'Lawsuit claims that school allowed anti-LGBTQ abuse of teen' & other Mon midday news briefs

School allowed anti-gay abuse of teen, lawsuit claims - Sue! Take it all! Folks need to learn the hard way. 

Coronavirus closed down colleges – now some LGBTQ students fear an abusive "war zone" at home - This ain't good. 

Baldwin endorses Biden: ‘He has always fought for bold, progressive change’ - Yep.

 Idaho’s Transgender Sports Ban Challenged In Federal Lawsuit - In case you didn't hear. . . 

Coronavirus pandemic villain - Pastor Tony Spell

This pandemic has brought the good in a lot of people and turned the spotlight on those professions which we needlessly take for granted. But I'm not here to talk about the good. Unfortunately, at the same time, some have chosen to exploit this critical situation to get paid, take advantage of the gullible, be selfishness or incompetent ,and basically show their verbal asses to the world.

First up on my list of the latter group is definitely Louisiana pastor Tony Spell of Life Tabernacle Church. He originally made a mockery of himself by refusing to abide by social distancing requirements for his church.   Believe it or not, he has compounded the embarrassment by urging those who receive stimulus checks to give them to either him or other churches. And he didn't even bother to be modest by asking for "some" or a "little." Not even the noted "10 percent" that is genuinely seen as customary tithing. He said give it all. To make matters worse, Spell has a disastrous interview Sunday morning on CNN.   As you can see via the above video, host Victor Blackwell didn't let him sneak by with a thing.

'Evangelical pastors using coronavirus pandemic for latest persecution lie' & other Fri midday news briefs

Evangelical Pastors Seize Political Opportunity in Coronavirus Crisis - Why am I not surprised.

Netflix’s ‘Circus Of Books’ Profiles Conservative Couple Behind Gay Porn Empire - Laaawd hammercy! 

 Americans Aren't Polarized on LGBTQ Equality, Survey Finds - That's right. There's broad support for our rights. 

 Anti-LGBT discrimination ballot drive moves to e-signatures - Meanwhile, things are hopping in Michigan.

Flash Gordon (1980) was intended to be campy romp

 

Flash Gordon, the story of a hero fighting a dictator, Ming the Merciless, of the distant planet Mongo, was a  comic strip created in 1934. Since that time, it has been the subject of many movies, television shows, and cartoons.

But I don't think any could top the 1980 movie in terms of abject campiness. From the dialogue to the characters, to the  cinematography,  the movie practically screeches ludicrous.  And notice I didn't even mention the costumes, which I can't begin to adequately describe. The phrase "extremely vivid" comes to mind. They look like they were made by a bunch of drunken drag drag queens. But that's not a bad thing. Lastly to top it off, the soundtrack was done by the legendary group Queen.

 And none of it was accidental. The makers intended for it to be this campy. I think they were attempting to capture the spirit of the original comic strip. It wasn't as if  they were treating it like a B-movie. Even though the star of the movie, Sam J. Jones, was basically unknown, other members of the cast - Topol, Brian Blessed, Max Von Sydow - were respected in the industry.  Flash Gordon was a minor hit and, as those who saw it can tell you, a sequel was in the works. However, disagreements during the making of the movie between Jones and the producer, Dino De Laurentiis, prevented it from happening.  

Now onto my favorite character. If there was one person who greatly typified just how wild and absurdly ludicrous the movie was, it had to be General Kala. Portrayed by Mariangela Melato, Kala can only described as perfectly too much in terms of scene stealing. Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest wouldn't have been able to compete. Her black and gold outfit  and boots is something I would kill to wear. I would look fantastic in it.  And her accent provides the final perfect touch.

Hate group leader Tony Perkins claims that Franklin Graham is not a homophobe. And the word 'irony' loses all meaning

Due to a controversy regarding his organization helping to fight the coronavirus pandemic in New York, Franklin Graham appeared on Fox News to play the victim and claim that he is not homophobic. What ensued next was a lovely pulling out of receipts, i.e. the revelation of statements from Graham and videos starring Graham attacking LGBTQ people, families, and voicing support for Putin's violent repression of LGBTQ Russians. Yes, I was involved and it was wonderful. But some folks did come to Graham's defense. 

Most specifically, the Family Research Council and its president Tony Perkins, came to Graham's defense:

When Franklin Graham set up a 68-bed field hospital in the middle New York City's Central Park, he didn't hang a sign saying, "Christian Patients Only." But somehow, the state's extremists think it's okay to demand only pro-LGBT caregivers on his staff. Samaritan's Purse, liberals argue, isn't tolerant enough to treat the sick. In a tweet so offensive it's difficult to believe he holds public office, New York State Senator Brad Hoylman (D) said, "It's a shame that the federal government has left New York with no other choice but to accept charity from bigots."

 

What a luxury it must be to criticize people in the trenches, while you sit in the safety of your home. Samaritan's Purse is risking its volunteers' lives to be on the front lines, at great expense to the organization, treating whomever the hospital sends them. Do you think these patients, a lot of them in desperate need of help, care who their doctors voted for in the last election? No. They just want to survive -- like the other 110,000 people infected in New York City.

 

If Senator Hoylman is so worried about politically-correct care, then where is his relief effort? The truth is, the only reason he has time to attack Franklin's virus responders is because his colleagues aren't on the ground meeting New Yorkers' needs. But then, that's what we've come to expect from the far Left. These liberal activists are more concerned about their agenda than actual people. We've seen it in the adoption debate, the foster care debate, and now in the medical debate. If the choice is between a Christian organization helping someone or the person getting no help at all, we already know what they'd choose: children without homes and patients without care.

Perkins continues on this absurd narrative without mentioning that Graham's past  homophobic statements was what helped to give folks pause.  And on that same note, one would think that Perkins and FRC would have been wise to not dip into the situation with their attempt to defend Graham.  Because neither FRC nor Perkins have room to talk. 

Particularly when one of FRC's spokespeople, Peter Sprigg, once expressed a desire for gays to be kicked out of  the country:

And Perkins himself is no slouch when it comes to homophobic statements. In 2014, he made a Holocaust reference by implying that gays want to put Christians in boxcars and take them to "re-education camps."

Franklin Graham claims he is not homophobic. The paper and video trail exposes him as a liar

Hat tip to my friend Joe Sudbay who brought this to my attention.

Franklin Graham appeared on Fox News Tuesday night to claim that he is not homophobic. He has been getting a lot of negative attention due to his attempt to provide help in New York during the coronavirus pandemic. And adding catches to his help:

According to Religion News Services.

 On a group of LGBTQ activists stood several yards away from the Samaritan’s Purse field hospital on the East Meadow lawn and blasted city and state officials and Mount Sinai Hospital for partnering with the evangelical humanitarian relief organization treating overflow patients suffering from the coronavirus. 

 . . . The LGBTQ coalition is the latest in a series of barbs aimed at Samaritan’s Purse since it opened a 68-bed field hospital in Central Park two weeks ago. The conflict pits the country’s growing acceptance of LBGTQ rights with the conservative values of a premier evangelical relief organization. The hospital is staffed with Christian doctors and nurses experienced in treating infectious diseases. But Samaritan Purse's policies require most contractors and some full-time volunteers to sign a statement of faith that includes a declaration that “we believe that marriage is exclusively the union of one genetic male and one genetic female.”

So on the Ingraham Angle, Graham attempted to deflect the controversy via a soft interview with host Laura Ingraham:

Laura: Why are you being attacked for opening a field hospital?
Franklin Graham: We believe marriage is between a man and a woman... We have a statement of faith that we require our employees to sign and in that is a marriage is between a man and woman... I’m not homophobic pic.twitter.com/eE0fv4Ree6

— Acyn Torabi (@Acyn) April 15, 2020

'Fundamentalism kills' - A gay man speaks about the rejection from his Christian family

Daniel Lawson

A really good Facebook friend of mine, Daniel Lawson, just published a personal account of his coming out in a fundamentalist Christian, right-wing family and how it nearly killed him. It's not an easy read and I commend him for having the courage to publicly tell his story. It should serve to remind us that the fight for our equality isn't solely for us, but also for our kids. So many folks like Daniel have been in this environment and have suffered for it.  We can't ever get blase about this battle because it's about more than rights. It's about the ability to love oneself even though others tell us that we shouldn't. And unfortunately sometimes, those "others" are the folks who are close to us:

From Medium:

It doesn’t take great powers of deduction to ascertain which of the “sinner” or “good Christian” categories I was railroaded into after coming out to my family over that Thanksgiving break after the dumpster fire Baptist college semester. As I watched my entire family change toward me before my eyes, it slowly began to dawn on me that there was, in fact, no going back now. Their supposed “love” had changed overnight to hostility, fear, anger and aggression. Their lifelong abusive ways, which always lay dormant and ready to strike, now ratcheted up into high gear. I had gone from one bad situation at the Bible college to now confronting an even worse, uglier mix at home, with no time to process the rapid traumatic chain of events that were altering the course of my life. My parents called up the local chapter of Focus on the Family and sought out a team of quack doctors and therapists to try to rid me of my “wicked lifestyle.” With each successive forced visit to one of these charlatans, the situation continued to spiral downwards as my parents’ anger and impatience grew that their son was not immediately “cured.”

 . . .Things reached a climax one night when my mom started an argument with me and suddenly, she flew into an irrational, senseless fit of rage and started chasing me down the hallway! I ducked into the bathroom and slammed my body against the door, locking it just in time as she barreled down against the door, howling and shrieking like a banshee and trying to beat down the door, screaming the whole time, “YOU’VE GOT THE DEVIL INSIDE OF YOU! YOU’VE GOT THE DEVIL INSIDE OF YOU!”

You can read the rest of it here. It's worth your time.