Joseph Backholm, chair of Preserve
Marriage Washington, has accused gay marriage backers of “emotional
manipulation” to win support, media watchdog RightWingWatch.org
reported.
Backholm and his supporters earlier
this month turned in nearly 200,000 signatures to block a gay
marriage law approved by Washington state lawmakers from taking
effect. Referendum 74 will ask voters in November to either uphold
or reject the law.
Appearing on The Janet Mefferd Show,
Backholm accused proponents of marriage equality of relying on
demonizing opponents and “emotional manipulation” to win support.
“The narrative on the other side of
this issue has basically been, 'good people support redefining
marriage, bad people don't; you're a good person, so join us.' So a
bunch of people who – generally we consider ourselves to be kind
and thoughtful and 'live and let live' kind of people, that's kind of
the American way – and so by virtue of that people just migrate by
default to where they perceive the people to be. Their narrative
depends entirely upon that, so logical discussions about this subject
rarely take place with those folks. But when they happen, the logic
behind their argument really does tend to fall apart. It's also
because that is what they depend on so heavily, it's why I'm
supremely confident that in the long term we win this discussion
because you can't rely on emotional manipulation forever,” he said.
(Related: Cenk
Uygur accuses gay marriage foe Joseph Backholm of hating gays.)