BREAKING: NOM’s Louis comes out for civil marriage equality; credits bus tour for change of heart

By Adam Bink

You read that right. P8TT friend Jeremy Hooper has the exclusive. If you need reminding, here’s our Louis (hi, Louis!):

Today, Jeremy published an interview with Louis in which he (a) repudiates many of the things he wrote on NOM’s blog, Facebook, and Twitter feed. Examples of Louis’ responses:

Any support or endorsement of what Peter LaBarbera does I retract. I have been reading via Twitter and his website what this guy has to say, and it is clear that he is just a hateful man and I would be embarrassed and ashamed to be associated with him.

Furthermore, the issues Peter takes on, even if they were true, are not in themselves valid reasons for denying same-sex couples access to civil marriage. I am aware how he was upset by my public support for the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell in December. His reasoning for such seemed to be something along the lines of “in order to protect marriage, you have to oppose everything homosexuals do”. If that were the case, Peter, how far should we go in restricting homosexuals’ lives?

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I once wrote or implied that all homosexuals are single, even if they had at some point or another, been legally married by the state. While in the eyes of the Catholic faith, these same-sex unions aren’t recognized as marriages insofar as holy matrimony is concerned, I retract this statement now that I have been able to see and distinguish and understand the differences between religious and civil marriage.

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I quoted from the research of Paul Cameron when I said that homosexuals have a shorter life-span. I must say that when I quoted this man I was not aware of his history and here and now do not wish to comment on the legitimacy or irrelevance of the man’s work as I am neither a psychologist nor does psychology interest me.

What I said, referring to the life-spans of homosexuals, I continue to believe in the following context: Any group of people that contract any viral disease more than the general public due to the nature of their lifestyle, logically, will have a life-expectancy lower than that of the general populace.

However, that kind of rhetoric, implying that gay men are unworthy of civil marriage due to any particular health issues surrounding their sexual activity was both inappropriate and offensive. It is for those reasons, that I retract this statement.
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I consider myself agnostic and while homosexual acts may very well be “immoral” in the eyes of Christian morality, I can no longer stand by any comments I’ve made in the past about the immorality of homosexuality. There are a variety of different sets and sources of morals and no one has the right to impose their set on the rest of society.

Wow.

Louis goes onto to credit the tour stop in Atlanta as being the first stop on his road to changing his heart. You may remember Atlanta as the site of Arisha’s discussion with Alveda King:

and where 254 equality supporters turned out to silently and peacefully oppose the 20 or so NOM supporters:

Here’s Louis:

As you may already know, I was the one behind the 2010 Summer for Marriage Tour which the National Organization for Marriage sponsored and operated throughout July and August last year. It was my doing when, in March that year, I approached Brian Brown about sponsoring and participating in a series of traditional marriage rallies scattered around the Nation.

In fact, the tour route itself, while chosen largely by NOM itself, incorporated as many of the sites I had originally chosen and helped independently organize. Other locations were added due to strategic, political or simply logistical purposes.

Ironically, one of the last tour stops added to the itinerary was Atlanta and I bring this site up because it was in Atlanta that I can remember that I questioned what I was doing for the first time. The NOM showing in the heart of the Bible-belt was dismal and the hundreds of counter-protesters who showed up were nothing short of inspiring.

Even though I had been confronted by the counter-protesters throughout the marriage tour, the lesbian and gay people whom I made a profession out of opposing became real people for me almost instantly. For the first time I had empathy for them and remember asking myself what I was doing.

If my transition from opponent to supporter of same-sex civil marriage was a timeline, Atlanta would be indicated by the first point on the line. The next point on that timeline would be two months later.

For the rest of that story, you’ll have to check out Jeremy’s interview.

As many of you may remember, I first came onboard P8TT last summer to document the NOM tour here on the front page. All I can say is, I am proud of this site and the people and organizations behind turning out so many equality supporters. I am proud that Arisha, Anthony, Phyllis and Danny spent weeks on the road to document the tour and force NOM and their staff to answer the hard questions. As you can see from reading Jeremy’s interview, the experience of talking to Anthony and our staff and reading this blog and your comments, and seeing so many real families who just want the same basic civil rights as anyone else, ended up making the difference. Over one thousand of you contributed on this very page to fund NOM Tour Tracker expenses to support this work, and ended up changing the mind of one of NOM’s leaders. We made a difference together!

If you continue to support the work we’re doing tracking NOM and want to chip in to get more success stories (Maggie next? Sky’s the limit!!), here’s that page again. Thanks for your support, thanks for making this page a place to change hearts and minds, and here’s to seeing what happens next!