Montana Tea Party Leader Axed Over Comments Concerning Hanging Of Homosexuals

The president of Montana's Big Sky Tea Party Association has been fired from his leadership position following remarks made online that implied his support for the public hanging of homosexuals.

According to a report from the Helena Independent Record, former Big Sky Tea Party president Tim Ravndal had the following exchange posted on his Facebook profile back in July:

Tim Ravndal: "Marriage is between a man and a woman period! By giving rights to those otherwise would be a violation of the constitution and my own rights"

Keith Baker: "How dare you exercise your First Amendment Rights?"

Dennis Scranton: "I think fruits are decorative. Hang up where they can be seen and appreciated. Call Wyoming for display instructions."

Tim Ravndal: "@Kieth, OOPS I forgot this aint America no more! @Dennis, Where can I get that Wyoming printed instruction manual?"

Dennis Scranton: "Should be able to get info Gazette archives. Maybe even an illustration. Go back a bit over ten years."

The conversation was posted as a reaction to a recent ACLU lawsuit filed against the state of Montana in order to secure greater rights for same-sex couples and their families, and appears to allude to the gruesome murder of gay University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard, who was tortured and tied to fencepost in Laramie in 1998. He later died from his injuries.

Ravndal later apologized for his part in this dialogue, telling the Great Falls Tribune that he "wasn't even thinking about the tragedy that happened in Wyoming," and that he does "not condone violence to any human being," but Big Sky Tea Party Chairman Jim Walker did not fully accept, and calls for Ravndal's ouster were eventually heard.

"We are extremely disappointed by Mr. Ravndal's commentary," wrote Walker in a statement explaining Ravndal's firing. "The discussion in that Facebook conversation is entirely outside the position of the Big Sky Tea Party. Even though Mr. Ravndal was having a personal conversation and made no reference to our group, we felt strongly that swift and decisive action was required as we cannot accept that sort of behavior from within our membership, let alone from an officer of the corporation."

"We continually make it known that we will not tolerate bigoted dialog, behavior or messages at our functions, our meetings or within our ranks," Walker continued. "If a person demonstrates bigotry relative to race, sex, ethnicity, etc. they are not welcome in our organization. The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone."

Comments

[BeeV]

11:23 AM on 09/22/2010

"The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone."

Really. Really? Do the members of the Tea party know this???!

[MaryscottOConnor]

04:14 PM on 09/12/2010

Totally typical of radical right wing conservatives in general, unfortunately.

"What? I didn't mean what you and everyone else can obviously see I DID mean!"

[littleblackcat]

01:39 PM on 09/11/2010

Begging pardon, there should have been a comma between "Swedish" and "Wiccan".

[littleblackcat]

01:38 PM on 09/11/2010

The Tea Baggers stand for individual freedom for everyone as long as everyone isn't gay, lesbian, black, hispanic, Thai, Japanese, Albanian, Wiccan Swedish, Viet Namese, Irish, atheist, German, Egyptian, Chilean, Budhist, Muslim, Polish, Native American, or a Druid.
That doesn't leave much of a gene pool.
If I've overlooked your particular group, ethnicity, or beliefs or lack of same, forgive me.
I'm a firm believer in minding my own business but with a divorce rate of 50% in this country, pedophiles in Congress and the priesthood, wide stances in public restrooms, and Senators who patronize prostitutes, the tea party needs to weed out its own poison ivy before pontificating on the sanctity of marriage between "a man and a woman".
If you want to bible thump, remember the directive "Do not point to the speck in thy neighbor's eye whilst ignoring the log in your own".

[rstewart3]

08:42 AM on 09/12/2010

"We continually make it known that we will not tolerate bigoted dialog, behavior or messages at our functions, our meetings or within our ranks," Walker continued. "If a person demonstrates bigotry relative to race, sex, ethnicity, etc. they are not welcome in our organization. The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone."

I suppose all of that went over your head, didn't it? Or did you read it like this:

""We continually make it known that we will not tolerate yakkity schmakity, blah blah blah, yeah whatever," Walker continued. "If a person demonstrates blablablabla, giggity goo. The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone as long as everyone isn't gay, lesbian, black, hispanic, Thai, Japanese, Albanian, Wiccan Swedish, Viet Namese, Irish, atheist, German, Egyptian, Chilean, Budhist, Muslim, Polish, Native American, or a Druid.
. Please forgive me if I forgot someone, I would hate to give them equal treatment."

Walker did the right thing by firing Mr. Ravndal, taking action as soon as he got wind of it. And as another HuffPost article will state, there are members who left when this happened. Kudos to Walker for weeding out the elements that are not wanted or needed in the Tea Party. Perhaps other Tea Party organizations should take his example, so they can get back to the original message.

[joelb5000]

05:04 PM on 09/10/2010

Of course they advocate violence against gays. It's only one of many reasons they oppose hate crimes legislation too. They hate gays period. It was only 10 years ago that Texas was putting gays in prison just for having sex. Remember the movie Borat? What I loved about it was he caught people speaking their mind--like that one old man who said gays should be hung. I'm not a fool. I know what these people believe, and it's precisely why gays can't wait for our elected leaders to give us rights. We need the courts to finally acknowledge us!

[rstewart3]

08:53 AM on 09/12/2010

The problem with hate crime legislations is that they are hard to define. Yes, you have the obvious, such as what happened to Matthew Shepard. But then you also have large gray areas as well, where something could be considered a hate crime by one side, but not by the other. It is hard to legislate hate crimes because everyone has a bias and does have some form of bigotry.

Yes, that is right, everyone has some form of bigotry.

Hate speech is even harder to legislate due to the fact that whomever is defining hate speech can pretty much include anything that they don't agree with. For instance, to the fringe left, ultra-Obama supporters, if I say I don't like Obama's policies, I am automatically labeled a racist, and therefore what I just said is hate speech.

While the idea and theory of legislating hate crimes and hate speech is nice, you must also consider the ramifications of its abuse once it is laid down into law, especially by the frings on both sides should they gain power. It is a road that must be tread carefully on.

[joelb5000]

05:29 PM on 09/12/2010

Everyone may have some form of bigotry, but that doesn't mean everyone takes a guy like Matt Shepard, ties him to a fence, and beats him to death with a tire iron because they don't like his sexuality. Hate crime legislation doesn't try to prevent people from having a bigoted point of view, but it does serve as a reminder that if you abuse someone because of some twisted bias, you will suffer the consequences. I'm all for hate crime legislation. I seriously wonder why anyone would oppose hate crimes laws unless they suspect one day they'll be committing the crimes.

[joelb5000]

05:40 PM on 09/12/2010

By the way, hate crime legislation is already the law. We don't have to worry about what happens if it becomes law--we're there. The argument is whether gays should be protected too. Conservatives love it when their dear church is added to the list of protectees, but God forbid a gay person get included. That's the argument, and it's hypocritical.

[tjconkster]

03:14 AM on 09/09/2010

“I know there is a comment on this rattling around somewhere inside my head....but..this is beyond the pale.....so this guy advocates the lynching of those who aren't like him...is this what the baggers mean by "let's take our country back.." So, I guess he would want to string me up...after all I'm 51, Anglo, and straight...I should be anti gay...anti immigration, and for everything repub....Wrong...I as liberal as they come....I have great friends in the LGBT community....this guy and his ilk can't hold a candle to my friends in the LGBT community....I would guess that he would be surprised if he learned that he has friends who are gay....maybe he is hiding something...I don't know...but the killing of Matthew Shepard was a heinous cowardly act..and to uphold the killers as heroes tells you all you need to know about this guy...He's a coward...

I truly hope that someday that my friends can marry...I hope that someday we won't have to label someone as gay, or lesbian, or bi-sexual, or transgendered.....I don't know that I will see this in my lifetime...but we won't have equal rights in this country until we all are considered equal....”

[conscioushope]

08:11 AM on 09/09/2010

tjc~

You and me both!
{{fanned}} for our mutual hopes and dreams!

Let's be friends!

[rstewart3]

08:59 AM on 09/12/2010

"is this what the baggers mean by "let's take our country back.."

No, this is not what the Tea Party means by "let's take our country back.." This is what the fringe elements on the ultra-right mean.

I am a conservative myself, and I believe in the basic premise of equality for all citizens. I have great Liberal friends, I have great friends in the LGBT community, and great friends all around. Even if I may not agree with something they do, it doesn't mean that I have the right to force my opinion upon their life, nor would I appreciate it if anyone tried to tell me how to live mine.

Perhaps one day, like you said, we will get beyond the labelling of people, and just finally realize that we are Americans. That should be the only label that really matters in the end.

[KYZipster]

04:54 PM on 09/08/2010

If he's denying a reference to Matthew Shepard, what does the reference to Wyoming and hanging fruit mean? Sounds like a reference to Billie Holiday's 'Strange Fruit' to me. This is some of the sickest stuff I've seen from conservatives in awhile, it should be front and center in the news.

[Ioan Lightoller]

03:08 PM on 09/13/2010

Wow! That just put me in mind of that old "Cold Case" episode where they beat up a young black man and then when he said he would tell, they hung him. I could see the far right-wingers doing this to GLBT people. If hate crimes legislation means they think long and hard about doing something like that to GLBT people, then so be it...and if they still do it and are convicted, they will get real jail time instead of some slap on the wrist.

[Jtt]

03:26 PM on 09/08/2010

This is a state leader in the organization.

[Jtt]

03:25 PM on 09/08/2010

Put this on the front page - the GBLT community needs to see it. If there was ever any doubts about the tea party.

[Jtt]

03:19 PM on 09/08/2010

The Tea party is a fledgling terrorist organization. There is no disputing that.

[conscioushope]

08:14 AM on 09/09/2010

jtt~

I like your phrase to decribe baggers: "fledgling terrorists"!

{{fanned}} for that!
Let's be friends!

[HisPetGoat]

02:29 PM on 09/08/2010

It's all a misunderstanding. Scranton was very obviously expressing his admiration for gays, particularly those who are well-hung.

[SurrealPumpkin]

02:38 PM on 09/08/2010

oh, geez!

[William Stephens]

05:32 PM on 09/08/2010

*dies laughing*

[celticsrule]

02:23 PM on 09/08/2010

If they followed their own policies their would be maybe five members
in the teabagger's party.

WHat they meant to say is do not get caught saying racist stuff or
you will force them to apologize for them and it makes them look bad
because the hatred is "understood" but shall not be said to non teabaggers

[conscioushope]

08:16 AM on 09/09/2010

Exactly, celtic!

{{fanned}}
Let's be friends!

[celticsrule]

05:52 PM on 09/09/2010

cool....fanned back

[LynnW49]

01:50 PM on 09/08/2010

=="If a person demonstrates bigotry relative to race, sex, ethnicity, etc. they are not welcome in our organization. The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone."==

Hmmm. That must be why the Tea Party-influenced Montana GOP platform includes this:
"We support the clear will of the people of Montana expressed by legislation to keep homosexual acts illegal." No doubt that was some nice background music for this terrible Facebook banter between Ravndal and Scranton.

And, note to GOP: The Montana Supreme Court struck down the State’s sodomy law in 1997 because it violated the Constitution (those activist judges!). What was "expressed by legislation" was a 2004 ballot initiative for a traditional marriage amendment to the state constitution (which passed by 66%, clearly not the will of all Montanans). And that happened because Rove and company made sure that as many states as possible had anti-marriage equality initiatives on their ballots in 2004.

As for invoking the tragic death of Matthew Shepard 12 years ago this month (10/12/98) quite explicitly ("Where can I get that Wyoming printed instruction manual?") and then claiming that you were not "even thinking about the tragedy that happened in Wyoming". . . One hardly knows where to begin.

[LynnW49]

02:02 PM on 09/08/2010

Mr Ravndal, in all his glory. http://mtcowgirl.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Tim-Ranvndal2.jpg

Clearly the tee shirt is wrong, he is not allergic to stupid.

And Kristi Allen-Gailushas, the Sec'y of the Tea Party who is running for the MT State House, left the Tea Party to rejoin the GOP because she was opposed to Ravndal's firing. And then she declared war on the gay community. Hereabouts, you can seek refuge from Not Extreme Enough for Me by going to the actual Republican party.

Heaven help us.

[Millie Lencioni]

10:24 AM on 09/08/2010

Isn't this amazing, that these people who consider themselves such elite Christians actually reveal their true colors? What church preaches this behavior?

[Ernie Lijoi]

01:30 PM on 09/08/2010

The Christian Church.

[SurrealPumpkin]

02:39 PM on 09/08/2010

There is no "The Christian Church". There are numerous sects that are collectively known as "Christian Churches" and "Christianity".

[Bude]

10:18 AM on 09/08/2010

Spreading the Bush doctrine, hate one another?