Lafree’s defense of Miss USA contestant contradictory

Kristi Lafree’s column “Miss (Liberal) USA?” praises Carrie Prejean (aka Miss California), whose recent anti-gay marriage comments during the Miss USA pageant secured her current 15 minutes of fame.

Lafree admires Prejean for “(disagreeing) with legalizing gay marriage,” while failing to acknowledge that the contestant did so with a downright embarrassing inability to articulate herself. In the contestant’s own prefacing remarks, “We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite.”

No, Ms. Prejean, we do not currently live in a land where everyone has that choice, hence the question you were asked. This utter lack of comprehension is unaddressed by Lafree who goes on to suggest that parents, “regardless of their personal beliefs,” wouldn’t want their children exposed to such a “mature topic.” Really? I personally know my parents had (affirmatively) discussed gay rights with me as early as elementary school.

I’m sorry if Lafree’s parents failed to do the same, as it might partially account for the closed-mindedness she currently displays. Additionally, Lafree claims it was unfair to ask Prejean for her personal beliefs, failing to realize that, quite simply, they did not. Prejean was asked nothing about her own views concerning homosexuality; rather, the question inquired whether or not she thought all other states should follow the example of those that have recently legalized gay marriage.

The fact is, one’s own morality in no way has to correspond with what they advocate politically, something it seems far too many conservatives fail to differentiate (a prime example being those who obstinately maintain that someone can’t be both anti-abortion and pro-choice).

Ultimately, Lafree’s defense of Prejean collapses due to the contradictions within the author’s own rhetoric. “(Prejean’s) question was obviously relevant,” Lafree once states, only to later declare, “The fact that the question was even asked is a disgrace.”
Credibility was also strained when Lafree, a political science major, thought it fit to dub an innocuous gossip columnist a “leftist radical.” If the unintelligible voices of Prejean and Lafree are representative of those which the gay rights movement has to contend with, I’d say we’re home free.

James Hook