Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA)

In 1986, fundamentalist Baptist preacher Joe Lutz mounted a primary challenge to Republican incumbent Senator Bob Packwood. Packwood was pro-choice and thus stained by an ideological impurity of the highest degree. Lutz's challenge fizzled, but out of the ashes of his campaign, he created an ultra-right wing pressure group that the ACLU calls "the most militant anti-gay organization in the northwest": the Oregon Citizens Alliance. The OCA was founded in Klamath Falls in February 1987, with Lutz's campaign manager, former hippie and Vietnam veteran Lon T. Mabon as executive director. Mabon is essentially the Borg Queen of the OCA. He has total control over the actions and policy proposals of the group, and his supporters' only duty is to send in money, believe in the mission and carry out his orders. The mission: to write hard-right Christian fundamentalist values into Oregon law, and then go on to assimilate the nation.

In 1988, Mabon scored his first victory. Running a vicious anti-gay smear campaign that equated homosexuality with pedophilia and bestiality and promoted the lies and distortions of quack psychologist and full-time homophobe Paul Cameron (see the section on Cameron for details) he convinced the voters of Oregon to pass an initiative (measure 8) rescinding an executive order banning discrimination in state employment on the basis of sexual orientation, which was later found unconstitutional by the Oregon Court of Appeals.

After an unsuccesful attempt at outlawing abortion in 1990, Mabon focused his hatred again on gays and lesbians. In 1991, he tried to place a measure on the ballot that equated homosexuality not only with pedophilia, bestiality and sadomasochism, but also with necrophilia! That offended even conservatives, so Mabon made a strategic retreat, dropped the reference to necrophilia and tried again. This time, he succeeded, and his proposition was put on the Oregon ballot in 1992. Measure 9, as it was called, would have banned the state or the public schools from doing anything "to promote, encourage, or facilitate homosexuality, pedophilia, sadism, or masochism". During the campaign, Mabon and the OCA tirelessly assured the public that their proposed measure was not discriminatory in nature and only meant to stop certain people from obtaining "special rights". Even though measure 9 was also supported by the Christian Coalition, the voters of Oregon recognized it for the snake oil it was and rejected it 56 to 44 percent.

Mabon has introduced, or has tried to introduce, slightly modified versions of his anti-gay measure in every election cycle since, and failed every single time. The last time that happened was in November 2000, when the Oregon voters rejected the deceptively worded "Student Protection Act II" by a slim margin. In December 2000, Mabon promptly filed an initiative petition for a slightly refined version of his proposition that will in all likelihood be on the ballot in 2002. There is a decent chance that he will fail again, because even the Republicans in Oregon are sick and tired of him.

The OCA website tries to create the impression that the OCA is well-rounded and cares about issues other than homosexuality, such as "freedom" and "human rights". A couple of mouse clicks later, the interested visitor finds - nothing. Except for some bogus facts about abortion, there is no substantial information that does not revolve around homosexuality in one way or another. Clicking on "homosexuality/pedophilia", on the other hand, unleashes a torrent of anti-gay propaganda and pseudoscience on the reader. We are informed, for example, that "anal intercourse causes numerous diseases ranging from Gay Bowel Syndrome", even though there is no such thing as "gay bowel syndrome", except as a label that conservative doctors used to attach to gay patients with parasites (straight people with parasites were never labeled as having "heterosexual bowel syndrome"). We are also told about Cameron's famous obituary study that supposedly shows that gay men have a low life expectancy, but in fact only showed that when young gay activists die, they die, well, young. These two examples do not do justice to the OCA, of course. Where they came from, there is enough source material for Ph.D. theses into homophobia to last for generations.

More reading on the OCA and its psychopath Führer: