts and cross-sex impersonation. And hatred refers to the affirmation of conservative assumptions about immigration and the nature and morality of homosexual acts and cross-sex impersonation.

The next time a “progressive” starts caterwauling that conservatives are divisive, remember what “progressives” do. They actually threaten and attack conservatives. They continually spread the poisonous lie to immigrants and members of the “LGBTQ” community—including children and teens—that those who hold conservative moral and political beliefs hate them. And they concoct hateful, divisive hoaxes to foment more “progressive” hatred.

Here’s a list of hoaxes alleging anti-“gay” and/or racist incidents. I’m sure government schoolteachers will be covering these in their unit on political hoaxes. Taylor Volk was right. There is an epidemic—an epidemic of Leftist hoaxes designed to spread hatred of conservatives:

Jussie Smollett can’t block special prosecutor in alleged hate hoax case, judge rules (New York Daily News)

Jackson gay rights leader accused of burning down own home (The Detroit News)

Student Charged with Making Anti-Gay Threats against Herself (National Review)

Christian college student lied about harassment from Trump supporters (Gay Star News)

A black student wrote those racist messages that shook the Air Force Academy, school says (The Washington Post)

Lesbian couple accused of faking hate crime (KDVR.com)

Whole Foods: ‘Anti-Gay Cake’ a Hoax (Daily Beast)

Racist, anti-LGBT flier found outside Dallas nightclub appears to be hoax (DallasNews.com)

Woman sentenced to 90 days for hate-crime hoax (Wisconsin Gazette)

Was ‘Relentlessly Gay’ Homeowner’s Fundraiser Just A Hoax? (HuffPost)

‘I don’t want to die!’: Leading gay ‘marriage’ activist in Ohio faked his own abduction (LifeSiteNews)

Anti-gay hate crime at University of North Dakota fraternity deemed a hoax (The Washington Times)