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Sally Kern: A Star Is Boring

What happened when this antigay wingnut was exposed on YouTube? She saw it as her big break.


Thanks to youtube, anyone anywhere who does something idiotic can become famous whether they deserve it or not. Behold the Miss Teen USA contestant who mangled a question about maps; Chris “Leave Britney Alone!” Crocker; or hapless beauty queen Stacey Hedger, who innocently and ineptly played “Star Wars” on her trumpet at a pageant years ago and was probably sitting quietly at home when she suddenly found herself dealing with online threats. Surprise! You’re famous -- and so untalented we want you to die!

However, all of these instant stars are just fluff, unlike new Internet sensation Sally Kern, a hitherto unknown Oklahoma state representative and religious nut who was recorded while speaking to a tiny group of God-Knows-Who-in-God-Knows-Where, Okla. She decided to take a break from her pothole-filling and garbage collection duties and grace her listeners with her vast knowledge of homosexuality, making statements like “the homosexual agenda is destroying this nation—OK, it’s just a fact”; declaring gays worse than terrorists; and confiding, “I think we’ve been suckered by this lie of separation of church and state.”

I can hear the loudspeakers now: “At tonight’s performance the role of Moron, usually played by the dead Jerry Falwell, will be played by Sally Kern.”

Rather than retreating into hiding after her YouTube moment, Kern was more than ready for her close-up. She’s working her newfound notoriety like Monica Lewinsky on Saturday Night Live. At first Kern claimed her comments were taken out of context, but you couldn’t mistake the meaning of “the biggest threat our nation has, even more so than terrorism or Islam” even if it was a lyric from Sweeney Todd. And I’m over the “out of context” excuse, which is always made when the speaker should simply say “Open mouth, insert foot, swallow.”

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Reader Comments
  • Name: Doc Cochran
    Date posted: 5/25/2008 8:00:00 PM
    Hometown: Columbus, Ohio

    Comment:

    I have to agree with Mr. Quigley. I think this article did nto exactly represent all aspects of this story correctly. The whole thing makes Oklahoma sound bad. If we could just learn to let go of the whole dramatic situation it would fade away and we could move forward in addressing more important issues.

  • Name: Judy S.
    Date posted: 5/14/2008 12:14:00 PM
    Hometown: Oklahoma City

    Comment:

    Sally Kern's minister husband is a nut too. He made an angry fool of himself a few years ago at a speech on teaching evolution vs. creationism (as i recall) at the Sam Noble Museum of Natural History in Norman. He interrupted the speaker, banged his bible, and demanded equal time for Creationism. He was truly frothing at the mouth and shaking and red-faced in anger. He was finally escorted out of the hall, where he continued ranting at the speaker, and finally escorted to his car. You can't rationalize somebody out of something that they didn't arrive at by rationality. This covers Sally and husband.

  • Name: joe quigley
    Date posted: 5/11/2008 12:18:00 PM
    Hometown: oklahomna city

    Comment:

    It is very important to get our facts correct if we go after others. Kern Failed in her attempt to get "Homosexcuaqlly Themed" books isolated in the public libraries. Terri Miller is incorrect in her summation of the library sytem although she is correct in the religious one. We all look foolish if we like people like Sally Kern stretch truth for effect. I and a few others worked very hard against Kern, and won. Miller's summation makes it appear Kern won her first crusade. The problem with this is that people might go now and waste a lot of energy on something that is already over when time and attention needs to be spent on real issues. Sensationalism is harmful both ways.

  • Name: James Nimmo
    Date posted: 5/11/2008 12:24:00 AM
    Hometown: Oklahoma City

    Comment:

    Rep. Sally Kern, asked lately on local TV what she'd do if she had a gay son, replied she would love him all the more as he would need it. If there is a mother proclaiming that gays are more dangerous than terrorists and Islam and hypothetically has a gay son, and in a public forum said if she had a gay son she would love him all the more, she has a severe mental condition and has forfeited any resemblance of respect for her virulent views from any decent respectable person with any molecule of sense in their education. Kern is fascinated with the private lives of strangers who have caused her no harm. People and organizations such as those that support Rep. Kern are desirous of only one thing and that is to control others in order to stamp out "otherness". If they had their way, the USA would no longer be the democracy Kern claims to defend, but rather a theocracy devoted to the practice of religion, much like the Islamic countries Kern denounces as dangerous.

  • Name: Terri L. Miller, Ed.D.
    Date posted: 5/10/2008 11:23:00 PM
    Hometown: Oklahoma City

    Comment:

    Among Kern's other stunts is her forcing libraries to put children's books out of children's reach. Such books as My Two Mommies, or King and King, or the book about the two male penguins that raised a chick are no longer accessible to children. Parents have to check out any children's book for their child if it remotely has anything to do with gay or lesbian. In addition, Kern is fighting for a bill to be passed that would make students able to respond to questions on tests and make statements in class from their religious point of view and that a teacher could be breaking the law if they did not take the answer as correct or acceptable. I used to work with this woman. It is obvious to anyone that she has missed her calling. She is not a legislator, she is a crusader for her view of how the world should be, which to many of us is quite scary.



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