Texas Representative Louie Gohmert on
Thursday claimed that gay rights are wrong because gay couples living
on a space colony wouldn't be much help at preserving life.
The Republican lawmaker said on the
House floor that lawmakers would never choose to send gay couples or
animals into space to start a new colony as humankind faced
extinction on Earth.
“I really wonder how many people in
this body who had the ultimate power to decide whether humanity would
go forward or not. Whether it was an asteroid coming. Something
that would end humanity on Earth, as dinosaurs were ended at one
time,” Gohmert
said.
“Okay, we got a spaceship that can go
as Matt Damon did in the movie (The Martian). Plant a colony
somewhere. We can have humans survive this terrible disaster about
to befall. If you could decide what 40 people you put on the
spacecraft that would save humanity, how many of those would be
same-sex couples? You're wanting to save humankind for posterity,
basically a modern-day Noah. You have that ability to be a
modern-day Noah, you can preserve life. How many same-sex couples
would you take from the animal kingdom and from humans to put on a
spacecraft to perpetuate humanity and the wildlife kingdom?”
Gohmert
floated a similar argument last year when he claimed that gays
can't have “what nature says is the preferred marriage” because
if placed on an island they would die out.
Elsewhere in his rant, Gohmert called
transgender people “perverse” and in need of help.