I mentioned in a post yesterday that Bob Vander Plaats, Iowa’s Most Unhinged Wingnut, and his organization the FAMiLY LEADER [sic] had drafted a pledge for GOP candidates to sign, which affirms their anti-gay bigotry and hatred. Michele Bachmann was, of course, the first to sign it.  But as usual, there’s more to the story, and anti-gay bigots never just traffic in one kind of hatred.  Baratunde Thurston reports that indeed the very first bullet point in this pledge absolutely glorifies slavery.  Here it is:

Slavery had a disastrous impact on African-American families, yet sadly a child born into slavery in 1860 was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household than was an African-American baby born after the election of the USA’s first African-American President.

Oh wow. These people are as ignorant as they are hateful. I’ll let Baratunde’s words on the matter stand as the only commentary necessary:

Let me be clear. The opinions and analysis of this all-white, moralistic, American Taliban have no purchase in the land of black folk. It’s not like the Official Committee Of Black Folk (I’m a rotating co-chair for the Northeast Directorate) sits around wondering what THE FAMiLY LEADER thinks about our family situation, but still, to invoke slavery in “defense” of marriage exposes a complete lack of historical understanding and common sense, much less sensitivity.

Who in the world thinks bringing up slavery to defend family is a good idea?

To the extent that the black family was even allowed to exist, it was under constant attack by state-supported and sanctioned terrorism. “A child born into slavery was more likely to be raised by his mother and father…” Really? A child born into slavery was the property of its master. The operative word was slavery. Period. Any relationship to its biological parents was far less respected than its commercial relationship to the American economy.

You hear these arguments all the time from common racists who don’t think they’re racists. It’s much more common to hear it in the South, from people who have been raised to believe that The Civil War wasn’t about slavery, and who will then assert that “it was terrible, but a lot of slaves had it really good!” To which I always reply, “Yes, it was about slavery, and uh…they were slaves.”

Anyway, so there you go:  Michele Bachmann signed a pledge that absolutely glorifies the enslavement of black Americans.  Oh, and it’s also anti-porn.  Read all of Baratunde’s piece and then go read Amanda.