Kanab family values

[shunn]

Almost exactly five years ago, I called your attention here to a brouhaha in the small town of Kanab, Utah, over the adoption by the city council of a non-binding resolution defining the family as "one man, one woman" with a "full quiver" of children. A few months later, Laura and I visited Kanab (a town founded by Mormon polygamists), where we were pleased to see many businesses opposing the resolution with "Everyone Welcome Here!" stickers in their windows.

I wish I'd known sooner, but I've just learned that there's a documentary out about the whole controversy:

Natural Family Values

I can't vouch for the quality, not having seen it yet, but you can be sure I'm ordering a copy and will watch it with interest.

I note also that major funding for Natural Family Values was provided by the B.W. Bastian Foundation, an organization that supports issues of LGBT equality.

The B.W. Bastian in question is my former boss Bruce Bastian, co-founder of WordPerfect Corporation. I like what he's been doing with his fortune in the days since WordPerfect Ruled The Earth. Another documentary that Bastian produced is 8: The Mormon Proposition, which I watched recently. It's an investigation into how the LDS Church secretly led the successful effort to pass Proposition 8 in California, which outlawed gay marriage, and, more generally, into the hideous ways gays have been treated by the Church. It's an excellent film, and is available to stream from Netflix, but be sure to have a box of Kleenex and a punching bag handy when you watch it.

I want to say more about 8, but I'm still trying to calibrate the shotgun blast that post will be.

Comments

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

The "full quiver" excludes child-free het marriages, such as yours and mine.

I think the most accurate descriptor for the only relationship these people recognize is "the allegedly monogamous heterosexual breeding pair."

Quivering with rage

[shunn.livejournal.com]

Ha! You're right, and in fact gay couples were hardly the only Kanabians to get up in arms about the resolution. Single people, the childless, not to mention breeders who weren't narrow-minded...

[shunn.livejournal.com]

(Though I wonder what the polygamists said.)