The Swedish blogosphere offers a great laugh today as communist blogger Ali Esbati implies that conservative columnist Marie Söderqvist is a fascist who opposes democracy.

Well, Mr Esbati should know.

I honestly don't know why I care about the American elections. I guess it's my interest in politics that makes the whole process so exiting even though it does not involve me personally. However, after the Republican debate on CNN I begin to wonder if this political drama is not turning into a shallow farce. John McCain and Mitt Romney's argument about whether or not Romney used the word "timetable" in an interview in 2004 was simply too silly.

More interesting than the debate itself is the fact that both ex-candidate Rudy Giuliani and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger now endorse McCain.

Anyhow, tomorrow will see the one-to-one debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

Rabbi Shafran of the Agudath Israel of America has published a letter from a father to his teenage son in the Jerusalem Post. In my opinion, this letter proves a good example of how a religiously superstitious parent abuses his child by inflicting shame and limiting freedom.

Sean, the right thing for a Jewish person is to marry another Jew.

Not only because our religion requires it. But because when Jews marry out, they disrespect who they are, they are disloyal to the Jewish past and they chip away at the Jewish future.

Whether or not our family kept strictly kosher or celebrated Shabbat or attended services often enough is all one thing. But the thought of bringing about the end of a proud Jewish line stretching back in time for centuries is something else. It's more than some religious transgression.

You never asked to be a Jew, I know. You were born one. But being Jewish isn't a burden. It's a gift. It means you are part of something bigger, much bigger, than yourself.

Each of us Jews represents the hopes of so many Jewish ancestors.

Libertarianism—unlike conservatism—holds that no human is responsible to history and collectivist traditions. Each and every one of us is capable to form his or her life independently from family and the society. All collectivist claims are false. We always have a choice between conformity and rebelliousness.

The religious parent rejects libertarianism on conservative grounds. The child is told that it has responsibilities towards earlier generations; and if the child does not conform to timeworn ideals, he or she will be punished with guilt and condemnation.

This is nothing short of child abuse.

Eric Schwartz of Arizona Daily Star:

The scientific community has long believed that as global warming continues and large amounts of freshwater ice melt into the ocean, the ocean's circulation will slow.

This would have a catastrophic impact on the environment as vividly, if somewhat overdramatically, portrayed in the film "The Day After Tomorrow."

But a paper published last week in Nature magazine, the result of several studies of past and possible future weather, says that in fact the very opposite is true and ocean circulation will become stronger as the icecaps melt.

"We missed what was right in front of our eyes," said Joellen Russell, an assistant professor of geosciences at the University of Arizona and co-author of the paper.

And:

Evidence from the most recent ice age, which reached its coldest 21,000 years ago, shows that the ocean had very little movement and exchange of deep water and surface water until the warming of the Earth about 18,000 years ago. "The evidence is piling up," that those models predicting a weakened ocean circulation in the coming decades are wrong, Russell said.

The increasing speed of the westerlies and their movement toward the poles "should stir the ocean's salty and fresh waters around and minimize the effect of the polar freshening," [co-author] Toggweiler said.

Still, the idea that the ocean's circulation will increase as the Earth warms is not fully accepted by scientists.

"It's controversial, but it explains what happened in the past and what is happening now," Toggweiler said.

The mounting evidence has won the new theory a lot of converts, Toggweiler said.

"We were lucky to publish first," Russell said.

"This is what science is all about," Toggweiler said. "Looking for where the common wisdom is wrong."

Here's the actual paper, published in Nature on 17 January 2008.

I have noticed a trend in science magazines recently. It seems to me that more and more researchers suggest that human-made global warming is not as big a threat as many (leftist) environmentalists would like us to believe.

(Seen in picture is a schematic outline of the world's ocean currents.)

John Edwards is expected to make the announcement in about an hour.

More here and here.

With sixty-four per cent of the votes counted, all major news networks and professional commentators agree in their prediction of a John McCain win in Florida. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton wins the Democratic primary in Florida. However, that will not benefit her, as the state has no delegates.

Heath Ledger's last movie:

I like John McCain and had hoped he would not sink so low as to use bigoted misconceptions. But I was wrong. In his latest telemarketing campaign, a woman voice attacks Mitt Romney's flip-flopping on social issues. The phone voice says,

"Mitt Romney thinks he can fool us. He supported abortion on demand, even allowed a law mandating taxpayer-funding for abortion. He says he changed his mind, but he still hasn't changed the law. He told gay organizers in Massachusetts he would be a stronger advocate for special rights than even Ted Kennedy. Now, it's something different."

Special rights is evangelical newspeak for equal rights, i.e. if citizen A wants his government to treat him as an equal to citizen B, the evangelical thinks citizen A wants special rights.

A tense moment at Capitol Hill:

Rival Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama came within a foot of each other just before President Bush's State of the Union speech Monday night and managed not to acknowledge each other, and certainly not touch.

Clinton, clad in scarlet, crossed the aisle between their seats on the House floor and reached out a hand to greet Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, the Democratic icon whose endorsement she had courted only to lose it to Obama.

Kennedy shook her hand while Obama, wearing a dark suit and standing between the two, turned away.

The rivals then retreated to their seats, only the aisle and four senators between them.

I don't know why Choderlos de Laclos's Les Liaisons dangereuses springs to mind. Maybe it's only a witticism of my vivid and somewhat perverted imagination?

This is quite remarkable. A recent survey conducted by the national Church of Sweden shows that only one in ten of its confirmands believe in God.

More in Swedish here.

This is so funny I just had to copy the entire blog entry. If I breach some international copyright law, I apologize beforehand. Anyhow, here's Dave Barry:

On Tuesday, millions of Florida voters will head for the polls. Being Floridians, many of them will become confused and drive into buildings, canals, cemeteries, other Floridians, etc. But some will actually make it to the polls, where they will cast ballots that will play a crucial role in the presidential election. Or, in the case of Democrats, not.

It turns out that the 2008 Florida Democratic primary doesn't count. Florida will be sending the same number of delegates to the 2008 Democratic convention as Uzbekistan.

This may seem unfair, but there's a simple, logical explanation: The whole primary system is insane. Consider the process so far...

First Iowa held "caucuses," in which Iowans gathered in small groups at night and engaged in some mysterious Iowan ritual that for all we know involves having intimate relations with corn. Right after that, Wyoming had a primary, but it was only for Republicans, because Wyoming Democrats (apparently there are at least two) will hold their primary on March 8.

Most of the candidates ignored Wyoming and focused on the New Hampshire primary, except Rudy Giuliani, who's following a shrewd strategy, originally developed by the Miami Dolphins, of not entering the race until he has been mathematically eliminated. After New Hampshire came Michigan, where the ballot listed all the Republicans, but only certain Democrats, including Chris Dodd, who had already dropped out of the race, but NOT including Barack Obama or John Edwards.

After Michigan came the Nevada caucuses, in which Hillary Clinton got more votes, but Barack Obama got more delegates. (If you don't understand how that could happen, then you have never been to a casino.)

Then came the South Carolina Republican primary, which of course was not held on the same day as the South Carolina Democratic primary, which will be Monday. Then comes Florida, in which Republican voters will elect some delegates, although the total will only be half the number Florida was originally supposed to get.

Meanwhile Florida Democrats, as I mentioned, will have the same impact on their party's nomination as if they fed their ballots to ducks.

I am not making any of this up: This is our actual primary system, except (I hope) the part about the corn. We're selecting candidates for the most important job in the world via a process that's less rational than the one used to choose Miss Kumquat of Pasco County.

How did we end up with this ridiculous system? We got it through endless petty squabbling, in both parties, over the issue of which states get to go first. That's right:

When confronted with what should be a minor procedural problem, the leaders of our major political parties can't even work intelligently with their own allies, let alone their opponents. This is why, no matter who wins in November, I am optimistic about the future of the nation. (I'm referring to Uzbekistan.)

Anyway, for those of you who plan to vote Tuesday, here's a quick overview of the political situation:

The Republican race – It's still wide open. Mitt "Mitt" Romney holds a slight edge in delegates, plus a heifer he got for winning Wyoming. Right behind him are John McCain, Chuck Norris and the late Ronald Reagan. Bringing up the rear is Rudy, who needs a win and has been frantically courting Florida voters. He's mowing your lawn right now.

The Democratic race – It's down to Obama vs. Clinton, and it's getting nasty. They hate each other, with the kind of passionate hatred that you see only between two people who hold essentially the same positions on everything. Edwards is still running, but at this point they don't even bother to put a microphone on him for the debates. He just waves his arms to indicate how he's going to take on the big corporations.

So that's the situation, Floridians. On Tuesday, it's your turn to stand up and be counted, unless of course you're a Democrat. But whatever you are, you should get out there and vote, even if you have no earthly idea what or whom you're voting for, or why, because that's what democracy is all about.

Also, Rudy, if you're reading this: My hedge needs trimming.

This makes no sense to people unfamiliar with television channel BBC Three, but to me and other fans the blobs will be sadly missed.

(Via Arga Lappen.)

(Warning: this entry may contain irony.)

Yes, the dinosaurs died because Adam ate a forbidden fruit. How could anyone be stupid enough not to believe a convincing line of evidence like that?

Hm... This is a trick question, right? I'm not sure, but I pick God. The correct answer has to be God, right?

The religious hatemongers failed to disturb Heath Ledger's memorial service in Los Angeles:

Heath Ledger's family and loved ones have held a private memorial service at a chapel in Los Angeles.

The service took place under heavy security last night at the Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park and Mortuary in a bid to thwart paparazzi and US religious extremists.

Religious groups vowed to picket the memorial because of Ledger's performance as a gay cowboy in Brokeback Mountain.

The memorial took place after hours at the chapel. Security guards manned the front gates and Los Angeles police checked the grounds to ensure Ledger's parents, Kim and Sally, his sister Kate, ex-fiancee Michelle Williams, his two-year-old daughter Matilda, former girlfriend Naomi Watts and 10 other close family and friends could mourn the loss of the 28-year-old in private.

Ledger's coffin was transported from Manhattan to the chapel for last night's service.

After the 30-minute service, the group moved on to the Beverly Hills Hotel for an intimate dinner in a private room.

I would not be surprised if Fred Phelps showed up at the funeral in Australia.

The mind-blowing salaries of successful footballers are my father's favourite topic of conversation. Next time I see him I will be able to tell him that British novelist Martin Amis now earns more per hour lecturing at the University of Manchester than England's top footballers.

David Bernstein offers a solution to the ongoing Gaza crisis:

Sixty years ago, when Egypt occupied Gaza, it refused to grant the local Arab residents, native Gazans and refugees from the Arab-Israeli war of 1947-48, citizenship. Instead, the Egyptian government intentionally cut them off from Egypt and kept them impoverished, so they could be used as a propaganda and military weapon against Israel. When Israel took over Gaza in 1967, it opened the border with Israel, providing tens of thousands of jobs for Gazans, and increasing the standard of living there dramatically, albeit from very low levels. After a wave of suicide attacks from Gaza, Israel gradually closed off the border with Israel, and finally closed it off entirely when Hamas took over last year. Meanwhile, Israel no longer occupies Gaza, and the population has sunken back into abject poverty.

With the Gazan's breach of the border with Egypt, and Egypt's refusal to use force to seal the border, things have come full circle. It's time to ask why Egypt, with 80 million people, can't grant Gaza's one million full Egyptian citizenship, and allow them to live in Sinai or even Cairo instead of being stuck in Gaza.

No matter what happens in the near future between the Palestinians and Israel, I doubt Israel will ever allow the reasonably free movement between Gaza and Israel that existed through the early 1990s. Giving the Gazans Egyptian citizenship, and making Egypt responsible for security in the area, would benefit Israel, the Gazans, and even Egypt itself, by destroying Hamas's base (Hamas being affiliated with Egypt's anti-government Muslim Brotherhood). It would also benefit the Palestinians in the West Bank, by allowing the more moderate residents there to reach an accommodation with Israel, perhaps in concert with Jordan.

The most surprising thing about the Democratic primary election in South Carolina is the crushing defeat Hillary Clinton suffered. Few thought she would win, but to see the main rival gain more than twice the number of votes must be humiliating.

"You can say many things about Mao, but he did rehabilitate thousands of drug addicts," said Per Johansson, head of the Swedish National Association for a Drug-Free Society, at a recent European conference. Johansson should know. Devout communist Nils Bejerot founded this proscriptive-beyond-reason organization on Maoist ideology.

(Chinese poster reads: "We will destroy the old world and build a new." It shows a worker crushing crucifixes, Buddha statues, and classical Chinese texts. This poster from 1966 is an example of Maoist propaganda during the Cultural Revolution. We can assume the drug addicts faced the same destiny as those religious symbols. A good thing according to Swedish drug warriors.)

European mainstream media is bias in favour of the Palestinians. That is why we are fed with sob stories about people being trapped in the Gaza Strip but rarely hear or read anything about the hundreds of rockets fired against Israel every month. It's no wonder people unfamiliar with the conflict get the impression that Israelis are the bad guys.

Biased journalists are too eager to report anything the Palestinian authorities and terrorist groups tells them. What many of them seem unwilling to recognize is that the information given to the media by the Palestinians often is bogus. On 19 January, I wrote that the story about Yasser Arafat donating blood after 9/11 was untrue. Now I have learned about fake pictures of a parliament session during an alleged power cut in Gaza on 22 January. Reuters, one of the world's top news agencies, was one of many that fell for the Palestinian media stunt and published the pictures.

(Via Michael J. Totten.)

On 30 December 2007, I wrote enthusiastically about Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic and the plans for commercial space travel. This is a truly fascinating subject for a man who grew up with Star Wars movies and dreams of intergalactic journeys. This week, it was revealed how exactly this new space tourism will work. Here's an explanatory picture from the Virgin Galactic press release (click on image to enlarge):

Bill Clinton is damaging his wife's claim that she will be an effective chief executive. In short, that is what The Economist's anonymous Lexington columnist and most other commentators say about the former president's frenetic involvement in Hillary Clinton's campaign. I think they are right.

This one is not mine. It's a poster made by London-based artist Daryl Waller. I think it's brilliant.

The most deranged church in America intends to humiliate the Ledger family at the funeral because it hates homosexuals. Flier copied from the Westboro Baptist Church website (which I refuse to link to):

I wonder what Jesus would say about this.

According to the latest opinion poll, Sweden's centre-right government has support from less than 38 per cent of the electorate. The Social Democrats, which is the main opposition party, has support from nearly 47 per cent. With the Greens and the Communists, the opposition bloc has support from 58.5 per cent of the voters. The graph shows the result of the 2006 general election (left) and the latest opinions poll (right).

I repeat what I wrote in November 2007: It's time to put an end to triangulation. Give the electorate a real choice. It's not too late to turn things around, but the Government have no time to lose.

Read more in Swedish here.

Conservative Christians have little support in Sweden. According to a new poll, only 20 per cent of voters want a society based on traditional Christian values.

Read more in Swedish here.

New research from Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, suggests the Gaydar exists.

Yesterday, I met a very friendly Canadian man at the Centre for Theology and Religious Studies at Lund University. He was visiting the centre on his way to another Scandinavian university where he will spend the semester as a guest professor. When I talked to him, he seemed familiar. Now I know who he resembles—he's Ned Flanders.

Seneca the Younger: "Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful."

(Via Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion, British paperback edition, page 313.)

Regan Suzuki of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization says ethanol and other biofuels could lead to food shortages in developing countries. Furthermore, it could pose a threat to the environment.

It's no wonder people are getting confused.

It's a bit silly to mourn someone you never met, but it happens sometimes. I was deeply saddened by the news of Heath Ledger's passing. After I have spent an hour reading obituaries, I realize I'm not alone feeling this way. Joey DiGuglielmo of Washington Blade expresses it well when he writes about the special affection many gay men have for Ledger after his outstanding performance in "Brokeback Mountain". To many of us, the film meant something more. Even though there are quite a few of us around, no films are made with main characters in same-sex relationships. This is, of course, a result of religious hatred towards homosexuals and the Hollywood producers' fear of scaring off the wider audience. If there is a gay guy in a mainstream film, he's most often an odd and effeminate man lacking all heroic qualities.

However, not only gay men remember Ledger for "Brokeback Mountain". From the New York Times:

The defining performance of Heath Ledger's tragically foreshortened career—more or less equivalent to what Jim Stark in "Rebel Without a Cause" was for James Dean—will surely be the role of Ennis Del Mar in "Brokeback Mountain."

A portrait of inarticulate love and thwarted desire, Ennis is a rich, complicated character succinctly sketched in Annie Proulx's original short story and brought to heartbreaking life by the film's screenwriters, Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry, by its director, Ang Lee, and above all by Mr. Ledger himself.

Outwardly, Ennis presents a familiar image of rough-hewn western masculinity, and the longing that surges under his taciturn demeanor does not so much contradict this image as help to explain it. Ennis's love for Jack Twist, whom he meets tending sheep on a Wyoming mountaintop in the early 1960s, takes Ennis by surprise and throws him permanently off balance. His lifelong silence, the film suggests, is less a sign of strength than of cowardice, a crippling inability to acknowledge or communicate the truth of his own feelings.

What made the performance so remarkable was that Mr. Ledger, without betraying Ennis's dignity or his reserve, was nonetheless able to convey that truth to the audience. This kind of sensitivity—the ability to signal an inner emotional state without overtly showing it—is what distinguishes great screen acting from movie-star posing. And while Mr. Ledger was handsome enough, and famous enough, to be called a movie star, he was serious enough, and smart enough, to be suspicious of deploying his charisma too easily or cheaply.

I second every word.

If you are in the mood for it, British newspapers The Times and the Telegraph has moving obituaries.

If you're able to read Swedish, you should read Expressen's article about Susanne Eriksson, a woman who was sentenced to prison for battling her multiple sclerosis with cannabis.

Sad news from the BBC:

Hollywood actor Heath Ledger has been found dead at a downtown Manhattan residence, a New York Police Department spokesman has said.

"He was found unconscious at the apartment and pronounced dead," a police spokeswoman said.

It is not yet clear how the 28-year-old Australian actor, who earned an Oscar nomination as a gay cowboy in Brokeback Mountain, died.

The latest reports suggest Ledger's death was drug related.

Read more in the New York Times's City Room blog.

A Dutch merchant of T-shirts is now selling an image of Anne Frank wearing a keffiyeh, the symbol of Palestinian terrorism. According to a member of a newsgroup I subscribe to, the T-shirt is called "Jihad Anne".

Mocking Jews and other victims of National Socialism seems to be the latest fashion statement in some "progressive" circles. I suppose the bad taste is excused by Israel's occupation of Gaza and the West Bank. I mean, Anne Frank had it coming, right?

Mike Huckabee says he wants a federal anti-abortion amendment to the US Constitution. Needless to say, he will never suffer the consequences of his proposed law.

To sacrifice the lives of women for a religious principle is truly immoral. That's what the Taliban do.

A new poll of the European Union shows that only 17 per cent of Bulgarians would be able to carry on a conversation with someone who is openly gay.

More here.

Here's the list. More here.

I have always been a big fan of the Oscars. Not that glamour, red carpets and overpriced designer dressers interest me, but because the winning movies rarely disappoint me. The Hollywood elite may have bad taste in style, but they surely know good movies.

This is really interesting. The International Herald Tribune reports that scientists now think volcanoes might be contributing to the thinning of some of the Antarctica's glaciers.

Anti-Semitism plays an integrated part of contemporary socialism. It springs from the collectivist idea that people share a common responsibility for the actions of individuals.

In a disturbing article, Forward reports that Venezuela's Jewish community now numbers about 12,000 compared to 16,000 when Hugo Chávez was first elected president in 1998. Jews flee the country due to state-sponsored harassment.

Judehatet lever och frodas i Sverige och Europa. Precis som under 1900-talet är det främst socialister som står bakom propagandan. Det ursinniga hatet mot judarna döljer man bakom en ibland helt legitim kritik mot staten Israel. Henrik Bachner har skrivit om detta i en utmärkt analys:

Den samtida antisemitismen i Europa och Sverige är, bortsett från nazistisk och radikal islamistisk propaganda, mycket sällan öppen och direkt. Som ett resultat av den stigmatisering av judefientlighet som följde på Förintelsen används i regel omskrivningar, kodord och argumentationsstrategier som syftar till att skydda budbäraren från negativa sanktioner.

Denna förvandlingsprocess liksom det antijudiska tänkandets nya uttrycksformer har noggrant analyserats och beskrivits i forskningen. Vad som kännetecknar vår tids antisemitiska diskurs är bland annat ersättningen av termen judar med ord och uttryck som till exempel "sionister", "lobbygrupper" och "mäktiga krafter". Utmärkande är också försöken att förfalska och invertera begrepp som antisemitism, nazism och Förintelsen. I syfte att ånyo legitimera en judefientlig hållning har dessa begrepp transformerats till beteckningar på judiska förbrytelser.

Läs hela artikeln här. Läs också Jonathan Lemans avslöjande blogginlägg om hur vänsterns rättshaverister försvarar judehatet.

My online friends, Swedish bloggers Blogge Bloggelito and Isabella Lund, have challenged me and a number of other people to reveal seven truths about ourselves. Here we go:

1. I'm an anglophile. I never read books or movie subtitles in Swedish unless I have to. I hardly know anything about what novels are popular in Sweden, but I do know the British top-ten list by heart. And until recently, my thoughts were almost exclusively in English. Furthermore, I spend more time on British and American chat rooms than I do on Swedish websites.
2. I'm a perfectionist. I can spend hours getting a single sentence right in an essay or article. It gets ridiculous sometimes. A whole day can pass by without any real work being done just because I'm dissatisfied with that one punctuation mark. It's ruining my life, which is why I decided not to pay that much attention to the language quality of the blog. I let minor spelling and punctuation mistakes stand to save me from insanity.
3. I'm manipulative. It's not really something I'm proud of, but if I really want something from someone, I try to boost their ego and imply that I'm one their side only to make them feel they owe me something. Their guilt and kindness is my triumph.
4. I'm short-tempered. Sometimes I get angry for the tiniest thing. I'm rarely wrathful for long though. Five minutes later I can't remember why I was so furious.
5. I'm cynical. I always expect the worse in people. It saves me from disappointments.
6. I enjoy irony. Perhaps it's a generation-thing, but I can't stand humourless people. If I say stealing newspapers from homeless people is OK because most of them can't read, I don't want to be lectured by some boring I-am-so-serious-all-the-time commie wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt.
7. I'm an arse man. My eyes are always on the hunt for those perfect male buttocks to daydream about.

That's my seven truths.

A new poll shows a large majority of Swedes are in favour of allowing gays to marry. Seven out of ten respondents told research agency Sifo they would back moves to change the current legislation.

More in Swedish here and here.

Flera kristdemokratiska riksdagsledamöter har krävt en folkomröstning om könsneutrala äktenskap. Med viss tvekan välkomnar jag en sådan folkomröstning.

Det är de kristna organisationerna som leder motståndet mot en könsneutral äktenskapslagstiftning, vilket i sig öppnar för en intressant samhällsdebatt om religionens roll i demokratin. Detta diskuteras för lite i Sverige trots att religiösa trosuppfattningar påverkar vårt samhälle. En folkomröstning skulle även erbjuda ett utmärkt tillfälle för samtal om de teologiska argumenten mot jämlikhet och likabehandling. En parallell kan göras till kvinnoprästfrågan, som trots hårda diskussioner ändå ledde fram till en ny syn på jämlikhet. Kanske kan äktenskapsfrågan resultera i en ny syn på sexualitet.

I frågan om homosexuellas möjlighet att gifta sig framförs ofta biologiska argument som går ut på att det krävs en man och en kvinna för att skapa nytt liv. Att ifrågasätta påståendet vore som att förneka gravitationen. Men att det krävs en man och en kvinna för att ett barn ska bli till är i sig inget bra argument mot att homosexuella ska få gifta sig. Att skaffa barn kan även homosexuella göra. Det krävs visserligen medveten planering, med det borde vara något positivt. Barn till homosexuella är alltid önskade och välkomna. För de många kristna som studerar abortsiffrorna med obehag borde detta vara ett starkt argument för homosexuellas lämplighet som föräldrar.

I en folkomröstning skulle väljarna få ta ställning till om det är rimligt att en modern demokrati ger vissa barn sämre skydd än andra med motiveringen att barn behöver sina biologiska föräldrar. En verklighet där många familjer inte bygger på blodsband skulle ställas mot en utopi där alla barn växer upp med sina biologiska föräldrar. Jag tror att en sådan debatt skulle ge en vinst för oss som ser äktenskapet som en bekräftelse på kärlek och stabilitet snarare än plikt och biologi.

Men det är ändå med viss tvekan jag stödjer kravet på en folkomröstning. En samhällsdebatt om en folkgrupp riskerar att urarta i vulgära påhopp som den svagare parten har svårt att värja sig mot. Till skillnad från tidigare folkomröstningar så skulle denna handla om människor av kött och blod. En folkomröstningsdebatt kan komma att generera hatiska uttalanden som enskilda homosexuella måste hantera. Liknande har hänt förut. Ett exempel såg vi 1994 i samband med att partnerskapslagen antogs av riksdagen. På svensk TV kunde man samma kväll höra en kristen man säga att homosexuella förtjänade döden. Jag har länge undrat hur homosexuella föräldrar förklarade för sina barn att farbrorn på TV tycker att pappa ska dödas. Vad säger man?

Det är möjligt att media denna gång håller sig för god för sådant och att debatten blir mer sansad än 1994. Dock finns det skäl att frukta det värsta om man studerar hur dagens religiösa debattörer behandlar frågor om homosexualitet i sina egna medier. Åke Greens numera världsberömda predikan ger en föraning. Det brukar tyvärr låta ungefär så när konservativa kristna diskuterar homosexualitet. Det är inte en slump.

Kyrkan har sedan medeltiden bedrivit en systematisk hets mot homosexuella. Idag har denna hets utvecklats till ett nätverk av internationellt verksamma kampanjorganisationer som specialiserat sig på att förolämpa och förtala homosexuella. En folkomröstning riskerar att locka f