This column was originally published by Sheila Kennedy on her blog, “A Jaundiced Look at the World We Live In.”
By Sheila Kennedy
June 6, 2025
If I were a Christian–a real one–I would cringe every time our Christian Nationalist Lieutenant Governor claimed that affiliation. Love? Compassion? Humility? How woke!
You won’t catch this pathetic excuse for a human echoing those admonitions.
Not that it’s surprising from the guy who tried to ban books when he briefly served on a library board, but Beckwith has greeted Pride month with his usual invective and bigotry. WISH TV, among others, has reported on his Facebook post, calling Pride celebrations an “annual siege on childhood innocence” backed by “corporate America and government institutions.”
The post, published just before 10:30 a.m. on the official “Micah Beckwith For
Indiana” Facebook page and “TheMicahBeckwith” on X, begins with the warning:
“PRIDE MONTH ALERT: The Rainbow Beast IS Coming For Your Kids!”.
Beckwith goes on to say that schools are prioritizing “DEI indoctrination over
reading, writing, or science” and accuses libraries of becoming “drag
indoctrination centers.”
“Try hosting a ‘Heterosexual Heritage Hour’ and watch the mob arrive,” Beckwith
continues.
Under a heading titled THE BIG PICTURE, the lieutenant governor calls Pride
Month a “state-corporate-pagan alliance to reprogram society” that has
exchanged “parental rights for government-sanctioned grooming.”
Beckwith closes the post by urging parents to “wake up”.
The post ends with a link to a story on the same topic published by a self-described
“Christian Independent Press” website.
I’ve gone to Indianapolis’ Pride parades for twenty-plus years. I’ve watched as those celebrations have grown, not just in the number of floats, but in the number and variety of organizations and businesses and families joining the celebration. Evidently, that acceptance annoys the faux Christians and MAGA bigots waging war against “woke-ism” (not to mention that dreaded equity and inclusion), but their efforts to rally the homophobes and misogynists and racists aren’t going very well. Just ask Target–or Costco.
I always wonder what explains people like Micah Beckwith–people with a frantic need to see the world in stark shades of black and white, and a corresponding need to believe that they are on the right side of the dividing line. I know that in a lot of cases, homophobic men are unsure of their own masculinity, or desperately trying to suppress their own homosexual urges, which they’ve been taught are sinful. Many are products of the fundamentalist churches in which they grew up, and still others evidently have an overpowering need to feel morally superior to someone or some group.
I know I should pity the Micah Beckwiths of this world. They are demonstrably unhappy people; something is hollow inside them. But that pity is hard to come by, because there is something so repellant about people who actively work to hurt and demean other human beings. I can understand it when people who–for whatever reason–dislike gays or Jews or Black folks, consequently fail to socialize with them. I think they’re missing out, but (as the saying goes) it’s a free country. You don’t like gay people, you don’t have to invite them over for dinner.
What I don’t understand–and will never understand–are the haters like Micah Beckwith, who aren’t satisfied to simply avoid folks whose lives they don’t want to accept–who want to actively hurt and humiliate people who are different. These twisted souls have some sort of primal need to see themselves as the proper arbiters of civic acceptance, and they want to use government to impose their faux Christianity on the rest of us.
It’s bad enough that we have to share the general population with stunted and mean spirited
people like Micah Beckwith, but I find it infuriating that they currently infest Indiana’s government. It isn’t just Beckwith–although he is definitely the poster child for these theocratic misfits. Todd Rokita and Jim Banks are “out and proud” Christian nationalists, ready and eager to jettison the Bill of Rights and spit on 200+ years of American progress. Indiana government hasn’t been this retrograde since the Klan years. It’s no wonder the state has a persistent brain drain.
What is so depressing is that a majority of Hoosiers voted for these hateful people. I can’t even blame the gerrymandering that has given us our embarrassing legislature–these dreadful people ran statewide.
For my part, I intend to embrace the “Rainbow Beast.” It’s the least I can do.
Sheila Suess Kennedy is Emerita Professor of Law and Public Policy at the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis. As an attorney, she practiced real estate, administrative and business law in Indianapolis before becoming corporation counsel for the City of Indianapolis in 1977. In 1980, she was the Republican candidate for Indiana’s then 1th Congressional District and in 1992, she became executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana. She joined the faculty of the School of Public and Environment al Affairs in 1998.
The views and opinions expressed are those of the author only and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Indiana Citizen or any other affiliated organization.
