ABC has decided to undergo yet another pointless experiment, designed to show the abject intolerance of the American people. NBC has done this before, with the Muslims at a NASCAR race. ABC decided to stage an event with gays at a sports bar. Get it? Gay men at the premiere gathering place for decidedly heterosexual men? ABC was obviously hoping for some juicy homophobic action.

So, they planted a gay couple in the sports bar and coached them to be overly affectionate. They also threw in an actor to heckle and abuse the gay couple, in hopes of getting the other patrons to join in.

Unfortunately for ABC, Americans are apparently not quite as homophobic as they had hoped.

I think my favorite line was at the end, when the obnoxious newslady proclaimed, Tolerance has become an American value. Because, you know, this country wasn’t founded on the principles of tolerance or anything. It’s a new phenomenon apparently. Of course, it’s also interesting to note that ABC is busy playing entrapment with Americans rather than actually covering the news.

It’s funny, because it wasn’t until ABC had the gay couple amp up the PDA that there was one person — one, out of their entire experiment — that started to complain. And why wouldn’t he? Gay or straight, it’s incredibly annoying to watch a couple make out in a public setting. And then ABC used it as an example of this man’s “homophobia”, even though there was not one patron who objected to the gay couple’s presence until ABC told them to amp up their affections to obnoxious levels unacceptable and inappropriate for any couple, gay or straight.

The only bias in this entire experiment was the bias that ABC itself had… the assumption that heterosexual men and women in flyover country who frequent sports bars would be inherently homophobic.

Now, if ABC wanted to see real intolerance, all they’d need to do is go to a city that’s a bastion of liberal thought… like, say, San Francisco or Berkeley. Go to San Francisco wearing a shirt supportive of President Bush and openly talk about how you support the military and the war in Iraq. Go to Berkeley and tell the hippies that the Marines should stay there and that they’re performing a valuable service. Go to any left-leaning city and talk about conservative values, and then you’ll see some strong, hateful intolerance.

But that wouldn’t serve ABC’s purpose, would it?

Hat Tip: Say Anything