Religious right group wants YOUR money to fight Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga

People for the American Way's Religious Right Watch just posted this:

Yesterday, the Florida Family Association hired a plane to fly above a Lady Gaga concert in Tacoma, WA with a banner reading “NOT BORN THIS WAY.” “How would you feel if your child or grandchild went to a concert where unbeknownst to you they were convinced to embrace a homosexual or transgender lifestyle for a lifetime?” the FFA told members when asking for contributions to run additional advertisements. “The fact that someone these kids do not know spent significant resources to fly a plan to tell them they are NOT born that way will prayerfully speak to their souls,” read the appeal for donations.

And here is the piece de resistance from the FFA's site itself:

Florida Family Association would like to fly more banners to counter Gaga’s hedonistic, Godless message at more concerts.  You can click here to see the schedule Ladygaga.com. It will cost $1,900 to fly this banner for four hours before sunset.  The goal is not to fly banners at every concert but at enough concerts to make a difference. Please consider making a designated donation for this project by clicking here or mailing your donation to Florida Family Association, PO Box 46547, Tampa, FL 33646.  All donations received through this solicitation will be used exclusively for the NOT Born this way banner at Lady Gaga Concerts.

And why are they doing this? Because according to them, with citations from the Family Research Council and discredited research Paul (gays stuff gerbils in their rectums) Cameron, children could get "tricked" into thinking that they are gay when in fact homosexuality is supposedly caused by "being introduced to the homosexual lifestyle by aggressive homosexual adults."

One wonders if anyone is even going to pay attention to those FFA's banners.

'NOM posts then pulls extremely bigoted videos' and other Tuesday midday news briefs

NOM RI posts shocking, must-be-seen videos; clips claim gays are ‘lethal’, not going to heaven, more - Videos pushing discredited claims about gays and cigarette smoking, "indoctrination of children," and how gays aren't going to Heaven? Way to go, NOM. And please note that your scrubbing of said videos didn't do any good. Copies have been attained.

DOMA: House Republicans Poised To Spend $3 Million On Legal Defense - Republicans - "we simply HAVE to cut spending. How else are we going to get the money to keep those nasty gays from getting married."  

E.U. Court of Human Rights: Religious beliefs may not be used to refuse service to same-sex couples - I believe the word you are looking for here is BOOM!  

Utah School Realizes Book About Lesbian Family Helps Prevent Bullying - More good news!  

G. Craige Lewis: The Most Dangerous Preacher in the Black Church - A truly vile individual. He goes after everyone, including those you would think are his allies.

Editor's note - Last night, the document on the right of my blog - How They See Us: Unmasking the Religious Right War on America reached 50,000 reads and embedded views. While not as vital to some members of the lgbt community as Jodie Foster's coming out, it does prove that there is a need for this information. On the risk of acting like President Obama continuously asking for money for his re-election campaign, I encourage folks to read this document if they haven't already, to embed it in their blogs if they feel so inclined, download it, print it out, send it to their friends, and especially our lgbt youth. I have been getting several positive messages from young lgbts who have said that this information encourages them to feel good about themselves. Let's go for 100,000 reads and embedded views!

'Religious protection' argument is a dangerous con

The battle over marriage equality in Rhode Island is heating up. The governor, Lincoln Chaffee, said he will not put up marriage equality for a public vote, therefore it will be decided by the legislature.

And already religious right groups are using the "religious protection" argument as a way to derail the potential bill.  Alliance Defending Freedom attorney Kellie Fiedorek told One News Now the following:

"Religious freedom belongs to everyone, not just a handful of people. The government cannot limit constitutionally protected religious liberties in a way that's foreign to our Constitution. This bill fails to ensure that those liberties of every Rhode Island citizen will be respected. The First Amendment's guarantee of religious freedom for all Americans is not limited to the four walls of a church."

That sounds nice, but what the article says next should be looked at with much negative scrutiny:

The legislation contains protections for clergy who refuse to do homosexual "wedding" ceremonies, but not people of faith who serve as justices, judges, or court commissioners.Another provision in H. 5015 prohibits penalties against churches and religious denominations that oppose same-gender marriage, but it fails to protect businesses operated by people of faith and Christian counselors who do pre- or post-marriage counseling.

So it seems that some people's ideas of "religious protection" is to discriminate against gays, even though they may be elected or appointed officials or own a secular business such as a restaurant and an apartment complex.

Elected or appointed officials should not get to pick and choose who they serve and secular businesses should not have the option to discriminate, not matter the faith of the owner.

Where exactly is the line drawn when it comes to "religious protection."  If you allow discrimination against gays under the guise of "religious protection," then just which group of Americans would be next?