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Pat Robertson Claims Gay Men Have Secret Rings They Use To Give People HIV In Resurfaced Video
A 2013 video of Evangelical Christian Pastor Robertson spouting a homophobic conspiracy theory on a segment of The 700 Club has resurfaced. Robertson is seen making claims gay men use rings to cut people's fingers when shaking hands in order to transmit HIV to victims.
The rant in the video was so bizarre that the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) had it removed.
Robertson's claims have resurfaced after the recent death of Rush Limbaugh who dedicated significant time trying to damage the LGBTQ+ community, to the extent of celebrating the deaths of AIDS victims on his show during 1989-1990.
Although clips of the video over the years from various sources continued to be taken down, the video can be seen below.
Robertson began by taking a question from a woman who explained she had switched churches after finding out a man she had been driving to the hospital had HIV and she felt the church should have disclosed his positive status since he was in her car.
Although Robertson did accurately state that HIV cannot be transmitted by simply sharing a car he quickly descended into an anti-LGBTQ+ theory.
He made claims of non existent laws saying:
"There are laws now, I think the homosexual community has put these draconian laws on the books to prohibit people from discussing this particular infection."
Although he claimed he was "misunderstood" this particular rant is one of many of Robertson's often problematic theories.
He said:
“In my own experience, our organization sponsored a meeting years ago in San Francisco where trained security officers warned me about shaking hands because, in those days, certain AIDS-infected activists were deliberately trying to infect people like me by virtue of rings which would cut fingers and transfer blood."
"I regret that my remarks had been misunderstood, but this often happens because people do not listen to the context of remarks which are being said. In no ways were my remarks meant as an indictment of the homosexual community or, for that fact, to those infected with this dreadful disease."
Social media users had quite enough of hateful conspiracy theories and were none too quiet about their feelings for Reverend Robertson.
There is no acceptable explanation for perpetuating hateful misinformation.
This goes for you too Reverend Robertson.