Dan Savage discusses bible at High School Journalism convention

Boo. I wonder how many minds he changed that day. There's never an excuse to call a bunch of high school students pansy asses. The message gets lost and becomes what he's preaching against. Stupid move.

I agree with Dan when he says he shouldn't have called them "pansy assed" but bullying it's not.

He's got to decide whether he wants to go on being a sassy and outrageous provocateur or if he wants to continue in his post-It Gets Better role as spokesperson for the entire LGBT movement.

He can't be both--or he'll just go on being a lightning rod like this.

And, by the way, there's some evidence out there that the students walking out was planned in advance by Focus on the Family.

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Can we say that ganging up on an individual speaker and walking out in a group is bullying then?

I agree wholeheartedly with Pal Joey. Savage's "jackass-ish" approach to "activism" as always rubbed me the wrong way and I assumed it would eventually come back and bite him in the rear end as soon as this "It Gets Better" campaign started. You don't have to have a degree in rhetoric (or even take the time to read about it) to understand why Savage reacting in the way that he did is only going to undermine the work he's doing.

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Updated On: 5/4/12 at 01:59 PM

When did he decide that he's the spokesperson for all LGBT people? There's definitely so many comments he has made that I've found offensive and just plain not true or reflective in any way of my political and personal values. A lot of famous LGBT academics like Judith Butler and Michael Warner have been very active in their dislike for him too. Most of all, he really annoys me.

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Remember when Perez Hilton, of all queens, kept screaming at Will.I.Am in public, calling him a faggot? That's what I think of when I hear Dan Savage calling somebody a pansy ass.

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I know I'm not coming from the highest moral or ethical plane, but I found it refreshing that someone I agree with gave it back as good as we've been getting it.

I will agree that he was bullying intellectually , but that is hardly the bullying that inspires fear for physical safety or a dangerously diminished sense of self worth. He challenged ideas and used "pansy-ass" to describe those too cowardly to examine their own belief systems.

Did he change minds? No. But his words, ideas and critiques can and probably have emboldened and encouraged those who have so often felt victimized but those who use the Bible to justify genuine bullying and other atrocities.

However imperfect the approach or situation, provocateurs have an important place in all social change. I often think we on the the left have been too pansy-ass ourselves when it comes to being bold in the assertion of our beliefs. There is place for Martin Luther Kings and Malcolm Xs in the pursuit of social and economic jusice.

If anyone was actually scarred by his comments, I feel deep sympathy for them, but I still admire Savage.

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Updated On: 5/4/12 at 02:56 PM

"I know I'm not coming from the highest moral or ethical plane, but I found it refreshing that someone I agree with gave it back as good as we've been getting it."

Who was he giving it back to? You don't have to be a bully to be offended by someone calling the bible bull****. Those kids didn't call him names and for all we know they're not bullies in their own schools. That's not the way you teach kids. It's not like he was addressing the Focus on the Family, he was addressing high school students.

"I apolize if I've hurt anyone's feelings, but I have a right to defend myself and to point out the hypocrisy of people who justify anti-gay bigotry by pointing to the Bible and insisting that we must live by the code of Leviticus on this one issue and no other."

And which one of the kids he called a pansy ass did that?

I don't know. It's just a clip of the speech. It doesn't even give the lead up to how he started talking about the Bible in the first place.

Updated On: 5/4/12 at 03:31 PM

I don't know the context of the entire speech either. The students were, I'm assuming, part of some Journalism Convention. The idea that Savage was there to "teach" them anything is unknown to me. But if he was invited to speak, we can assume, the organizers wanted to hear his opinions, including defenses for his opinions.

Again, I don't know the entire context, but I don't get the feeling from the clip that he is debating anyone specifically from the audience, just ideas counter to his own.

As for offending his audience by calling the portions of the Bible that sanction human slavery and the murder of women "bull****", was it inappropriate? Maybe. I personally find it telling that a generic two-syllable curse-word would invite more offense than the ideas condoning holding people in chattel and stoning women to death it describes.


This incident hasn't turned me against Savage. He may someday do something that does, but this isn't it. I still admire him.

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Updated On: 5/4/12 at 03:54 PM