Analyzing and refuting the inaccuracies lodged against the lgbt community by religious conservative organizations. Lies in the name of God are still lies.
. . . the controversy over Jennings, which had been growing since his appointment in May, has been skillfully deflected by some journalists and commentators who have been attacking the government of Uganda for considering a law that would toughen laws against homosexual behavior that threatens public health and children. "Uganda wants to execute people for being gay," lesbian commentator Rachel Maddow asserted on her MSNBC program on December 2. She called it the "kill-the-gays bill" and demanded that Christians in the U.S. denounce it.
Jumping on the story, the New York Times has claimed the bill would "impose a death sentence for homosexual behavior."
These claims are flat-out disinformation.
Dr. Scott Lively, who visited Uganda in March of 2009 to encourage efforts to protect traditional family values, says the proposed death penalty in the bill, just one of many provisions, is for "aggravated homosexuality," which is actually pederasty, pedophilia, homosexual parent/child incest, homosexual abuse of a disabled ward, and knowingly spreading AIDS. Dr. Lively is the author of The Pink Swastika and the president of Abiding Truth Ministries.
So "aggravated homosexuality" is actually pederasty, pedophilia, and knowingly spreading AIDS? Thanks for the clarification.
I don't know if Kincaid and Lively realize it or not, but their attempts to explain the bill gives us more insight into the blatant homophobia which led to its creation.
Thanks to an ugly seasonal thing and a small bout with depression (my early mid-life crisis is approaching along with my 39th birthday), I am now presenting the 2009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformers of the Year Awards a bit later than usual.
And to me, it's not necessarily a bad thing. It seems that everyone else has already brought out their best (and worst) lgbt moments of the year so my lateness gives me an opportunity to talk about incidents occurring this year which may have been obscured via all the attention hogged by other situations (i.e. the Maine vote and other battlegrounds over marriage equality.)
Don't get me wrong. Marriage equality is an important issue but it is not THE issue in regards to the lgbt community or lgbt equality in general.
So let me get on with it:
In this crop of awards, I followed the spirit of the Grammys and pre-announced at least one award before the official Year End Awards post.
And of course that award for Anti-Gay Video of the Year went to the National Organization for Marriage for that lovely "Gathering Storm" hot mess commercial.
The "Enjoyable Train Wreck" Award - All of those lovely individuals who testified futilely against the passage of marriage equality in Washington, D.C. You have to give it to these folks who let their zaniness out for the whole world to see.
There was Brian Brown of the National Organization for Marriage, former legislator Walter Fauntroy, and my two favorite:
But she doesn't get the prize. That special bobby belongs to activist Ruth Jacobs, who spends too much time talking about "the anus:"
The "Laying of Hands" Award - Remember Manifested Gloried Ministries? That's the African-American church which tried to exorcise a "homosexual demon" from the 16-year-old young man? Words aren't necessary when one views the clip.
Except for maybe why couldn't that have been me and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. I'm all for laying of hands on him:
"I Don't Care How Much He Smiles, He Still Creeps Me Out" Award - Richard Cohen. I immensely enjoyed how Rachel Maddow just tore Cohen apart in assessing his role in Uganda's pushing an anti-gay bill. But one thing stays with me. Throughout the entire thing, Cohen had that same eerie smile. In fact, I have rarely seen a photo of him without that same eerie smile. It looks as if he is an infant with a pleasant case of gas:
Forget Peter LaBarbera, Matt Barber, and the rest. Cohen is the spookiest member of the religious right.
"Why Don't They Just Be Quiet" Award - tie - Perez Hilton and Carrie Prejean
Perez Hilton - Come on guys, we simply must be honest. This entire mess with Carrie Prejean started because Perez Hilton couldn't keep his mouth shut. So what if Prejean gave that answer (which I certainly didn't agree with it). Did Hilton have to exacerbate the situation by going on video and calling her foul names?
The only reason why Prejean lost control of the situation was because of her blatant hypocrisy and inability to comprehend the forces using her.
And of course that brings me to Carrie Prejean, the flawed beauty queen, co-winner of this award, and a female who knows a good opportunity when it comes to her by way of a media blogger with a big mouth.
At first, Prejean elicited a lot of sympathy because it did seem that Hilton was picking on her and (let's face reality), she's blond and seemingly perky. Perky blond women seem to be, for some reason, highly popular in America.
The religious right also knew a golden opportunity when they saw one too.
They compared her to Esther, which really should have offended Christians.
Esther was a Jewish queen who saved her people from genocide by the Persians.
All Prejean did was answer a question.
I fail to see the similarities.
But then came her alliance with the National Organization for Marriage in violation of Miss California duties,
the news about her church's appreciation for Paul Cameron's discredited work,
the dirty pictures(which for some reason has caused a recent explosion of hits on my site),
Miss Prejean's popularity descended so fast that I hear the homeless won't read her book in the public library.
"Don't Cry for Me Argentina" Award - Mark Sanford for his diligence in making marriage safe for a man, his wife, and his Argentinian mistress. How dare lgbts want to get in on the action. Seriously though folks, seeing that Sanford is my state's governor, you just know that I was going to mention him.
By the way, Sanford also receives the "You Are So Lucky that Jenny didn't have a friend who told her to cut you" Award as well as the "You Were Smart Not To Bring Your Ass Home"Award.
And speaking of South Carolina legislators, state representatives Greg Delleney and Joan Brady get the "Good Idea Marred by Homophobia" Award.
In May of last year, a bill was introduced in the SC Legislature that that required schools to create teen dating violence prevention policies. Brady sponsored the bill. Delleney created an amendment requiring the bill to pertain to only heterosexual relationships.
Delleney said that he was afraid that the bill without the amendment would "force" schools to teach about same-sex relationships.
Oh we couldn't have that. Anyway, because of this ridiculous amendment, a bunch of us raised hell, held a press conference at the State House, and the bill was defeated.
Granted, not to many people nationwide really gave a damn or cared to remember this incident because apparently us Southerners are naturally ignorant and homophobic so who cares what we think anyway.
But hey, like country singer Kacey Jones, I'm not bitter.
And now the big award, the mega award - The 2009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformer of the Year.
First a little history.
In 1978 when the album Saturday Night Fever won the Grammy for Best Album, almost 40 people took to the stage to claim the trophy because so many people worked on the album
In that same spirit, the 2009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformer of the Year goes to a group effort.
The award goes to the folks at BigGovernment, Gateway Pundit, Mass Resistance, Michelle Malkin, Sean Hannity, the Washington Times, Accuracy in Media, and the rest of the insane right-wing for their past and continued attacks on Obama appointee Kevin Jennings.
All of them had something to do with the slurring, smearing, and the near destruction of this man's reputation.
Mercy, where do I start with this one? Who knew that the words "Fistgate" would become so repeated when Mass Resistance drudged it out of its fevered anti-lgbt imagination in 2000?
Just what exactly did Jennings do to these people? Spread rumors about their mothers.
They have accused him of supporting pedophiles. That wasn't true.
They have accused him of teaching children to "fist." That wasn't true.
They have accused him and GLSEN of trying to get children to read explicit material. That wasn't true.
They have accused him and GLSEN of encouraging children to go to leather bars. That wasn't true.
They have accused him and GLSEN of encouraging children to have public sex in parks with strangers. That wasn't true.
They have accused him of allowing the abuse of an underaged child. That wasn't true.
They even accused him of advocating murder. And that wasn't true.
I don't think people realized just how vital it was that these lies did not cause Jennings to lose his position. If it had, it would have been yet another scalp for folks eager to undermine President Obama after the Van Jones resignation.
It would have driven an even bigger wedge between Obama and some members of the lgbt community (yes even bigger than the one he supposedly has now - when one eliminates the opinions of lgbts of color).
Most of all, it would have created a potential Sword of Damocles over the head of every future lgbt Presidential appointee.
The fact that Jennings has survived is not a miracle, but a product of good work via organizations like Media Matters and Think Progress who beat down every lie before it had to time gain power.
Well that's that. May we all have an excellent 2010.
Time for my seasonal thing medication. This dose is wearing off.
Because there's still some homo-hostile fight left in the old gal - James Dobson - a regular Scarlett O'Hara. But just how long can we buy the "our nation is facing a crisis that threatens its very existence" line before the realization comes that it's JUST a line. Exodus Board Members Plays The “Dupe” In Uganda - And speaking of more religious right silence . . . More fallout from that excellent New York Times piece about the Ugandan anti-gay bill.
(The 2009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformers of the Year awards are coming later today - provided I can shake this ugly seasonal thing I've got.)
Yesterday, the New York Times came out with a sensational article about the Ugandan anti-gay bill. It was short, precise and linked Scott Lively, Caleb Lee Brundidge, and Don Schmierer to the bill, making sure to note that their "teachings" that homosexuality can be cured has been discredited in this country and also noting how the bill came to pass because of a conference the three took part in earlier last year in Uganda.
And in the article, they come across exactly as they are -anti-gay charlatans who are now cowardly backtracking after the world sees what they have done.
For three days, according to participants and audio recordings, thousands of Ugandans, including police officers, teachers and national politicians, listened raptly to the Americans, who were presented as experts on homosexuality. The visitors discussed how to make gay people straight, how gay men often sodomized teenage boys and how “the gay movement is an evil institution” whose goal is “to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity.”
Now the three Americans are finding themselves on the defensive, saying they had no intention of helping stoke the kind of anger that could lead to what came next: a bill to impose a death sentence for homosexual behavior.
One month after the conference, a previously unknown Ugandan politician, who boasts of having evangelical friends in the American government, introduced the Anti-Homosexuality Bill of 2009, which threatens to hang homosexuals, and, as a result, has put Uganda on a collision course with Western nations.
Personally I don't buy their huge mea culpa. When you demonize lgbts as predators, just what do you think would happen? Was there some belief that folks would welcome lgbts with open arms after being told that they want to rape children (and bear in mind, I said "rape," which is bad enough. The fact that Lively and company actually took the time to spin exact details on how gays supposedly rape children - via sodomy - is even worse.)
I never liked Barney Miller, the ensemble sitcom about a police precinct. I always felt it was stilted and claustrophobic.
But despite my objections, it was a very successful show, running for seven years and winning a bunch of awards, including an Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series.
And it was one of the first shows to feature semi-regular gay character.
Actor Jack DeLeon portrayed Marty Morrison, a gay purse snatcher who was seen on several episodes.
I don't know how to feel about Marty. It's not that I had a problem with how DeLeon portrayed him as a stereotypically flighty "queen."
I just had a problem with DeLeon.
I am not familiar with the actor but on two other occasions, he portrayed a gay man and both times I found his characterization to be crude and one-dimensional.
One portrayal was featured in a past posting of Know Your LGBT History (The Choirboys). In it, DeLeon is playing a gay man walking a poodle.And he has the "fortune" to encounter a naked man in the park.
The other portrayal (which I have not talked about yet) was on the Rated X episode of Sanford and Son. DeLeon portrayed the director of a pornographic film. It's bad enough that his sexual orientation was featured as a joke, but then the script called for him to make a crude advance to actor Redd Foxx.
I'm sorry but even if I were the most homophobic homophobe, I would never buy the fact that any gay man would ever make a play for Redd Foxx or his character Fred Sanford.
But I digress.
Believe it or not though, this episode of Barney Miller featuring DeLeon is actually a good one. It's called Discovery and in it, he and Miller are helping a friend who has been harassed and extorted by a policeman. Between you and me, I found the portrayal of Marty's friend (the victim of the shakedown) to more enjoyable:
President Obama's "safe schools czar," Kevin Jennings, is a former schoolteacher who advocated promoting homosexuality in schools and was forced to admit he had poorly handled an incident in which a student told him he was having sex with older men. Jennings has since been tied to a pornographic suggested reading list for 7th graders that was designed by the organization he founded and directed for over a decade, and dozens of members of Congress have called for his ouster.
And that, my friends, is a clever lie.
Fox News is referring to the recent psuedo controversies put together by the webpage Big Government, the anti-gay hate group Mass Resistance, and several other "entities" (I'm being nice) to smear Jennings.
Bear in mind, I said "recent."
You see the media did cover Jennings earlier last year, although I doubt Fox News would want anyone to remember this coverage. It was when the network and other entities were falsely claiming that Jennings contributed to the statutory rape of a child.
I am referring to the so-called Brewster incident in which a student confided in Jennings about an encounter he had with an older male. Fox News and its cohorts, hungry for more Obama appointee blood after the resignation of Van Jones, went after this tip with a huge amount of fervor, claiming that Jennings broke the law by not reporting what the student told him.
And their claims blew up in their faces.
The young man, Brewster, was of legal age at the time of the incident.
He provided a statement to Media Matters praising Jennings for his advice during that time of his life. He also providedMedia Matters with his I.D. proving that he was 16 at the time of the incident. Sixteen is the legal age of consent in Massachusetts, the state where the incident took place.
By the way, Brewster also said that he did not have sex with the older male; a statement that everyone seems to forget.
Brewster's statement proved that Jennings did not contribute to any statutory rape of any form or type.
And the media did cover the entire brouhaha, including CNN:
and (wait for it) . . . Fox News.
Fox News even corrected the claim that Brewster was underaged:
So basically when Fox News says that the "mainstream media" missed covering Kevin Jennings, the news organization is lying. The media, including Fox, did cover the lies lodged against Jennings and found them to be lacking.
Just because members of the media (except for Fox News) took later attempts to smear Jennings for the nonsense they were and ignored them is not a bad thing.
2009 was a busy year - busy, tiring, and in some ways annoying. I intend to recap the year with my 2009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformers of the Year awards (coming this weekend).
However for now, I am going to wish you a Happy New Year and leave you with two of my favorite memories of 2009 courtesy of Barney Frank's very satisfying destruction of a someone comparing President Obama to Hitler and Rachel Maddow's even more satisfying destruction of so-called ex-gay Richard Cohen.
Though the noise has faded a bit, members of the right are still attacking Obama appointee Kevin Jennings.
I've been pretty much ignoring the new attacks because they have gotten stupid.
The right-wing site Big Government has continuously attacked Jennings with a series of National Enquirer type articles filled with bad innuendoes and lies.
And the site makes sure to give each attack the clever name of "Fistgate (choose your number here), making reference to the original attack on Jennings, i.e. that he supposedly taught children how to "fist" - a charge that has been continuously refuted.
Now you will remember the huge ado about the suggested reading list that GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network - the group that Jennings founded) had suggested for students.
That's the reading list which contained some books with mature themes; so much so that GLSEN advised that adults peruse the list of books and make choices regarding reading material for students.
Well the website Big Government isn't letting the pseudo controversy over the list go without putting it to good use. The website seems to be intent on taking every book from the reading list, outlining some of the most graphic material, and then presenting what it found as a "new controversy."
Choices from the suggested reading list have been the basis for several recent "Fistgate" "articles."
We are up to "Fistgate 13," the most pathetic of them all.
Racial slur spray painted on side of City Hall - First Columbia pass gender-inclusive non-discrimination laws and now black folks think that they can run for public office. Just WHAT is this world coming to?
Don Belton Murdered - The black and gay community both loses a leading light thanks to a senseless murder.
We've written a few posts in the past about the custody battle being waged between Lisa Miller and Janet Jenkins, a Vermont couple who had a daughter together in 2002 but eventually separated and soon became locked in a custody fight after Miller moved to Virginia, became a Christian active in Jerry Falwell's church, and sought sole custody of their daughter, Isabella, with the representation of the Falwell-founded Liberty Counsel.
When they were a couple, Miller and Jenkins decided to raise Isabella together.
When they split, Miller agreed to let Jenkins have visitation rights. Jenkins was even paying child support.
Miller refused to allow Jenkins to have unsupervised time with Isabella, claiming that Jenkins was harming Isabella. The Virginia Child Protective Services investigated and found the charges to be false.
Since that time, the two have been in and out of court for years (with Miller keeping Isabella away from Jenkins) until the case finally reached its apex in November due to Miller's constant refusal to follow the law:
Homosexual activists have failed in an effort to impose acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle on the world.
The United Nations General Assembly voted to delete language from a proposed resolution that claimed that two new anti-discrimination categories exist: sexual orientation and gender identity.
"What this body is trying to do is to elevate the homosexual agenda to a global right that governments are treaty-bound to accept," explains Austin Ruse, head of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-FAM). "There was an attempt to have this reinterpretation officially accepted by the General Assembly, and it was defeated."
One News Now does not provide details regarding the resolution but another right-wing publication, Lifesite News, does:
The deleted reference was to General Comment 20 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). The ICESCR was adopted by the UN on December 16, 1966, and declares that states that are part of the agreement will "undertake to guarantee that the rights enunciated in the present Covenant will be exercised without discrimination of any kind as to race, color, sex, language, religion ... or other status."
General Comment 20 states that the phrase "other status" includes "sexual orientation" and "gender identity." This means, according to the Comment, that members of the ICESCR "must ... adopt measures, which should include legislation, to ensure that individuals and entities in the private sphere do not discriminate on prohibited grounds."
This state of affair accentuates the problem for lgbts worldwide.
That by merely wanting to conduct our lives in peace, we are trying to "force acceptance,"
And that somehow we aren't deserving of basic human dignity.
Austin Ruse, the man cited in the article further said:
"Most countries have a very traditional view of human sexuality, of marriage, [and] of the family, so when these ideas percolate through from radicals in the United States and the European Union, and they eventually get to the General Assembly where a lot of traditional people are represented, they get defeated," Ruse notes.
Someone should ask Ruse just what is his view of "traditional human sexuality and people."
Does it involve hanging children like they did to those two innocent boys in Iran?
Or how about butchering innocent activists like what was done in Jamaica?
Or what about the laws in 30 Islamic countries that make homosexuality a criminal offense. In most cases punishment range from floggings to life imprisonment. In Mauritania, Bangladesh, Yemen, parts of Nigeria and Sudan, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Iran, convicted homosexuals can also be sentenced to death.
Ruse and those who stand with him not only have a warped sense of tradition but also of right and wrong.
And it leads me again to say while I love and fear God, I have a serious concern about those who claim to represent Him.
As we remember major lgbt stories in 2009 like Maine and Carrie Prejean, let's not forget the so-called minor stories.
One in particular I would like to point out because it was a victory for the lgbt blogging community.
Remember Peter Vadala?
He was the former employee of Brookstone (a Massachusetts retailer store) who was fired for supposedly expressing his Christian beliefs.
As we learned more about Vadala, it turned out that him "expressing his Christian beliefs" amounted to telling a lesbian employee that she is a "deviant" for simply talking about her upcoming wedding. Gay marriage, by the way, is perfectly legal in Massachusetts.
At first glance, the incident looked like a perfect cause celebre for the religious right. A young Christian attacked by the supposedly intolerant and invisible homosexual lobby - a perfect fundraising tool if there ever was one.
But it flopped.
What made Vadala's story different than say the story of Repent America when a supposed religious group was arrested at Philly Pride in 2004 or the group of city workers who filed a lawsuit against the city of Oakland when they were told to remove an anti-gay flyer from their workplace?
Pending something major, many bloggers are either playing it low-key or having a fond look back at some moments in 2009.
For me, it will be time for the 20009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformers of the YearAwards in which I look back at some of the highlights (and lowlights) of anti-lgbt hysteria.
I can tell you right now that there will be a few surprises because unfortunately some of our own went out of their way to help the religious right in their anti-lgbt endeavors via unnecessary ugly words or abandoning an lgbt leader before he even had a chance to defend himself.
But it's still all in fun. And in that spirit, let me announce one award now:
The Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Video of the Year award (or the Ed Wood Memorial Video Vanguard Award) goes to . . . oh come on, as if you would be shocked:
National Organization for Marriage's Gathering Storm Ad
In April of this year, the National Organization for Marriage launched an ad campaign claiming that gay marriage will have negative consequences for people's freedom and rights. Central to this campaign was a commercial. Naturally, this commercial recycled a bunch of lies about current events involving cases of lgbt rights and families.
But all of that took a backseat because the commercial was bad. I mean just plain awful. Valley of the Dolls bad, Heaven's Gate bad, Plan 9 from Outerspace bad.
See for yourself:
Instead of anger, the ad elicited laughter and a huge amount of parody ads, as well as ads which served to correct its phony claims. Among the funniest and most informative were:
And just when it looked like things couldn't get any funnier, it came out that the people in the "Gathering Storm" ads were actors. We know this because somehow their audition tapes got released on youtube, thereby further revealing the abject phoniness of the entire campaign:
The fight for marriage equality has had some major victories and setbacks in 2009. However the "Gathering Storm" controversy was a watershed moment. It demonstrated the weakness of the argument against marriage equality and also demonstrated that all the money in the world and backing can't replace the integrity of your position.
If you don't have integrity, you will fall on your face.
I hope everyone had a happy holiday. Back to the @!& as they say.
A couple of weeks ago, this segment focused on the Ricki Lake Show and how it did much for positive lgbt visibility.
Now comes the flipside. The Jerry Springer Show is a twisted ongoing train wreck. It actually started out as a legitimate talk show but struck it big by focusing on guest fights and other outrageous topics.
And unfortunately the lgbt community was victimized by this. I can't count how many times the talk show focused "poor straight men" who was "tricked into sex" by trangendered women. And often these segments would end violently for all parties involved.
Or the following segment which features a "former" gay man trying to keep his gay brother away from another gay man.
Now I've heard that the show is staged and the guests are actors, but that's besides the point. The negative lgbt images showcased by the Jerry Springer Show was just flat out wrong:
Media Matters has done a lot this year to fight right-wing nonsense.
They were very helpful in fighting the lies against Kevin Jennings (helpful? Hell, a lot of my information came from them) as well as other lies pushed by some those on the right who seek to exploit ignorance and fear.
So with that in mind, I want to throw out props to the group and encourage you all to support them. Lgbt issues are just one of the things they deal with:
Now secondly, some of you may have noticed that I have been hinting about a second book.
Well to give you more information, I have been working on a second book. But this one won't be as detailed as Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, my first book.
I want to break down religious right distortions in a manner that conveys their nastiness as well as shining a light on the entities who spout them. My goal is to bring more attention to the historical hypocrisy of these so-called pro-family groups.
Heterosexual Menace: Father forces sex on son - This mention is not meant to bash heterosexuals. Lord knows if lgbts were the offending party, this incident would be in a religious right email as well as a "news item" on One News Now. This mention is just to show the depths of ignorance people can stoop to about us.
Every now and then, a situation takes that place that's so strange, it diverts my attention away from focusing on the religious right.
During the mad battle over health care reform, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Oklahoma) recently gave a speech on the Senate floor hoping that a senator would not make the vote. He encouraged prayer on the matter:
What the American people ought to pray is that somebody can’t make the vote tonight. That’s what they ought to pray.
Now some people thought the Senator he was implying about was 92-year-old ailing Robert Byrd (D- West Virginia). Coburn's comment got much criticism, including from Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois):
I have been trying to reach Sen. Coburn. … This statement troubles me, and I’m trying to reach him come back to the floor and explain exactly what he meant about a senator being unable to make the vote tonight. … I’m reaching out to Sen. Coburn. I’ll be on the floor for the next 45 minutes, and I hope that he will join me there.
As far as it is known, Coburn did not clarify what he meant by his statement.
In an interesting case of irony, when a vote did come up, a senator missed it - Republican James Inhofe.
And all of that led to this mindboggling, bizarre call to CSPAN from a teabagger who not only thought Sen. Inhofe was dead but that his prayer caused it.
Personally I prefer on-camera breakdowns to be done by either Joan Crawford or Maggie Smith.
Don't worry, by the way. Senator Inhofe is not dead - he just didn't make the vote.
But I don't know what's so weirder about this video - the fact that it reveals yet again the abject cluelessness of these teabaggers or the fact that both the CSPAN host and Senator John Barasso (R-Wyoming) kept a straight face throughout the entire thing:
Transcript:
CALLER: Yeah doctor. Our small tea bag group here in Waycross, we got our vigil together and took Dr. Coburn’s instructions and prayed real hard that Sen. Byrd would either die or couldn’t show up at the vote the other night.
How hard did you pray because I see one of our members was missing this morning. Did it backfire on us? One of our members died? How hard did you pray senator? Did you pray hard enough
HOST: Senator Barasso, he was referring to Senator Inhofe, who was not part of the round of voting this morning.
BARASSO: The votes today, they needed 60 votes in favor of the bill. Senator Inhofe is opposed to the bill, and whether he was there or not didn’t make any difference. There was no way that Jim Inhofe was going to vote for the bill, the senator from Oklahoma. So that’s why he wasn’t there this morning.
HOST: Do you know where he was, senator, why he wasn’t able to make the vote this morning?
Despite the fact that some of us consider Peter LaBarbera to be a laughing stock and a useful @^!* in this so-called culture war, there are some people who support him.
Such as the creator this site.(click at the risk of getting righteously indignant).
Please note that the site owner took LaBarbera's Grinch of the Year post (in which he did not nominate me . . . the bitch!) almost word for word and added his/her own interesting headline:
Who are the faggot and dyke Grinches this year?
And so that you don't miss it, check out the lovely side graphics about African-Americans. Or if you don't want to get on that nasty site again, I incorporated one for you:
I won't even talk about the comments regarding President Obama.
Some may disagree with me giving this blog attention. However, I just want to remind people that a lot of times, homophobia and racism are indistinguishable.
If you hate one group, it's easy to transcribe that hate to another.
And if LaBarbera thinks he is aiming for Heaven when he attacks the lgbt community, then he really should take another look.
If he is on the side of the angels, then why is he attracting this devil?
Hat tip to my online buddy who did not express that I reveal his name in this post. If he does, then I will reveal it.
Grasping At Straws - How dare Peter LaBarbera not nominate Joe Jervis or Pam Spaulding for one of his grinch awards. Come to think of it, neither Pam nor any other woman got a nomination. Hmmmm. I ought to pull a Kanye on him.
Now that Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty is running for president (unofficially that is), he is backtracking from pro-gay legislation he signed:
To borrow a phrase, have your views evolved over time? In 1993 I voted for a bill prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation in public accommodation, housing, and employment. That was 16 years ago.
Yes, gay-rights activists regarded you as a pretty cool guy at the time. We overbaked that statute, for a couple of reasons. If I had to do it over again I would have changed some things.
Overbaked? That statute is not worded the way it should be. I said I regretted the vote later because it included things like cross-dressing, and a variety of other people involved in behaviors that weren't based on sexual orientation, just a preference for the way they dressed and behaved. So it was overly broad. So if you are a third-grade teacher and you are a man and you show up on Monday as Mr. Johnson and you show up on Tuesday as Mrs. Johnson, that is a little confusing to the kids. So I don't like that.
Has the law been changed? No. It should be, though.
So you want to protect kids against cross-dressing elementary-school teachers. Do you have any in Minnesota? Probably. We've had a few instances, not exactly like that, but similar.
For the record, there have been cases of teachers who have returned to class after gender reassignment surgery, although I am not sure that any of them occurred in Minnesota. After initial fears and some trepidation, the schools, students, and parents adapted to the situation. And there have been cases of transgendered students who are as young as six.
So certainly the issue is complicated but the way Pawlenty tries to trivialize it as a way to flip flop on his earlier pro-lgbt stance is rude. It reveals not only a misrepresentation of non-discrimination laws but also a cynical willfulness to exploit ignorance of the transgendered community.
Just a precursor to my own 2009 Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters Misinformer of the Year awards. Can last year's champion Matt Barber hold on to his title or will he be outdone by a group effort not unlike the one that gave the Saturday Night Fever album the Grammy award in 1978? Stay tuned for more details.
Media Matters (who will probably be sending me a bill) has just announced their 2009 Misinformer of the Year award and to the surprise of no one, it's Glenn Beck:
Now while Beck gets the major award, Media Matters also gave a host of minor awards for outrageous statements.
And again to the surprise of no one, many of those statements had to do with comments made against the lgbt community:
In addition to a sustained assault on Department of Education official Kevin Jennings, right-wingers made outrageous attacks based on sexual orientation:
Of course I'm disappointed that the Media Matters list omitted the dust-up between Matt Barber, Peter LaBarbera, and Exodus International which recently came up.
However, it just occurred to me that our biggest strength in this so-called cultural war is the mouths of our opposition. Give them enough time and they verbally hang themselves.
And in this case, a public hanging is just what we need. After all, why keep the craziness of the religious right to ourselves. In the spirit of holiday generosity, everyone needs to see just how crazy these folks are.
The Pathetic State of the Anti-Gay Right - More on that lovely religious right catfight between Exodus International, Porno Petey and Matt Barber. Why don't they just all kiss and make up?
I's always annoying to me how so many, the media included, write off the black community when it comes to whether or not it supports lgbt equality, particularly gay marriage.
There is too much of a need to create conflict between the lgbt and black community without examining the nuances of just the black community feels regarding gay rights.
And there is generally an unfortunate omission of the thoughts and opinions of lgbts of color.
With that in mind, I am very pleased with yesterday's editorial in the Washington Post with Rev. Dennis W. Wiley and the Rev. Christine Y. Wiley, pastors of Covenant Baptist Church in Washington.
They are also co-chairs of the organization DC Clergy United for Marriage Equality, a group which helped get marriage equality passed in D.C.
It's an excellent read, particularly this part:
We are sometimes asked what accounts for the homophobia within the African American community. This question seems to assume that the community is disproportionately homophobic compared with other racial and ethnic groups. We are not aware of any credible study that has conclusively proved this assumption. However, our first-hand experience has convinced us that homophobia within the black church and the wider community is real. And the factors that have nurtured these beliefs over the years are complex.
When issues of gay rights and gay marriage come up, the first question many black people ask is, "What does the Bible have to say about it?" This seemingly innocent question doesn't acknowledge that when we approach the Bible, our perspective has been shaped by where we were born, by whom we were raised, what Grandma taught us, where we went to school and what our pastor preached in church -- usually conservative ideas on matters such as homosexuality. Therefore, we tend to interpret the Bible not objectively, but through the lens of our cultural and historical context.
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The conservative strand of black religion is evident in what Harvard professor Peter Gomes calls "bibliolatry" -- the practice of worshiping the Bible rather than worshiping God. It is also found in a "literal" interpretation of the Bible that focuses more on the letter of the text than on its spirit, and concentrates on passages about domination, oppression, hierarchy, elitism and exclusion rather than on the major themes of love, justice, freedom, equality and inclusion that run throughout the Bible.
A more complicated element of black homophobia is the lingering influence of sexual stereotypes that originated during slavery. According to theologian Kelly Brown Douglas, the myth of "over-sexualized" black bodies portrayed black men as violent "bucks" who posed an ever-present threat to white women, and black women as "Jezebels" who seduced white men.
All I can say is that we need more of these editorials and more of these discussions AND in places like Ebony and Jet magazine, AND The Advocate magazine. Preferably as a magazine cover story.
Editor's note - in an aside that has absolutely nothing to do with this piece, I want to give a quick shout out and congratulations to my online friend Jeremy Hooper, whose marriage to his partner will be included in the Winter 2010 edition of Martha Stewart Weddings.
Cliff Kincaid of Accuracy in Media knows who to blame for the recent controversy over the Ugandan anti-gay bill:
