Write Chris Matthews and Hardball to complain about Tony Perkins's lies

The news of the Pentagon study confirming the repeal of DADT is awesome. Now while attention is focused on that, allow me to get a little of your attention to something that needs our participation.

The following is an email I sent to Chris Matthews and the staff of Hardball in regards to Tony Perkins's appearance on the show yesterday. It is imperative that as many of us also submit emails. You can feel free to use my letter or submit your own. The email address is hardball@msnbc.com


To: Chris Matthews and the staff of Hardball,

Dear Mr. Matthews,

On November 29, you had Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council on your show speaking against the designation of his organization as an official anti-gay hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. In making his point, Mr. Perkins committed several distortions which need to be brought to your attention.

1. When he cited work from the American College of Pediatricians as proof that homosexuality is a "dangerous lifestyle," he did not mention that this organization is not a legitimate medical group. The American College of Pediatricians is not a legitimate medical group. It is a sham organization dedicated to the laundering of junk science about the lgbt community, i.e. the kind of "science" which demonizes the lgbt community. One of its chief researchers was George Rekers, that is before he got caught coming from a European trip with a "rentboy."

Earlier this year, the American College of Pediatricians tried to push a webpage, Facts About Youth, to American schools.

Among other things, this site made the following claims about gay men:

Some gay men sexualize human waste, including the medically dangerous practice of coprophilia, which means sexual contact with highly infectious fecal wastes

2. Perkins claimed according to a study in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, 86 percent of men who molest children identified as gay.  He conveniently did not mention that in the study of 229 convicted child molesters,  63 victims were male, and 166 victims were female.  Eighty-six percent of 63 isn't a drop in the bucket and it's certainly not enough to make a generalization in regards to the gay community.

I am well aware of the fact that when discussing controversial issues, journalists have a duty to show a degree of parity and present "both sides." However, journalists also have a duty to call out any distortions made by either side of the issue.

At the very least, I would hope that you and your staff come to the realization that when it comes to discussing gay issues, neither Tony Perkins nor anyone else in the Family Research Council can be trusted to be accurate or truthful.


Thank you for your time,

Alvin McEwen

www.holybulliesandheadlessmonsters.blogspot.com

Feel free to copy what is in this letter or send your own. But by all means, please be polite. We have a right to be angry with how Perkins distorts facts to demonize us, but we are still a people with dignity. The point is to let Matthews know how Perkins and FRC lie about lgbt issues.

Family Research anti-DADT repeal poll demonstrates sloppy work and other Tuesday midday news briefs

That poll referred to by the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins that supposedly shows that 63 percent of the military opposes the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell? It's a lie. Check out this interesting statistic via Goodasyou.org:

43% [of respondents] are supporters of the Tea Party movement (3,691 people).

Demographically, 62% are pro-life, 70% support traditional marriage 70% are historical contributors, 45% are male and 71% are 50 years of age or older.

*FULL POLL DATA: http://downloads.frc.org/EF/EF10K46.pdf

Talk about your skewed poll. And bear in mind also that comes on the heels of legitimate work which says while most Americans support the repeal of DADT, the tea party doesn't. Of course FRC is going to get the result it wants against the DADT repeal when almost half of those polled are from a group against the repeal in the first place.


And in other news briefs:

Colorado urged not to hire coach over gay views - This is interesting.

ACLU sues Miami Beach on behalf of gay man wrongly arrested by police near Flamingo Park - And I hope that the ACLU wins. The case is ugly.

Panic among Kenya's gays and lesbians after prime minister's threat to have them arrested - Things may be bad for us here in America but it's worse overseas. Please keep these folks in your prayers.

The end of gay men being camp - Not while I'm alive, honey!

Senator McCain's opposition to DADT repeal contradicts his earlier statements

To the surprise of no one:

The Pentagon study that argues that gay troops could serve openly without hurting the military's ability to fight is expected to re-ignite debate this month on Capitol Hill over repealing the 17-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

Officials familiar with the 10-month study's results have said a clear majority of respondents don't care if gays serve openly, with 70 percent predicting that lifting the ban would have positive, mixed or no results. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the findings hadn't been released.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen, who have both said they support repealing the law, were scheduled to discuss the findings with Congress Tuesday morning and with reporters Tuesday afternoon.

Republicans, led by Sen. John McCain of Arizona, have mostly opposed repealing the law because they say efforts to do so are politically driven and dangerous at a time of two wars.

It's interesting that McCain would take this tone. In 2009, he said the following:

My opinion is shaped by the view of the leaders of the military. The reason why I supported the policy to start with is because General Colin Powell, who was then the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is the one that strongly recommended we adopt this policy in the Clinton administration. I have not heard General Powell or any of the other military leaders reverse their position, just like when on other issues, that people are expert and knowledgeable of, I rely on their opinion. But this is unique. These military leaders are responsible for the very lives of the men and women under their command, and that's why I am especially guided, to a large degree, by their views.

And in 2006 (via John Aravosis of Americablog), he said:

And I understand the opposition to it, and I've had these debates and discussions, but the day that the leadership of the military comes to me and says, Senator, we ought to change the policy, then I think we ought to consider seriously changing it because those leaders in the military are the ones we give the responsibility to.

Seems to me that McCain is ducking and dodging.

Family Research Council's Tony Perkins pushes George Rekers flavored falsehoods on Hardball

And the lies continue

Today on the news show Hardball, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council sought to defend his organization's claim that gay men molest children at a higher rate than heterosexuals.

In attempting to do this, Perkins cited research by the American College of Pediatricians. However, there are several things about this group that Perkins omitted:

The American College of Pediatricians is not a legitimate medical group. It is a sham organization dedicated to the laundering of junk science about the lgbt community, i.e. the kind of "science" which demonizes the lgbt community. One of its chief researchers was George Rekers, that is before he got caught coming from a European trip with a "rentboy."

Earlier this year, it tried to push a webpage, Facts About Youth, to American schools.

Among other things, this site made the following claims about gay men:

Some gay men sexualize human waste, including the medically dangerous practice of coprophilia, which means sexual contact with highly infectious fecal wastes

In addition, it also contained several errors in regards to research and other claims about the lgbt community.

But these things are irrelevant because the big story is how the American College of Pediatricians benefits people like Perkins.

Just as he did on Hardball, Perkins can cite the ACP without going into details about its errors. The official sounding name of the organization obscures all of that, and thus makes Perkins's position sound accurate.

The sad thing is that I think Perkins knows this.

And apparently this was not the only distortion Perkins committed during his Hardball appearance. Perkins said the following:

If you go back to the Archives of Sexual Behavior, a peer-reviewed reviewed journal, that stated that in self-identified… 86% of men, homosexual men, or who engage… or men who engage in molestation of children, 86% of them identified as homosexual or bisexual. That study has not been refuted.

However, according to the site Box Turtle Bulletin:

The study was not “refuted,” in Perkins’ terminology, simply because the finding was not considered to be significant, not even by its authors. The study, “Behavior patterns of child molesters” by W.D. Erickson, N.H. Walbek, and R.K. Seely which appeared more than twenty years ago (1988, to be exact), didn’t set out to determine the sexual orientation of child molesters. The study, of 229 convicted child molesters in Minnesota, (which, by the way, was never intended to be nationally representative in any way) was focused on the types of sexual contact the men engaged in with their victims — vaginal or anal penetration, oral contact, and so forth. In this particular sample, 63 victims were male, and 166 victims were female. The “finding” that Perkins and company found so exciting is encapsulated in just one sentence: “Eighty-six percent of offenders against males described themselves as homosexual or bisexual.”

That’s right, one lone sentence out of a ten page document, buried deeply within the text. In other words, the authors themselves didn’t see it as a significant finding. And it may be because the authors didn’t delve into the adult relationship makeup of these offenders, or what criteria the offenders used in their self-labeling. Nor did they attempt to investigate whether there was any validity to their self-labeling.

Concerned Women for America plays the race card while Bryan Fischer makes a Freudian slip

The whining of religious right groups newly named as anti-gay hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center is reaching the levels of absurdity.

Witness this statement regarding the designation by Concerned Women for America:

The SPLC began as a civil rights organization in the 1960s, but has been marginalized by “gay rights” organizations. They no longer simply focus on the noble cause of fighting racism and have, instead, become another tool for the left. This time, the SPLC has taken their liberal propaganda too far. By demonizing traditional family groups that support traditional marriage, they just put a huge portion of the African-American community in California in the same category with the rest us so-called bigots.

According to an Associated Press exit poll, 70 percent of African-Americans in California who voted for Barack Obama also voted for Prop 8 and in support of traditional marriage in 2008. The very people the SPLC supposedly seeks to protect from bigotry and “hate crimes” are heavily in favor of the very institution that the SPLC is fighting against.

I hope CWA's statement alerts everyone to the true cynical nature of this so-called pro-family groups.

Seems to me that the simplest thing for the CWA (and the other organizations named as anti-gay hate groups or profiled) is to address SPLC's charges head on with a simple statement such as "SPLC is inaccurate because we never said those things or took those stances," or "our statements and actions have been misconstrued."

But rather than doing this, CWA is attempting to drag the African-American community into this argument in a sad attempt to play that community against the lgbt community. And let's face it - the CWA does not give a flip about either community.

No one should address the racial component of CWA's argument because it is irrelevant to the facts, which is according to SPLC:

 (CWA founder Beverly) LaHaye has blamed gay people for a “radical leftist crusade” in America and, over the years, has occasionally equated homosexuality with pedophilia. In 2001, she hired prominent anti-gay propagandists Robert Knight  . . . and Peter LaBarbera . . . to launch CWA’s Culture and Family Institute. Matt Barber was CWA’s policy director for cultural issues in 2007 and 2008 before moving on to similar work with the Liberty Counsel  . . .

While at CWA, on April 12, 2007,  (Matt) Barber suggested against all the evidence that there were only a “miniscule number” of anti-gay hate crimes and most of those “may very well be rooted in fraudulent reports.” In comments that have since disappeared from CWA’s website, Barber demanded a federal probe of “homosexual activists” for their alleged fabrications of hate crime reports.

CWA long relied on and displayed Knight’s articles and talking points, including claims that “homosexuality carries enormous physical and mental health risks” and “gay marriage entices children to experiment with homosexuality.” Most remarkably, Knight cited the utterly discredited work of Paul Cameron to bolster claims that homosexuality is harmful.

Today, CWA continues to make arguments against homosexuality on the basis of dubious claims. President Wendy Wright said this August that gay activists were using same-sex marriage “to indoctrinate children in schools to reject their parents’ values and to harass, sue and punish people who disagree.” Last year, CWA accused the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), a group that works to stop anti-gay bullying in schools, of using that mission as a cover to promote homosexuality in schools, adding that “teaching students from a young age that the homosexual lifestyle is perfectly natural … will [cause them to] develop into adults who are desensitized to the harmful, immoral reality of sexual deviance.”

As a gay man, I am amused by CWA's sad attempts to drag the black community into the argument. But as a black man, I am very angry. The way the CWA has label lgbts as oversexed monsters seeking to molest or "indoctrinate" children is no different than the way racists labeled black men as mindless brutes seeking to rape white women.

How's that for a racial component to the argument?

Meanwhile Bryan Fischer, the main reason why the American Family Association is considered as an anti-gay hate group, lodged his complaints against the designation.

It was one of those Freudian moments:

The Southern Poverty Law Center last week added five members to its list of “hate” groups, one of which is the American Family Association.

This illustrates one point and proves another. The point it illustrates is that the first and last refuge of a man without an argument is name-calling.

That would be an excellent point to make, except for one thing. As People for the American Way put it:

  . . .it should also be noted that Fischer's entire professional career is based on calling gays names like nancy-boys and sexual perverts and sexual deviants and pedophiles and domestic terrorists who are part of a "deviancy cabal" who "want to use the anal cavity for sex."

People who live in glass houses definitely shouldn't throw stones.

This sad attempt by CWA and Fischer to sidestep SPLC's charges continues to prove the main point of this entire controversy - you can't portray yourself as a victim when a paper trail reveals you to be a bully.

Hat tip to People for the American Way.


Related posts:

The American Family Association must address Bryan Fischer's hateful comments

Concerned Women for America - endorsing hateful anti-gay comics and bad data

Homophobic bigots don't like being called homophobic bigots and other Monday midday news briefs

The SPLC hate list and the Nazi card - Matt Barber (no slouch in the anti-gay department) says that religious right groups have won the argument against SPLC because they have been accused of being like the Nazis. But there is a serious problem with his argument. It was the religious right groups who have compared lgbts to Nazis. Just another omission of logic on the part of Barber.

Most Support DADT Repeal, But Tea Party Opposed - The tea party would oppose breathing because some "people who don't deserve it" are taking up air.

Watch: John McCain Says That DADT "Is Working" - Sen. McCain is certainly bitchy these days.

Michigan Newspaper Runs Anti-Gay Ad - Simply twisted.

Pryor vs. Future - It amazes me how some people think about gay sex more than gays.

American Family Association will not confront reason why its considered a hate group

The American Family Association is confronting its designation as a hate group via its phony news service, One News Now:

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is defaming a number of pro-family organizations by adding them to its list of "hate groups."

The leftist legal organization has issued a list of alleged "hate groups" that includes mainstream Christian ministries because of their opposition to the sin of homosexuality. Dr. Gary Cass of DefendChristians.org, a ministry of the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission, tells OneNewsNow the American Family Association earned a spot in the ranks with other groups that are usually considered racist or violent.

"To say that anybody who has a principled objection to homosexuality [and] the impact that that sinful lifestyle has on individuals and on society is somehow morally equivalent to overt racism and violence is absolutely defamatory," Cass contends.

However, just as in the case of the other supposed moral values groups who have cried foul over their designations as hate groups and profiles, it's not what the AFA is saying that's important. It's what the organization is not saying.

Nowhere in the article is a quote from anyone in the AFA, nor does the article address a key reason why the organization is seen as a hate group by SPLC, i.e. the words of its director of analysis for government and policy Bryan Fischer:

The AFA seeks to support “traditional moral values,” but in recent years it has seemed to specialize in “combating the homosexual agenda.” In 2009, it hired Bryan Fischer, the former executive director of the Idaho Values Alliance, as its director of analysis for government and policy. . . Fischer claimed in a blog post last May 27 that “[h]omosexuality gave us Adolph Hitler, and homosexuals in the military gave us the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war machine and 6 million dead Jews.” (Ironically, the elder Wildmon was widely denounced as an anti-Semite after suggesting that Jews control the media, which the AFA says “shows a genuine hostility towards Christians.”) Fischer has described Hitler as “an active homosexual” who sought out gays “because he could not get straight soldiers to be savage and brutal and vicious enough.” He proposed criminalizing homosexual behavior in another 2010 blog post and has advocated forcing gays into “reparative” therapy. In a 2010 “action alert,” the AFA warned that if homosexuals are allowed to openly serve in the military, “your son or daughter may be forced to share military showers and barracks with active and open homosexuals.”

Gays aren’t the AFA’s only enemies. “Islam is a totalitarian political ideology,” Fischer said in August 2010. “It is as racist as the KKK. … Allowing a mosque to be built in town is fundamentally no different that granting a building permit to a KKK cultural center built in honor of some King Kleagle.” In late 2009, he suggested that all Muslims should be banned from joining the U.S. military.

The irony of Cass being interviewed in the article is that his group, the Christian Anti-Defense Commission, was profiled by SPLC but not considered as a hate group. Cass has called for an elimination of "taxpayers monies" to SPLC, something he has been advocating since April.

Cass also said in the article:

"To say that anybody who has a principled objection to homosexuality [and] the impact that that sinful lifestyle has on individuals and on society is somehow morally equivalent to overt racism and violence is absolutely defamatory."

However, he did not address SPLC's reasons for profiling his group. Nor did he address questionable things his organization has done in the past which may have contributed its profile, such as defending the work of the discredited Paul Cameron (a man who has in the past made up stories about gay men castrating children) or defending the actions of a church which sought to exorcise a "homosexual demon" out of a child.

Claiming to be victims of an "anti-Christian leftist conspiracy" may gain Cass and the AFA some initial support, but sooner or later they and members of other organizations profiled by the SPLC will have to answer questions regarding their actions.

You cannot continue to cry "victim" when there is a paper trail showing you to be a bully.


Related posts:

Concerned Women for America - endorsing hateful anti-gay comics and bad data

Why the National Organization for Marriage was profiled for its anti-gay hatred

Concerned Women for America - endorsing hateful anti-gay comics and bad data

While the Concerned Women for America was profiled by the Southern Poverty Law Center for the spewing of anti-gay propaganda, it wasn't designated as an official anti-gay organization. This may be because the group has kept a low profile since Obama's election as President. However, when CWA does rear its ugly head, there are a lot of questions as to whether this group does actually stand for "Christian principles." 

The following is a repost of a piece I did about the group in June of this year. Added is a very special emphasis on an anti-gay comic which CWA's founder Beverly LaHaye endorsed in 1986. This comic is pertinent for three reasons - it totally refutes the notion that CWA is being "picked on" for its supposed traditional values (i.e. its stand against gay marriage), and to my knowledge, LaHaye never apologized for endorsing this very homophobic comic. Lastly, I doubt that the CWA has backed away from the positions stated by the comic. My guess is that they don't present them as graphically hateful as Hafer (the comic' s creator) did:

From June 2010:

Research has come out today justifying 200 other studies and basic common sense - children do not suffer from being raised in a same-sex household:

For their new study, published on Monday in the journal Pediatrics, researchers Nanette Gartrell, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Francisco (and a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles), and Henry Bos, a behavioral scientist at the University of Amsterdam, focused on what they call planned lesbian families — households in which the mothers identified themselves as lesbian at the time of artificial insemination.

. . . The authors found that children raised by lesbian mothers — whether the mother was partnered or single — scored very similarly to children raised by heterosexual parents on measures of development and social behavior. These findings were expected, the authors said; however, they were surprised to discover that children in lesbian homes scored higher than kids in straight families on some psychological measures of self-esteem and confidence, did better academically and were less likely to have behavioral problems, such as rule-breaking and aggression.

Naturally members of the religious right went apoplectic over the research. Wendy Wright from Concerned Women for America was the first up at bat, attacking the funding sources of the research in a CNN article:

Funding for the research came from several lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender advocacy groups, such as the Gill Foundation and the Lesbian Health Fund from the Gay Lesbian Medical Association.

Dr. Nanette Gartrell, the author of the study, wrote that the "funding sources played no role in the design or conduct of the study."

"My personal investment is in doing reputable research," said Gartrell. "This is a straightforward statistical analysis. It will stand and it has withstood very rigorous peer review by the people who make the decision whether or not to publish it."

...Wendy Wright, president of the Concerned Women for America, a group that supports biblical values, questioned the legitimacy of the findings from a study funded by gay advocacy groups. "That proves the prejudice and bias of the study," she said. "This study was clearly designed to come out with one outcome -- to attempt to sway people that children are not detrimentally affected in a homosexual household."

She also said:

Studies have shown that children thrive having both a mother and a father, Wright said.

"You have to be a little suspicious of any study that says children being raised by same-sex couples do better or have superior outcomes to children raised with a mother and father," she said. "It just defies common sense and reality."

Of course Wright omits the fact that none of the studies she vaguely refers to even looked at same-sex households.

And she also seems to be saying that since the study looked at same-sex parenting in a positive fashion, then it's automatically biased, which is like an anti-Semite saying that a study favoring the Jewish community should be seen as automatically biased, or a racist saying that a study favoring African-Americans should be seen as automatically biased, or . . . I think you get the picture.

People for the American Way puts CWA's attack on this study in proper perspective:

This coming from an organization that has repeatedly cited the "research" of Paul Cameron.

Allow me to put it in another perspective.

In the late 80s, this comic book, Homosexuality: Legitimate, Alternate Deathstyle, was published by a man named Dick Hafer and it supposedly gave the "facts" about the "gay lifestyle."

By "facts," Hafer meant Paul Cameron's discredited studies and cherry-picked legitimate science enhanced by cartoons of gay men coming out of sewers to sexually accost potential victims, sexually molesting children, and spreading diseases with abandonment.

This book even puts forth the belief that gay men need to be quarantined in their homes so that parents whose children are stricken with AIDS and HIV don't harm them.

So what does this have to do with the Concerned Women for America?

Concerned Women and its president at the time, Beverly LaHaye, endorsed this monstrosity. On the back cover of the comic book are the words:

Americans need to wake up to the facts regarding the Homosexual movement. Dick Hafer exposes the depravity of their lives in his book, Deathstyle. This is a book which needs to be read by all of those concerned about society and our nation.

Now one could say that CWA shouldn't be judged on what it endorsed over 20 years ago. Fair enough.

However, to my knowledge, neither CWA or LaHaye ever rescinded the endorsement of Homosexuality: Legitimate, Alternate Deathstyle.

And it can be argued that CWA continues to push the "gays and lesbians are diseased dangers to society, but to children in general" narrative contained in Deathstyle, albeit in a less "spectacularly provocative" fashion. The group certainly continues to cite Cameron's research, which makes up a huge part of  the booklet.

But basically, it comes down to one question. Who do we trust in regards to lgbt parenting?

A meticulously done study which has stood up to peer reviews?

Or a group who endorses literature which says, amongst other things, that gays should be quarantined to protect them from the families of children stricken by AIDS and HIV?

And just in case you have the stomach for it, the following are other images from this anti-gay comic book:

Hat tip to this webpage featuring DeathStyle. It is not anti-gay but a site which looks at "problem-based comics" from the past.
 

Why the National Organization for Marriage was profiled for its anti-gay hatred

This is actually a repost of two pieces I wrote in July detailing a very short feud between me and the National Organization for Marriage.

It is very relevant to right now seeing that the National Organization for Marriage is not happy after being profiled by the Southern Poverty Law Center for it's anti-gay bile. Of course the organization claims that it is being unfairly labeled as "bigoted" simply because it is "standing up for traditional marriage." However, this post proves otherwise:

From July 2010:

What's up with the National Organization for Marriage (NOM)?

Not too many people are noticing this, but that organization, started to supposedly "protect marriage" from us so-called evil LGBTs, seems to be going off the deep end in terms of rhetoric.

When it began, NOM cleverly played up the "we are unfairly being called bigots because we simply want to protect marriage" meme. And that was because of the savvy of its founder, Maggie Gallagher.

But now with Gallagher handing the reins of the group to Brian Brown, the organization has abandoned all pretenses of martyrdom and is headed straight for crazy-talk territory.

This was evident when it joined forces in its "Summer for Marriage" tour with one Louis J. Marinelli III, a man who not only cites the discredited work of Paul Cameron, but is also very vocal in the belief that gays want to cause all sorts of mischief from molesting children to creating polygamous relationships.

And if that's not bad enough, from an administrator of NOM's Facebook page comes this little "gem:"

(Gays and lesbians) are not being repressed, discriminated against. There is no and never has ever been a homosexual man hunt for them. Jews, Christians, and Blacks were hunted down and murdered. Homosexuals have nothing in common with the three.

Now I could go into a history of the persecution of the LGBT community in places like Nazi Germany or talk about Sakia Gunn, Michael Sandy, or even Matthew Shepard (whose murder was not soley about a robbery no matter what the right says), or the countless number of LGBTs who have lost their lives due to hate but what's the point?

Sometimes people say things so wildly inaccurate that any comment you want to make is unnecessary. The statement by NOM is beyond the pale and it further proves what many LGBTs know about that group. NOM is not interested in defending marriage. It's only interested in bashing LGBTs, but not by physical attacks.

NOM seeks to psychologically bash us.

U.S. judge says lesbians can be 'converted' if allowed to serve in the military

I wasn't going to post anything else today after this morning, but this bit of repulsive information needs to be known:

Joe Rehyansky, a part-time magistrate and Vietnam veteran, wrote on conservative news site The Daily Caller that lesbians should be allowed to serve in the military because straight male soldiers could “convert” them.

The Daily Caller swiftly removed some of his remarks but not before they were picked up by other websites.

Mr Rehyansky, of Hamilton County, Tennessee, argued that men were naturally more promiscuous than women and “it fell to men to swing through the trees and scour the caves in search of as many women as possible to subdue and impregnate – a tough job but someone had to do it”.

Then, he claimed that the “promiscuity” of gay men, coupled with HIV, would have “the potential for disastrous health consequences” if gay men were allowed to serve openly in the military.

Rehyansky's entire piece is vomit-worthy, spewing the same anti-gay distortions which is now coming back to haunt organizations such as the Family Research Council. But it's the following part that's causing eyes, tempers, and blood pressures to be raised:

His final argument, which has now been removed by The Daily Caller, was as follows: “My solution would get the distaff part of our homosexual population off our collective ‘Broke Back,’ thus giving straight male GIs a fair shot at converting lesbians and bringing them into the mainstream.”

How very interesting that this piece came out the week before Congressional hearings and a vote on the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the military policy in regards to gays serving in the military.

Call it a hunch, but I'm betting those who want to retain the policy aren't going to be calling on Rehyansky as a witness.

The Family Research Council should be apologizing to the gay community

The disagreement between the Southern Poverty Law Center and the new groups designated as anti-gay hate groups hit the Washington Post yesterday.

And while I am happy with the coverage, I am not happy with how these groups are trying to cover their tracks. They are trying to make it seem as if they are being attacked because they have made stands against gay marriage.

The key person pushing this argument is Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council.

Perkins has even had the temerity to demand an apology from the SPLC:

Family Research Council will continue to champion marriage and family as the foundation of our society and will not acquiesce to those seeking to silence the Judeo-Christian views held by millions of Americans. We call on the Southern Poverty Law Center to apologize for this slanderous attack and attempted character assassination."

Let's be clear about something - the claim that these groups, particularly FRC,  are being attacked merely for their stance against gay marriage or their stance against homosexuality is a lie.

FRC in particular has a long history of demonizing the lgbt community. Via studies, briefs, and research papers heavily reliant on junk science and fear tactics, FRC attacked the lgbt community long before discussions of gay marriage even came on the scene.

Unfortunately some of these past studies, briefs and press releases are no longer on FRC's web page.  In December of 2008, I noticed this and emailed the organization asking for an explanation. I was told the following:

The papers that you inquired about have been removed from our website indefinitely due to the fact that they have outdated sources.

The email further pointed out that there were several other studies which remained on the web page.  The irony is that these studies used the same material the "outdated" papers used, which is another way of saying that FRC got rid of the papers but used the same bad sources.

Luckily for me though, John Aravosis of Americablog created a webpage which featured statements by the Family Research Council (and other religious right groups and figures) pertaining to the lgbt community. The following are just a few things said about the lgbt community:

"Homosexuals say they don't want the children, but boy they put a lot of energy into going after them." - Robert Knight of FRC writing in a Focus on the Family newsletter, quoted by People for the American Way, "Hostile Climate," 1997, p.15.

"Gaining access to children has been a long-term goal of the homosexual movement." - "Homosexual Activists Work to Normalize Sex With Boys," Family Research Council publication, July 1999

"There is a strong undercurrent of pedophilia in the homosexual subculture. Homosexual activists want to promote the flouting of traditional sexual prohibitions at the earliest possible age....they want to encourage a promiscuous society - and the best place to start is with a young and credulous captive audience in the public schools." - Robert Knight, Family Research Council.

"In the United States, homosexual activists are more circumspect about their efforts to gain access to children...homosexual activists publicly disassociate themselves from pedophiles as part of a public relations strategy"- "Homosexual Activists Work to Normalize Sex With Boys," FRC publication, July 1999

"You don’t have to eat the stale crumbs off the dirty floor, which is basically what lesbianism is." - AFTAH (Americans for Truth) Web site interview with FRC's Yvette Cantu.

I should mention that throughout all of the complaints and claims of persecution, neither Perkins nor any of the other persons or groups profiled by the SPLC have issued the short clarifying statements of "we have not done these things" or "our statements have been misconstrued."

Make no mistake about it. These groups have been spooked by being called out on their lies and are on the defensive. And now they are attempting to flip the argument.

But you can't make yourself look like a victim when a paper trial exposes you as a bully.

No matter how Perkins tries to spin the situation, he has a lot of answering to do at the very least in regards to FRC's past statements against the lgbt community.

Perhaps he should be the one to make the apologies.

Related posts:

Newly named anti-gay hate groups plead victimhood but do not address charges

Talking Points Memo picks up the SPLC anti-gay hate groups story

Ignoring your hate group status won't make it go away

Family Research Council, American Family Association named as anti-gay hate groups

18 Anti-Gay Groups and Their Propaganda

10 Anti-Gay Myths Debunked

Newly named anti-gay hate groups plead victimhood but do not address charges

Well that was quick. I just knew something would happen that I had to address.

Apparently some organizations who are on the Southern Poverty Law Center's list and profiles of anti-gay hate groups aren't happy about it and their spokespeople are addressing the issue.

But the venue that they chose to address SPLC's list and the way that they are saying (or rather what they are not saying) raises some questions as to the accuracy of their complaints.

Coral Ridge Ministries's Robert Knight, Concerned Women for America's Wendy Wright, and Christian Anti-Defamation Coalition head Gary L. Cass all responded in outraged tones over SPLC's either profiling or designating their organizations as anti-gay hate groups.

The venue where they choose to address the charges was on the pages of World Net Daily, an online publication which is infamous for its anti-gay rhetoric.

A writer on the site, Les Kinsolving, has in the past referred to the lgbt community as the "sodomy lobby."

In October of this year, he called a judge’s order to stop enforcement of the military’s ban on gay and lesbian troops in the military as a "disease ridden judicial decision."

In August of this year, the publication dropped conservative writer Ann Coulter as a keynote speaker from a conference it held because she earlier spoke at a conference held by a gay Republican group.

And in February of this year, another writer on World Net Daily, Molotov Mitchell, spoke out in favor of Uganda's "Kill The Gays" bill, even evoking Martin Luther King Jr's name in defense of it.

Joining Cass, Perkins, and Knight was Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council in an official statement which may not have been put out to World Net Daily specifically but was still picked up by the publication.

The irony of appearing in an anti-gay online publication in order to complain about being unfairly targeted as anti-gay seemed to have escaped Perkins, Wright, Knight, and Cass. This is probably because they were too busy pleading victimhood.

Knight - "Smearing legitimate groups merely for disagreeing about homosexuality is a very hateful act."

Perkins - "The Left's smear campaigns of conservatives is being driven by the clear evidence that the American public is losing patience with their radical policy agenda as seen in the recent election and in the fact that every state, currently more than thirty, that has had the opportunity to defend the natural definition of marriage has done so . . ."

Cass - "We are going to form a coalition of organizations to lobby Congress to withhold funds from SPLC."

Wright - "If they were to judge according to actions, they would have to have a special section for homosexual groups that vandalize and threaten people who oppose the homosexual agenda. We've had death threats against us posted openly on websites because of our work to uphold traditional marriage."

Of course Wright did not say just which lgbt groups were threatening her organization. Nor did she, Knight, Perkins, or Cass directly address any of the charges lodged by the SPLC, which are listed in a detailed report.

For the record, Knight, whose name pops up several times in the report, is inaccurate when he said that groups are being smeared for voicing a mere objection to homosexuality. SPLC said the following in the report:

Generally, the SPLC’s listings of these groups is based on their propagation of known falsehoods — claims about LGBT people that have been thoroughly discredited by scientific authorities — and repeated, groundless name-calling. Viewing homosexuality as unbiblical does not qualify organizations for listing as hate groups.

SPLC also gave a detailed description as to what these falsehoods are, including the claims that:

Gays molest children at a higher rate than heterosexuals,

Same sex parents harm children,

Gays have a lifespan shorter than heterosexuals, and

Gays controlled the Nazi party in Germany and helped orchestrate the Holocaust.

SPLC contends that these groups are knowingly pushing these falsehoods.

Now it would seem to me that through all of the whining and clinging to the cross of victimization done by Knight, Perkins, Wright, and Cass would be some type of declaration that these charges aren't true.

Maybe some type of short statement such as "we never said these things" or "we were misconstrued."

But none of the four denied the fact that their organizations are pushing these falsehoods.

So while it seems that these groups aren't ignoring SPLC's charges, it's obvious that they are doing a insanely poor job of refuting them.

Talking Points Memo picks up the SPLC anti-gay hate groups story

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. I most likely won't be posting until Friday afternoon.

The popular political blog Talking Points Memo has picked up the story about SPLC naming the Family Research Council as an official anti-gay hate group:

The Family Research Council is perhaps the most prominent voice in conservative social politics and the hosts of an annual rite of passage for many Republicans who hope to run for president. And now, FRC is on the same Southern Poverty Law Center list of hate groups as the Ku Klux Klan.

The SPLC gave the Family Research Council the designation due to anti-gay speech from its leaders, which the SPLC says includes calls for gay men and lesbians to be imprisoned.

Labeling the Family Research Council a hate group puts one of Washington's most powerful social issues advocates into the company of groups like the Nation of Islam and the now mostly defunct Aryan Nations in the eyes of the SPLC, which tracks 932 active hate groups in the U.S.

The article is an excellent read, particularly the part that goes into details regarding the comments of FRC employee Peter Sprigg. But I found this part to be very interesting:

The SPLC designation of the Family Research Council as an anti-gay hate group potentially poses more of a challenge for Republicans. Though many conservatives view the SPLC as a progressive group and therefore no more worthy of respect than, say, ACORN, the SPLC hate group label will almost undoubtedly make it into press reports about future events like the Values Voter Summit. That means Republican presidential hopefuls who may want to reach out to gay and lesbian Republican groups like the Log Cabin Republicans and GOProud -- which can be good sources of fundraising as well as "I'm not anti-gay" cred on the campaign trail -- may have to explain why they publicly praised and rushed to address a group that SPLC is calling one of the worst perpetrators of ugly myths about gays.

As Beirich told me, there is no difference between the FRC and the KKK in the eyes of the SPLC now. Still, she said that the hate group designation doesn't mean the SPLC thinks everyone who supports the FRC "has a full understanding of what they're up to." Many who support the FRC may do so because of the group's very public ties to evangelical Christianity, and Beirich stressed that the SPLC designation has nothing to do with an "attack on the churchly world."

By the way, FRC did not return TPM's request for a comment on the hate group designation.

Related posts:

Family Research Council, American Family Association named as anti-gay hate groups

Ignoring your hate group status won't make it go away

The priest, the victim, and the hitman and other Wednesday midday news briefs

Texas: Catholic Priest Allegedly Tried to Have Teen Sexual Abuse Victim Murdered - Soon to be an episode of Law and Order no doubt, probably one of the creepiest things I have read in a while.

New federal task force on LGBT youth suicide prevention to be announced - Say what you will, this is major.

Bryan Fischer, Tony Perkins, and the Hate Agenda - Keep the pressure up on these folks!

Caution over HIV 'breakthrough' - I agree. Read the article, keep praying, and keep playing it safe.

Tell the Apple iTunes Store to remove anti-gay, anti-choice iPhone application - I'm speechless about what Apple iTunes is doing.

Ignoring your hate group status won't make it go away

For now, the groups (i.e. the American Family Association, the Family Research Council) just added by Southern Poverty Law Center to the list of anti-gay hate organizations seem to be silent on their new status.

But other folks aren't.

Lgbt activist and author Dan Savage is making sure that this designation isn't being ignored.

Savage (who came up with the idea of the "It Gets Better Project" to combat the problem of gay teen suicides) took CNN to task yesterday during an interview for how the network gives a platform to these groups:

The Southern Poverty Law Center labels these groups as hate groups and yet the leaders of these groups, people like Tony Perkins, are welcomed onto networks like CNN to espouse hate directed at gays and lesbians. And similarly hateful people who are targeting Jews or people of color or anyone else would not be welcome to spew their bile on networks like CNN and then that really -- we really have to start there. We have to start with that type of cultural reckoning.

Meanwhile, a person whose presence was noted several times on SPLC's profile of these groups, Robert Knight of Coral Ridge Ministries, has come out with a new book claiming to tackle the so-called "harmful effects of same-sex marriage."

One wonders if he cited the work of the discredited Paul Cameron in this book like he has done several times in the past, including as a Congressional witness in 1994 when he spoke against ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act).

One thing is certain. Even before SPLC's citation, he wasn't so eager to talk about Cameron. In June of this year,  Knight, through his representative, declined to have an interview with me about the subject.

This is a far cry from the conversation I had with him in 2004 when he came to the University of South Carolina to have a debate with former Human Rights Campaign head Elizabeth Birch.

During the conversation after the debate (a conversation I recounted in my 2007 book Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters), I was able to question Knight as to why he used Cameron's work even though it had been discredited several times.

His answer to me was:

“Yes we have used his research. So what?”

But Knight and others listed by SPLC do have their defenders.

William A. Jacobson, Associate Clinical Professor at Cornell Law School, didn't care for SPLC's list. He is especially angry that the National Organization for Marriage is on the list (Editor's note - SPLC does not consider NOM as an official anti-gay hate group, but did profile the organization):

The inclusion of NOM on this list really is outrageous, and typical of how SPLC seeks to demonize a mainstream conservative (and in this case, constitutional) view.  The explanation SPLC gives for including NOM is flimsy and filled with innuendo.  

Jacobson also said about SPLC's list in general:

Most of these groups are unknown to me,  although a couple are well-known Christian groups, such as American Family Association and Family Research Council (both of these entities will be on SPLC's upcoming Hate Group list).  I don't defend or not defend these groups because I don't know much about them, but based upon SPLC's past performance, the burden should be on SPLC to make the case for including a group on a hate list.

Unfortunately that leads one to think that Jacobson didn't read SPLC's breakdown of these groups at all. The organization gives very detailed reasonings as to why these groups are profiled as well as the inaccurate things they say about the lgbt community.

Jacobson - and many responders to his blog post - were conveniently silent about these inaccurate claims, instead choosing to play the victim and complain about "liberal conspiracies" against Christians.

THIS is the DADT repeal ad that Fox News refused to run

Earlier today, I mentioned in my news briefs an article talking about how Fox News refused to run a DADT repeal ad.

Well just because those so-and-so's won't run it doesn't mean that I won't. I found the ad to be an excellent piece:

'Ex-gay' group targeting middle school students and other Tuesday midday news briefs

Notorious ‘Ex-Gay Group Plans to Target Middle School Students in 2011 - And they like to claim that we target children.

Fox News rejects ad featuring gay troops discussing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” - And this shocks us because?

PFOX Board Member Cited As Key A Reason The Family Research Council Is a SPLC Certified Hate Group - Sometimes it is about who you know.

NJ Assembly approves tougher bullying law - Excellent!

Bogus study claims that fatherless homes leads to lesbians

In a huge show of audacity, the recently named anti-gay hate group the Family Research Council just came out with a study of its own on the lesbian community. And of course, this "study" has been propped up by another anti-gay hate group the American Family Association via its phony news publication, One News Now:

A recently released study shows a link between childhood family structure and the rate of female homosexuality -- undermining the claim that sexual orientation is genetic or biological.

Family Research Council (FRC) looked into the family lives and worship rates of 7,643 women between the ages of 14 and 44. Pat Fagan, senior fellow and director of the Marriage and Religion Research Institute at FRC, co-evaluated the data and tells OneNewsNow about the findings.

"Once the girl grows up in a home in which her father is not present, it's about three times" more likely she has had or will have homosexual partners, he says -- but when she is raised by parents who are married and "always intact, it's about a four-percent rate." Moreover, he explains that rate is "slightly higher in the always-intact-but-cohabitating parents -- that's parents who never married."

Statistics are also higher with step-families, the cohabiting step-family, and the single divorced parent, adds the FRC spokesman.

In keeping with what I said yesterday, I am going to keep this short and sweet.

I wouldn't believe the Klan if they came out with a "study" about African-Americans, so why should I or anyone else believe a study about lgbts by a group who not only has a known bias against lgbts but has been known to play loose with the facts.

It's all about credibility and in this case, the Family Research Council doesn't have any.

However, if you feel so desired to read an excellent take down of this ridiculous piece of work, check out this post by my online buddy, Zach Ford.

Family Research Council, American Family Association named as anti-gay hate groups

Today, the Southern Poverty Law Center added five more groups to its list of anti-gay hate groups, including some names that are long overdue.

The new groups are:

1. American Family Association
2. Americans for Truth About Homosexuality
3. Dove World Outreach Center
4. Family Research Council
5. Illinois Family Institute

This brings the total of anti-gay hate groups to 18 and all of them are profiled in exact detail by SPLC.

Other groups profiled by SPLC but not designated as official hate groups are:

1. Christian Anti-Defamation Commission
2. Concerned Women for America
3. Coral Ridge Ministries
4. Liberty Counsel
5. National Organization for Marriage

And as an added bonus SPLC also has a page in which they debunk 10 anti-gay myths. And I am sure you have heard of all them before (i.e. gays molest children at a higher rate than heterosexuals, gay have a short lifespan, you can "cure" homosexuality.)

And one thing that cannot be repeated enough is SPLC's reasons to list these organizations as anti-gay hate groups:

Even as some well-known anti-gay groups like Focus on the Family moderate their views, a hard core of smaller groups, most of them religiously motivated, have continued to pump out demonizing propaganda aimed at homosexuals and other sexual minorities. These groups’ influence reaches far beyond what their size would suggest, because the “facts” they disseminate about homosexuality are often amplified by certain politicians, other groups and even news organizations. Of the 18 groups profiled below, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) will be listing 13 next year as hate groups (eight were previously listed), reflecting further research into their views; those are each marked with an asterisk. Generally, the SPLC’s listings of these groups is based on their propagation of known falsehoods — claims about LGBT people that have been thoroughly discredited by scientific authorities — and repeated, groundless name-calling. Viewing homosexuality as unbiblical does not qualify organizations for listing as hate groups.

The last sentence was emphasized by me because it needs to be remembered. Unfortunately when the inaccuracies of various religious right groups are pointed out, the conversation tends to go on a religious direction and this is a mistake.

When we go to the religious direction, we give these groups a chance to cover themselves. "These are merely our personal religious beliefs," they say. 

Religion is immaterial. The bad acts that theses groups commit in the name of religion is the point we should focus on and hammer consistently.
Keep our message short and sweet - these groups knowingly lie about lgbts in attempts to demonize us.

My advice to everyone is to read SPLC's profiles, memorize them, and pass them around to your friends and neighbors.

These groups and their spokespeople are liars and we need to call them as such. We need to hammer that point over and over and over again until it is drilled into the head of America.

Hat tip to People for the American Way and Truth Wins Out

Related posts:

The American Family Association must address Bryan Fischer's hateful comments

10 reasons why Americans for Truth is a hate site

Christian Anti-Defamation Commission defends exorcists and hate groups from the 'scary gays'

Why doesn't Robert Knight want to talk about Paul Cameron? 

National Organization for Marriage needs to address hate in its own ranks 
  
The top 12 lies of Tony Perkins and the Family Research Council

Joint Chiefs chairman want DADT repealed as soon as possible and other Monday midday news briefs

Employing discrimination as an act: Far-right back to pushing the 'ENDA will tie our hands' charade - Gary Cass strikes again. Making sure everyone has the fair right to work? Not such a good idea. Defending discredited researchers and churches who want to exorcise "homosexual demons" out of children? Super.

Pentagon to Release the Fabled DADT "Study" a Day Early - This promises to be interesting. The momentum continues to be on our side.

Navy Chief Praises DADT Survey, Isolating McCain Further - Another good sign.

Joint Chiefs chairman: Congress should end gay ban as soon as possible - The final bit of good news. Get cracking folks.

NJ senator introduces college anti-bullying law - More good news for us.

Benilde student wants to start gay advocacy group - I love it when the next generation is proactive.

The American Family Association must address Bryan Fischer's hateful comments

 (Editor's note - An online buddy, mentor, and one of my all-around favorite people Pam Spaulding is having surgery this morning. Pam is a truly awesome individual to whom I owe a lot to in terms of getting this blog off of the ground and noticed.  My prayer is that she has a successful operation.)

There is this constant talking point, or rather whine, by many who are involved with conservative Christian groups (i.e. the religious right) that they are under attack by so-called "Godless forces of radicalism" or that they are unfairly called bigots because they simply want to defend "Christian values."

The American Family Association is one of these groups. According to its own webpage, the AFA:

works to promote decency and morals in American culture,
1. to restrain evil by exposing the works of darkness and to promote virtue by upholding that in culture which is right, true and good;
2. to convince men of sin and drive them to Christ's grace and forgiveness; and to
3. to guide and encourage Christians to live-out the new holy identity that is theirs as citizens of Christ's kingdom.

These are seemingly nice qualities for an organization to have, except when one actually listens to the words Bryan Fischer, an employee of AFA:

• Homosexuals comprise less than three percent of the population, yet are responsible for one-third of all child sex abuse cases. There is an overwhelming correlation between homosexual preference and pedophilia. This is further evidence that homosexuality is in fact sexual deviancy. For this reason alone, no homosexual should be elevated to the United States Supreme Court. 

• If we connect the dots here, the inescapable conclusion is that gay sex is a form of domestic terrorism. 

• Bottom line: every Muslim who enters the United States carries within his bosom the seeds of sedition. It is dangerously foolish for the United States to invite folks inside our borders whose god orders them, through his holy prophet, to murder American infidels. 

• “Hitler discovered that he could not get straight soldiers to be savage and brutal and vicious enough to carry out his orders, but that homosexual solders basically had no limits and the savagery and brutality they were willing to inflict on whomever Hitler sent them after. So he surrounded himself, virtually all of the Stormtroopers, the Brownshirts, were male homosexuals. 

• . . .the illegitimacy rate among Hispanic women is over 50%. I’m not sure pro-family values are as strong in the Hispanic community . . .

Fischer is AFA's Director of Issues Analysis and his statements have caused much consternation amongst many people. But his latest statement, criticizing the awarding of the National Medal of Honor to Army Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta, took the proverbial cake.

Giunta recently received the National Medal of Honor for saving members of his squad during the War in Afghanistan on October 25, 2007.

However, Fischer said:

We have feminized the Medal of Honor.

. . .When we think of heroism in battle, we used the think of our boys storming the beaches of Normandy under withering fire, climbing the cliffs of Pointe do Hoc while enemy soldiers fired straight down on them, and tossing grenades into pill boxes to take out gun emplacements.

That kind of heroism has apparently become passe when it comes to awarding the Medal of Honor. We now award it only for preventing casualties, not for inflicting them.

So the question is this: when are we going to start awarding the Medal of Honor once again for soldiers who kill people and break things so our families can sleep safely at night?

Fischer's comments about Giunta has received a lot of deserved negative attention from many voices, except for one - that of the American Family Association.

As far as it is known, the AFA has said nothing about Fischer's comments regarding Giunta nor any of his other outrageous statements. Nor has any other religious right group, even though Fischer has been sought as a speaker to various religious right functions such as the Values Voters Summit this year, which was also attended by Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, Indiana Rep. Mike Pence, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney.

By the way, none of these individuals, some who are possible 2012 presidential candidates, have said a word about Fischer's comments.

But it would appear to me that the most important voice in this matter should be the AFA because it is the organization which gives Fischer a platform.

The folks at the AFA seem to be playing dumb in hopes that if they don't acknowledge the controversy, then it will go away.

This behavior has certainly worked for them in the past when the organization was caught selling a video featuring a man who falsely claimed to have been "delivered from homosexuality." (The AFA is still selling the video by the way.)

But for the American Family Association to remain silent about Fischer's comments contradicts everything the organization claims to stand for - truth, virtue, decency, and morality.

Hatred and bigotry lodged in God's name is still hatred and bigotry.

Many, myself included, have on several occasions accused religious right groups of working in the name of a bad facsimile of God which is perverted by their own egos, prejudices, and selfish desires of conquest.

If  the AFA continues to be silent about Fischer then they will prove our point better than we have ever hoped to imagine.

Phony Christian gets DESTROYED over Medal of Honor comments

 

Regardless of what the religious right says, if Christianity is suffering problems in this country, they shouldn't blame the lgbt community.

Perhaps some of these folks should look in the mirror.

We have phony Christians praising countries who would persecute lgbts, relying on fear tactics and outright lies, and finally as the piece de resistance, not only criticizing soldier for saving lives rather than "killing the enemy" but at the same time, totally disrespecting women.

One that last note, I speak of the American Family Association's Bryan Fischer and his recent comments about Medal of Honor recipient, Army Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta.

Guinta received the Medal of Honor for saving members of his squad during the War in Afghanistan on October 25, 2007.

However, Fischer criticized the awarding of the Medal of Honor to Giunta.

Fischer is known for saying hatefully outrageous things in the name of God, but I think even he will admit that he went too far with this:

We have feminized the Medal of Honor.

. . .When we think of heroism in battle, we used the think of our boys storming the beaches of Normandy under withering fire, climbing the cliffs of Pointe do Hoc while enemy soldiers fired straight down on them, and tossing grenades into pill boxes to take out gun emplacements.

That kind of heroism has apparently become passe when it comes to awarding the Medal of Honor. We now award it only for preventing casualties, not for inflicting them.

So the question is this: when are we going to start awarding the Medal of Honor once again for soldiers who kill people and break things so our families can sleep safely at night?

While I hate to point this out, Fischer's inference is inaccurate. During the course of saving his comrades, Giunta did in fact kill one of the enemy soldiers and wounded another.

Fischer, who to my knowledge has never served a day in the Armed Forces, has been called to the carpet all over the place - from the blogsphere, to the editorial pages, to the evening news.

And as such it should be. This is a free society where every man has a right to express his opinion. But you should expect some type of verbal blow back if your opinion makes no logical sense or infuriates many people.

Fischer's opinion in this case more than fits the bill in both descriptions. He is even catching hell on the American Family Association's webpage.

The comments below his piece are many and they are all, shall we say, questioning Fischer's Christian virtues:

As disgusting as I find this post, I am exiting the page with a smile on my face because of how uplifting I find the comments here. Christians, Mormons, atheists, soldiers, EVERYONE is on the exact same page.

This is unbelievably twisted logic, and a dramatically false interpretation of the Christian gospel. Go back to the Bible and read a little more, and while you're at it -- beg forgiveness from all the brave Medal of Honor recipients you have insulted, and all the feminists you have enraged.

Like the scorpion that would rather sting and die than not sting and live. There was only one reason for this disturbing article.... A deep seated jealousy and insecurity about his "manliness" Oh the fact that Pres Obama gave the award had something to do with it. Its that same twisted logic used on Senator Kerry. He went to Vietnam and risked his life, Bush pulled strings and got out of it. Bush never fought in a war, thats why he started one, so he could be macho ... By the way Jesus walked around in Bare feet slept on the ground ,helped the poor and was humble. Jesus was love incarnate. He was also celibate .. I guess he wasn't a real man, never had a woman

Why hasn't the AFA taken this down? There is more than enough evidence to prove that not only that his facts are plain wrong and his theology completely backwards, but his opinions are completely detrimental to any sort of credibility you hoped to have as well. This is a major failure on your part that this even got it past editing. How many more comments do you need to fill your quota? Here's +1. Also, Mr. Fischer: You need to put the Xbox down for a bit. The Medal of Honor isn't an achievement you can unlock if you kill 1,000 Afghanis.

Unbelievably revolting. If I had read his article on a comments section rather than a website, I would have thought it was a troll just trying to piss people off. Sadly that isn't the case. And to use the word 'feminization'? As if it masculine to kill people? Just an FYI: Jesus had a zero kill-count. I think one commenter nailed it on the head: "Amazing. You've managed to enrage Christians, atheists, Republicans, Democrats, Conservatives, Liberals, the pro-war crowd, the anti-war crowd, men, women, veterans, conscientious objectors, and this is just the beginning of the list. Not since 9/11 have I seen so many people united in the face of one horrible deed."

When you have one (Congressional Medal of Honor) around your neck ,your opinion might matter. Until that day I invite you not to belittle the sacrifices and actions of those who have earned this Honor.

"So the question is this: when are we going to start awarding the Medal of Honor once again for soldiers who kill people and break things so our families can sleep safely at night?" I'm sorry, this is a Christian website and you're claiming we don't glorify killing people and breaking things enough?

My father was a U.S. Army Ranger at Pointe du Hoc (note correct spelling) and both he and I think you are a colossal idiot. Of course, he only won two Silver Stars, one Bronze Star, and two Purple Hearts, so maybe he doesn't know what he's talking about.

If you think that what Salvatore Giunta did wasn't "manly" enough, I'll pay for your plane ticket to Afghanistan so you can take his place. I'm willing to bet an entire year's salary that you wouldn't last five minutes before you were begging to be put back on a plane to America, much less save the lives of your comrades in the same way this man did.

Amazing. You've managed to enrage Christians, atheists, Republicans, Democrats, Conservatives, Liberals, the pro-war crowd, the anti-war crowd, men, women, veterans, conscientious objectors, and this is just the beginning of the list. Not since 9/11 have I seen so many people united in the face of one horrible deed. Congratulations, Bryan. I hope your follow-up post will be a resignation letter.