Tuesday, August 04, 2009

The religious right will not learn from the Tel Aviv tragedy



I have a question for Concerned Women for America, Americans For Truth, the Family Research Council, the Traditional Values Coalition, and all of the other so-called pro-family groups.

For years, you all have looked to foreign countries to supply you with proof that giving lgbts the right to marry, passing hate crimes legislation in our favor, or generally supporting us in any way would lead to the downfall of this country.

You have manipulated incidents in places like Sweden, the Netherlands, and Canada to make the case that we are trying to destroy the goodness of society.

Are you going to learn from this incident in Tel Aviv? Are you going to understand that the constant labeling of lgbts as "the scary other," the "monster under the bed," or the "boogeyman in the closet" has recriminations that aren't necessarily Christian?

Are you going to cool the lying rhetoric?

Who am I kidding? They probably won't. Former ad executive and former lgbt expert Linda Harvey (head of Mission America) just released a statment about the attack in Tel Aviv:

"We are deeply saddened by this violent act and the deaths of these young people, and pray for the perpetrator to be found and brought to justice.

"At the same time, it is deplorable this incident is already being used by the homosexual community to blame this act on those holding a traditional moral viewpoint. Israelis, just as anyone else on earth, should still have the right to oppose homosexuality for religious or other reasons without being called accessories to murder. The motive is still unknown; why engage in slanderous speculation?

. . . "It's tragic that any teens go to these centers, and we remain unequivocally opposed to their purpose, which is to legitimize this behavior and draw young people into claiming a homosexual identity, often without parental involvement or knowledge. " Harvey said . . . "No one needs to be involved in homosexuality, but unfortunately, these two young people can no longer hear that message."


And I have just received an email from the American Family Association. Apparently they are angry at Triple AAA for offering family memberships to lgbt couples:

The American Automobile Association (AAA) has begun offering "Family Memberships" to homosexual couples, recognizing the homosexual couple as being "married," according to a homosexual activist organization in Florida.

Thirty states have overwhelmingly voted to define marriage as being between one man and one woman. Yet AAA is treating homosexual couples as if they are married.

The homosexual couples need only state that they are married to receive the family benefit. In the eyes of AAA two homosexuals living together constitute “marriage” and make a "family." All they have to do to get the "family membership" benefits is to say "we are gay and married."


Then comes this "lovely" article in AFA's One News Now - Congressman consumed with allowing homosexuals in military:

Diane Gramley, president of the American Family Association of Pennsylvania, is unhappy that Murphy, a married father, recently held a news conference in Philadelphia with a radical homosexual group to launch his campaign to push for the passage of H.R. 1283, which would end the ban.

According to Gramley, Murphy is exploiting his Iraq war service to advance that agenda. "He is an Iraqi war veteran, and it almost appears as if he's using that position to drum up the support he thinks he needs to overturn this law," she says.

Gramley admits she sent a letter to Murphy, pointing out the national security risks of changing the policy. "It's a national defense issue, and we mentioned that in the letter. Because if you get homosexuals in the military, you are then putting additional pressure upon our troops because they're being housed in very intimate situations with individuals who are sexually attracted to them," she adds.


Nope, they haven't learned a thing.




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Monday, August 03, 2009

What do the lgbt community and President Obama have in common? Those damned 'headless monsters'


This nonsense over whether or not President Obama is an American citizen has made me philosophical.

Most specifically, the new controversy has made me philophical. This one has to do with President Obama's alleged Kenyan birth certificate:

The latest development in the Obama "birther" conspiracy is the emergence of a "Kenyan birth certificate" for the president, put online by movement maven Orly Taitz.

Oddly, the same people who are so skeptical of Obama's Hawaii birth certificate are willing to accept this new document despite many flaws, documented by the Washington Independent's Dave Weigel and Markos Moulitsas.


There are numerous flaws with this birth certificate including:

First, the hospital is Coast Provincial General Hospital (sometimes said to be Coast Province General Hospital), not Coast General Hospital.

Second, Kenya was a Dominion the date this certificate was allegedly issued and would not become a republic for 8 months.

Third, Mombasa belonged to Zanzibar when Obama was born, not Kenya.

Fourth, Obama's father's village would be nearer to Nairobi, not Mombasa.

Fifth, the number 47O44-- 47 is Obama's age when he became president, followed by the letter O (not a zero) followed by 44--he is the 44th president.


Not that it matters of course. As I understand it, those fine fiends at Free Republic are on the case to prove that the birth certificate is not a flaw.

It should make for more comedy, as if this nonsense about President Obama not being a United State citizens hasn't been funny already.

But it becomes less comical when one analyzes the entire situation in relation to the lgbt community.

President Obama has now become afflicted with that lovely thing that many of us in the lgbt community know of too well - the headless monster.

The headless monster is a belief or idea that is passed off as truth even when it has been consistently debunked. The belief's "head" or credibility has been lopped off. However, belief continues to be propped up as truth due to the insistence of a loyal group who will swear to its veracity.

These include beliefs like President Obama is not an American citizen.

Or beliefs like "homosexuality takes 20 years off of your life," or "the majority of child molesters are gay men," or "homosexuality is a dangerous lifestyle."

No matter how many times we have debunked these lies, they continue to be thought of as truth by people either too ignorant or too homophobic to accept the fact that there is nothing wrong with being an lgbt.

But while the birther mess is providing us with a laugh a minute, the constant repeititon of "headless monsters" about lgbts has caused real harm to us and our families.

So what does all of this mean? I don't know. Maybe it's something to think about the next time our community goes off on the President about not moving fast enough on our issues.

Granted, we should never slack up when it comes to getting our issues taken care of, but maybe the realization that we are all in the same boat may give us a bit of levity.

After all, us and the President are in the same boat. Let's rock it when need be but not sink it.




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A crazy black man interviews a crazy black woman, more on the Tel Aviv tragedy, and other Monday midday news briefs

Audio: Subjectively, we find 'ex-gay' odd; Objectively, we find 'ex-gay' otherwordly - I am going to say it and I don't care who gets offended - When two crazy black people get together, all you get is more crazy.

Police Say They Have A Lead in Tel Aviv Killings - I haven't been out of the loop so much that I didn't hear about this tragedy. I've already written a draft of something that I want to ask religious right groups.

Netanyahu condemns "horrific killing" at gay club. Israeli pols demand stop to anti-gay rhetoric - Amen. just Amen!

Judge Penny Brown: Black Church Should Be at Forefront of HIV/AIDS - Bet you won't see this item in the black media.

Another WingNutDaily Birther blooper: Kenya wasn't a republic until Dec. 1964 - Repeat after me - "The birthers are stupid and need Jesus!"

Census to Release Raw Marriage Data - Color me indifferent




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Conservative columnist slimes gay victims of violent crime

Town Hall columnist Mike Adams isn't known for his good taste when writing about the lgbt community. But I think he has gone too far today in writing about a possible hate crime that happened in July to two gay men in North Carolina.

Adams wrote the piece in what was supposed to be a satirical attack on hate crimes legislation. In pursuit of that vein, he doesn't let anything get the way of his point, such as the facts.

The original situation took place in Wilmington, NC on July 17. In early morning hours, Chaz Housand and Chet Saunders were beaten into unconsciouness by a group of thugs.

Housand suffered broken facial bones and lacerations; Saunders sustained a concussion and internal bruising, and says that his fine motor skills have been impaired. Neither remembers what happened so neither can say whether or not sexual orientation has a role in their attack.

However, there were witnesses to the attack:

Witnesses said three men had beaten the victims and kicked them when they were down.

“This is our town,” one of the suspects had said, before kicking a victim one last time and leaving, according to the account witnesses gave police.

. . .In the hours after the incident, police received multiple tips. First they got a description of the suspects’ vehicle, Blanton said. Then 911 dispatchers received a call telling police the suspects were at a home on Dapple Court.

Officers went to the residence and saw three men, who fit the suspects’ descriptions, sitting in the living room. One of them had blood on his shoe, Blanton said.

. . . Officers charged Melvin Freanthony Spicer, 25; Daniel Minwoo Lee, 21; and Jong Tae Chung, 27, each with one count of assault inflicting serious injury, according to a statement from Officer Crystal Williamson.


So why does Adams slime his way in? Apparently one of the young man who was attacked had been involved in lobbying attempts to change North Carolina's hate crimes legislation.

So, as Adams seems to imply, forget everything else. The young men probably got drunk and deserved whatever happened:

While neither Housand nor Saunders knows exactly what happened, both said they can think of no reason someone would attack them, other than their sexual orientation. I guess what they are saying is that they have easily discernible characteristics, which make them look “obviously gay.”

. . . People like Chaz Housand and Chet Saunders do need something to protect them from their own stupidity. Saunders told the local paper “I never really expected something like this to happen.” Clearly, anyone who believes he can get so drunk that he forgets much of the night in, of all places, downtown Wilmington is suffering from severe intellectual hernia.

So, let me be clear about where I stand on this issue: We should not, especially in a time of deep budgetary crisis, use public funds to protect the drunk and stupid from their own drunkenness and stupidity.

To the extent that the drunk and stupid are given protection from their own poor decision-making it should come from private initiatives. And so I’ve come up with an initiative that will save the North Carolina taxpayers from having to waste precious resources passing new, or modifying old, hate crimes legislation.


It amazes me. Rush Limbaugh and company seems to always praise conservatives for that "rugged individualism" and spirit that made America great.

I see very few conservatives embodying this image. I see a bunch of overpaid thinktank sucking hacks who really need to sit down before they ruin the public discourse any further.

I can't honestly say what happened to Housand and Saunders. But whatever the case may be, they don't deserved to be slimed by anyone, much less Adams.

What a coward.




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Sunday, August 02, 2009

Carrie Prejean saved traditional marriage - a lie you can't believe even if you were high on acid

I am reading something on the online rightwing site Town Hall that just defies description.

Apparently Kathryn Jean Lopez, editor of National Review Online, has published a piece that credits beauty queen and former Miss California Carrie Prejean for "saving traditional marriage" and holding back the push for marriage equality.

I kid you not. Of course how Lopez accomplishes this is an old trick that I have seen the religious right do - take several unrelated incidents and link them together. The credibility of these claims generally depend on the emotions of the audience they are writing to.

Lopez is obviously a master of this because according to her after Prejean made her now infamous statement and had her brush up with gossip columnist Perez Hilton, the momentum started to shift against marriage equality.

Of course she claims that it is not her argument but that of National Organization for Marriage head Maggie Gallagher's in the newest issue of the National Review, which has Prejean on the cover. But if you ask me, based on what she wrote, it's obvious that Lopez had an whiff of whatever Gallagher was inhaling when she wrote her piece:

The New York Times, just a day or so after Gallagher's piece ran, confirmed that something has changed. In an article titled "Backers of Gay Marriage Rethink California Push," the paper reported on how, discouraged by the political and cultural climate, many gay-marriage advocates are scaling back efforts to overturn Proposition 8. This, despite the supposed inevitability of which some of my friends on the right were all but convinced, not long ago.

In reality, there is much debate amongst those who want to overturn Proposition 8 on whether it would be advantageous to pursue this action in 2010 or 2012. I hardly think it has anything to do with Prejean seeing that the situation with Proposition 8had been taking place long before she verbalized her opinion about gay marriage.

The last part of Lopez's piece is a hoot:

And unlike the most strident advocates of gay marriage, who spent the time during and after the Proposition 8 campaign intimidating and punishing those who supported the measure, most of us who oppose gay marriage are not looking to exclude anyone from any kind of happiness.

Carrie Prejean is now a face of that kind of tolerance. The contrast of her measured, mildly offered opinion to the angry, ugly Internet response from beauty-contestant judge Perez Hilton, who asked Prejean the fateful question, was striking . . . According to a recent CBS/New York Times poll, support for gay marriage has dropped nine percentage points from a 42 percent historic high. According to Gallup, only 13 percent of Americans believe that gay marriage would make us better off, while 48 percent believe it would be change for the worse. While Republicans were tripping over themselves to pose with the party's Log Cabin branch and join the march of inevitability, a beauty queen made it OK to confidently acknowledge reality, in a loving and beautiful and even tolerant way.


So Lopez, Gallagher, and others are trying to make Prejean some sort of symbol now; a Florence Nightingale-cum-Betsy Ross of the anti-gay marriage movement.

It could work.

All they have to do is make everyone forget about those half naked pictures of her, her breast implants, and her wannabe-divalike behavior that led Donald Trump (who was in her corner)to finally kick her to the curb.

And I haven't even scratched how Gallagher and her National Organization for Marriage tried to distance themselves from Prejean when it was discovered that there were some tire tracks in that pure as the driven snow image she has tried to project.

The entire thing leaves me depressed. Obviously, Lopez can't seriously believe that tripe she wrote. But she is getting paid a lot of money for it.

How can I get in on that racket?




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Friday, July 31, 2009

Know your lgbt history - Cleopatra Jones and her lesbian drug lords

I am a serious fan of the Cleopatra Jones movies from the early 1970s.

Cleopatra Jones, portrayed by the late Tamara Dobson, was an African-American secret service agent who fought drugs in her community and overseas.

It's a shame that only two movies, Cleopatra Jones and Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold, were made. They were landmarks in motion picture cinema because it was one of the few times that a black woman took centerstage in a movie and probably the first time a black actress played an action hero.

However, there were some problems, particularly with the choice of villain Cleopatra Jones had to combat.

They were both lesbian drug lords. A lesbian villain in one movie wouldn't be bad, but the makers of the Cleopatra Jones made it a point to include a lesbian as the villain in both.

And to me that sends a bad message. Why not a man? Why not a heterosexual woman?

However again, there is a silver lining to this cloud. The actresses who played the drug lords did a rather good job, proving that talent can always transcend stereotyping and bad parts.

Two-time Oscar and Emmy award winner Shelley Winters plays Mommy in Cleopatra Jones.

I'm almost ashamed to admit that I loved her performance. Winters (whose career was not damaged at all by this movie) is having fun with the role. She comes on the screen with all of the subtlety of a speeding train.

The following scene (beginning at 6:21) displays best what I mean as she berates a henchman for missing a chance to kill Jones. A fun game to play while watching this movie is to count how many costume changes and wigs Dobson and Winters go through.



Now in Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold, actress Stella Stevens takes a more serious tone with her role of the Dragon Lady and that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Whereas Winters went for superbutch extreme, Stevens is played her character as a sensuous woman equally adept at binding up her hair and leading her army in pursuit of doublecrossers or putting on a cocktail dress and charming patrons of her casino.

Subsequently, she and Dobson engage in a long drawn out fight scene, unlike Winters who has a short fight with Dobson before her demise.

Unfortunately I can only provide the trailer of the movie in the following clip. But it gives you a good impression of the Dragon Queen.

Now the only problem I had with Stevens's character is the relationship between her and her Asian adopted daughter. It is obvious the Stevens's character has taken a, shall we say, less than maternal interest in the girl. Particularly when she has her brutally murdered for helping Cleopatra Jones.



Editor's note - The fight scene from Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold is here for anyone who wants to view it.

Past Know Your LGBT History postings:

Know your lgbt history - Norman, Is That You?

Know your lgbt history - The 'Exotic' Adrian Street

Know your lgbt history - The Choirboys

Know your lgbt history - Eddie Murphy

Know your lgbt history - The Killing of Sister George

Know your lgbt history - Hanna-Barbera cartoons pushes the 'gay agenda'

Know your lgbt history - Cruising

Know your lgbt history - Foxy Brown and Cleopatra Jones

Know your lgbt history - I Got Da Hook Up

Know your lgbt history - Fright Night

Know your lgbt history - Flowers of Evil

The Jeffersons and the transgender community


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Black minister fighting for lgbt rights, mess in Maine, and other Friday midday news briefs

Minister Wants the Black Church to Help Fight for LGBT Rights - One of the reasons why there seems to be a problem in the black community with lgbts is because we never hear positive stories like this one.

Photo: Even Pandora is like, 'Whoa, these boxes are unsavory!' - Using outside help, some folks in Maine are trying to deny equality to their fellow citizens.

Christian Civic League of Maine's Heath on the 'insidious methods' of the Homo Agenda - One of the most unfortunate thing about the Maine situation is that this nut may gain a degree of legitimacy. Perfect. Another religious right talking head.

DP Bill Passes House Subcommittee - How about some good news for today.

Maderazo: A Transgender Person is Murdered Every 3 Days in the World…Mostly in Latin America - What kind of mess is this? No one deserves to be murdered for who they are.

U.S. military accused of atrocities against Iraqi gays - I continue to be impressed by the Washington Blade. Stay on this story!




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