It took place in Grand Rapids. It’s still sad and fucked up, but not surprising.

Did they tell him to shut the fuck up?

I would have.  I hate doctors who think they are gods and treat their patients like shit.  I just don’t understand where assholes get off thinking that b/c they have religious belief they are allowed to be bigots and discriminate.  That’s not what the 1st Amendment is about—it’s the opposite of that.

And at no point was this man behaving in a way the Jesus Christ in the Gospels says his followers should behave.  Fucking hypocrite.

Above all, in general you stay out of other people’s affairs.  That is basic common sense/politeness/etiquette…

Plus, it’s what Jesus says (not Paul or Augustine or Phelps, but the Christ himself as quoted by Matthew)

6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.

6:14 For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, 15 but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

Not Christian at all.

Dude - c’mon, who’s surprised here? Grand Rapids, MI. “The buckle of the Bible Belt.” They’ve got the whole “love your neighbor” thing down pat. Except when they’re hating teh Gay! (this article), ripping off the gullible (Amway) or killing brown people (Blackwater.) Feel the Christian joy!

Yeah, exactly. I was not at all surprised to read this happened in Grand Rapids. Disgusted, but not surprised.

...gay marriage, shouldn’t be called a marriage because it’s a religious based word, and he’s a Christian, and there’s no way that marriage could be considered legal in the gay sense…

Yeah, well not every Christian denomination agrees with you, you dipshit.

Oh, keshmeshi ... it’s just that, undoubtedly according to this doctor’s self-satisfied and Holy brain, if you’re not white, and/or blond and blue-eyed, and/or of Dutch descent, and/or owner of an SUV, a suburban home, 2.5 kids and a submissive wife that you fuck in a God-approved manner, then you’re not really a Christian.

Grand Rapids is also the home of Zondervan Publishing.

Western Michigan is a great place to visit, then leave before the Calvinists spoil your fun.

But instead of her symptoms, they say the doctor was more interested in the couple’s relationship…

Proving once and for all and beyond all doubt that there is no cure for the common cold or for the common scold.

I was not at all surprised to read this happened in Grand Rapids.

Well, I sure was, as a gay man living in Grand Rapids.  I’ve taken my partner to Spectrum for treatment on several occasions, was open about the relationship, and never had any trouble. Nobody had any problem treating me as a family member (for example, when my partner was unconsicous)—that’s usually the point at which anti-gay preudice emerges. Several of the doctors and other staff members practicing there are, to my knowledge, openly gay.

Now, admittedly, this was at the two main Spectrum facilities—Spectrum Health South Pavilion Urgent Care Center may be a different matter.

bekabot - rim SHOT! w00t!

in re: Zondervan publishing - one of the most traumatizing moments I had in a research project was when I realized that that LeHaye dude, the author of the Left Behind series, also wrote a Christian sex manual earlier in his career. Bleargh!

*disclaimer - sex is not “bleargh”; writing about godly sex = Teh Only Way, gays burning in hell, and oh yeah, wives give it up for their husbands whenever, no question (thanks Schafly!) = major bleargh!)

rea: That is wonderful for you, I’m happy, and (without snark) let me just say that I envy you, b/c I think you’re very lucky.

I have ancestors who had the misfortune of being Jewish around there back about 100 years ago.  .  It’s now becoming incredibly clear why they changed their last name…

ack, and that’s “Schlafly.” My bad. Will stop spamming now.

Reminsd me of a post I made earlier in this week about how Christians who “love gays” show their love in an abusive manner. I’m sure he was just terribly concerned about the welfare of their souls… Gah!

Because a routine soul smear is standard procedure in an Urgent Care visit. [/snark]

Seriously, if he’s that concerned, there are other career paths open to him. I know it’s all about Letting Your Light Shine and all, but he can always go to seminary and let the bigotry blaze full force from the pulpit.

I’m happy, and (without snark) let me just say that I envy you, b/c I think you’re very lucky

Well, but of course, its not a matter for congratulations that I have been able to take a seriously ill partner to the hospital for treatment on several occasions without being subjected to an affront.

I certainly don’t deny that there are religious bigots and homophobes in Grand Rapids, but the bulk of the population is capable of carrying on ordinary business without throwing nasty scenes.

I know it’s all about Letting Your Light Shine and all,

except it’s NOT.  Like I quoted above, Jesus says NOT to bray about your religion in public.  He says crowing about how good you are is a great way to make sure you don’t go to heaven.  WAnt to go to heaven?  THen do good stuff without looking for a reward.  be kind and god will know it.

be a bigot, go to hell.

(sorry, shift key appears to have had something sticky spilled on it.  damn kiids!  get off my keyboard!)

Ah, rea, I beg pardon. :/ I suppose I’m twitchy; perhaps it comes from being in the wrong circles when I visit family there.

“Jesus says NOT to bray about your religion in public” - hee! “bray” - it’s so true ... And yes, it is written thus, but it’s funny about people seem to forget it, right?

Western Michigan is a great place to visit, then leave before the Calvinists spoil your fun.

That’s great advice for all the Dutch Calvinist outposts dotted across the Midwest, not just the Michigan ones…

Delurking….

I was saddened, though not entirely surprised, to see this story.  I do, however, want to throw in another opinion on Grand Rapids from someone who spent roughly 20 years living there.

When I grew up there, things were much worse.  I remember the care my fellow committee members and my 16-year-old self took when leading our church toward becoming open and affirming in the mid-90s (UCC, so not too surprising), and the immediate and long-lasting backlash that followed from the community for a year or two afterwards.  That has largely disappeared now, I understand from my parents, and the church’s gay and lesbian population has dramatically increased.  I also remember watching friends and family members struggle with the fear of coming out in high school, largely staying closeted until they had left the area for college and coming out to only a few close friends back home.

While I am certain that gay youth have some of the same fears today, the culture, especially downtown, seems far, far more accepting than it did when I left right around the turn of the century.  There are gay rights groups with visible presences both in terms of storefronts and public action.  The UCC will hold its General Synod in Grand Rapids next summer (can’t tell I’m a preacher’s kid, can you?), and while they are prepared for higher than normal protests due to the Rev. Wright fallout and a planned media campaign stressing their open and affirming status (which hopefully won’t be shut down by the networks like the last one), they are certainly not backing down in the long-running fight to show that “gay” and “Christian” are not mutually exclusive terms.

As far as the medical community is concerned, it unfortunately varies as widely public opinion.  I’ve asked my mother, a practicing physician in GR for the past 25+ years who has struggled with other physicians’ biases on gay rights and other issues in the past, about her take on this story, but alas, it seems that those darned dr’s hours are more regular than her grad student daughter’s and I have yet to hear back.  At any rate, yes, the Spectrum doctor committed a truly nasty breach of doctor-patient protocol, not to mention basic human protocol, and should be reprimanded.  But like rea, I just wanted to point out that not all of the Grand Rapids medical community, much less the rest of the community, harbors these beliefs. 

Sorry so long, and perhaps so defensive- I didn’t realize how much this story bothered me until I started writing.  Heck, I’ve been in a grad program at a different midwestern religious university for so long that visiting my parents in Grand Rapids often feels like a refreshing break of liberalism and acceptance.  Man, I never thought I’d say that, I really need to finish this degree and move on!

...relurking.

Grand Rapids, Michigan? That says it all.

“We are just beginning this review of this matter and must follow the laws protecting patient confidentiality and the rights of employees. Therefore, we will not comment further at this time.”

In order to maintain the privacy of the patients whose privacy our employee invaded...
Oh, wait.  Nevermind.

nobody says shit like this beccause they mean well & are just misguided. this is power+priveldge+misogyny…Ive had many doctors say wholly inappropriate things to me m whether political, religious or in general, while theyve had me at their mercy in their offices & it always shakes out the same: they think they are superior humans to you. and if youre a woman—& in this case gay, but it could be jewish, or arab, or black or whatever the fuck that drops you even further a notch down from white men (or whatever ethnicity the doc feels superior to, wrt his ethnicity)—and they hate women, essentially, they will say whatever the fuck they want to you , like you were a farm animal. and they do it becuase it again reinforces their superiority & because they are sadists & relish the priveldge they think accorded to them to hurt you, a woman. why are they withholding the fuckers name? i hope he gets burned really badly on this one. in a fair world, he would be busted out of practicing.

I just don’t understand where assholes get off thinking that b/c they have religious belief they are allowed to be bigots and discriminate.

Caren, C of AP—Respectfully, you have it backwards. He probably doesn’t think that his religious beliefs permit him to be a bigot and a nosybody so much as he started off as a bigot and a nosybody, and realize that it would be ‘way easier to bring off if he pretended he was just being Jesus’s Little Helper.

Hell, he was probably working up to asking if they’d let him watch next time.

Unprofessional.  Period.  Paragraph.

I’ll leave it to the actual Grand Rapidans above to note that the town has, to my understanding, changed in the last 15 years or so. My impression is that it gets more conservative as you leave GR and go west toward Lake Michigan, excepting Saugatuck.

But we in Kalamazoo are much more liberal and we have the cool name, so come visit us and see our most recognizalbe landmark, the water tower from an abandoned mental institution. .

I am so glad I left Grand Rapids after spending 47 years there.  I wish I had done it earlier.  The doctor is an asshole, but the board of directors of Spectrum (usually referred to as speculum by the doctors I know) is fully laden with members of the DeVos and VanAndel families (look them up if you want to have the shit scared out of you).  So dear doctor will I’m sure be getting a big pat on the back instead of a big kick in the ass.

Yay Kalamazoo!  Home to same-sex partner benefits for city employees until Republican State AG and all-around fucktard Mike Cox (dick joke goes here) forced us to remove them!  “CONFIDENCE IN MANHOOD WEAKENING DUE TO DICK JOKES! MUST CRUSH EVERY TINY ENCLAVE OF TOLERANCE- RARGH!” 

Sorry about all the exclamation points.  I love my city, but I hate the bullshit that happens here.

Also, kudos for the water tower reference. 
Kalamazoo; leading West Michigan in “WTF school” architecture.

Oh, I lived in Kalamazoo for ten years, and while I haven’t been back in a long time, it was a great place to live. I miss having my lunch in Bronson Park. And Bell’s. And Michigan News. And lots of stuff.