An Open Letter to the ‘nacle

Remember when you were upset last fall when one poll after another revealed that a substantial number of liberals applied a religious test to Mitt Romney?

I tried to explain to you that people felt threatened by our involvement in racist and sexist discrimination. We resisted racial equality for 24 years after the United States Supreme Court had finally joined the cause of equality. To date, the United States of America remains the only western democracy that fails to guarantee the rights of women in the constitution.

In part, that is because of Mormon efforts headed up by Gordon Hinckley to derail the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment that had cleared Congress with a bipartisan majority.

Our actions continue to have consequences in the lives of women. Only recently, the Supreme Court ruled that women cannot appeal to courts in cases of pay discrimination if perpetrators can conceal the initial violation of law for 181 days.

If I were a politically aware woman, I would have to take a very close look before I could vote for a Mormon conservative. Lilly Ledbetter, for example, lost thousands of dollars in wages because of the LDS opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment and today her social security benefits are substantially lower than they would have been had she been treated fairly.

Although the consequences of our intolerance continue today, one might argue that the priesthood ban and the Equal Rights Amendment are thirty years in the past.

Unfortunately, our leaders have dedicated the last decade to interfering in the marriages of our gay children and neighbors. As our intolerant agenda continues, our victims have taken notice and are targeting us as the perpetrators of their discrimination.

If we want tolerance for ourselves, we need to stop targeting others. Everyone who demanded a fair shake for Mitt has an obligation to speak out against the homophobic agenda of our leaders. We have no claim on tolerance while we remain a threat to the rights of others and should not be surprised when our friends and neighbors regard us with suspicion.